Why Can't We Be Friends?….or President Obama visits the Republican Caucus

Today, the political shows are abuzz with the live question and answer session that took place today between President Obama and the Republican caucus. All the shows have reflected on the public’s general distaste with the partisan vitriol in Washington in both parties. To combat this image, President Obama made overtures for greater bipartisan work in his State of the Union on Wednesday and today visited the Republican caucus to participate in a “free exchange of ideas.”

What’s interesting is that the public and media seem to believe that this Republican vs. Democrat political culture is the most viscious its ever been in American politics. That may be, but I don’t believe that to be necessarily true. For example, I wish we could see a similar exchange of ideas from the 1790s era of American politics when Federalists so hated Democratic-Republicans (and vice-versa) that they would cross the street rather than share the sidewalk with someone of an opposing party. I won't even get into the antebellum and civil war years. That said, I found today’s events to be quite an anomaly. Certainly, previous presidents have spoken at meetings of their opposition in attempts to increase feelings (or the appearance of) bipartisanship. However, today’s meeting was the first such event to be taped and aired live.

Here is the full question and answer session:

[Image via mentalfloss]

He Shall From Time to Time…..A Brief History of the State of the Union

Tonight, President Barack Obama will deliver his first State of the Union address as president. The need for a president to address Congress about the state of the union is laid out in our Constitution in Article II, Section 3, which mandates that the president “shall from time to time give to the Congress Information on the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient.” Like much of the Constitution, this requirement is written in somewhat ambiguous language that the early presidents interpreted in different ways. For example, what kind of requirement is “from time to time?” President George Washington interpreted that to mean once a year, and so the State of the Union is delivered once a year, usually at the start of a new legislative session.

Another interesting aspect of the constitutional requirement of a state of the union is that it does not explicitly state that the president must deliver it before Congress in person. George Washington and John Adams both chose to deliver the address in person. John Adams’ State of the Union only took about 5 minutes to deliver. Imagine if that was the case today. While the first two presidents delivered the address in person, Thomas Jefferson believed the sight of a president addressing Congress was too similar to the practice of the King of England addressing parliament. He rankled at any display of monarchial power. Therefore, he sent a written copy of his state of the union to be read to Congress. This became the standard practice for presidents until Woodrow Wilson. He resurrected the practice of delivering the address in person, a practice that was later adopted by FDR. While presidents still have the constitutional right to mail their address to Congress, it has become an unwritten requirement of the modern presidency to deliver it in person.

There have been some tense moments surrounding previous addresses, check out a NY Times article that describes some of these addresses in greater detail.

To read more about the State of the Union address and the American presidency, check this out.

Delivering the State of the Union address live on primetime television was a practice started by President Lyndon Johnson. Will you be watching tonight?

[Image via knowledgerush]

“Reading maketh a full man, conference a ready man, and writing an exact man.” – On the walls of the Library of Congress

On January 26, 1802, Congress passed an act calling for the establishment of a library within the U.S. Capital. The primary purpose of the library was to field research requests from Congress. Only members of Congress, Supreme Court Justices and other high-ranking government officials are allowed to take books out of the library. The rest of us have to obtain a library card to use research materials within the library.

The Library itself has a rich history full of intrigue, drama and fires. Much of the library’s original collection was destroyed by fire during the War of 1812. Thomas Jefferson sold 6487 books to the library, which made up his entire personal library. This act shows how seriously Jefferson believed in the mission and importance of the Library of Congress, and how much he needed money to keep his ever tenuous personal finances in the black (which they rarely were).

The Library of Congress remained in the Capital building for much of the 19^th century. After the Civil War, the library began to grow in scope and in prominence and was eventually moved into its own building. It has come to serve as our de facto national library and now encompasses programs to promote literacy and greater historical appreciation nationwide. It is the largest library in the world in terms of shelf space (530 miles of bookshelves) and the 2^nd largest in terms of number of books held in its collections (29 million books). Visit the library’s website to do some research or just to check out the cool services the library offers online.

For more of the history of the Library of Congress, check this out.

[Images via Zanegrant, bbg-aura and about]

Presidential Reading lists, do they matter? What do the presidents read?

On August 24th, Slate posted an article analyzing the list of books Obama would be bringing with him on his vacation. Read the article here: http://www.slate.com/id/2226142/?GT1=38001

As the article elucidates, the president’s reading list is at times used as a barometer of national feeling, or in the case of George W. as an attempt to prove intelligence, with mixed results (see Slate article). Obama’s list seems to be a nonstarter because it appears to be based solely on his reading interests at this point. Interestingly, his list includes David McCullough’s John Adams. I wonder if past presidents have read biographies of their predecessors. If so, what motivates these choices besides courting public opinion? Do they conceive of these biographies as historical road maps with warning signs imbedded in the text or more simply as a way to have a conversation through history with other members of the same ultra- exclusive club?

Since reading the Slate article, I’ve been thinking about what our presidents have chosen to read in their free time more broadly. Beyond just using books in our modern age as a public relations tool to connote everyman-ness or further some other agenda, what kinds of books have our presidents turned to in their personal lives away from public scrutiny? Have our presidents viewed their relationship with reading the same way that I have? As a vital relationship that can provide anything from comfort to education to just plain entertainment? With these questions in mind, I have tried to find out some of the books and authors our presidents have turned to while in office.

Abraham Lincoln was famous for being a self made man from America’s frontier. He was self- taught and spent little time if any in organized schools. Instead, Lincoln taught himself by reading whatever books he could get his hands on. He famously said of his love of reading, “My best friend is the man who’ll give me a book I ain’t read.” Of the many books he read in his lifetime, Lincoln’s favorites included Shakespeare’s Macbeth and Hamlet, along with the poetry of Edgar Allan Poe, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Robert Burns and Lord Byron. One can imagine Lincoln entertaining those who worked in the telegraph office with monologues from one of Shakespeare’s dramas while awaiting word from the front during the war. Stories about families forced to turn on one another due to circumstance might have seemed appropriate during a war which often required the same of many American families living in border states.

Teddy Roosevelt was also a voracious reader who was an author in his own right. He authored his own history of the War of 1812 along with several books relating to his love of nature. Teddy has lately been remembered through books and articles for his legacy in furthering the national park system, and this love of nature and the environment was reflected in his reading choices.

Finally, a book that seems to connect many presidents over a large span of years has been the bible. Thomas Jefferson wrote his own version of the New Testament gospels that was in keeping with his interpretation of Christianity. In addition, Millard Fillmore (president from 1850-1853) learned to read by reading the family bible. To him, and countless others, the bible served not only as a religious text, but as an essential educational tool for those not lucky enough to attend formal schools. More than a hundred and fifty years later, George W. Bush would also list the bible as an important book in his life as it represents the foundation of his religious beliefs.

That said, does any of this matter? I love this kind of trivial information, but does the reading list of any president really hold any significance? I guess if we view the experience of reading as something of a transformative experience, as something that molds us, then we might take into account one’s personal library as an indication of how a person’s worldview has been shaped.

The question of what the presidents read is a favorite of mine, and hopefully I will get a chance to return to it in the future in greater detail.

Images via Mediabistro, Haysville Library, and dachshundlove.