Ndependents, 202 7488002 we would love to give your desk love to get your comments we would love to get your comments. The many papers and pictures in the papers this monday morning. Here is a poignant one in the Washington Times. It comes in california and the reagan library. Low wall out and from the library were someone has left flowers and a note. A point out in this Washington Times piece that the library was closed yesterday after the announcement of mrs. Reagan cost death. A steady stream of mourners stopped by to deliver flowers and pay respects. Wall street Journal Photo of nancy reagan from 1981 in the red room of the white house. The cut line says she was known for her charm and grace. President obama says she redefined the role of first lady during her husband passed firstterm. A look at the Washington Post picture of the reagans from 1988. This was at a luncheon in new orleans. The headline to that story says, it in substance and style she redefined the role of first lady. One more picture for now. One of the many memorable photos from the time of the death of president reagan. Nancy reagan bowing her head, touching the casket of her husband on june 9 in 2004. Looking forward to your phone calls as they come in but we want to talk about the legacy of mrs. Reagan for a couple of minutes with Richard Norton smith, author and president ial historian. Guest good morning. Host how will you most remember nancy reagan, both as a public figure but as a person . Guest i have the opportunity to work with her in effect and the president after they left office. For a while i was director of the reagan library. It is interesting. One thing we have heard a lot this week is about her influence behind the scenes, particularly personnel, her reinforcement of her husband cost policies. Policies. Bands all of that is true. Something else that she did that i think is even more relevant to the current political situation in which we find ourselves. Ronald reagan was a conviction politician. He also had been a former union head, a negotiator. He always said if i could get 70 i will call it a good deal and come back later. She was very much the same way. Would not allow a grudge and politics are full of them, she would not let a grudge get in the way of advancing her husbands agenda. 1976, james baker, who was then a minor official in the commerce department, he had become chief delegate hunter. Very effective in that role. Spencer, the political operative who had been instrumental in getting Ronald Reagan elected governor in 1966. In 1976 went to the other side to work for ford. Logic told you there are two people youre never going to see associated with a reagan presidency. To the contrary, nancy reagan was instrumental kim baker, the old delegate hunter, he became Ronald Reagans chief of staff. Spencer was very much a part of the campaign in 1980 and beyond. That just speaks to her shrewdness and frankly a generosity of spirit. A pragmatism that im not sure the current candidates in either party emulate. Host what was she like to be with in person . Guest everything you have heard about. The graciousness is true. She had a marvelous as of humor. To be honest with you some people were too afraid of her to make her laugh. But if you could make her laugh, she liked to laugh. Instances inber of social situations. We would bring to the library all kinds of people. Covering the whole political spectrum. She was very comfortable with that. Invited fell afoul of mrs. Reagan when he was notably unsuccessful chief of staff after having been secretary of the treasury. I thought, i am pushing the envelope too far here. She was perfectly willing part of the reagan legacy. She would commit herself body and soul. She worked very hard on that library to help bring it into existence and to sustain it and ensure its future long after both she and the president were gone. It was one of the real sources of pleasure for her in her later years. Host wanted to ask you more about legacy as we wrap up the cause we know you have to get going. A little more perspective on her legacy compared with that of other first ladies in history. Guest one of the things about first ladies, each one is unique. Each one to some degree shapes a job around not only their interests but their temperaments and personalities. Mrs. Reagan is a complicated legacy. In the sense that she is not just a traditionalist as i think people may have expected in 1981. She was a very substantive policy oriented first lady. If you know what i mean. And yet someone who took pains to conceal that aspect of the job. Quite frankly we may never know the forward steps of her influence not just in personnel but on substantive issues as well. She wanted Ronald Reagan to go down in history as a peacemaker. Significantmade a contribution. The exact size of it we may never know. Its not the sort of thing that will be committed to paper. We know more than we did 30 years ago. I think with the passage of time this growing appreciation of the magnitude of her role and her contributions to the success of the reagan presidency. Host Richard Norton smith author and president ial historian. Thank you for helping us get this program started as we are about to talk to viewers. Appreciate it. Guest my pleasure. Host one facebook posting from charlie. No matter how anyone feels about the reagans you show some type of respect for her passing. Nancy reagan was a lady first and foremost and a lady always knows when to leave. That is charlie. Julius is calling from chicago heights, illinois. Caller ok. What i remember about ms. Nancy reagan, when she got off the plane at ohare field, i guess you would call it a dog whistle. She said it is so good to see all these white faces out here. That is how i remember her. Host lets hear from joe. To mrs. Reagan, she was [indiscernible] say no to drugs. , hypocrisy if you might say, with all due respect. Contrast, thehe war was congress did not war. Reagan was bringing millions of money, billions of money on drugs in central america. Ronald reagan had alzheimers at one time they at first they nancy said, her husband has alzheimers. When it happens to you that is the point. Hiv, they were against hiv. Hiv. Had a friend who got hiv. E, i dont care about they die on the war, it is ok. I have a friend, now i am going to support. That is an irony. Says unless it happens to you. Thats the point im trying to make. Host lets hear from howard in illinois. I would suggest to you that nancy reagan was a wonderful woman, a queen in her own right. A wonderful wife. Ronald reagan never strayed. There was no scandal. She always conducted herself as elegant as any president ial wife ever did. That speaks a lot for the fact that she was effective in whatever she did in her personal relationships. I dont know her, but i do know things my patients told me about her that she was an extremely personal, intimate with her husband and that he was happy with her unlike most residents in recent history most president s in recent history. That is my understanding of her through significant thirdparty people. I would say she was really a queen in her own right. Host thanks for calling. Carol at twitter rights, from all accounts she was much smarter and intellectual than liberal media give her credit for. Truly had a great love story. A statement by the president , president obama and first lady. Ansi reagan once wrote nothing can prepare you for living in the white house nancy reagan once wrote nothing could prepare you for living in the white house. We were fortunate to benefit from her proud example and her warm and generous advice. Our former first lady redefine the role in her time there. Later she became a voice on behalf of millions of families going through the aching reality of alzheimers and took on a new role as advocate on behalf of treatments that hold the potential and promise to improve and save lives. From president and mrs. Obama. Constance, you are on the air from birmingham, alabama. Caller good morning. Host what would you like to say this morning . Caller i remember nancy reagan. She was very nice, warm. Very kind woman. Humble. I remember her as doing the just say no to drugs program. Which was very successful and still goes on. I also remember her as taking care of her husband during alzheimers. Verynk that gives you a nice perception of her as being a wonderful person and a woman and a wife to her husband. Host thank you, constance. Cecil is on the line from indiana. Good morning. Caller good morning. I was really young when ms. Reagan was first lady. Strength ander dignity. I remember during a press she fell out of the stool she was sitting in. Shemember when she got up to keep her dignity about her. I thought that was admirable. He was a great lady i would like to express my condolences to her family. Host onto dan in wayne, michigan. Caller she was a wonderful lady. I think she was his second wife. Now that era is over. They pass that bill we allowed that at the last minute. I do not know when people are going to stop the nonsense that is going on in washington. Host looking forward to more of your calls. I want to promote the lines one more time. Democrats, 202 7488000. Republicans, 202 7488001. Ndependents, 202 7488002 here is a photo on the front page of the new york times. This was back in 1976. Speaking at the Republican Convention in kansas city. The story those witnessed in the photo comes from luke cannon lou cannon who has written several books about president reagan. Heres protector testers protector fierce protector. He writes mrs. Reagan was a fierce guardian of her husbands image. During mr. Reagans improbable climb to the governorship of california and ultimately the white house she was a trusted advisor. Without nancy, there would have been no governor reagan, no president reagan. They go on to write that behindthescenes she was the prime mover in mr. Reagans efforts to recover from the scandal known as irancontra. Some of the proceeds from the sale had been diverted to the contras opposing the leftist government of nicaragua. Trying to persuade her husband deal,logize for this arms mrs. Reagan brought political figures into the white house. Among them, robert strauss, to argue her case to the president. The president eventually conceded that she was right. On march 4, 1987, the president made a distant apology in a nationally televised address that improved his slumping public Approval Ratings. That is the new york times. Newark,ar from james in new jersey. Caller how are you doing . Host doing fine. Caller i kind of knew reagan since 1978. Happened, one thing nancy did that really helped me, i have been almost five years straight, no alcohol, no drugs. It does work. Just saying no. Any people addicted to drugs, just say no. It does work. Almost five years straight. No alcohol, no drugs. Thank you. Host thank you for calling. Several callers mentioning mrs. Reagans just say no antidrug slogan. The Washington Times gives a bit of history. Mrs. Reagan said the idea for just say no, a phrase that has iconographyd public , came from a talk she gave it an element or school in oakland. A little girl raised her hand and said, mrs. Reagan what do you do if something offers you drugs . And i said, you just say no. And there it was born. I think people thought we had an Advertising Agency over to dream up the whole thing but that is not true. That is mrs. Reagan. We have chris from nottingham, maryland. Caller good morning. My thought is let me say that nancyyearold reagans prime and all of the things you guys are mentioning, the just say no program, happened when i was very little or definitely before then. My image of nancy reagan has been one of respect. I respect her as someone who my elders have respected. My personal experience with her is very narrow. [indiscernible] will what i do feel like and this is offtopic but i feel it is related. I feel like the coverage of Nancy Reagans passing in the last two days has been interesting because i feel like all coverage of Nancy Reagans passing an almost to the point where i did not see anyone covering the win of Bernie Sanders in maine yesterday. I thought it was interesting to hear every single state that votes, we have major coverage almost all through the night anytime there is state voting. Maine voted and all they were talking about was nancy reagan. I understand she was very influential, certainly changed the role of the first lady. I think it is important to cover all the news and not just some of it especially when an underdog pulls and upset. Host understand the point. At 9 30, we will go back to the campaign. We will focus on last nights debate with Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton. We will watch pieces of it and take some of your calls at 9 30 eastern time today. Time, we will read the phone numbers for you. Democrats, 202 7488000. Republicans, 202 7488001. Ndependents, 202 7488002 looking forward to talking to more of you. Woodruffbit from judy of the pbs news hour. Part of our first ladys series a couple of years back and talk about how the assassination attempt on president reagan helped to change a presidency that was brandnew. [video clip] it made her much more protective. She was completely focused on him and his safety but after argue, was you could it was her sole focus. At one point she said Something Like, when he left to go somewhere i was not even able to breathe deeply until he came back. That was in the movie. Something she said in a documentary to us. She was much more looking for any which way she could to keep them safe. He was going to be out and around but she was grilling people around him to make sure that he was always doing whatever was the safest possible thing. It just made her even more determined to keep him healthy. Host that was a small piece from our segment about nancy reagan, part of a larger series on first ladies. If you want to watch that segment or any of the first ladies segments we did, you can go to our website cspan. Org and eries andthe word s you will see first ladies pop up. David, tallahassee, florida. Thank you for calling. Caller good morning. Just wanted to make a comment. I vaguely remember the reagan presidency back when i was a kid. I have seen how politics has progressed over the years. That old the sincerity politicians had compared to today. Great to be able to flash back when someone dies. You can flash back and look at their history and see where we came from and hopefully we can hold onto it. Host fix for calling. More photos from the papers this morning. Nancy reagan at the u. S. Capitol , 2004. Her husband president reagan lying in state there. Photo from the new york times. Mrs. Reagan showing up at the Washington Hospital carrying a jar of jelly beans. Favorite snack of mr. Reagan when she went to see the president as he recovered. Heres the front page of the Washington Post. Shot of nancy reagan. Exerting profound influence on a popular president. Mrs. Reagan was often seen as the bad cop to her husbands congenial good cop, putting her at odds with senior staff who wanted more exposure for the man known as the great communicator. After John Hinckley junior attended to assassinate her kept senior. Reagan aides and sympathetic public at bay while he convalesce. She argued against his running for reelection in 1984 because of fears about his safety. She defined her role as being a shield for the emotional and physical wellbeing of the president. An the Washington Post. Carmen is up from hamilton, montana. Caller i think that is the fastest time i have ever gotten on. When Justice Scalia died everybody was praising him and everything. I just thought, citizens united, how he crippled this country. Never did anything for the poor people. Nancy was kind of the same way. She mustve been a good lady some way but her and her husband, they have rocked our world with this trickledown economy and everything. That just say no thing, instead of going into hospitalization plan, a plan to take care of peoples health, she went to a punitive plan. Wanted to put everybody in jail. They built this big Border Crossing in san diego with about 32 entrances and had this operation and they found one joint and spent billions of dollars. I never saw a woman who helped spend more of our taxpayers money and do less for the poor. Im sorry i have bad things to say but im glad her instantly are gone. I will be gone im glad her instantly are gone. I will be gone sunday host i will let you go. Mrs. Reagan was fiercely loyal to her husband, he writes. That devotion was matched only by her devotion to our country. Her influence on the white house was complete and lasting. During her time as first lady and since she raised awareness about drug abuse and breast cancer. When we moved into the white house we benefited from her work to make those historic rooms beautiful. That is from president george w. Bush. We covered an event yesterday out in ohio with Governor John Kasich who is trying to win his home state for the republican nomination. He was joined by actor and former california governor arnold schwarzenegger. They took a moment at a Campaign Event to remember mrs. Reagan. [video clip] i wanted to say briefly and recognize the passing of nancy reagan today. She was one of the greatest first ladies. Extraordinary human being. Such a wonderful partner to her husband, president reagan. Who was without any doubt one of the greatest president s in the history of the United States. [applause] i know she will join him now in heaven and this love affair between the two of them will start all over again. I want to say a word about nancy reagan because, today my wife is going with me for a couple days on the trail. I am thrilled that she will be with me. My staff is thrilled because they say she keeps me in line. I have a sense it was a little bit that way with nancy reagan and her husband. She looked out for him every step of the way. Made sure that the people [laughter] she did not do that, sweetie. She made sure the people that were around him were people that were committed to what he believed in. She was an incredible lady, very strong and a total class act. I h