History news. Up next on American History tv David Reynolds editor of lincolns selected writings. He discussed president lincolns assassination and the man who shot and killed him. Actor john wilks booth. President lincoln died on april 15th, 1865. This event was hosted be i the City University of new york. Its about an hour and a half. Tomorrow to honor the 150th anniversary of his death lincoln was shot 150 years ago tonight and then died the next morning. President obama will proclaim a day of remembrance. For now though i want to take us back in time to that fateful night on april 14th, 1865. Ill first summarize what happened and then ill discuss the cultural background of Lincoln Lincoln and his murderer John Wilkes Booth. About this time in the evening 150 years ago Abraham Lincoln and his wife Mary Todd Lincoln were preparing to go see the noted actress laura king in the comic play our american cousin which was featured at fords theater. It was wellknown that lincoln a regular theater goer would be at the play that evening because the story was in the headlines. Washington was still in celebration over the surrender of robert e. Lee to ulysses s. Grant five days earlier. April 14th was also the fouryear anniversary of the beginning of the civil war at ft. Sumpter in Charleston Harbor South Carolina despite all the joy and excitement lincoln had second thoughts about going out that fight, not that he had any scruples about it being good friday. He didnt share the strict christian problems that christians had of going to the theater on a holy day. However, he had had a disturbing dream the night before his bodyguard ward hill layman had left town warning him not to go out in public due to the highly charged atmosphere with disgruntled enemies surely lurking about. Also lincoln had a hard time getting people to go with him. He had asked both general grant and secretary of war Edward Stanton to accompany him but the wise of these two men didnt get along of mrs. Lincoln. Poor mrs. Lincoln. She had problems getting along with a lot of people. Although i think she was a little bit unfairly treated by history. Anyway, the president s invitation was politely declined. Lincoln then invited a young family friend clara harris who gladly accepted and brought along her fiance major henry wrathbone. By the way whoops, didnt there we are. Thats these are the actual clothing that was worn thaechbing. The coat pretty typical gentlemans outfit for that era for an evening outfit except the boots, the size 14 boots that you cant see it but they had red filigree on the top of them, kind of fancy. But fairly typical really of an evening coat for a man. The party arrived at fords theater. Thats the one with the sort of circular entrance. This is a recreation of it in recent times. The party arrived at fords theater at around 8 00. The play had been going on for 20 minutes. After the president entered the theatre lead actor in the play spotted him and signaled the orchestra by ad libbing. As president lincoln would say, that reminds me of a little story. The band got the cue. And as lincoln and his party entered the president ial box above stage right, you can see it there with the flags draped around it right kind of above the stage to the right. The band played hail to the chief. Lincoln bowed to the cheering crowd below and mrs. Lincoln smiled and waved. The president settled into the comfortable rocking chair that was arranged for him while his wife saturday beside him and their two guests to their right. The play had gone on for two hours when at about 10 after 10 00 a loud popping sound was heard in the theater followed by a womans screams. Suddenly a thin darkhaired man, eyes glaring, was seen in the railing of the president s box. The man lept 12 feet down to the stage. You can see there where each man of the stage having lept the box. The leap was partly broken when his heel caught got caught in the flag draped under the box. The man walked across the stage and exited on stage left. Some say that he turneded to audience and yelled sic semper torantus. He said later on he did yell it. Thus always to tyrants. There was a stunned silence in the theater punctuated by mrs. Lincolns cries of murder, murder, my husbands blood, my husbands blood. Lincoln had been shot in the bab of the head but actual he he was not bleeding profusely. A clot quickly formed that a doctor who soon arrived had to remove with his finger to allow for some bleeding and therefore relieve the pressure on his brain. Most of the blood actually was on major rathbone whose arm had been badly slashed by the attacker who had been armed with both a pistol and boeing knife. So rathbone tried to stop him and his artery was slashed. The theater became sheer mayhem. Some in the audience surged forward tumbling over the seats toward the stage some getting on the stage. Others rushed outside the theater. Several including two doctors and the actress laura keen went directly to lincolns box. Lincoln never regained consciousness. He was carried across tenth street to a boarding house observed by william and anna peterson. There was a lot of activity tonight going on in the Peterson House house. And the president was laid out on his bed. Ironically, John Wilkes Booth had been staying there two weeks earlier. The ironies of history. Anyway lincoln had to be arranged diagonally because the bed was small and he was 64. All night he was attended by physicians and the room was visited by some 90 people during the course of the night. Cabinet members, other politicians as well as ordinary citizens. Lincolns breathing and heart rate waiverered throughout the night and finally stopped all together at 7 22 in the morning of april 15th. Heres kind of a portrait of the death bed. Rather beautiful portrait, i think. Quite painful, as well. During that agonizing night doctors probed his wound with this long instrument there on the bottom right. And felt a bullet that had gone through the brain, lodged behind the right eye. In the autopsy lincolns brains were removed and this crude crushed bullet to the right of the gun there was found along with some skull fragments. I dont know if you can see the skull oh, yeah on the dark pad there. Later the murder weapon was found and it was a single shot dering jer pistol. News of the killing spread. As after any huge public tragedy, think of nefb, there was a mixture of confusion paranoia, and anger. Assassins were thought to be everywhere, innocent people who were brought in as possible witnesses were jeered by crowds who yelled hang him, hang him. It was soon said that secretary of state william h. Steward had been killed and other leaders were in danger as well as the assassination of lincoln. Now, many of the facts came to light. Lincolns assassin, it was learned, was the famous actor John Wilkes Booth. He was a stage star and was considered very handsome. He was the brad pitt or rob lowe of his time. If he were around today he would be up for peoples magazine sexiest man of the year. He was the First American actor known to have his clothes ripped off by adoring fans. He often lept to the stage the way he had after the shooting. For instance, he entered the stage for macbeth, and i think if he hadnt caught his foot in the leg, he broke his small tibia when he fell. Anyway, booth had made as much as 20,000 a year as an actor which is quite a lot of money in those days. But he had been bornnd raised in the slave state of. Maryland and his sympathies were for the confederacy. So a year before the murder in the summer of 1864 he stopped touring as an actor and devoted himself by avenging himself by plotting against lincoln. His original plan was to kidnap lincoln, take him to the south and hold him hostage to exchange him for confederate prisoners who were then being held in northern prisons. That issue faded when prisoner exchanges were restored by general grant in early 1865, having canceled and restored them this by then it was clear the confederacy was in dire straits. Booth, increasingly vin dikt tive gathered fellow conspirators tos a gist him. These are just some of them. These are the ones that were actually hanged. Booth is on the left of course, and these are the other conspirators. Booth kept track of lincoln and attended some of his major events. He was there outside the capital on march 4th when lincoln delivered his second inaugural address. Its hard to see but on the righthand picture hes way up there in the corner circled in red on the top. And then several other conspiratoring are just below lincoln. You can barely see lincoln here. Not a clear photograph but anyway, in a way lincoln was surrounded even then. This is on march 4th you know, before the assassination. But booth once did get in pushing and shoving booth once got close enough to lincoln before this picture that he later said i had an Excellent Companies to kill him then. So he was a little sorry he couldnt do it then. Now, he also showed up at the aprilen 11th talk. We didnt have a picture of that, that lincoln gave after the surrender of lee from the white house in which he called for africanamerican stuff ranlg which was the first time an american president had ever done that in public. So booth was actually there. He was quite close to him at that time and he muttered to a fellow conspirator, that means nigger citizenship. Im going put this man through. Meaning im going to kill this guy. So the plot became that that booth would target lincoln. George one of his conspirators would kill Andrew Johnson and another conspirator powell payne, variousy names for him, would kill secretary of state william steward. And the idea was to try to throw the northern government into chaos, really throw into chaos and create such mayhem in the north that somehow you know, booth actually thought on some level he could really somehow preserve the confederacy even though at that time while there were still some battles going on its true, the case was very, very bad but he had in his brain that somehow he could save it. And the only one that succeeded in the plot was booth himself because lewis powell went to stewards house and talked his way in by pretending to deliver medicine to him. Steward had been injured and he ended up forcing his way in there and kind of fighting his way upstairs and started stabbing steward. Fortunately steward though had a brace on his neck metal brace and that deflected a lot of the blows otherwise he might have been killed perhaps. Anyway, he was pretty badly stabbed and cut up. But then somebody interfered and so that everyone was screaming and so powell rushed downstairs. On the way out he stabbed stewards son and he expected somebody else, david harold, who is in the bottom to be there waiting with his horse. He had been waiting but he heard all the screams so harold just left. He left the scene. Meanwhile, george wendt into the hotel where Vice President johnson was and was going to kill him but he chickened out. He just went and had a drink. So he he basically chickened out. But he got hanged for it anyway. Anyway so harold who had left powell, powell had to make his way over to the house and all that. Her harold went southward and met up with booth and escaped through maryland all of the way across to virginia. Took about 12 days. And they were trapped in the barn of the garrett farm the farm of richard garrett. It was sort of like a tobacco shed. Harold actually gave himself up as you can see there. Hes the one at the door. Booth wanted to fight his way out. Thats not a very good picture of booth i dont think. But he wanted to kind of fight his way out and maybe become a martyr. He was shot through the neck and he died a few hours later. The guy that shot him was trigger happy. His name was boston corbett. He became really, really famous as a result of having killed the assassin of Abraham Lincoln. Meanwhile, the oh, these were the four that were hanged. And thats mrs. Serratt and powell and harold and axlerot. The big controversy was how guilty was mrs. Serratt. She she ran a boarding house some of the conspirators stay and to this day its dub rouse how guilty she really was. She was the first woman hanged in American History. So that was the the rest of them, you know, i mean, they were deeply involved in the plot. And meanwhile the the nation was mourning the death of Abraham Lincoln. Walt wittman was in his home. He had been in washington but he went home to brooklyn and when he heard the news he was totally silent. He couldnt talk. His mother couldnt talk. Nobody could talk. But he sat down and he wrote this amazing poem. Became his most popular poem. Im just going to read maybe the first and last verse because i have a copy of it right here. O captain, my captain our fearful trip is done. The ship has weathered every rack. The port is near. The bells i hear. The people all exalting while follow as the city keel. The vessel grim and daring. But o heart heart, heart oh the bleeding drops of red were on the deck, my captain lies, falling cold and dead. And then the last verse. My captain does not answer whose lips are pale and still. My father does not feel my arm. He has no pulse nor will. The ship is anchored safe and sound. Its voyage closed and done. From fearful trip the viktors ship comes in with object one. Exalt, oh shores and ring oh bells, but i with mournful dread walk the deck my captain lies fallen cold and dead. It became his most popular poem mem raised by many, many people. He had to read it so often along with that lecture that todd mentioned the death of Abraham Lincoln he got sick of the poem and said damn my captain. I shouldnt say that. But sorry to break the mood there. But, you know its like some of the old beatles tunes and Rolling Stones on my ipad. Enough, you know. Ive heard them too much. But, no its wonderful poem. He also wrote another one called when lilacs last and the diayard bloom which is maybe a more beautiful poem and certainly more characteristic but this is a very moving poem, i think. And the lincoln funeral train there was a huge funeral in washington. Mrs. Lincoln didnt really want to come. She stayed in her room because, i mean she was just totally devastated. They had lost willie. They had lost a son earlier. And now she loses her husband. And but the whole nation mourned basically and there was a train after the washington ceremony that went nearly 1700 miles up north very slowly stopping in many many places. There was a kind of half open coffin where you could see his face. He had been enbammed. Unfortunately the body looked less and less like lincoln the more it reached chicago. It finally made chicago and ended up in springfield where he had lived and he is buried there. So it was quite a procession. Walt whitman when lilacs last in the bloom talks about this and the procession of the train going and all the people by the railroad track. Most of them wearing black. And then crowding to see the coffin and everything. Thats an incredible poem, too. And i want to talk about a little more of the cultural pack ground background of booth but first i want to introduce my book and i want to back in to booth and lincoln via my book which just came out with nor on the. And there had been more than 16,000 books on lincoln. So what i tried to do in this book is a little different is i brought together three you will see the three bodies of text. One is his own writings called authority tatative text, just the way they appeared. Speeches letter he even wrote poem, he even wrote little jottings and so forth. I tried to select them. And then theres a section called lincoln in his era if this is a lot of writing about him in his own time. Songs, poems essays sermons, speeches newspaper articles. And then theres a section called modern views and i take samples from the whole last century starting with sandberg going through James Mcpherson and shawn and Harold Holtzer and a whole bunch of other people so i tried to bring those bodies of text together to in way create a onestop lincoln and the books are for sale if anyone is interested. My nice nor on the people are here including my editor thea. And its been a lot of fun. It was a lot of fun to do this book and whats really nice about the n on the editions is they allow you to put footnotes at the bottom of the page which not all books do now. Not that i try to overfootnote either but i try to add enough so that a lot of strange names are mentioned along the way and i briefly identify them. So i really like that format a lot. And then theres chronology and bibbography and so forth. Some of the other people that are in that lincoln in his era, karl marx and frederick douglas. I really tried to samptz a lot of different views of him just to give you a good sense of his culture. And i wanted to take the opportunity to read you the first paragraph from the book. I dont think you can probably read that but ill just of all Great National heroes and statesmen of history lincoln is the only real giant. This stateman by lee told is hard to dispute. Abraham lincoln is generally recognized as americas greatest president and its central historical figure. And now i think the reason he said this and the reason we say this today and hes beloved both by liberal historians and conservative historians. I think the reason thats true is that he faced a nation that was so divided far more divided than our nation today. Were very polarized today to be sure. But it was far worse then because 11 states left the union. Imagine they left and they created, quote, a new nation. It wasnt really a new nation. Lincoln never believed it was a new nation but they thought it was a new nation. And he somehow made it through all of that. And with never ever giving up his vision. His vision was eventually to get rid of slavery. He wanted to contain slavery but then he had a vision of getting rid of it. And im not going to read any more from my preface. Well okay, ill go ahead. Why not. Lincoln embodied Many American ideals and qualities. The self made man, born in a one room kentucky log cabin. Had a heart scrabble frontier childhood and rose through various occupations to become an illinois lawyer, a congressman, and the 16th president of the United States. And had less than one year of formal education. Think of that, less of one year of schooling. And yet could recite shakespeare by the page and enjoyed he could memorize many other writings as well as he loved reading esops fables, poetry, sermons, daniel websters speeches. He was an inquisitive and curious. He rejected his parents calvinistic baptist and free thinking phase before reaching a pan religious outlook that took into account both Divine Providence and human effort both fate and action. He was seen as funny and given to story telling and telling jokes that couldnt be repeated in front of ladies back then. Yet he had a melancholy side that some say yielded periods of depression. He kind of knew every kind of mood possible, i think, really. Anyway, i go on for about three pages in the preface and discuss his attitude towards slavery and all that. But i wanted to maybe just in that section my book lincoln and his era wrote a few songs about lincoln and this song was called the song that got lincoln elected. Now, thats not really true. Not quite true but it was very, very popular. It was incredibly popular called lincoln and liberty by the Hutchison Family singers like the hippies of their era. By hippies i mean theyre radical abolitionists. So they tried to pushilin con in an even more radical direction than he really was. He only ran on a ticket opposing the extension of slavery into the west. He didnt really run on what we call positive liberty, positive liberty is when the government steps in and tries to defend human rights and create legislation that is positive liberty. And most aft amendof the amendments before the civil war was examples of negative, hands off but the time the song was written he wasnt really quite there yet. But for the Hutchison Family singers, he really was. And just a few things. He was born in kentucky. He lived in indiana, hoosiertum and the sucker, refers to a fish. I mean illinois, the suckers is illinois. And when he says when they say, our good david sling is unairing the slave giant. Talking about the little giant Steven Douglas who in the debates over slavery lincoln slew him. Not really. I mean some people think douglas actually won those debates. But if youre the hippies back then you think that lincoln won, right . So and theyll find that means thats a reference to lincoln cutting trees and making rails. Goes Something Like hoorah for the choice of the nation our chiefton so brave and so true will grow for the great reformation for lincoln and liberty too well go for the son of kentucky the hero of hoos sureierdum too snots the prize of suckers for lincoln and liberty too thats how it goes. And, you know [ applause ] no i should be saying sorry about that. Anyway, you know, it reminds me sometimes popular songs can be a little edgy and reminds me of the 60s when blowing in the wind kind of was edgy. Particularly when sunk by dylan. Peter, paul, and marys version was a little bland even though i loved it. It kind of opened a way, that in the hendrix music. Songs like this sometimes open the way a little bit. And in a way like a prowl. And then there was another song we are coming father abraham. Im going to sing the whole song. No. I promise i wont. But, you know, you can plug in any number. We are coming father abraham 300,000 more. Lincoln raised troops, called for volunteers. He instituted the draft. And it shows the reference for lincoln that these soldiers began to develop for him because he used to visit the troops, go to the battle front and actually visit these people. And they could sense a real sense of compassion there. And it goes Something Like now again, i put 600,000 because you can really there was a version with 500,000 as well. And they also used the word abram usually. We are coming father abram 300,000 more from mississippis winding tree and from new england shore we leave our plows and workshops our wives and children dear with hearts too full for utterance but were the silent tear we dare not look behind us but stead lastly before we are coming father abram ham 300,000 more we are coming we are coming our union to restore we are coming father abraham 300,000 more there are 300,000 more verses, too. I dont know how they ever memorized all of these songs. Anyway. But now i wanted in my book also to represent the more negative views of lincoln in his own lifetime. And there were people called copperheads who were basically democrats, northern democrats who didnt like the war and they didnt like lincoln. And you can see there are negative images on these books. This one was a poem. Both of these books present lincoln as a devilish tyrant who violated the bible and trampled the constitution and threatened to destroy the United States by bringing about a reversal of races. So i wanted to be sure to include that in my book. Thats there too. In a way leads to the fact that he was really under a lot of threats. Because of these pockets of hostility, he received many assassination threats and he told his law partner billy, i feel i should meet with some terrible end. Mrs. Lincoln said hes always exposed. The president has been warned so often that i tremble for him on every public occasion. Back then you could just go see the president and walk into the white house at one of the public receptions and meet him. And he did this all the time. His stepmother sarah bush lincoln, didnt want him to be president because she feared he was going to get killed. And when she heard i knowed he killed him. Ive been awaiting for it. Ive been awaiting for it. So she knew he was going to get killed. So the question arises why John Wilkes Booth . Why him . After all he was just typical of his eras antilincoln sentiment. Booth declared that slavery was a blessing his country was for the white race and not for the black race. He hated lincoln. But this was just very very typical among lincoln hater so why John Wilkes Booth . Well, i attribute it really to what i call the american style of acting these super intense passions total absorption in the role being played and also to what i call the higher law. Walt whitman im going the talk about booths father because it has a lot to do with his whitman, the poet went and saw booths father often on the stage and was so incredibly influenced by booth. And he said his genius was to me one of the grandest revelations of my life a lesson in artistic expression, he had much to do in shaping me in those early years. There were basically two types of acting. One was teapot style british and restrained style where the actor had one hip on one hand on the hip and the other sort of twirling his hand and the other was this became known as american style which was really over the top and very vehement. And booth took this to an extreme so much so that for example, once he had to be pulled off of the domona of the evening for fear he was going to suffocate her with a pillow. Several times, as richard, i ii pursued the richmond of the evening clear out of the evening with a sword and had to be disarmed in a saloon. And he was sometimes walk the streets in his robes or cardinal rishi, rishila and distribute coins. He always got great whitman said that even when he was terrible, he was just great. So he was also a drunk. So the theater i shouldnt go on about John Wilkes Booths father but theater managers learned to look him up before the performance so he wouldnt get too near the bottle. But anyway whitman said the words, fire energy, and abandon found him in him unprecedented meanings. When he was in a passion, face neck, hands would be so fused as i was would be fightful. His whole mean enough to scare the audience actors, often actors were afraid of him. They should have been. Now, John Wilkes Booth carried on the tradition of the american style of acting. Whitman was a little uncertain. I saw him several times this is john wilkes now on the left. John wilkes on the left. The middle one was he had ten children and many of them became actors. So in the middle theres junius jr. And on the right,ed win booth. Actually in this this was done in november 1864. Not too long before the assassination. Andedwin loved lincoln and booth hated lincoln. And there was a real quarrel between those two. I dont like the hand on the sword there. Do you . About to whatever. But actually in this performance he was mark anthony. But this was not too long before the assassination. But whitman said i saw him several times. He had flashes i thought, of real genius but he was a clear fellow who had strange ways. He was kind of odd on the stage because he was leaping around like a stunt man almost, leaping here and there. Now, a positive reviewer said he had more than fire and fury of his great great father than anyone in his family. Of all the children, John Wilkes Booth had the native fiery and fury. But his onstage sword sword fights were so intense that he sometimes inflated real wounds and wounded himself. And in one richard iii the richmond of the evening said, for gods sake john, die if not, im going to die. So he really, again, carried on his fathers tradition. But his acting really merge with real life. Booth wrote in his diary when he was on the run, he was in the swamps in the woods running away. Im here in despair and, why, for doing what brutus, in july yas caesar, was monday honored for and what made william tale, in another play, a hero yet i for striking down a far greater tyrant than they ever knew and looked upon as common cut throat. But my action was purer than either of theirs. So he really became absorbed into his roles as his father was but his father was politically neutral and his brother loved lincoln so he was over there in the confederacy sort of absorbed in this brutus like sensibility. Another thing that inspired him was the higher law. William steward had said theres a higher law than the constitution. Meaning that the law of justice the law of divine right, the law of morality because he was saying well, some team think the constitution condones slavery. And to some degree, it did at that moment. Or at least it was silent on slavery but somewhat condoned it. And throughout the 1850s people acted on the higher law, particularly john brown, who thought he was john brown was a militant abolitionist who singlehandedly tried to wipe out slavery and thought he was appointed by god to go down south and to end slavery. He took 21 men and raided harpers farery in 1829 and in order to stir up slave insure recollection. He was captured tried and convicted on three counts and he was hanged. But at his hanging was John Wilkes Booth. The soldiers around the scoffold included John Wilkes Booth who had left a gig in richmond. He was an actor. And he joined a local militia and he went to the hanging. He wanted to be there. And he saw it. And much to his own surprise he came to admire john brown a lot. Not that he agreed with him because he didnt agree with him at all. He thought just the opposite about things but he admired his guts. John brown mounted the scaffold he admired his guts. He mounted the scaffold confidently, shook hands with his jailer, thank you for your services and was extremely calm. John wilkes booth, time and again said he was such a brave men. He hated those he contrasted brown and lincoln. He said, lincoln and other antislavery politicians were treacherous. He also wrote that lincoln was standing in the footprints of john brown but is no more fit to stand with that man. Brown was a man that inspired the greatest character of the century. They were characters, almost like they were on the stage of history. This character, john brown. He said, lincolns appearance, this is booth, is a disgrace to the seat that he holds. So, John Wilkes Booth wanted to be john brown in reverse. Both of them used religious language a lot. When booth talked about slavery, he said, i have ever considered a blessing slavery that god bestowed on this nation. Before he died, he said that something great and decisive must be done, i struck boldly. I walk firm steps, our country owes all of its trouble to lincoln and god made me his instrument. He fooled to himself that he was the new john brown but in reverse. What version of higher law do we accept . John brown or John Wilkes Booth . Believe it or not, there have been a number of people over the years who have accepted booth. In 1904, the statue was erected in honor of booth. In honor of killing Abraham Lincoln. A novelist said you cannot help feel but a deep love for booth. You cant help it. Then former rand paul aide jack hunter who helped write a book on the tea party every may 10th which is the birthday of John Wilkes Booth raises a the east to his hero to booth. He said booths heart is in the right place. There are people, not that many, but there are, who loved John Wilkes Booth. There are people who love john brown. A lot of people dont like john brown either. Even to this day, there are some good historians who just think he is a crazy fanatic. However, someone like emerson said that he was the new saint who made his gallows like the cross, in other words, he was like jesus christ. Frederick douglass said, i could live for the slaves, but john brown could die for them. I could live for the slave. Debbie beois wrote a nice book on brown. So whose law was right . Lets look at lincoln himself. Lincoln was much more steeped in religion than what is acknowledged. He read the bible often. He did not belong to a church, but he read the bible. He had written an antichristian pamphlet early in his career, but in his own way, he was very religious. He often thought about god. He even approached the cabinet about putting god in the constitution. When he was approached by some religious people. He also issued nine proclamations of prayer on thanksgiving. Thomas jefferson didnt even issue one proclamation of prayer on thanksgiving. Because he thought it was a combination of church and state. Jefferson davis issued 10. They were having a competition there. In lincolns case, it gives rise to this visionary rhetoric, the house divided, which is from the bible. The gettysburg address, one nation under god. The second inaugural address has 14 mentions of god, three mentions of prayer and four biblical citations. In a way, a lot of his rhetoric is saturated in religion, even though again, he was not a conventional member of any church. It reminds me of walt whitman, who said, mine is the greatest of faiths and the least of faiths. I reject any organized religion, but have such deep faith. That is the way i think of lincoln. He also met regularly with church leaders, and he bred a sort of ecumenical spirit, was close to jewish people, catholics, many kinds of protestants, and had a very strong basse, religious base, among churches, and many different kinds of churches in the north. I suppose you could even say that he waged his own holy war, particularly as the war went on. Some say that he had the higher law, created his own law, because he canceled habeas corpus at one point and put some people in jail for saying bad things in the newspaper, and so forth. He was only once involved, not directly, but a lot happen under his watch. So to speak. A lot thought that he followed his own kind of law at least in certain ways. Yet he had the ultimate goal of preserving the union and abolishing slavery. To support the more, he started the National Currency, the National Banking system, all kind of federal funding infrastructure, not to mention proclamations and all of that. To support the war he started the National Currency National Banking system all sorts of federal funding infrastructure, not to mention his proclamations and all of that. In a way, he did strengthen the National Government all under the ages of this idea of freedom, of liberty. The reason his higher law is particularly appealing is he understood the other side. He had the wisdom of insecurity. He said both sides pray to the same bible. Read the same bible and pray to the same god but god has his own purrs. He wasnt like some other higher law people saying god supports what i am doing and he thinks you are the devil. God supports what i am doing and you are the devil. Lincoln never felt that way. His wife was from a slaveholding he himself had been born in five of her close relatives fought for the confederacy. He himself had been born in kentucky and Stonewall Jackson he really admired him. He had a real openness that a lot of people who believe in higher law just dont have. He wasnt alone gun. His higher law devotion to human rates was developed in the democratic process. He believed in the democratic process. He thought that was the best way of filtering the higher law and trying to get through. He realized it did not always work that way but when he says a government of the people, for the people one nation under god, he wants the people to decide. We know democracy does not always work that way, but only somebody with a vision like abe lincoln, i could say he does. Walt whitmans final view of lincoln was that actually booth did us a favor. He made what whitman called the great martyr chief. Which is americas great. He said lincolns death provides a cement more than anything underlined in a cordial army. Its the one thing needed to blast the nationality. In a way, he is right. Whether you are liberal or conservative, i think you can talk with respect about lincoln even though you can notice wrinkles there were plenty of wrinkles there as well. I think this there is a he is he meant. Perhaps if John Wilkes Booth had not followed his higher law, maybe he would not be quite as powerful a presence as he is. Whitman says a nation is defined and created by its deaths. The people who die. When you think of Martin Luther king when you think of kennedy certain in the case of lincoln that was the one death that really created, defined america and created it. In a way brought it together despite all the naysayers and whatever the rand paul types. Those are about turrialba. Even libertarians i suppose its hard for libertarians to swallow lincoln. Because he did create such a strong government. But anyway. We can talk about this and debate it, but i think it is through his compassion and sort of his more democratic understanding of the higher law that lincoln achieved greatness. Anyway, thank you very much. I appreciate it. [applause] i am supposed to we have another microphone. Anybody have any comments . Maybe you want to do your own riff on lincoln or maybe you want to disagree with me, which is fine. Professor reynolds, its a great pleasure to see you again. Im curious i dont know if you have had the opportunity to read a new book which is a biography of John Wilkes Booth. I just finished it. The last three words of that book are embraced and forgiven. With reference to John Wilkes Booth. In your opinion, are we now as a culture in a position to forgive John Wilkes Booth, and if we are, what does that say positively and negatively about our society . Are we in a position to forgive . Im trying to think John Wilkes Booth certainly is a celebrity. He is famous and theres a lot of fascination with John Wilkes Booth. And how he did it. And so forth. I suppose i take the walt whitman view of him which is almost accidentally or unwittingly, John Wilkes Booth in a sense did something good because lincoln always knew he used to receive assassination letters all the time. Kept them. Sometimes he burned them and threw away. Some he kept. He said it doesnt matter what i do. Someone tries to assassinate me, i dont care how many cavalry people are around me. He said im not going to prevent assassination and he wasnt really scared of it either. I think we can forgive booth in a whitmanesque sense in that his action created some positive good, i think unwittingly. Can we admire his boldness . I disagree with John Wilkes Booths views, i wrote a book about john brown and i dont feel the same ring about John Wilkes Booth that i feel about john brown because i happen to feel the same way as we dubois did. I think fundamentally his heart was in the right place but John Wilkes Booths heart was in the wrong place. I believe in a right and a wrong on issues like slavery. I dont forgive him in that sense, but i suppose in a whitmanesque type interpretation the terry alford book i think is very will done. One other book by mclaughlin called came out a few years ago. Also very good on John Wilkes Booth. Does anybody else have any admiration or feelings of admiration. And if you do it is perfectly fine. You are allowed to say it. That is not what i was going to ask. Thats fine. Recently, there was an oped page in the New York Times about how lincoln was romanticized and was a martyr and both sides sort of shook hands and treated each other as gentlemen. But the thesis was this repressed the significance of the war and they said this led to reconstruction, the end of reconstruction. It builds up the southern myth that minimizes the significance of getting rid of slavery and paved the way for the terrible betrayal of the 13th and 14th amendments and the jim crow era which began to end in the 1950s. Do you agree with that . What happens is lincoln, from about 1876 onward becomes a marshmallow icon that can be comfortably assumed whether youre a southern white supremacist or a krald northerner, he becomes everybodys hero. In birth of the nation they say lincoln was the souths best friend, but he was killed. Its a wonderful movie, wonderful in the sense of being technically wonderful, but it is a horrible, racist movie. Lincoln is a huge if we only had antibiotic lincoln around. He believes in colonizing the slaves abroad and all of that. He becomes absorbed very easily into jim crow and becomes a hero for jim crow people. To be sure. There are enough conservative things within lincoln himself, thats why i said that song was a little edgy. He wasnt quite there yet with that song. There were enough conservative things that conservatives could later grab onto and say look at this. Were the hutchinson singers they were trying to push him because im only saying as a tame version of that song, there were really radical versions of that song that was really abolitionist. You can find miserable versions of how the slaves are they are absolutely trying to push him that way. Push his image, rather. They could not influence him. But just his popular image. Yeah. Does that imply that lincoln in life could not have created that National Identity you talked about . Could you ask the question again . Is the implication that lincoln had to die to create this National Identity in light with his program what he was going to do postwar . I dont think even walt whitman believed that. He called lincoln a kind of a cement. He really did strengthen the sense of the nation. Before the civil war, United States was a pleural word and afterwards it was singular. It was largely because of his example. Mentioned some of the negatives, but theres so much patriotism on his behalf. James mcpherson is right when he says the northern view one in spite of later jim crow. Ultimately, the lincoln view wins. I like to think if he had lived, he still would have been quite effective even though he was charitable of his feelings toward the south. I think he would have grown as he did grow during the war. Maybe others would just say he is a conservative. How do others feel about that issue . What would have happened if he lived . I hate to call death the icing on the cake, obviously death is much deeper than that. It kind of enhanced his ability to create the nation. Maybe we would have been better off in the end if he had lasted three more years. Certainly Andrew Johnson, his successor, was fairly inept about government reconstruction. So certainly that can be said. Yeah. Wait. Oh, sorry. Do you feel johnson destroyed radical reconstruction . He was a drunk and inept president. He was responsible for erasing a lot of the pattern that lincoln had already set. I dig is fairly widely agreed i think its fairly widely agreed and i certainly agree Andrew Johnson was ultimately a very, very negative force and that certain strides had been made early in reconstruction to carry on lincolns legacy but that johnson fairly quickly snuffed a lot of those strides out. A lot of people lost heart as well and reconstruction quickly just tumbles towards jim crow basically and it didnt take that long. It was really under johnson that began. That reaction and redemption all began under Andrew Johnson. So yeah absolutely. You mentioned booth had many opportunities to actually assassinate lincoln. I was wondering, do you think that because he was an incredible actor that he chose the theater to commit this final dramatic act and create the most dramatic spectacle which meant that he was actually an actor along with the president so that he in the end would create an incredible thing that he could never on the stage even though he was a fantastic actor and quite famous. Well when you think about it not only that but before he killed lincoln in the theater, he had a very elaborate plot of kidnapping lincoln by one person grabbing lincoln in the theater and then lowering, if you can imagine this lowering lincoln on a rope down a waiting conspirator on the side of the stage. Can you imagine lincoln dangling in the air . He was obsessed by the theater. Im talking about booth. For him, this was his greatest role, really. He kept visiting the theater and went to grovers theater which was another big theater. He kept asking is lincoln coming tonight. Can you invite him to the theater . He knew all the theater managers. He was totally obsessed by it. The theater was very important. We have colleagues who construe lincoln as a political philosopher. Is David Reynolds lincoln a political philosopher or is he a politician with human insights . Good question. Theres a whole school i do think lincoln was a political philosophier. Even though his philosophy comes through his language and in the way he expresses himself. But his political philosophy is one is extremely moral and ethical, but also somehow ambiguous. I disagree with john burkes books who says in the second inaugural, meaning disappears completely and all we have is indeterminacy in ambiguity. I dont agree with that whatsoever. I dont think he revels in ambiguity the way hawthorne does or medal melville does. I disagree with that, but i think he does know about uncertainty. Thats part of his political philosophy. Thats important. Then you avoid ambiguity combined with a sense of vision and morality and ethics, thats very hard to achieve for a politician and political leaders. It got us into a lot of danger in the 20th century and 21st century because people dont generally have that kind of vision. Any other questions . What became of the booth family acting careers . Edwin booth actually became super duper famous. Edmund booth, he was really great. He didnt have the american style so much as much as the subtle sort fof dawdler. I think was a much better actor than John Wilkes Booth. Others in the family trickled out but edmund booth owned many theaters and he was a manager and an actor and he was really great. In the late 19thcentury. He was never very proud of his brother at all and they disagreed so radically as his sister asia loved John Wilkes Booth so much. John wilkes was her darling and she wrote a defensive me moire and always loved John Wilkes Booth more than anybody more than her brothers or serious. Edmond booth is the one who made it. Any other questions or comments maybe . Philip . One thing going through my mind you mentioned briefly Frederick Douglass and his thoughts about john brown. Frederick douglass interest me in his relationship to lincoln which evolved tremendously does it not, beginning quite as a critic getting hopeful at the time of the election in 1860, becoming critical during what he considered the slowness of the administration to act against slavery. And then these meetings that take place in person in the white house, the first time a president meeting with an africanamerican adviser to talk about slavery. Douglass himself comes away more increasingly impressed with the authenticity and honesty and antislavery stance of the president. His reaction to the assassination i know he goes on to give a talk in rochester after the assassination in which he says among other things that lincoln was the black mans president. The black peoples president. We remember a later speech in 1876 in which he says lincoln was nothing but the white persons president. Even in that speech he saved the nation and was great. But yeah. Im just reiterating some of the points you made which is that theres a gate distance between 1865 and 1876. Right. And a Different Task for a man like douglass in the first year than in the last . There are a lot of people who really change their opinions of lincoln, but when he meets lincoln he feels an utter lack of racism on a personal basis. As does Sojourner Truth and meets lincoln in the white house. Douglass and many other people go through a journey to be sure. Isnt it rather confusing that Frederick Douglass wrote three autobiographies, each adopting the social climate of what the time was so that a researcher trying to write on Frederick Douglass doesnt really know which of the three is the truth or if they are all truth for their time . In other words, whether he bought a slave or whether he ran away or whether a bunch of women paid for him to be a free man. Each one is different in these three versions. So what is your stance . Its partly a memory of confabulation and distortion. Where the older you get you remember things differently and write them down differently than at the time you experience them. Thats part of it. Its part of the culture too. Frederick douglass autobiographies are each different from each other and you have to reconstruct the cultural and publication history and all of that the way his mother who is absent from the early version suddenly pops up and is very important. All of these different kinds of changes, it is really weird. It almost becomes a developing fiction or fictional autobiography. Youre right. Absolutely fascinating. Im curious how much the conspirator was developed with the forethought or how much was loud talkers. I always wondered about one odd ball thing. Had they succeeded, unless im confused, they would have made president edwin stanton. If you had picked one person in the confederate, you would not want to be president of the United States and stanton was far harsher than he is ward and of course lincoln and johnson. To what degree do you think we should think of this as a truly organized conspiracy and to what degree was a bunch of loud drunks . A lot of it was impromptu and kind of of the moment, but from the fall of robert e. Lee afterwards, they had not really thought of the succession. If stanton was president my goodness, he was more like lincoln. He was tougher on slavery than lincoln. Like john brown who wanted to create mayhem and chaos in the south, booth thought he would create real mayhem and sure chaos no matter who succeeded. He didnt think deeply about it. Some say john brown didnt think deeply about what he did either. But, youre right. When you wonder about these things being thought out i dont think that booth was totally rational about it. I really dont. Particularly in the idea of lowering lincoln in the theater on the rope. Seriously, for a while, its ridiculous. Anyway, i dont think it was particularly well conceived or well thought out. Professor reynolds, may i ask a followup to that question about succession from a slightly different angle . I think the reasons for lincoln selecting Andrew Johnson as his running mate in 1864 are pretty wellknown. The political reasons. Tennessee, unionists, etc. Given he was such a reactionary force during the deconstruction era, did he contemplate his own mortality . No president had been assassinated before him, but two within the last 20 years and died. Obviously, lifespans were shorter back then. Do you think he thought through the implications of what happened if he did not complete his second term and the implications of johnson becoming the second president . I dont think johnson was a good choice. I suppose if we put ourselves in his shoes we would say oh, the border states like tennessee and kentucky and maryland and missouri and everything we have to somehow keep them and the war is not going that well. In the fall of 1864, it started to go well. The idea to get some southern person there i dont think it was very well thought out. History proved it wasnt well thought out the Andrew Johnson choice. And i think it was sort of geographical and political. Thats really what it was. Andrew johnson was even drunk at lincolns inauguration. He could barely talk. He said things like oh, this guy over here believes in liberty and i believe in liberty. He was drunk at his own swearing in. The question is about mortality. Gave money its funny. We dont know how much he thought about his own mortality other than to say maybe some day i would be assassinated. Maybe he should have been more responsible about that. Theres many criticisms you can make of lincoln. And he was human being. He really believed in his own mortality, i think he did right by making simon chase the chief justice. That was a good he made some good appointments as well. But i agree totally that he should have been a little more responsible about that particular choice. On the subject of president ial succession, does it go president Vice President speaker of the house and then to the cabinet . That is later. Anymore questions or comments we do have a nice reception after this with some cocktails and food and everything. Im hoping you will stick
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