Example for future first ladies, ellen wilson died just a year and half into the president s term. The grieving president soon met washington businesswoman edith galt. They married after a secret courtship and edith wilson served as first lady for more than five years. Her unprecedented role in managing the president s affairs after he suffered a stroke remains are the most controversial efforts of any first lady. Tonight, the story of the Wilson Administrations two first ladies, ellen and edith. We have two tragc deaths here to tell you about these two interesting women and the times in which they lived. Her book is allen and edith, Woodrow Wilsons first ladies. John mills cooper is Woodrow Wilsons biographer. Thanks for being with us. We have been telling the stories chronologically, but Everybody Knows about edith wilson managing the white house as it is described after her husband suffers a stroke. We will tell that story first because so many people really want to know what happened. John cooper, let me start with you. When in his administration did he suffer a stroke more than halfway through the second term. It was october 1919. Here just returned from a whirlwind speaking tour. He was tried to sell the country on ratifying the peace treaty and going into the league of nations. He had really worn himself out on that and his doctors actually aborted the tour and got him back to the white house. After about five days in the white house, he suffered a massive stroke. The story of the stroke night itself is very dramatic or it can you tell us recently what happened that night . There are some conflicting reports about what happened, but i think that the most accurate portrayal is that he got up in the morning, edith had been going into check on him during the night and she found him slumped to the floor and couldnt move his left side. She went out into the corridor and used a telephone that did not go through the switchboard. She did not want to have this universally known. She asked the chief usher to call the doctor from this other phone. The doctor came in and they helped him into bed, but he was paralyzed on his left side. A character that is going to be a big part of the story is kerry greeson. Kerry greeson is the doctor. Here been inside the white house first under the Taft Administration and then shortly, taft introduced him to his successor wilson and pretty soon after the inauguration, wilsons sister fell down and grayson treated her and did a good job. And he was a virginian which went a long way with the wilsons. He was the white house physician. He was the one who treats him. They called in various consultant specialists, but grayson was the one who treated wilson. What was the extent of his condition . How badly had the stroke affected him . He had a blockage in an artery leading to his brain and this is usually not a fatal stroke, but it did immobilize him for a while. He probably would have recovered fairly rapidly had he not 10 days later suffered a second medical condition. He had prostate trouble and he had a urinary tract infection with a very high fever. Of course they didnt have antibiotics at that time, they debated whether to operate, but the specialist felt that to operate on a 52yearold man with high Blood Pressure and a stroke would have been very unwise. So they just decided to let nature take its course and eventually he recovered, but it really sapped his vitality. This onetwo punch really did him in for about a month. Christie is free to agree or disagree, but i think the worst effect of the stroke on wilson was really on his emotional balance. His judgment also. His intellect wasnt impaired and his speech was an impaired. Yes some he could function that way, but so much more goes into being a leader and the president then just being smart and being able to do these things. Another thing is, partly because of that other illness that you just talked about, christie, they isolated him. That is when youre supposed to keep away from stress. Now they know it is exactly the wrong thing to do. What you want to do with the person who is had a stroke is get them into social interaction. With the best of intentions they were doing exactly the wrong thing. Dr. Graysons letters are part of the collection at the Woodrow Wilson library at stanford about two hours from washington. In putting this program together, we will learn more about wilson threw graysons letters. We have a letter in this box from Henry Morganthau who wanted to write about experiences. So he was asking grayson if he could use certain information. The information you gave me about president wilson and youre having come to the conclusion that he should resign and how he was influenced by mrs. Wilson to give up this plan. So mrs. Wilson was very concerned that her husband would not get better if he did not have something to engage his mind, that he would just deteriorate if he was forced out of the presidency. While president wilson was ill, it has been speculated widely among historians. We have one document here that sheds a little bit of light on that. It is a telegram from Henry Morgenthau who was the ambassador to turkey and he is writing to dr. Carey grayson asking if the president has any objection to a citizens meeting to protest against turks being left in control of constantinople. And morgenthau has been asked to speak at this meeting. At the bottom of this telegram is ediths handwriting. We are familiar enough with her handwriting to recognize it as such. At the bottom she writes, thinks it well to postpone speaking on such subjects. What we dont know is, did you just take this telegram into wilson, ask his opinion and then write that or did she just come to that conclusion herself. The public was very interested and curious to know the condition of wilsons health. Rumors were rampant in the papers, even congressmen didnt know what was going on. They only knew what they read in the papers. After it was all over, Carey Grayson later wrote a summary of what happened from the time of the stroke until wilson left the white house. On the last page the decision was made to announce that wilson was suffering from nervous exhaustion. There were no other details given as to what was wrong with him. Really no one knew the extent of his illness. He really was not capable of doing anything. Dr. Grayson thought it wise to issue general statements only. Further, mrs. Wilson, the president s wife, was absolutely opposed to any other course. She did not want it to be known that he was really suffering. Again, she was protecting her husband and she wanted him to be able to fulfill his duties as president. She was worried about his legacy. Ultimately, she was concerned about his health and she felt that if you left the presidency, left the white house, he would just waste away and die. So how did they react . A couple of different ways. Robert lansing who was the secretary of state and would have been fired if wilson hadnt had the stroke, there had been a bad break, that is another story. But lansing tried to get the cabinet in on it and i think he even made some communications with the Vice President , who stayed out of it completely. He simply said no. Greeted in the constitution. This is before the 25th amendment actually is not as much of a protection as we think in cases of inability. We wont talk about disability this is the inability of the president to do his duties. What does that mean . This means if he were dead the Vice President succeeds. This is the one time that we really had a disabled president. How do you deal with it . Edith was scared. This was a very scary thing. Make it up as you go along. On facebook, david welsh says, what part of personality or intellect prepared mrs. Wilson to take over during his recovery . What skills did she bring to this responsibility she was taking on . That is a very good question because she had exactly two years of formal schooling and her whole entire life. She came from a large family and had been chosen by her grandmother to take care of her, to be her caregiver. Her grandmother was a very opinionated woman and taught edith, basically, that it was good to have opinions and to make decisions. Edith had been widowed relatively young and had inherited gaults jewelers which was like the tiffanys of washington. So she kept the Jewelry Store and had a manager who made a lot of the decisions, but she was used to having everything her way. So she brought this very decided personality. In addition, woodrow had courted her by showing her a lot of secret papers. Henry kissinger used to say that power was the ultimate aphrodisiac. I think Woodrow Wilson would have agreed. So he was using this entre to the secret papers as part of his court ship pier and she was susceptible to that and so he shared a great deal of what he was doing, really a great deal of what he was doing, with her. I think john said that she probably knew as well as anyone what he was doing and what he was thinking because he was a real lone wolf when it came to being a president. He did not have a lot of close advisers. That is true. This is from edith wilson herself. They published her memoirs. In this big controversy about how much power she took upon herself. Heres what she said or did i myself met never made a single decision regarding the disposition of public affairs. Today we know, the gatekeeper to the president is really the most important job. He or she controls accent to the president is in some regards president. As she said, it is not just who got to see him, they pretty much embargoed well for well over a month. No one got to see him. But also what the president gets to see. She would decide what was best for him to see and what not. To me, one of the raps on edith in this was that she was putting her husbands health ahead of the good of the country and that somehow the priorities were wrong there. Well, i dont think that is entirely why she did what she did. She knew what he wanted. If he couldnt express himself, she knew he would not want to resign. He would want to hang onto this. As christy said, she knew his mind better than anybody else. If anybody was going to act as a substitute, she was the best. The secretary of state got lakhdar the cabinet members very thickly. Wilsons secretary plus the loyalists like eaker and daniels in the cabinet put a kibosh on that very quickly. There were two senators who were detailed to come in and assess the condition of wilson because it came out when lansing went up to capitol hill that he hadnt spoken to the president about a very volatile situation in mexico. They deputized one democrat and one republican and edith and dr. Grayson really stagemanaged that very well. Accounts differ on exactly what they did, but whatever it was him it was enormously successful, including the republican who would have been most anxious to show that there was something wrong with wilson, set to the press afterwards that the president grasped his hand with both of his. But that was impossible because a president could not move his left hand. But he was so taken with his apparent animation. He made a lot of jokes, because that part of his thinking came back for quickly. He loved to make puns and he loved to tell jokes and stories. That came back relatively quickly. But as john said, the judgment was really what took a hit. We have a timeline of the president s incapacitation. As john cooper told us it was september of 19 19. It was in march of 1920 when he left the house for the first time. By the way, we have to talk about all of the political intrigue and important decisions going on in the aftermath of world war i. His beloved league of nations was rejected by the senate at that time for the first time. In april of 1920 the president had his first cabinet meeting, eight months not meeting with the cabinet. It is almost unthinkable. How could the cabinet continue . I routine. And also, wilson was a great delegator. Except in Foreign Affairs. Other than that, he gave his cabinet secretaries lots of leeway. So they were used to running things on their own. It is just very lucky and maybe something of a tribute to that that the government function as well as it did. Not all that well, but it did keep going. There is a story about edith. All during that time, what really was her role . I think one aspect of her role that was overlooked is the extent to which she tried to make woodrow give way on some of his intransigence about the league of nations. In her memoir, which is fanciful in places, she says that she asked him leads to compromise with the republicans in congress to try to get the treaty passed with the league of nations. She said that he turned to her and said, little girl, dont you desert me. She was about five foot nine. She says in her book that she never try to change his mind again. But, we have evidence that there were at least two other occasions on which she did try to change his mind. She and his chief of staff had discussed some of the places where they hoped woodrow could give a little ground and where the republicans could give a little ground and they hoped to find some compromise. She took some notes very hurried, almost shorthand notes of what is obviously a speech that she was going to give to wilson that wound up saying and for the sake of the country and the peace of the world, please consider this. It didnt work, apparently, because he didnt change. She was not a woman to take notes on something and not do something about it. A little bit later, she had some conversations with ray standard baker who is very close to wilson and later became his official biographer. He gave edith some suggestions, again, some talking points, to try to get wilson to change his mind. But he didnt and by the time he refused, by that time the republicans were also heartening their line. Some of the hardliners were reeling in the republican leadership. So donald on facebook asks if edith ever spoke out publicly on the league of nations. She did not speak out on anything. This is again to correct a big misperception of edith. I do not think she was at all powerhungry for herself. She wanted what her husband wanted. His agenda was her agenda. She used to say to people, i never make speeches. I think she made a few, years after woodrow died, but during the time he was in the white house, she was asked to present something innocuous like a bouquet of flowers to the girl scouts and she said id like to make a speech, but i never have and i wont. She did not even approve of voting for women. Or womens suffrage. Lets go back in time, but before we goes up the section to reviewers, we thought youd all want to get this out because it is such an interesting aspect historically. What is the bottom line of this. In American History . How did it affect how we view the role of the president , the role of the first lady and the constitutional issues . The role of the president , i mean, woodrow follows Theodore Roosevelt and these two together acting one after the other, made the president the center of the government, the active part. And even president s later such as calvin coolidge, especially, who wanted to retreat to the sidelines, couldnt do it trade that is what really changed their. The first lady role probably in terms of i think ellen had more to do than edith did. That is a great segue because we are now moving into the ellen story. Tonight is a special twohour program because we have to first ladies to talk about. Our lines will be open and you can reach us if you live in eastover central time zone. You can be part of the facebook conversation, go to cspan on facebook and finally you can tweet us using at first ladies and be part of the conversation. Were going to roll back the clock and talk about the long marriage of Woodrow Wilson to his first wife ellen. To sit the stage for that were going to visit the wilson house. It is available for you to visit if you come to the nations capitol. Inside right now in the drawing room is peter. We are here with law and home who is the executive director of the house. This is a house where president and edith wilson lift post presidency. How did they acquire this house . They moved here literally the day they left the white house in 1921. This home cost 150,000 and they managed to scrape together the money i assembling both president wilsons winnings as the Nobel Peace Prize winner and also donations from canadas wealthy friends and political supporters. Edith wilson lived here until her death in 1961. That is 40 years. Also them expired in this home. In 1924 for president wilson. Although it is Edith Wilsons house a mother is the presence of ellen wilson, isnt there . We try at the Woodrow Wilson house to remember the president s years which include both first ladies, both ellen wilson and edith wilson. It is important when you are considering figures in history to remember that they had childhoods and experiences that led them to the places that they were. So what are we looking at here . This is a painting painted by ellen wilson who was a painter of considerable talent. Even as a young girl she knew that she was a good painter and enjoyed it. It is interesting that when president wilson proposed marriage to her she said yes, but id like to go to the Art Students League in new york, which is where she went to school for a year before they were wed. It is interesting that president wilson at that point in his life accepted that and married this woman who was independent and really laid the groundwork for and understand during of the role of women in society. His last wishes included the wish that this painting hang over his casket before he was laid to rest at the national cemetery. We are about a mile from the white house. We will show you some more a little bit later. Thanks so much. Edith was born in georgia in 1860. Tell us about her early life. Her father was a presbyterian minister and he served in the civil war, but he had to leave because of some stressrelated conditions. He died in a mental institution, possibly a suicide. Allen was very close to her mother, but her mother died in childbirth with her fourth child when she was 43. So ellen really had to take over the family, first after her mothers death she had to take care of her father and then after her fathers death she had to take care of her brothers and sister. So she became a very competent manager. She was very well educated for a woman of her time and place. She would have gone to college if sh