That is the inauguration. I propose we begin a massive attack on crippling and killing diseases. [applause] i shall propose to this congress a 10 billion nationwide Clean Waters Program to put modern municipal waste Treatment Plants to make our waters clean again and do it now. The president sets the tone for the legislative agenda. Whether or not congress chooses to follow them or rewrite them, the president has given them an outline. Sometimes president has never had a chance, harrison and garfield died before their first opportunity. They came into office in march. So in the 19th century, state of the Union Messages were given in december. When the constitution was changed, they moved the congress up to january and now they are usually in january and february. There have been some miscues. President cleveland sent a controversial proposal dealing with a tariff and the days before we had a income tax. And one of those things that divided parties and created great passions and unfortunately for cleveland whose party who was not united on this issue and they lost the next election probably because of that division and a lot of people. But in most cases state of the Union Messages are a long laundry list of things the president wants to see them done. They are not long speeches or inspiring but wish lists. When anything is done in congress, the galleries are opened and as long as there are galleries and there have been galeries since 1795, the public can come in. But, of course there arent that many seats in the gallery. Each member of Congress Gets a single ticket for a spouse or for a member of their staff or favored constituent. The press gallery is absolutely packed. Galer is packed. There is not a lot of space for the public on those occasions. But over time, the public has gotten to hear and read it through the media. In the 19th century, you would have read the entire speech in most newspapers. In the 20th century beginning in 1923, Calvin Coolidges message was broadcast on the radio. In 1936, Franklin Roosevelt suggested moving from the middle of the day to the evening because you would get a much larger audience. In the 1940s, television came along. 1947, trumans state of the Union Message was covered by television. In 1965, president johnson said move it back into the evening so more people can see it. Its an evening performance and Major Networks are all covering it and it gets considerable audience that way and in the late 1990s, it has been streaming on the internet and around the world. In recent years, the two parties have become cheerleading squads for their president s. But there are moments when something that the president says inspires something more. It is a bipartisan reaction and you can tell what the mood of the congress is to some degree, what the responses are. And all the world knows that no successful system builds a wall to keep its people in and freedom out. [applause] immediately after the speech, members of congress will rush out into the hall where there will be dozens of cameras so television stations around the country, they will be getting a personal reaction, immediate reaction. In the house chamber, you can twitter and tweet and some of those people will be responding instantly. Mr. Speaker, president , distinguished members of the house and senate, when we first met here seven years ago, many of us with the first time was with the hope of beginning something new for america. We meet here tonight in this Historic Chamber to continue that work. If anyone expects just a proud resuscitation of my administration, i say lets leave that to history, we arent finished yet. [applause] one thing that you cannot do that is very different than say most parallelments where heckling is considered fair sport, in u. S. Congress you have to be respectful of the president. One member of the house did interrupt the president and did shout out and he was censured by the house of representatives. That is unbecoming conduct. President obama the reforms im proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally. Liar. The office of the constitution dn and wrote the corner stution in secret they did require certain things to be open, not open. They dont require congress to meet in open session. Just from time to time to publish a journal of their proceedings and they dont ask the president to give an annual message but ask him to deliver a message on the state of the union. They would be pleased to see that the president comes very much every year. They would be astonished to realize that the congressional record is published every day after the proceedings and not only the state of the union but words of the members of the house and senate. That is something they had intended that this was a republicic, it was a democratic republic and was representative of the people and the people had a right to know what was going on. In that sense, even though they werent that specific, they set some goals that i think the government has met. I can report to you that the state is old but this faithful union is good. [applause] as president obama prepared for his state of the union address, he released this video on twitter. President obama its my last one. And as im writing, i keep thinking of the road we traveled together. That makes america great. Our capacity to change for the better. The ability to come together as one American Family and pull ourselves closer to the america we believe in. Its hard to see sometimes in the daytoday noise of washington but it is who we are and it is what i want to focus on. And cspans coverage starts tonight at 8 00 p. M. Eastern with Senate Historian and a congressional reporter, looking back at the history and tradition of the president s annual message and what to expect in this years address. At 9 00, our live coverage of the president s speech and response by Governor Haley and your reaction by phone, tweets and email as well as those from members of congress on cspan and reair our state of the Union Coverage and the republican response starting at 11 00 p. M. Eastern. Also live on cspan 2 00 after the speech. We will hear from members of congress with their reaction to the president s address. Last year, he talked about expectations of his final year in office. Heres a look. President obama in short all the progress we have some Unfinished Business and i plan on doing everything i can with every minute i have to deliver on behalf of the american people. Since taking this office i have never been more optimistic about the year ahead. In 2016 im going to leave it all out on the field. So you mentioned the president ial race voting starts in a matter of weeks. So the question is in the final year of a presidency, how much are people listening and watching the Office Holder as opposed to focusing on the future . Host ments are signing executive orders, tidying umh Unfinished Business. President obama since day one wanted to close the base on guantanamo. I suspect he will be raising that issue trying to fulfill promises during his last year. You start targeting barack obama in the urban centers like cincinnati or states in ohio and florida and bringing out the africanamerican vote which barack obama is good at, could make him relevant. Host Douglas Brinkley is in new the his new book take first call from chris in new haven, connecticut. Caller thanks for taking my call. Im really pleased that this president is going to take his last year in office to do something really significant about gun violence in the united tates. It was clear to me that they were going to be really important people. Host to what extent has the last year president s tackled such big issues, big and ontroversial issues like guns . Guest president obama shed tears talking about the first graders slaughtered in newtown, connecticut. I went to the fairfax town hall that cnn held and i was Milling Around and i would introduce myself as historian doug brinkley. And they would say i lost my daughter at aurora and my son in newtown. He is playing a grassroots role. This president is starting to build a coalition of n. G. O. s, nonprofit groups and families of victims, when you have 30,000 people a year that are killed due to gun violence, you build a coalition and we will see him continuing in that particular role as being an activist on trying to get background checks for gun purchases made much tougher. Tonights state of the union, the big symbolic moment of the union is going to be the empty chair. You go to oklahoma city, there is an amazing memorial and empty chairs in the park that people. The empty chair will be representative of those People Killed by unviolence and solemn moment this evening and thats the symbol a reducing gun violence part of his last year in office issue. On the international front, Climate Change, which isnt popular in the american press. Hard to get people riled up. But globally it is very potent and those two issues are those you will see him dealing with because no other leading figure has the platform as he does on those particularly troublesome Public Policy issues. Host you can watch it tuesday 8 00 eastern time is the Preview Program with the speech at 9 00 right here on cspan as well. Next call is barry here in washington, d. C. , independent caller. Host im worried about the winter flooding that has gone in the midwest and always worry about flooding and the mississippi delta and new orleans. Its a complicated issue, the mayor of new orleans is trying to remove statues. Things have to be done on a case by case basis. Wrote a piece at the anniversary of selma, Edmund Pettus bridge should be renamed after congressman john lewis. Edmund pettus had no connection to the bridge and would be a great way to honor john lewis. Those are appropriate but other times people go way too far. We want everybody to look like they did today and i think we have to slow some of that down a little bit and be very cautious on the tearing down of statues and renaming of everything. Certainly in new orleans, huge advocate we need to do a park for one of the heroes of the Civil Rights Movement in new orleans. I like honoring people that have done great things for the Civil Rights Movement in the southern cities like new orleans. But i think to change washington at lee college and get rid of lees name and that is a slippery slope for us to do as a country. Host bob, you are on with Douglas Brinkley. Caller mr. Brinkley, you wouldnt believe this i got on, this is my favorite program. I know you wrote the book on Franklin Roosevelt. We are both big Bernie Sanders fans. And i was wondering, the thing that Bernie Sanders trying to do is break up the big banks, start a work program like Bernie Sanders is talking about. Would f. D. R. Be considered a socialist . And i would like to hear your comments. Guest its a very good question. One could say that f. D. R. In some ways was a democratic socialist, although that term socialism seems repugnant to many people due to the cold war context that it was used. The word people like to use is progressivism. F. D. R. Is somebody who very much after rnie sanders, went ig companies and trusts. Water power and the like. I dont think its wrong to compare what Bernie Sanders message to what Franklin Roosevelt was saying. He was standing to what used to be called the forgotten man and woman of america of the the difference is f. D. R. Had been secretary of the navy during world war i and was an activist in that role and had great military experience, Foreign Policy experience to a degree that Bernie Sanders is not. Bernie sanders is like f. D. R. But on international affairs, f. D. R. Was the greatest in his era and sanders doesnt have positions. Host since we are talking about him, remind us of what his last year in office was like, third term there. How significant . Guest his last year, he had to run for a full year alive was 1944. He died april 12, 19456789 in 1944 he had the huge victory and beginning of the end of hitler, the turning of the tide in europe and he reluctantly ran in 1944. He said i just want to go back to the Hudson River Valley and bird watch, relax, enjoy myself. But he felt compelled to see the war through. And he had an endless summit meetings and wear and tear on his body. By early 1945 when he went to met ummit at yalta, and he with churchill and stalin and looking at the postworld war ii world. Roosevelt wanted to make a conservation effort. Believed that conservation was the premise for global peace. He wanted a standard for natural resources, which never quite happened and he was pushing forward what would be his great legacy the United Nations and died in warm springs, georgia, exhausted. His heart was a mess. Blood pressure was high. He was prone to having horrific headaches and not the man he was two years earlier. His health was in decline. When he died, his body was moved from warm springs to washington and then up to hyde park, new york, where he was buried and considered an extraordinarily successful commander in chief during world war ii and always picking the right people and counting on George Marshall and Dwight Eisenhower and earnest king and mark clark and George Patton and the rest. He was remarkable. I rank him as one of our two debatest president s. Host barbara is on the democratic line. Ello, barbara. Caller i just had a comment that i think what the president is trying to do at this point in time is a very good thing. Not only should they put that into law of all people with Mental Health problems, not having access to guns, because i have a daughter that open carries and one has Mental Health problems. At the grassroots problem, i dont feel they should be in the same room along with the locking mechanism and only be fired whose thumbprint fits that gun that would be a definite control. Those two are very well and should be instituted in our laws to put some kind of control there. Guest i think its important for people to understand that we need the Second Amendment issue with guns was not controversial until recent times. People worked around it. As the National Rifle association grew into a lobby group and the Supreme Court got conservative, when barack obama was running for president , right when obama was getting the nomination, you had the District Of Columbia verdict which said it was illegal in washington, d. C. , to not allow people to have handguns. This was a scalia wrote the judgment on this. And it was a big victory for the n. R. A. And Second Amendment to the individual right to bear arms which all of us know that will Second Amendment is fuzzy, d they mean militia or individual. Our whole presidency has been involved with this gun issue and he has been fighting an uphill battle against the n. R. A. And every time there are Mass Shootings, he has become the mourner in chief. I counted 13 Mass Shootings he has had to weigh indirectly. Its going to be impossible to look at the obama years without looking at the role of guns the power of the n. R. A. , Mass Shootings, what the president did or didnt do, what congress didnt do. Ts part of the obama era. And the president postsan bernandino, but san bernandino gives someone like president obama the connection with national security. That was a terrorist attack that these people got guns easily in the United States. And im not weighing on which side but im pointing out that president obama is going to make his a major part of his last year. I envision as expresident in chicago weighing in on the public schools, Holding Town Hall forums, working to make chicago safer and use the model what he does in chicago for other places in the United States. I wouldnt be surprised if he does more town halls this year on the gun issue and in the end we are going to vote. Hillary clinton is with president obama. Well see who wins the 2016 president sal election and it will be very telling which way this gun control issue will move. How when he was president , he couldnt run for reelection in 1952 because he had a 27 Approval Rating and nobody wanted much to do anything. Lyndon johnson in 1968, his last full year, just consumed by vietnam and irrelevant in a ountry that had the most angry year. So these last years are very hard. I would say Ronald Reagan had a good last year along with bill clinton in the sense he was able to get his Vice President elected and people started saying as Margaret Thatcher won that