The Great Contradiction: The Tragic Side of the Founding with Joseph J. Ellis

Pulitzer Prize–winning historian Joseph J. Ellis joins host Professor Robert Allison to talk about his new book, The Great Contradiction: The Tragic side of the American Founding.  Drawing on decades of scholarship, Ellis reflects on the ideas, personalities, and hard choices that shaped independence and the early republic.

Together, Allison and Ellis explore what made the Revolution truly revolutionary, how figures like Washington, Jefferson, Adams, and Madison, whose stories Ellis has told in works such as Founding Brothers and Passionate Sage, understood their moment in history, and why the founding era continues to challenge, inspire, and provoke debate 250 years later. Insightful, candid, and  engaging, this episode offers listeners a master historian’s perspective on America’s most consequential generation—and the unfinished work they left behind.

Transcript

WEBVTT
 
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 Hello, everyone.
 
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 Welcome to the Revolution two fifty
 
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 podcast.
 
 00:00:05.190 --> 00:00:06.652
 I'm Bob Ellis and I chair the Rev
 
 00:00:06.692 --> 00:00:08.114
 two fifty advisory group.
 
 00:00:08.474 --> 00:00:10.518
 We are a consortium of about seventy five
 
 00:00:10.538 --> 00:00:12.000
 groups in Massachusetts planning
 
 00:00:12.039 --> 00:00:14.083
 commemorations of American independence.
 
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 And our guest today is Joseph J. Ellis,
 
 00:00:17.169 --> 00:00:19.228
 who is one of the most distinguished
 
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 historians of the founding.
 
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 He's written over a dozen books on this,
 
 00:00:23.530 --> 00:00:26.170
 and his latest is called The Great
 
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 Contradiction,
 
 00:00:27.111 --> 00:00:29.451
 The Tragic Side of the American Founding.
 
 00:00:29.471 --> 00:00:31.152
 So thanks so much for joining us, Joe,
 
 00:00:31.192 --> 00:00:32.652
 from the mountains of Vermont.
 
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 Oh, it's my pleasure.
 
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 And I am coming to you from Papa
 
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 Mountain in the middle of Vermont,
 
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 and it's like a blizzard going on outside.
 
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 It's calm inside,
 
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 and I look forward to our conversation.
 
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 So do I.
 
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 And you've written in this book and in
 
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 others about someone else who lived on top
 
 00:00:52.302 --> 00:00:52.923
 of a mountain,
 
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 and that's Thomas Jefferson.
 
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 Oh, yeah.
 
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 He's a critical figure in this book for
 
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 a lot of reasons.
 
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 Yes.
 
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 I did a full book on him, and...
 
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 And I went to college at William and
 
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 Mary, which is where he went to college.
 
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 And so whenever you looked at your desk
 
 00:01:11.322 --> 00:01:11.962
 at William and Mary,
 
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 somebody wrote in Jefferson as it's carved
 
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 in there.
 
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 That said,
 
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 I think that Jefferson is like the Mona
 
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 Lisa of American history.
 
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 Is he smiling or not?
 
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 Interestingly,
 
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 both sides in the Civil War,
 
 00:01:30.736 --> 00:01:32.778
 the Southerners, pro-slavery,
 
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 and the Union, anti-slavery,
 
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 thought they were fighting for
 
 00:01:36.581 --> 00:01:37.983
 Jeffersonian principles.
 
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 And guess what?
 
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 They were.
 
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 He's like the dirigible above the Super
 
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 Bowl,
 
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 casting inspirational messages to both
 
 00:01:47.111 --> 00:01:47.652
 sides.
 
 00:01:48.692 --> 00:01:51.215
 And he's going to fail you in some
 
 00:01:51.254 --> 00:01:51.936
 respects.
 
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 That said,
 
 00:01:54.677 --> 00:01:57.099
 he wrote the fifty-seven magic words in
 
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 American history,
 
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 the most important words in American
 
 00:02:00.382 --> 00:02:00.862
 history.
 
 00:02:01.503 --> 00:02:02.024
 It begins,
 
 00:02:03.625 --> 00:02:05.826
 we hold these truths to be self-evident.
 
 00:02:06.406 --> 00:02:07.207
 He actually wrote,
 
 00:02:07.688 --> 00:02:09.409
 we hold these truths to be sacred and
 
 00:02:09.490 --> 00:02:10.471
 undeniable.
 
 00:02:11.151 --> 00:02:13.513
 But Franklin changed it,
 
 00:02:14.032 --> 00:02:15.375
 said we don't need to put God in
 
 00:02:15.435 --> 00:02:15.655
 here.
 
 00:02:18.116 --> 00:02:21.397
 but those words are the founding basis for
 
 00:02:21.497 --> 00:02:23.378
 the American Revolution.
 
 00:02:24.580 --> 00:02:26.281
 And I'll say something right here at the
 
 00:02:26.320 --> 00:02:29.203
 beginning that I think is really important
 
 00:02:29.342 --> 00:02:31.223
 and needs to filter through the whole
 
 00:02:31.783 --> 00:02:34.366
 series that we talk about.
 
 00:02:34.406 --> 00:02:34.885
 Question,
 
 00:02:35.026 --> 00:02:38.207
 why was the American Revolution a
 
 00:02:38.288 --> 00:02:39.027
 revolution?
 
 00:02:41.408 --> 00:02:43.110
 Well, because we won the war?
 
 00:02:43.330 --> 00:02:43.711
 No.
 
 00:02:44.170 --> 00:02:45.391
 That made possible...
 
 00:02:46.171 --> 00:02:46.891
 the revolution,
 
 00:02:47.451 --> 00:02:49.133
 but what was the revolution?
 
 00:02:50.032 --> 00:02:51.473
 The revolution was this.
 
 00:02:52.213 --> 00:02:55.455
 It was a reversal of the tectonic plates
 
 00:02:55.536 --> 00:02:58.377
 of Western political thought.
 
 00:02:58.396 --> 00:03:01.578
 Power did not flow downward from kings,
 
 00:03:02.098 --> 00:03:04.299
 excuse me, from God to kings.
 
 00:03:05.873 --> 00:03:09.135
 It flowed upward from that mystical or
 
 00:03:09.195 --> 00:03:12.179
 mythical thing called the people to their
 
 00:03:12.239 --> 00:03:13.939
 elected representatives.
 
 00:03:15.161 --> 00:03:17.342
 This is the big deal.
 
 00:03:18.043 --> 00:03:20.965
 This is what we're celebrating in this two
 
 00:03:20.985 --> 00:03:22.526
 hundred and fiftieth anniversary.
 
 00:03:22.947 --> 00:03:26.508
 We are the first enduring nation sized
 
 00:03:26.568 --> 00:03:28.751
 republic since the Roman Empire.
 
 00:03:30.093 --> 00:03:32.336
 And that once we did that,
 
 00:03:32.936 --> 00:03:34.736
 over the course of the next century or
 
 00:03:34.796 --> 00:03:35.538
 half century,
 
 00:03:35.657 --> 00:03:37.359
 virtually all the nations of Eastern
 
 00:03:37.459 --> 00:03:41.020
 Europe abandoned monarchy and became
 
 00:03:41.061 --> 00:03:41.782
 republics.
 
 00:03:42.662 --> 00:03:45.243
 We were the model for the republic.
 
 00:03:46.465 --> 00:03:49.145
 We tend to talk about it as democracy
 
 00:03:49.225 --> 00:03:49.567
 now.
 
 00:03:50.687 --> 00:03:51.467
 Ironically,
 
 00:03:51.568 --> 00:03:53.088
 throughout the American founding,
 
 00:03:53.188 --> 00:03:54.849
 up until the age of Jackson,
 
 00:03:55.449 --> 00:03:57.711
 the word democracy was an epithet.
 
 00:03:59.056 --> 00:04:01.598
 Democracy meant mob rule,
 
 00:04:02.020 --> 00:04:04.282
 vulnerability to demagogues,
 
 00:04:05.223 --> 00:04:07.026
 something that sounds pretty familiar to
 
 00:04:07.105 --> 00:04:07.646
 us today.
 
 00:04:09.897 --> 00:04:13.300
 A republic, Latin res publica,
 
 00:04:13.760 --> 00:04:15.122
 things of the public.
 
 00:04:15.562 --> 00:04:17.764
 The public is different from the people.
 
 00:04:18.345 --> 00:04:20.487
 The public interest is the long-term
 
 00:04:20.586 --> 00:04:21.627
 interest of the people,
 
 00:04:21.648 --> 00:04:22.848
 which at any given moment,
 
 00:04:22.908 --> 00:04:24.651
 most of the people don't fathom.
 
 00:04:26.692 --> 00:04:28.954
 And elected representatives are supposed
 
 00:04:28.975 --> 00:04:30.156
 to be virtuous.
 
 00:04:30.255 --> 00:04:32.017
 Virtue is a big word for them.
 
 00:04:32.598 --> 00:04:35.220
 Virtue means doing the right thing
 
 00:04:36.221 --> 00:04:38.922
 even when it means that you're opposing
 
 00:04:38.982 --> 00:04:39.802
 public opinion.
 
 00:04:41.122 --> 00:04:42.244
 Adams, for example,
 
 00:04:42.524 --> 00:04:44.684
 when he lost the election for president to
 
 00:04:44.725 --> 00:04:46.144
 Jefferson in the eighteen hundreds,
 
 00:04:46.165 --> 00:04:47.966
 said it was the proudest day of his
 
 00:04:48.026 --> 00:04:49.947
 life.
 
 00:04:49.966 --> 00:04:52.026
 I lost because I refused to go to
 
 00:04:52.107 --> 00:04:55.608
 war with France, which was popular.
 
 00:04:56.709 --> 00:04:57.829
 I did the right thing.
 
 00:04:59.028 --> 00:05:01.709
 And I can retire to my place outside
 
 00:05:01.749 --> 00:05:04.709
 Boston in complete happiness as a result
 
 00:05:04.749 --> 00:05:05.069
 of that.
 
 00:05:05.088 --> 00:05:08.870
 And so I'll stop there.
 
 00:05:08.910 --> 00:05:11.730
 But the issue that we need to discuss
 
 00:05:11.750 --> 00:05:16.511
 in our modern incarnation is, I think,
 
 00:05:16.571 --> 00:05:18.612
 the Declaration of Independence.
 
 00:05:18.632 --> 00:05:19.612
 They should read my book.
 
 00:05:20.012 --> 00:05:21.732
 But before you read my book,
 
 00:05:22.653 --> 00:05:23.833
 read the Declaration.
 
 00:05:25.005 --> 00:05:26.807
 It's only a page and a half long.
 
 00:05:26.846 --> 00:05:32.449
 You can get it on your device and
 
 00:05:33.750 --> 00:05:36.471
 sit down at Christmas or afterwards with
 
 00:05:36.512 --> 00:05:38.552
 your family, with friends,
 
 00:05:38.973 --> 00:05:41.475
 and have a dialogue.
 
 00:05:41.514 --> 00:05:42.334
 For example,
 
 00:05:43.255 --> 00:05:44.997
 we hold these truths to be self-evident
 
 00:05:45.016 --> 00:05:46.317
 that all men are created equal.
 
 00:05:46.677 --> 00:05:47.458
 What does men mean?
 
 00:05:47.497 --> 00:05:48.559
 Mm-hmm.
 
 00:05:49.396 --> 00:05:50.838
 Does it mean mankind?
 
 00:05:51.838 --> 00:05:53.420
 Abigail Adams thought that.
 
 00:05:54.341 --> 00:05:55.843
 Or does it just mean men?
 
 00:05:58.444 --> 00:06:01.427
 And that's an interesting debate to have.
 
 00:06:04.529 --> 00:06:07.452
 But beyond that particular lesson,
 
 00:06:08.093 --> 00:06:12.617
 a recognition that at issue is the issue
 
 00:06:12.658 --> 00:06:13.978
 of race and gender.
 
 00:06:15.120 --> 00:06:16.060
 To what extent
 
 00:06:17.516 --> 00:06:19.437
 Is the language of the Declaration
 
 00:06:19.637 --> 00:06:22.819
 incompatible with slavery?
 
 00:06:22.899 --> 00:06:24.401
 And I think the answer to that is
 
 00:06:24.440 --> 00:06:25.382
 clearly yes.
 
 00:06:26.822 --> 00:06:28.423
 And that then raises a question.
 
 00:06:29.564 --> 00:06:30.404
 If, in fact,
 
 00:06:30.625 --> 00:06:32.425
 the words of the Declaration and the
 
 00:06:32.446 --> 00:06:36.088
 values embraced as we depart the British
 
 00:06:36.168 --> 00:06:39.031
 Empire are incompatible with slavery,
 
 00:06:39.290 --> 00:06:41.252
 and almost all the major founders
 
 00:06:41.872 --> 00:06:42.713
 understood this,
 
 00:06:42.853 --> 00:06:44.615
 I'm not imposing this on them,
 
 00:06:46.086 --> 00:06:47.668
 The word that they had used when they
 
 00:06:47.687 --> 00:06:50.189
 were leaving the empire is that King
 
 00:06:50.209 --> 00:06:52.009
 George III and the parliament is
 
 00:06:52.048 --> 00:06:53.870
 attempting to enslave us.
 
 00:06:56.430 --> 00:06:59.151
 And so the language of the declaration and
 
 00:06:59.172 --> 00:07:01.093
 the values they believe they're acting on
 
 00:07:01.132 --> 00:07:01.812
 behalf of
 
 00:07:03.303 --> 00:07:04.625
 And remember, as I said,
 
 00:07:05.245 --> 00:07:08.026
 they're deciding this formally undivided
 
 00:07:08.086 --> 00:07:10.307
 group of colonists who've never cooperated
 
 00:07:10.348 --> 00:07:13.790
 before are deciding to come together and
 
 00:07:13.829 --> 00:07:17.192
 defeat the major military and economic
 
 00:07:17.232 --> 00:07:18.471
 power on the planet.
 
 00:07:19.413 --> 00:07:21.014
 What chance do they have?
 
 00:07:23.615 --> 00:07:25.596
 And there is this moment when they vote
 
 00:07:26.576 --> 00:07:29.057
 on independence on July second,
 
 00:07:31.257 --> 00:07:35.721
 And the representative from Virginia comes
 
 00:07:35.800 --> 00:07:40.642
 up to the representative from
 
 00:07:40.802 --> 00:07:44.064
 Massachusetts, whose name is, I forget,
 
 00:07:44.105 --> 00:07:46.026
 but he's, anyway,
 
 00:07:46.185 --> 00:07:47.466
 I will get it to you in a
 
 00:07:47.526 --> 00:07:49.387
 second, and says,
 
 00:07:51.088 --> 00:07:53.129
 I am lucky because I'm fat.
 
 00:07:54.750 --> 00:07:56.072
 And you are very unlucky.
 
 00:07:57.504 --> 00:07:58.526
 because you're skinny.
 
 00:07:59.185 --> 00:08:01.567
 And when they come to hang us,
 
 00:08:03.870 --> 00:08:04.810
 I will die quickly.
 
 00:08:05.870 --> 00:08:09.533
 And you will stay in that position for
 
 00:08:09.572 --> 00:08:10.834
 a very, very long time,
 
 00:08:10.853 --> 00:08:12.314
 and it'll be very painful for you.
 
 00:08:13.396 --> 00:08:14.276
 So what Jefferson,
 
 00:08:14.377 --> 00:08:16.218
 in the language of the Declaration, says,
 
 00:08:16.317 --> 00:08:17.579
 our lives, our fortunes,
 
 00:08:17.619 --> 00:08:18.678
 and our sacred honor
 
 00:08:19.764 --> 00:08:21.064
 It's lyrically wonderful,
 
 00:08:21.144 --> 00:08:22.365
 but it's true too.
 
 00:08:22.766 --> 00:08:24.687
 They're putting everything on the line.
 
 00:08:24.726 --> 00:08:28.470
 They're playing a game of cards in which
 
 00:08:28.509 --> 00:08:30.430
 they're going all in before they've even
 
 00:08:30.451 --> 00:08:31.471
 looked at their cards.
 
 00:08:33.985 --> 00:08:35.106
 And at any rate,
 
 00:08:35.626 --> 00:08:38.090
 recovering that mentality is important,
 
 00:08:38.870 --> 00:08:41.192
 but also recovering what kind of
 
 00:08:41.253 --> 00:08:46.037
 government they create after independence.
 
 00:08:46.597 --> 00:08:48.759
 If you ask even very well-educated
 
 00:08:48.820 --> 00:08:50.761
 students at some of the places I taught,
 
 00:08:50.802 --> 00:08:53.043
 like Mount Holyoke or Williams or Amherst,
 
 00:08:54.345 --> 00:08:55.606
 they won't get this right.
 
 00:08:56.751 --> 00:08:57.131
 Okay.
 
 00:08:58.452 --> 00:08:59.273
 The question is,
 
 00:08:59.673 --> 00:09:02.154
 what was the government called?
 
 00:09:02.215 --> 00:09:04.576
 It was created in seventeen seventy seven
 
 00:09:04.616 --> 00:09:06.518
 right after independence was declared.
 
 00:09:07.437 --> 00:09:09.700
 And it was called the Articles of
 
 00:09:10.899 --> 00:09:11.980
 Confederation.
 
 00:09:12.421 --> 00:09:13.241
 Right.
 
 00:09:13.261 --> 00:09:15.543
 They didn't establish a nation.
 
 00:09:16.687 --> 00:09:18.668
 They established a confederation.
 
 00:09:19.168 --> 00:09:19.849
 In other words,
 
 00:09:19.908 --> 00:09:22.431
 what they established was almost precisely
 
 00:09:22.471 --> 00:09:25.292
 what the Confederacy is going to demand
 
 00:09:25.552 --> 00:09:26.712
 in.
 
 00:09:28.533 --> 00:09:31.655
 Because people did not think of themselves
 
 00:09:31.696 --> 00:09:32.417
 as Americans.
 
 00:09:32.576 --> 00:09:35.219
 They thought of themselves as Virginians
 
 00:09:35.479 --> 00:09:37.919
 or South Carolinians or New Yorkers.
 
 00:09:39.541 --> 00:09:42.442
 The average farmer in a lifetime never
 
 00:09:42.503 --> 00:09:44.605
 traveled more than twelve miles from his
 
 00:09:44.644 --> 00:09:45.044
 farm.
 
 00:09:46.504 --> 00:09:49.327
 so that it was a local mentality that
 
 00:09:49.408 --> 00:09:51.750
 wasn't compatible with the nation state.
 
 00:09:52.652 --> 00:09:55.774
 And so we must not confuse the founding
 
 00:09:55.815 --> 00:09:56.875
 that we're celebrating,
 
 00:09:57.056 --> 00:09:59.479
 which is represented by the Declaration,
 
 00:10:00.720 --> 00:10:02.322
 and the founding that will come eleven
 
 00:10:02.361 --> 00:10:03.023
 years later.
 
 00:10:04.403 --> 00:10:05.845
 That's the Constitution.
 
 00:10:06.625 --> 00:10:08.725
 That's the creation of a nation state.
 
 00:10:09.046 --> 00:10:11.307
 But they're not ready to do that at
 
 00:10:11.366 --> 00:10:14.808
 this time for reasons that have to do
 
 00:10:14.948 --> 00:10:16.168
 not, it's not, you know,
 
 00:10:16.208 --> 00:10:16.870
 if you look at us,
 
 00:10:16.929 --> 00:10:19.951
 if a southerner in eighteen forty says,
 
 00:10:20.870 --> 00:10:22.251
 I believe in states rights,
 
 00:10:23.091 --> 00:10:25.393
 you can be pretty darn sure he's talking
 
 00:10:25.413 --> 00:10:26.193
 about slavery.
 
 00:10:27.878 --> 00:10:31.798
 But if someone says that in eighteen
 
 00:10:32.139 --> 00:10:35.421
 seventy, he doesn't mean that.
 
 00:10:35.681 --> 00:10:37.301
 He's not just thinking of slavery.
 
 00:10:37.341 --> 00:10:39.422
 He's thinking that I don't trust any
 
 00:10:39.461 --> 00:10:42.383
 government beyond beyond my neighborhood.
 
 00:10:42.743 --> 00:10:43.822
 If I'm voting for somebody,
 
 00:10:43.883 --> 00:10:45.163
 I need to know him personally.
 
 00:10:45.783 --> 00:10:48.164
 And so that's a mentality that's there.
 
 00:10:48.985 --> 00:10:52.528
 And it means that the Constitution is a
 
 00:10:52.969 --> 00:10:54.190
 drastic change.
 
 00:10:55.991 --> 00:10:58.974
 But if we stick to the moment of
 
 00:10:59.815 --> 00:11:01.035
 seventeen seventy six,
 
 00:11:02.197 --> 00:11:03.599
 we are not a republic.
 
 00:11:03.658 --> 00:11:05.620
 We're a confederation of sovereign states.
 
 00:11:06.501 --> 00:11:07.522
 Right.
 
 00:11:07.542 --> 00:11:08.783
 We're talking with Joe Ellis,
 
 00:11:08.822 --> 00:11:10.903
 whose new book is The Great Contradiction,
 
 00:11:10.943 --> 00:11:13.384
 The Tragic Side of the American Founding.
 
 00:11:14.225 --> 00:11:15.985
 I think the two delegates you were talking
 
 00:11:16.024 --> 00:11:18.186
 about from Virginia and Massachusetts were
 
 00:11:18.426 --> 00:11:20.506
 Benjamin Harrison and Elbridge Gerry.
 
 00:11:20.606 --> 00:11:21.126
 I could be wrong.
 
 00:11:21.167 --> 00:11:21.628
 You got it.
 
 00:11:21.927 --> 00:11:23.148
 I've got it written down here.
 
 00:11:24.187 --> 00:11:25.649
 I've reached a point in my life,
 
 00:11:25.668 --> 00:11:27.649
 you're not quite at my stage yet,
 
 00:11:28.809 --> 00:11:30.152
 I have trouble with names.
 
 00:11:31.493 --> 00:11:33.254
 I was giving a talk in Woodstock a
 
 00:11:33.294 --> 00:11:35.096
 couple weeks ago, and I said,
 
 00:11:35.136 --> 00:11:35.977
 I have trouble with names.
 
 00:11:35.998 --> 00:11:37.559
 Does anybody else have trouble with names?
 
 00:11:38.000 --> 00:11:39.621
 Everybody in the audience raised their
 
 00:11:39.682 --> 00:11:39.922
 hand.
 
 00:11:39.982 --> 00:11:42.865
 Probably an elderly audience.
 
 00:11:43.485 --> 00:11:45.427
 At any rate, bear with me.
 
 00:11:50.515 --> 00:11:52.417
 I don't want to jump too far ahead,
 
 00:11:52.476 --> 00:11:54.379
 but two people who come across as really
 
 00:11:54.619 --> 00:11:58.280
 interesting in the book are Henry Knox,
 
 00:11:58.341 --> 00:12:00.702
 we know about for his earlier bringing the
 
 00:12:00.962 --> 00:12:03.144
 gun cannon from Fort Ticonderoga to lift
 
 00:12:03.203 --> 00:12:04.945
 the siege head of artillery.
 
 00:12:05.225 --> 00:12:06.787
 But then as Secretary of War,
 
 00:12:06.886 --> 00:12:10.908
 he has this idea about Indian policy.
 
 00:12:10.989 --> 00:12:13.110
 And then Alexander McGillivray comes up in
 
 00:12:13.150 --> 00:12:13.410
 that.
 
 00:12:15.412 --> 00:12:17.253
 If they ever made a movie about that
 
 00:12:17.293 --> 00:12:19.474
 chapter, Alexander McGillivray,
 
 00:12:19.494 --> 00:12:20.214
 whoever plays him,
 
 00:12:20.234 --> 00:12:21.715
 is going to win the Academy Award.
 
 00:12:21.855 --> 00:12:22.515
 I think so.
 
 00:12:22.956 --> 00:12:24.397
 Because that character,
 
 00:12:24.537 --> 00:12:26.317
 which very few people know about,
 
 00:12:26.477 --> 00:12:28.139
 was the leader of the Creek Nation.
 
 00:12:29.119 --> 00:12:32.081
 And it's about the signing of the treaty
 
 00:12:32.321 --> 00:12:35.722
 in that establishes Creek control over a
 
 00:12:35.783 --> 00:12:36.743
 certain area of land,
 
 00:12:36.763 --> 00:12:39.705
 which would be modern day Mississippi and
 
 00:12:40.024 --> 00:12:42.527
 Alabama, or most of Mississippi.
 
 00:12:43.626 --> 00:12:46.931
 And that story is great.
 
 00:12:47.291 --> 00:12:49.192
 I don't put it in the book,
 
 00:12:49.273 --> 00:12:50.693
 but I put it in another book that
 
 00:12:50.833 --> 00:12:51.394
 Abigail,
 
 00:12:51.835 --> 00:12:54.577
 when the when the forty eight chiefs come
 
 00:12:54.638 --> 00:12:55.458
 to New York,
 
 00:12:55.479 --> 00:12:57.980
 which was then the capital to negotiate a
 
 00:12:58.042 --> 00:12:58.562
 treaty.
 
 00:12:59.062 --> 00:13:00.984
 And it's prompted, just as you say,
 
 00:13:01.065 --> 00:13:03.067
 by Washington and by his assist by a
 
 00:13:03.106 --> 00:13:03.886
 military guy.
 
 00:13:05.033 --> 00:13:05.514
 who said,
 
 00:13:05.634 --> 00:13:07.674
 if we don't do something to change Indian
 
 00:13:07.735 --> 00:13:08.294
 policy,
 
 00:13:09.134 --> 00:13:12.135
 the only Indian east of the Mississippi to
 
 00:13:12.176 --> 00:13:13.816
 be found will be found in the history
 
 00:13:13.855 --> 00:13:15.115
 books.
 
 00:13:15.176 --> 00:13:18.677
 And we fought a war because we didn't
 
 00:13:18.716 --> 00:13:20.738
 want to have anybody take our property
 
 00:13:20.798 --> 00:13:22.278
 from us without our consent.
 
 00:13:23.077 --> 00:13:25.078
 The same principle holds true for the
 
 00:13:25.139 --> 00:13:26.078
 Native Americans.
 
 00:13:26.778 --> 00:13:29.620
 We cannot take their land without their
 
 00:13:29.659 --> 00:13:30.139
 consent.
 
 00:13:30.922 --> 00:13:33.624
 And we need to create a treaty with
 
 00:13:33.663 --> 00:13:35.664
 the Creeks that give them that control.
 
 00:13:35.804 --> 00:13:36.804
 And in the hope,
 
 00:13:37.206 --> 00:13:39.846
 as the nation expands across the
 
 00:13:39.866 --> 00:13:42.048
 Mississippi, the same policy would obtain.
 
 00:13:42.528 --> 00:13:45.289
 And that these Native American states
 
 00:13:45.590 --> 00:13:48.231
 could be admitted into the Union as
 
 00:13:48.312 --> 00:13:49.552
 independent states.
 
 00:13:50.273 --> 00:13:51.874
 And the only whites that could live there
 
 00:13:51.913 --> 00:13:53.554
 are people that they allow in.
 
 00:13:53.774 --> 00:13:53.875
 Right.
 
 00:13:54.850 --> 00:13:57.815
 Washington really threw his best energies
 
 00:13:57.914 --> 00:13:58.456
 into this,
 
 00:13:58.576 --> 00:14:01.081
 and it's the biggest defeat of his life,
 
 00:14:01.902 --> 00:14:03.885
 and he never recovered from it.
 
 00:14:04.547 --> 00:14:05.948
 And he said the only way to have
 
 00:14:06.048 --> 00:14:06.570
 stopped
 
 00:14:07.315 --> 00:14:09.297
 the Georgians from coming across and
 
 00:14:10.138 --> 00:14:13.640
 define the treaty would have been a
 
 00:14:13.721 --> 00:14:14.922
 Chinese wall.
 
 00:14:17.203 --> 00:14:20.668
 And so if there are two great tragedies
 
 00:14:20.707 --> 00:14:21.368
 at the founding,
 
 00:14:21.629 --> 00:14:24.490
 one is slavery and the other is the
 
 00:14:24.530 --> 00:14:26.572
 failure to reach a just accommodation with
 
 00:14:26.592 --> 00:14:27.614
 the Native Americans.
 
 00:14:28.414 --> 00:14:29.676
 The way I try to put it in
 
 00:14:29.696 --> 00:14:31.658
 the book and let the reader decide for
 
 00:14:31.677 --> 00:14:32.578
 him or herself
 
 00:14:33.774 --> 00:14:37.056
 Are they Greek tragedies or Shakespearean
 
 00:14:37.096 --> 00:14:37.696
 tragedies?
 
 00:14:38.157 --> 00:14:42.038
 A Greek tragedy means it's ,
 
 00:14:41.658 --> 00:14:43.018
 tis the will of the gods.
 
 00:14:43.619 --> 00:14:44.859
 It couldn't have changed.
 
 00:14:45.619 --> 00:14:47.399
 Even great leadership couldn't have made a
 
 00:14:47.460 --> 00:14:48.019
 difference.
 
 00:14:48.721 --> 00:14:52.381
 Or is it a Shakespearean tragedy with
 
 00:14:52.442 --> 00:14:53.562
 proper leadership?
 
 00:14:54.442 --> 00:14:58.024
 It could have gone the other way.
 
 00:14:58.063 --> 00:15:00.384
 To your listeners, I think,
 
 00:15:01.345 --> 00:15:03.485
 The failure on Indian removal is a Greek
 
 00:15:03.525 --> 00:15:04.086
 tragedy.
 
 00:15:05.426 --> 00:15:07.986
 The failure on slavery is a Shakespearean
 
 00:15:08.006 --> 00:15:08.567
 tragedy.
 
 00:15:09.506 --> 00:15:10.207
 With leadership,
 
 00:15:10.268 --> 00:15:14.349
 it could have gone the other way.
 
 00:15:14.389 --> 00:15:16.188
 What kind of leadership do you think might
 
 00:15:16.229 --> 00:15:16.448
 have?
 
 00:15:16.590 --> 00:15:16.950
 I mean,
 
 00:15:16.970 --> 00:15:18.309
 we don't need to get into the whole
 
 00:15:18.350 --> 00:15:21.530
 counterfactual world, but what else?
 
 00:15:21.571 --> 00:15:23.812
 You have all of these almosts and
 
 00:15:23.892 --> 00:15:26.611
 proposals and then great silences because
 
 00:15:26.631 --> 00:15:28.173
 we don't know what's being decided.
 
 00:15:28.942 --> 00:15:31.583
 among these delegates at these various
 
 00:15:31.644 --> 00:15:32.443
 conclaves.
 
 00:15:40.269 --> 00:15:42.830
 Here's the problem that the founders
 
 00:15:42.870 --> 00:15:43.311
 faced.
 
 00:15:44.099 --> 00:15:46.301
 And you can't be a presentist on this.
 
 00:15:46.660 --> 00:15:48.461
 I'm an opponent of presentism.
 
 00:15:48.501 --> 00:15:49.903
 I've offended a lot of people at the
 
 00:15:49.942 --> 00:15:52.784
 New York Times who apparently hate me on
 
 00:15:52.804 --> 00:15:54.166
 this.
 
 00:15:54.866 --> 00:15:57.288
 The job of a historian is to go
 
 00:15:57.328 --> 00:15:59.309
 back and recover the mentality of the
 
 00:15:59.350 --> 00:16:00.350
 people at the time.
 
 00:16:01.890 --> 00:16:05.912
 It would be like going to a group
 
 00:16:05.971 --> 00:16:08.232
 of people somewhere in the Caribbean and
 
 00:16:08.293 --> 00:16:10.852
 saying, have you never heard of Jesus?
 
 00:16:11.413 --> 00:16:15.455
 And this offends some people,
 
 00:16:15.575 --> 00:16:17.475
 some historians and apparently some people
 
 00:16:17.495 --> 00:16:18.495
 at the New York Times,
 
 00:16:20.076 --> 00:16:26.497
 and that we have to –
 
 00:16:21.596 --> 00:16:22.216
 Robert Underwood Jr.
 
 00:16:22.216 --> 00:16:25.576
 :
 
 00:16:22.255 --> 00:16:24.158
 begin it no judgment can be made until
 
 00:16:24.177 --> 00:16:27.440
 we recover their mentality and here's the
 
 00:16:27.480 --> 00:16:29.821
 way they saw it that's that makes it
 
 00:16:30.000 --> 00:16:32.623
 difficult to make anyway.
 
 00:16:32.763 --> 00:16:33.724
 Robert Underwood Jr.
 
 00:16:33.724 --> 00:16:35.664
 : The only way to end slavery.
 
 00:16:37.855 --> 00:16:41.317
 is to pass a constitution that grants the
 
 00:16:41.356 --> 00:16:43.136
 federal government the power to make
 
 00:16:43.376 --> 00:16:45.096
 domestic and foreign policy.
 
 00:16:45.618 --> 00:16:46.298
 In other words,
 
 00:16:46.697 --> 00:16:49.677
 the constitution needs to replace the
 
 00:16:49.778 --> 00:16:52.219
 Articles of Confederation in that regard.
 
 00:16:54.458 --> 00:16:55.058
 However,
 
 00:16:57.159 --> 00:17:01.581
 any attempt to end slavery during this
 
 00:17:01.620 --> 00:17:03.681
 subsequent debate in the Constitutional
 
 00:17:03.721 --> 00:17:04.240
 Convention,
 
 00:17:04.280 --> 00:17:05.642
 which I say we're going to stay away
 
 00:17:05.682 --> 00:17:06.902
 from it, but here we are with it.
 
 00:17:10.111 --> 00:17:13.992
 if you insisted on ending slavery,
 
 00:17:16.013 --> 00:17:18.115
 all the southern states would have left.
 
 00:17:20.936 --> 00:17:22.778
 By southern, I include Virginia,
 
 00:17:22.877 --> 00:17:25.338
 North and South Carolina, and Georgia.
 
 00:17:26.019 --> 00:17:28.381
 And that war, even if they didn't leave,
 
 00:17:28.421 --> 00:17:32.103
 it would have never been approved and
 
 00:17:33.644 --> 00:17:34.084
 vended.
 
 00:17:35.744 --> 00:17:37.086
 And so they face a dilemma.
 
 00:17:38.170 --> 00:17:39.871
 The only way to end slavery is to
 
 00:17:39.911 --> 00:17:43.231
 get a federal government empowered to end
 
 00:17:43.311 --> 00:17:45.853
 slavery and overrule the states.
 
 00:17:46.752 --> 00:17:48.094
 But if you do it,
 
 00:17:50.513 --> 00:17:51.694
 they would have just left,
 
 00:17:51.775 --> 00:17:55.056
 and then they wouldn't secede from the
 
 00:17:55.175 --> 00:17:56.817
 Union because it would just go back to
 
 00:17:56.936 --> 00:17:59.857
 being what it was under the Articles of
 
 00:17:59.938 --> 00:18:00.857
 Confederation.
 
 00:18:01.218 --> 00:18:03.318
 And so that's their dilemma.
 
 00:18:03.838 --> 00:18:05.660
 I think that's a genuine dilemma.
 
 00:18:05.680 --> 00:18:06.359
 It is.
 
 00:18:07.039 --> 00:18:09.402
 It's what means that while I said earlier,
 
 00:18:09.662 --> 00:18:11.803
 I think it's a Shakespearean tragedy,
 
 00:18:12.002 --> 00:18:16.885
 it could be regarded as something that
 
 00:18:17.066 --> 00:18:18.267
 couldn't have gone the other way.
 
 00:18:18.467 --> 00:18:20.468
 What they tried to do was defer it
 
 00:18:20.488 --> 00:18:22.309
 and say, we won't debate this.
 
 00:18:23.349 --> 00:18:27.592
 until the year that the slave trade was
 
 00:18:27.672 --> 00:18:30.073
 potentially going to end.
 
 00:18:30.113 --> 00:18:32.213
 That's what Washington thought it was.
 
 00:18:32.753 --> 00:18:34.374
 And he sat throughout the convention,
 
 00:18:34.413 --> 00:18:34.954
 of course.
 
 00:18:35.555 --> 00:18:39.596
 And he is the only prominent Virginia
 
 00:18:39.635 --> 00:18:42.917
 planner who freed his slaves in his will.
 
 00:18:45.959 --> 00:18:48.980
 And Washington's interesting in this
 
 00:18:49.039 --> 00:18:49.420
 regard,
 
 00:18:49.460 --> 00:18:50.980
 and I've written a whole book about him,
 
 00:18:54.019 --> 00:18:56.971
 Washington didn't believe in life after
 
 00:18:57.031 --> 00:18:57.353
 death.
 
 00:19:00.221 --> 00:19:01.282
 Neither did Jefferson.
 
 00:19:03.284 --> 00:19:05.505
 Adam said, I don't know, but who cares?
 
 00:19:05.545 --> 00:19:06.965
 Because if it's not there,
 
 00:19:06.986 --> 00:19:07.945
 we'll never know about it.
 
 00:19:08.945 --> 00:19:09.207
 He says,
 
 00:19:09.227 --> 00:19:10.767
 if there is a life after death and
 
 00:19:10.886 --> 00:19:11.488
 I go to heaven,
 
 00:19:11.887 --> 00:19:14.528
 my idea of heaven is making love with
 
 00:19:14.588 --> 00:19:16.910
 Abigail and arguing with Franklin.
 
 00:19:17.289 --> 00:19:18.810
 That's heaven.
 
 00:19:20.311 --> 00:19:21.853
 But Washington...
 
 00:19:22.913 --> 00:19:24.074
 believed that when he died,
 
 00:19:24.153 --> 00:19:25.674
 he was going what he called to the
 
 00:19:25.714 --> 00:19:27.176
 mansion of my fathers,
 
 00:19:28.136 --> 00:19:29.438
 meaning into the ground,
 
 00:19:30.699 --> 00:19:32.580
 the dark mansion of my fathers.
 
 00:19:33.060 --> 00:19:34.843
 But for Washington, therefore,
 
 00:19:34.883 --> 00:19:38.625
 the only form of immortality was to live
 
 00:19:38.746 --> 00:19:41.488
 on in the memory of future generations,
 
 00:19:42.509 --> 00:19:42.788
 us.
 
 00:19:44.450 --> 00:19:48.594
 And he knew that if slavery,
 
 00:19:49.094 --> 00:19:52.136
 if his head of his plantation
 
 00:19:53.286 --> 00:19:54.446
 was part of the story,
 
 00:19:54.527 --> 00:19:56.708
 he was going to suffer in that regard.
 
 00:19:57.489 --> 00:19:58.009
 And therefore,
 
 00:19:58.108 --> 00:20:02.132
 one of the things he did is he,
 
 00:20:02.532 --> 00:20:05.355
 unlike most people with big estates who
 
 00:20:05.394 --> 00:20:07.355
 could leave it on to the senior male
 
 00:20:07.395 --> 00:20:08.696
 so it can stay intact,
 
 00:20:09.076 --> 00:20:11.199
 he left it to seven different people so
 
 00:20:11.259 --> 00:20:12.118
 it would split.
 
 00:20:12.900 --> 00:20:15.801
 So there wouldn't be such a plantation in
 
 00:20:15.821 --> 00:20:16.382
 the future,
 
 00:20:16.623 --> 00:20:18.523
 because he thought it would associate him
 
 00:20:18.564 --> 00:20:19.324
 with slavery.
 
 00:20:19.704 --> 00:20:21.526
 He doesn't want us to honor him by
 
 00:20:21.865 --> 00:20:22.426
 going down
 
 00:20:23.828 --> 00:20:24.470
 Look at his plant.
 
 00:20:24.549 --> 00:20:26.511
 He wants us to go to the Washington
 
 00:20:26.551 --> 00:20:27.853
 Monument and look at it.
 
 00:20:28.153 --> 00:20:28.413
 By the way,
 
 00:20:28.433 --> 00:20:30.455
 it's the largest monument in Washington.
 
 00:20:30.516 --> 00:20:32.077
 It's the only one with no words on
 
 00:20:32.137 --> 00:20:34.800
 it.
 
 00:20:34.820 --> 00:20:36.462
 I'm talking too much, but you got it.
 
 00:20:36.482 --> 00:20:37.143
 No, you're doing fine.
 
 00:20:37.683 --> 00:20:38.924
 We're talking with Joe Ellis,
 
 00:20:38.984 --> 00:20:41.067
 whose new book is The Great Contradiction,
 
 00:20:41.087 --> 00:20:43.309
 The Tragic Side of the American Founding.
 
 00:20:44.021 --> 00:20:46.303
 following up a number of other books like
 
 00:20:46.643 --> 00:20:48.423
 founding brothers the revolutionary
 
 00:20:48.463 --> 00:20:50.723
 generation which earned the pulitzer prize
 
 00:20:50.763 --> 00:20:53.404
 and passionate sage about john adams in
 
 00:20:53.444 --> 00:20:55.905
 retirement american sphinx on thomas
 
 00:20:55.945 --> 00:20:58.547
 jefferson and his excellency about general
 
 00:20:58.567 --> 00:21:00.428
 washington as well as others and this is
 
 00:21:00.448 --> 00:21:06.029
 a and um talking about this um the
 
 00:21:06.089 --> 00:21:07.170
 tragic side of this
 
 00:21:10.215 --> 00:21:13.179
 tragedy right the the chapter on
 
 00:21:13.239 --> 00:21:15.080
 washington is really quite profound
 
 00:21:15.121 --> 00:21:17.384
 because he is letting his estate crumble
 
 00:21:17.403 --> 00:21:19.286
 thinking this isn't the important thing at
 
 00:21:19.306 --> 00:21:21.989
 the same time he has um houdon coming
 
 00:21:22.028 --> 00:21:25.413
 and making his um you know his statue
 
 00:21:25.432 --> 00:21:27.214
 the paintings and so on but he it
 
 00:21:27.234 --> 00:21:28.957
 seems like he's ending his life with deep
 
 00:21:28.997 --> 00:21:30.979
 regrets about things the things he has not
 
 00:21:31.019 --> 00:21:31.680
 accomplished
 
 00:21:32.405 --> 00:21:33.105
 Right.
 
 00:21:33.145 --> 00:21:36.788
 He regrets the fact that he maintained
 
 00:21:36.847 --> 00:21:37.968
 slavery for many years.
 
 00:21:37.988 --> 00:21:43.009
 And I think he owned over two hundred
 
 00:21:43.069 --> 00:21:45.671
 slaves, although he didn't own them all.
 
 00:21:45.931 --> 00:21:47.611
 Martha owned more than half of them.
 
 00:21:47.631 --> 00:21:49.112
 And that was one of the problems he
 
 00:21:49.172 --> 00:21:51.472
 had because he refused to separate
 
 00:21:51.553 --> 00:21:52.212
 families.
 
 00:21:53.292 --> 00:21:55.335
 And if he freed his slaves,
 
 00:21:55.955 --> 00:21:57.257
 they were all intermarried.
 
 00:22:00.338 --> 00:22:01.359
 He's not perfect.
 
 00:22:03.642 --> 00:22:07.744
 He's late to the game on this issue.
 
 00:22:07.825 --> 00:22:08.905
 Nobody's perfect.
 
 00:22:09.886 --> 00:22:12.568
 But if you're looking in the context of
 
 00:22:12.628 --> 00:22:15.672
 that time, he is the leader to me.
 
 00:22:17.284 --> 00:22:20.244
 who passes the test more readily on the
 
 00:22:20.285 --> 00:22:25.227
 slavery issue than any other southerner.
 
 00:22:28.268 --> 00:22:31.409
 And I think that the people that don't
 
 00:22:31.449 --> 00:22:34.809
 look so good in retrospect among,
 
 00:22:35.230 --> 00:22:38.411
 let's say the big founders are Washington,
 
 00:22:38.891 --> 00:22:44.073
 Franklin, Jefferson, Adams, Madison.
 
 00:22:45.173 --> 00:22:45.973
 Those are the biggies.
 
 00:22:48.479 --> 00:22:51.861
 The two that don't look so good are
 
 00:22:51.921 --> 00:22:53.280
 Jefferson and Madison.
 
 00:22:56.221 --> 00:22:59.844
 Adams is confusing because he doesn't want
 
 00:22:59.864 --> 00:23:01.664
 the issue of slavery to be raised at
 
 00:23:01.765 --> 00:23:04.566
 all because it's going to undo the whole
 
 00:23:05.926 --> 00:23:06.826
 thing.
 
 00:23:10.184 --> 00:23:11.286
 Because of Abigail.
 
 00:23:14.606 --> 00:23:14.846
 You know,
 
 00:23:14.866 --> 00:23:17.689
 like Abigail writes a letter in April of
 
 00:23:17.749 --> 00:23:18.648
 seventy six.
 
 00:23:19.789 --> 00:23:21.510
 It begins, by the way,
 
 00:23:22.250 --> 00:23:23.151
 I always tell my students,
 
 00:23:23.191 --> 00:23:24.751
 whenever you get a letter that begins,
 
 00:23:24.811 --> 00:23:26.853
 by the way, look out, baby,
 
 00:23:27.012 --> 00:23:28.453
 it's coming at you right now.
 
 00:23:29.354 --> 00:23:31.494
 And what she says is that.
 
 00:23:32.796 --> 00:23:34.737
 The argument that you've been hurling at
 
 00:23:34.777 --> 00:23:37.999
 George the third have clear implications
 
 00:23:38.038 --> 00:23:38.519
 for women.
 
 00:23:40.256 --> 00:23:42.596
 And she's not just saying women have the
 
 00:23:42.656 --> 00:23:43.518
 right to vote.
 
 00:23:45.398 --> 00:23:47.180
 And she's a feminist before the word
 
 00:23:47.220 --> 00:23:48.621
 feminism exists.
 
 00:23:49.461 --> 00:23:52.502
 But she also is against male supremacy.
 
 00:23:54.023 --> 00:23:54.964
 what's the word for that?
 
 00:23:55.065 --> 00:23:55.505
 Path?
 
 00:23:55.525 --> 00:23:57.625
 Patriarchy.
 
 00:23:57.665 --> 00:23:58.425
 Patriarchy.
 
 00:23:58.465 --> 00:23:58.945
 Thank you.
 
 00:24:00.487 --> 00:24:05.608
 And she says, and he says, oh,
 
 00:24:05.648 --> 00:24:06.548
 you must be kidding.
 
 00:24:06.588 --> 00:24:07.750
 And she says, I'm not kidding.
 
 00:24:08.569 --> 00:24:12.251
 I'm going to the government tomorrow in
 
 00:24:12.531 --> 00:24:14.211
 Boston and tell them I'm being taxed
 
 00:24:14.251 --> 00:24:15.272
 without my consent.
 
 00:24:16.153 --> 00:24:19.574
 And she has a huge influence on him.
 
 00:24:19.875 --> 00:24:19.994
 And
 
 00:24:23.615 --> 00:24:24.477
 I mean,
 
 00:24:24.497 --> 00:24:28.480
 if there ever is an Adams monument on
 
 00:24:28.500 --> 00:24:30.781
 the Mall, and there isn't one now,
 
 00:24:30.902 --> 00:24:31.663
 interestingly,
 
 00:24:31.903 --> 00:24:33.865
 because he doesn't fit the mythical
 
 00:24:34.726 --> 00:24:35.365
 requirement.
 
 00:24:35.445 --> 00:24:39.569
 He's too obviously a perfect human being.
 
 00:24:40.510 --> 00:24:41.811
 But I think that it ought to be
 
 00:24:41.892 --> 00:24:44.894
 done with Abigail right there along with
 
 00:24:44.933 --> 00:24:45.134
 him.
 
 00:24:45.414 --> 00:24:47.757
 And I at some point said that it
 
 00:24:47.777 --> 00:24:48.557
 should be placed
 
 00:24:49.337 --> 00:24:52.461
 on the tidal basin close to the Jefferson
 
 00:24:52.480 --> 00:24:54.362
 Memorial so that they can take turns
 
 00:24:54.422 --> 00:24:56.644
 casting shadows over each other's facades.
 
 00:24:56.703 --> 00:24:57.104
 That's fantastic.
 
 00:24:58.826 --> 00:24:59.346
 But nobody,
 
 00:24:59.945 --> 00:25:02.268
 I met with the Congress to talk about
 
 00:25:02.307 --> 00:25:03.429
 this ten years ago.
 
 00:25:05.171 --> 00:25:06.832
 They were considering a monument and that
 
 00:25:07.092 --> 00:25:07.813
 never happened.
 
 00:25:08.272 --> 00:25:08.712
 Well,
 
 00:25:08.772 --> 00:25:10.714
 there is a commission working on this now.
 
 00:25:10.815 --> 00:25:11.816
 They want a monument.
 
 00:25:11.875 --> 00:25:12.036
 Yeah.
 
 00:25:12.717 --> 00:25:14.137
 To John and Abigail,
 
 00:25:14.198 --> 00:25:16.020
 as well as John Quincy and Louisa
 
 00:25:16.060 --> 00:25:16.681
 Catherine.
 
 00:25:16.760 --> 00:25:18.884
 So they want to include both of their
 
 00:25:19.403 --> 00:25:19.724
 wives,
 
 00:25:19.744 --> 00:25:22.887
 who did have a big influence on them.
 
 00:25:23.548 --> 00:25:23.970
 Oh, yeah.
 
 00:25:24.369 --> 00:25:25.791
 I didn't know what you just told me.
 
 00:25:25.852 --> 00:25:26.873
 I'm pleased to hear that.
 
 00:25:27.232 --> 00:25:28.914
 Yeah, yeah.
 
 00:25:28.994 --> 00:25:29.516
 Yeah, so I'll
 
 00:25:30.346 --> 00:25:31.547
 connect you with them because they're
 
 00:25:31.586 --> 00:25:33.887
 really interested in moving this forward.
 
 00:25:33.928 --> 00:25:35.107
 And there's also, by the way,
 
 00:25:35.147 --> 00:25:37.509
 an Adams Presidential Center in Quincy,
 
 00:25:37.548 --> 00:25:38.509
 Massachusetts, you know,
 
 00:25:38.529 --> 00:25:40.470
 the birthplaces that's focusing on.
 
 00:25:41.010 --> 00:25:41.611
 Right.
 
 00:25:41.651 --> 00:25:42.371
 That I knew about.
 
 00:25:42.431 --> 00:25:42.691
 Yeah.
 
 00:25:43.332 --> 00:25:44.531
 I used to take a lot of students
 
 00:25:44.571 --> 00:25:45.172
 to Quincy.
 
 00:25:45.352 --> 00:25:49.874
 And Adams is my favorite founder because
 
 00:25:50.474 --> 00:25:51.555
 he's the one I want to have a
 
 00:25:51.615 --> 00:25:52.174
 beer with.
 
 00:25:52.595 --> 00:25:52.855
 Yeah.
 
 00:25:52.915 --> 00:25:53.316
 Yeah.
 
 00:25:53.355 --> 00:25:54.256
 He's the guy.
 
 00:25:54.756 --> 00:25:55.916
 He would tell you the truth.
 
 00:25:56.557 --> 00:25:57.938
 Yeah, he would.
 
 00:25:58.038 --> 00:25:59.239
 Your book, Passionate Sage,
 
 00:25:59.298 --> 00:26:01.941
 is probably the best book on John Adams
 
 00:26:01.980 --> 00:26:04.461
 because it does capture his personality,
 
 00:26:04.481 --> 00:26:05.202
 his character,
 
 00:26:05.242 --> 00:26:07.144
 even though it's about his retirement
 
 00:26:07.203 --> 00:26:09.404
 years when he's looking back at all of
 
 00:26:09.444 --> 00:26:10.145
 this.
 
 00:26:10.205 --> 00:26:12.626
 Right.
 
 00:26:12.707 --> 00:26:13.307
 As I say,
 
 00:26:13.667 --> 00:26:16.210
 I'm familiar with imperfection in my own
 
 00:26:16.250 --> 00:26:16.569
 life.
 
 00:26:17.390 --> 00:26:19.191
 Therefore, I like people who are like me.
 
 00:26:19.211 --> 00:26:20.913
 Right, right.
 
 00:26:21.833 --> 00:26:23.095
 We're talking with Joe Ellis,
 
 00:26:23.195 --> 00:26:24.678
 whose latest book is The Great
 
 00:26:24.698 --> 00:26:25.479
 Contradiction,
 
 00:26:25.519 --> 00:26:27.742
 The Tragic Side of the American Founding,
 
 00:26:28.324 --> 00:26:30.027
 as well as about a dozen other books
 
 00:26:30.086 --> 00:26:33.011
 about the founding period.
 
 00:26:33.031 --> 00:26:35.214
 You have one chapter in the book called
 
 00:26:35.375 --> 00:26:36.356
 Unpainted Pictures.
 
 00:26:39.465 --> 00:26:41.807
 because so much of this period exists
 
 00:26:41.827 --> 00:26:43.669
 through these great paintings,
 
 00:26:43.709 --> 00:26:46.711
 but then you have other stories and images
 
 00:26:46.750 --> 00:26:49.492
 that it's harder to capture.
 
 00:26:49.512 --> 00:26:50.054
 Right.
 
 00:26:52.174 --> 00:26:54.777
 Most of the artists who painted during the
 
 00:26:54.817 --> 00:26:58.519
 Revolution paint very glorified versions
 
 00:26:58.599 --> 00:27:01.582
 of reality and in that sense presented a
 
 00:27:01.622 --> 00:27:03.824
 major problem for Ken Burns.
 
 00:27:03.943 --> 00:27:04.084
 Mm-hmm.
 
 00:27:04.604 --> 00:27:06.546
 And there's no Matthew Brady photographs
 
 00:27:06.566 --> 00:27:08.387
 that there were for his West Point series.
 
 00:27:08.769 --> 00:27:10.651
 But his staff did a remarkable job of
 
 00:27:10.711 --> 00:27:12.031
 coming up with paintings,
 
 00:27:12.112 --> 00:27:13.573
 mostly from the nineteenth and early
 
 00:27:13.613 --> 00:27:15.875
 twentieth century that did things.
 
 00:27:15.955 --> 00:27:19.038
 But that when I was raising the question
 
 00:27:19.058 --> 00:27:20.400
 of unpainted pictures,
 
 00:27:20.519 --> 00:27:23.143
 I was thinking on the race issue,
 
 00:27:23.202 --> 00:27:28.048
 especially that this that these
 
 00:27:30.296 --> 00:27:34.498
 slaves that attempt to escape and flee to
 
 00:27:36.259 --> 00:27:36.939
 this island.
 
 00:27:38.660 --> 00:27:42.241
 And they don't have any, well,
 
 00:27:42.402 --> 00:27:44.242
 half of them die of smallpox.
 
 00:27:44.303 --> 00:27:46.304
 Over a thousand die of smallpox.
 
 00:27:46.364 --> 00:27:48.704
 And so the picture of all these dead
 
 00:27:51.446 --> 00:27:55.230
 former slaves who were seeking freedom
 
 00:27:55.931 --> 00:27:59.954
 gives you a measure of how, well,
 
 00:27:59.994 --> 00:28:00.474
 first of all,
 
 00:28:00.515 --> 00:28:03.498
 how the weapons of mass destruction in the
 
 00:28:03.577 --> 00:28:07.561
 eighteenth century were viruses.
 
 00:28:08.923 --> 00:28:11.826
 And then there's a picture at Yorktown
 
 00:28:11.905 --> 00:28:12.046
 when
 
 00:28:16.868 --> 00:28:19.750
 who is charging the last redoubt.
 
 00:28:21.371 --> 00:28:29.593
 And he's lifted up by a black soldier
 
 00:28:29.813 --> 00:28:33.013
 that's with him.
 
 00:28:34.434 --> 00:28:37.996
 And the Continental Army is integrated.
 
 00:28:39.817 --> 00:28:41.940
 And there were over a thousand or twelve
 
 00:28:41.961 --> 00:28:44.463
 hundred at the last battle.
 
 00:28:44.483 --> 00:28:47.247
 There were a hundred at the first battle
 
 00:28:47.527 --> 00:28:49.088
 at Bunker Hill.
 
 00:28:50.030 --> 00:28:52.493
 And so that the next time that the
 
 00:28:52.534 --> 00:28:53.375
 American army
 
 00:28:55.106 --> 00:28:58.409
 is going to be integrated racially is the
 
 00:28:58.429 --> 00:28:59.269
 Korean War.
 
 00:29:00.490 --> 00:29:03.310
 Blacks served in World War I and World
 
 00:29:03.330 --> 00:29:04.652
 War II, to be sure,
 
 00:29:05.393 --> 00:29:07.554
 but they all served in segregated units.
 
 00:29:09.153 --> 00:29:11.375
 Truman changed that in, uh, in, uh, in,
 
 00:29:11.655 --> 00:29:12.336
 uh, in, uh, in, uh, in, uh, in,
 
 00:29:12.355 --> 00:29:13.696
 uh, in, uh, in, uh, in, uh, in,
 
 00:29:13.717 --> 00:29:14.196
 uh, in, uh, in, uh, in, uh, in,
 
 00:29:14.217 --> 00:29:14.676
 uh, in, uh, in, uh, in, uh, in,
 
 00:29:14.696 --> 00:29:15.157
 uh, in, uh, in, uh, in, uh, in,
 
 00:29:15.178 --> 00:29:15.698
 uh, in, uh, in, uh, in, uh, in,
 
 00:29:15.718 --> 00:29:16.337
 uh, in, uh, in, uh, in, uh, in,
 
 00:29:16.357 --> 00:29:17.499
 uh, in, uh, in, uh, in, uh, in,
 
 00:29:17.519 --> 00:29:18.058
 uh, in, uh, in, uh, in, uh, in,
 
 00:29:18.078 --> 00:29:18.618
 uh, in, uh, in, uh, in, uh, in,
 
 00:29:18.638 --> 00:29:19.079
 uh, in, uh, in, uh, in, uh,
 
 00:29:19.099 --> 00:29:19.140
 in
 
 00:29:20.825 --> 00:29:27.109
 Another indication that the race issue was
 
 00:29:27.410 --> 00:29:29.111
 something that was on their minds.
 
 00:29:29.611 --> 00:29:31.251
 Washington was slow to this.
 
 00:29:32.012 --> 00:29:33.374
 He had to be persuaded.
 
 00:29:34.034 --> 00:29:37.717
 But the most effective combat unit was a
 
 00:29:37.777 --> 00:29:42.400
 predominantly black unit that changed his
 
 00:29:42.460 --> 00:29:45.622
 mind to a great extent about bringing in
 
 00:29:45.662 --> 00:29:46.501
 black soldiers.
 
 00:29:46.642 --> 00:29:46.701
 Hmm.
 
 00:29:48.696 --> 00:29:50.818
 So he is someone whose mind could change,
 
 00:29:51.819 --> 00:29:52.059
 Washington.
 
 00:29:52.119 --> 00:29:52.961
 Yeah, yeah.
 
 00:29:54.821 --> 00:29:56.203
 And he had around him, you know,
 
 00:29:56.384 --> 00:30:00.948
 in his aides, people, you know,
 
 00:30:01.008 --> 00:30:06.011
 Lafayette was in this crew and who were
 
 00:30:06.092 --> 00:30:08.653
 all in favor of, you know,
 
 00:30:08.733 --> 00:30:09.894
 abolition of slavery.
 
 00:30:11.096 --> 00:30:12.798
 And I think he had never traveled in
 
 00:30:12.817 --> 00:30:13.778
 the North before.
 
 00:30:15.220 --> 00:30:16.441
 And he saw a different world.
 
 00:30:16.461 --> 00:30:18.481
 So the war itself was a conversion
 
 00:30:18.542 --> 00:30:21.125
 experience for Washington on the race and
 
 00:30:21.184 --> 00:30:22.365
 slavery issue.
 
 00:30:23.807 --> 00:30:24.707
 Yeah.
 
 00:30:24.727 --> 00:30:28.670
 So he also changed, well,
 
 00:30:29.290 --> 00:30:31.311
 he and Jefferson really are kind of polars
 
 00:30:31.432 --> 00:30:32.012
 in this.
 
 00:30:32.073 --> 00:30:33.594
 Yeah, they are.
 
 00:30:33.614 --> 00:30:35.695
 In many ways.
 
 00:30:35.715 --> 00:30:36.997
 Well, later in his life,
 
 00:30:37.517 --> 00:30:38.377
 when he's president,
 
 00:30:41.817 --> 00:30:44.179
 let's say,
 
 00:30:44.219 --> 00:30:45.940
 Jefferson doesn't come at you from the
 
 00:30:45.980 --> 00:30:47.039
 front with a saber.
 
 00:30:47.059 --> 00:30:48.820
 He comes at you from behind with a
 
 00:30:48.861 --> 00:30:49.201
 knife.
 
 00:30:50.661 --> 00:30:54.282
 And he was Secretary of State at the
 
 00:30:54.343 --> 00:30:56.503
 time in the cabinet.
 
 00:30:56.584 --> 00:31:00.884
 And he spread the word that Washington was
 
 00:31:00.944 --> 00:31:02.885
 senile.
 
 00:31:02.905 --> 00:31:04.527
 Don't pay any attention to what he's
 
 00:31:04.567 --> 00:31:05.946
 telling you over there in France.
 
 00:31:08.307 --> 00:31:10.169
 And Washington didn't hear about this for
 
 00:31:10.209 --> 00:31:10.749
 a while.
 
 00:31:12.414 --> 00:31:14.555
 And when he did, he told Martha,
 
 00:31:14.855 --> 00:31:18.096
 he said, after I die,
 
 00:31:18.596 --> 00:31:20.635
 don't ever let that man step onto our
 
 00:31:20.695 --> 00:31:21.175
 property.
 
 00:31:21.656 --> 00:31:22.497
 That was Jefferson.
 
 00:31:23.557 --> 00:31:25.376
 And later, Jefferson,
 
 00:31:25.457 --> 00:31:26.757
 when he's elected president,
 
 00:31:26.777 --> 00:31:28.778
 he's only ten miles away from Mount
 
 00:31:28.817 --> 00:31:30.758
 Vernon, and he has to come,
 
 00:31:30.778 --> 00:31:32.458
 and she sort of has to let him
 
 00:31:32.498 --> 00:31:32.738
 come,
 
 00:31:32.778 --> 00:31:34.098
 and she says it was the worst day
 
 00:31:34.138 --> 00:31:34.838
 of her life.
 
 00:31:35.898 --> 00:31:38.159
 But again,
 
 00:31:38.818 --> 00:31:40.380
 I'm not in favor of tearing down the
 
 00:31:40.420 --> 00:31:41.480
 Jefferson Memorial.
 
 00:31:43.382 --> 00:31:45.202
 Maybe putting some things in there that
 
 00:31:45.624 --> 00:31:47.404
 are quotations that aren't the most
 
 00:31:47.545 --> 00:31:48.105
 uplifting.
 
 00:31:48.484 --> 00:31:48.905
 Yes.
 
 00:31:49.526 --> 00:31:51.988
 But he did write the most important words
 
 00:31:52.028 --> 00:31:52.988
 in American history.
 
 00:31:54.849 --> 00:31:57.111
 You said some years ago that over the
 
 00:31:57.151 --> 00:31:58.632
 course of American history,
 
 00:31:59.152 --> 00:32:01.114
 no one who has bet against Thomas
 
 00:32:01.153 --> 00:32:02.515
 Jefferson has won.
 
 00:32:03.375 --> 00:32:05.137
 It's a really interesting way of looking
 
 00:32:05.178 --> 00:32:06.380
 at it because he has all of this
 
 00:32:06.460 --> 00:32:07.040
 baggage,
 
 00:32:07.060 --> 00:32:10.266
 but then he also has that uplifting idea.
 
 00:32:10.425 --> 00:32:10.967
 He does.
 
 00:32:11.366 --> 00:32:11.827
 He does.
 
 00:32:13.170 --> 00:32:15.874
 He's the most, I think, you know,
 
 00:32:16.414 --> 00:32:17.997
 Washington is the greatest leader ever.
 
 00:32:20.092 --> 00:32:22.012
 Franklin's the wisest.
 
 00:32:23.054 --> 00:32:25.316
 Jefferson is the most intellectually
 
 00:32:25.355 --> 00:32:26.237
 sophisticated.
 
 00:32:29.519 --> 00:32:31.721
 His way with words rival those of Lincoln.
 
 00:32:34.124 --> 00:32:34.344
 So
 
 00:32:35.384 --> 00:32:35.765
 Okay,
 
 00:32:35.924 --> 00:32:37.205
 I went to William & Mary where he
 
 00:32:37.246 --> 00:32:37.385
 went.
 
 00:32:38.185 --> 00:32:39.186
 By the way, UVA,
 
 00:32:39.227 --> 00:32:40.988
 which he created because he no longer
 
 00:32:41.028 --> 00:32:42.669
 thought William & Mary was that good.
 
 00:32:44.348 --> 00:32:47.111
 But not that well, thirty years ago,
 
 00:32:47.651 --> 00:32:52.113
 UVA gave a statue of Jefferson to William
 
 00:32:52.113 --> 00:32:53.354
 & Mary and they planted it in a
 
 00:32:53.394 --> 00:32:54.855
 place and I went down and watched it.
 
 00:32:55.474 --> 00:32:57.135
 And it's in a location where they have
 
 00:32:57.675 --> 00:32:59.356
 Jefferson looking at a woman's dorm.
 
 00:33:01.479 --> 00:33:01.939
 And I said, well,
 
 00:33:01.959 --> 00:33:05.282
 that might be appropriate.
 
 00:33:05.343 --> 00:33:08.686
 But Jefferson could pass a lie detector
 
 00:33:08.727 --> 00:33:10.028
 test on things.
 
 00:33:10.107 --> 00:33:14.212
 And, like, you know, he opposed...
 
 00:33:15.374 --> 00:33:17.875
 What he said was, I'm opposed to slavery,
 
 00:33:18.275 --> 00:33:20.615
 but that we can only end slavery after
 
 00:33:20.655 --> 00:33:22.615
 we have removed the freed slaves to
 
 00:33:22.675 --> 00:33:25.896
 another location outside Virginia or the
 
 00:33:25.977 --> 00:33:27.357
 United States altogether.
 
 00:33:27.837 --> 00:33:29.378
 Because if we don't do that,
 
 00:33:29.419 --> 00:33:33.140
 they will intermix and it will corrupt the
 
 00:33:33.200 --> 00:33:35.059
 pure Anglo-Saxon race.
 
 00:33:35.681 --> 00:33:39.481
 Well, his plantation...
 
 00:33:40.851 --> 00:33:44.192
 is a laboratory of racial mixing.
 
 00:33:45.152 --> 00:33:47.232
 And he's fathered at least four children
 
 00:33:48.053 --> 00:33:50.153
 of his own who are mixed race children.
 
 00:33:51.314 --> 00:33:56.036
 And it's almost like if you could question
 
 00:33:56.076 --> 00:33:58.576
 him on this, he would say, oh, yeah.
 
 00:33:59.196 --> 00:34:04.877
 And he's very difficult to pin down.
 
 00:34:04.917 --> 00:34:05.238
 Yeah, he is.
 
 00:34:07.585 --> 00:34:09.606
 is you have the account of Lafayette's
 
 00:34:09.686 --> 00:34:12.047
 visit in the .
 
 00:34:11.668 --> 00:34:14.028
 Lafayette wants to raise the issue of
 
 00:34:14.068 --> 00:34:14.610
 slavery,
 
 00:34:14.650 --> 00:34:16.411
 and Jefferson will point out the
 
 00:34:16.451 --> 00:34:20.114
 architecture of UVA and other ways of not
 
 00:34:20.414 --> 00:34:21.835
 engaging with this subject,
 
 00:34:21.855 --> 00:34:23.255
 which is I could see you have read
 
 00:34:23.315 --> 00:34:24.036
 my book, man.
 
 00:34:24.056 --> 00:34:26.038
 That makes me happy as the deck that's
 
 00:34:26.097 --> 00:34:26.438
 in there.
 
 00:34:26.498 --> 00:34:27.398
 Yeah, yeah.
 
 00:34:27.679 --> 00:34:31.121
 And he has a way of making you
 
 00:34:31.141 --> 00:34:32.681
 feel if you raise those questions,
 
 00:34:33.503 --> 00:34:34.443
 it's inappropriate.
 
 00:34:37.525 --> 00:34:41.789
 Let's talk about the architecture of UVA
 
 00:34:41.829 --> 00:34:43.050
 and that kind of thing.
 
 00:34:43.130 --> 00:34:44.251
 He's very good at that.
 
 00:34:47.155 --> 00:34:52.400
 But I still think you got to take
 
 00:34:52.440 --> 00:34:56.943
 him into account and that, well,
 
 00:34:56.963 --> 00:34:57.985
 I'll go on any further,
 
 00:34:58.065 --> 00:35:00.927
 but among the Virginians,
 
 00:35:01.929 --> 00:35:04.931
 uh he i think every there's morning joe
 
 00:35:05.050 --> 00:35:06.592
 the guy morning joe always says you know
 
 00:35:06.612 --> 00:35:09.835
 he's a big favor of uh madison and
 
 00:35:10.014 --> 00:35:12.036
 um and i if i were got on
 
 00:35:12.056 --> 00:35:13.737
 the program i would say well which madison
 
 00:35:13.757 --> 00:35:16.960
 are you talking about madison changes
 
 00:35:16.980 --> 00:35:18.840
 madison in the seventies and eighties is
 
 00:35:18.920 --> 00:35:21.302
 extraordinarily admirable but he shifts
 
 00:35:22.063 --> 00:35:24.425
 He becomes a Virginian and not an American
 
 00:35:24.505 --> 00:35:27.250
 in the seventeen nineties and very
 
 00:35:27.289 --> 00:35:28.851
 pro-slavery by that time.
 
 00:35:31.795 --> 00:35:32.597
 But at any rate,
 
 00:35:35.079 --> 00:35:37.963
 the fact is this collection of people we
 
 00:35:37.983 --> 00:35:38.824
 call the founders,
 
 00:35:40.496 --> 00:35:43.518
 remains the most impressive collection of
 
 00:35:43.579 --> 00:35:44.719
 people we've ever had.
 
 00:35:45.280 --> 00:35:47.202
 They did two things that are
 
 00:35:47.242 --> 00:35:48.003
 extraordinary.
 
 00:35:48.483 --> 00:35:50.505
 They won a successful war for independence
 
 00:35:50.545 --> 00:35:52.387
 against the dominant military power in the
 
 00:35:52.427 --> 00:35:53.949
 world that had never lost a war.
 
 00:35:55.777 --> 00:35:59.199
 And secondly, they created a nation state,
 
 00:35:59.219 --> 00:36:05.742
 a republic that set the form for Western
 
 00:36:05.782 --> 00:36:07.382
 politics for the next century.
 
 00:36:09.423 --> 00:36:14.365
 And then they led the way in rescuing
 
 00:36:14.405 --> 00:36:17.547
 us from the dictatorships of Japan and
 
 00:36:17.606 --> 00:36:18.007
 Germany.
 
 00:36:18.967 --> 00:36:24.731
 And so it's fashionable in circles in
 
 00:36:24.791 --> 00:36:26.893
 certain areas of the profession to demean
 
 00:36:26.913 --> 00:36:28.253
 them.
 
 00:36:29.534 --> 00:36:31.295
 And I'm saying no.
 
 00:36:33.456 --> 00:36:34.978
 If you're looking for perfection,
 
 00:36:35.557 --> 00:36:38.619
 you need to go to another planet.
 
 00:36:38.659 --> 00:36:40.521
 But they're the best we've ever had.
 
 00:36:43.666 --> 00:36:44.166
 This is, I mean,
 
 00:36:44.266 --> 00:36:46.548
 it's an interesting point because we've
 
 00:36:46.588 --> 00:36:49.952
 seen revolutions in our lifetimes and it
 
 00:36:49.992 --> 00:36:51.672
 seems it's going to be impossible to get
 
 00:36:51.713 --> 00:36:53.135
 rid of the bad old regime,
 
 00:36:53.155 --> 00:36:54.755
 but then what's much more difficult is
 
 00:36:54.815 --> 00:36:56.557
 creating one that's not worse.
 
 00:36:56.657 --> 00:36:59.079
 And this group is able to do that.
 
 00:36:59.940 --> 00:37:02.684
 The system they create does allow us to
 
 00:37:02.704 --> 00:37:04.724
 do all of these other things and allow
 
 00:37:04.764 --> 00:37:06.547
 us then to look at their imperfections.
 
 00:37:09.989 --> 00:37:11.672
 I'm just saying that the achievements are
 
 00:37:11.711 --> 00:37:12.293
 incredible.
 
 00:37:12.873 --> 00:37:14.516
 And part of it is because they came
 
 00:37:14.556 --> 00:37:16.518
 at the beginning and they had the
 
 00:37:16.579 --> 00:37:18.320
 opportunity to do that.
 
 00:37:18.400 --> 00:37:20.264
 But as I said earlier,
 
 00:37:21.451 --> 00:37:22.451
 From their point of view,
 
 00:37:22.490 --> 00:37:24.052
 they were risking everything.
 
 00:37:24.391 --> 00:37:27.992
 And the Burns film is good at recovering
 
 00:37:28.532 --> 00:37:33.514
 some of that and how horrible it is
 
 00:37:33.574 --> 00:37:36.436
 to be a fighter and stand there while
 
 00:37:36.456 --> 00:37:38.096
 the man next to you is decapitated or
 
 00:37:38.115 --> 00:37:41.416
 disemboweled and recovering what war in
 
 00:37:41.436 --> 00:37:43.538
 the eighteenth century really felt like.
 
 00:37:44.338 --> 00:37:45.597
 I think it's very good at that.
 
 00:37:46.219 --> 00:37:47.259
 What it doesn't do,
 
 00:37:47.318 --> 00:37:49.000
 because you can't take a picture of an
 
 00:37:49.119 --> 00:37:49.559
 idea,
 
 00:37:50.639 --> 00:37:53.661
 What it doesn't do is the question of
 
 00:37:53.780 --> 00:37:54.961
 why is it a revolution.
 
 00:37:55.181 --> 00:37:57.503
 It doesn't attempt to do that.
 
 00:37:59.083 --> 00:38:00.844
 I'm in it, not in a big way,
 
 00:38:01.324 --> 00:38:03.824
 but I do encourage anybody who hasn't seen
 
 00:38:03.864 --> 00:38:04.405
 it to see it.
 
 00:38:04.445 --> 00:38:05.525
 It's very much worth it.
 
 00:38:05.545 --> 00:38:05.905
 Good.
 
 00:38:05.965 --> 00:38:06.806
 Good.
 
 00:38:06.847 --> 00:38:07.266
 Thank you.
 
 00:38:08.067 --> 00:38:08.266
 Thank you.
 
 00:38:08.286 --> 00:38:09.568
 We're talking with Joe Ellis,
 
 00:38:09.588 --> 00:38:10.907
 whose latest book is The Great
 
 00:38:10.947 --> 00:38:11.688
 Contradiction,
 
 00:38:11.748 --> 00:38:13.768
 The Tragic Side of the American Founding.
 
 00:38:14.269 --> 00:38:15.650
 We could probably go on talking all day
 
 00:38:15.690 --> 00:38:16.289
 about this.
 
 00:38:16.309 --> 00:38:17.650
 I know
 
 00:38:21.701 --> 00:38:24.003
 let you go.
 
 00:38:24.023 --> 00:38:24.925
 Yes, I do.
 
 00:38:25.204 --> 00:38:30.230
 One final thing that it's a rich irony
 
 00:38:30.269 --> 00:38:32.193
 that in the year that we're going to
 
 00:38:32.233 --> 00:38:33.994
 celebrate the two hundred fiftieth of
 
 00:38:34.034 --> 00:38:35.956
 American independence.
 
 00:38:37.440 --> 00:38:40.282
 The occupant of the White House regards
 
 00:38:40.302 --> 00:38:42.143
 himself as the second coming of George
 
 00:38:42.304 --> 00:38:42.664
 III.
 
 00:38:43.846 --> 00:38:45.706
 Now, if you said to Donald Trump,
 
 00:38:45.726 --> 00:38:46.568
 who is George III,
 
 00:38:46.608 --> 00:38:48.329
 he wouldn't know who you were talking
 
 00:38:48.369 --> 00:38:48.668
 about.
 
 00:38:48.829 --> 00:38:51.471
 But I'm saying that in this sense,
 
 00:38:51.550 --> 00:38:54.554
 that group of youngsters who has formed
 
 00:38:54.594 --> 00:38:55.914
 something called No King,
 
 00:38:57.175 --> 00:38:59.637
 and there's millions of people supporting
 
 00:38:59.677 --> 00:38:59.777
 this,
 
 00:39:01.242 --> 00:39:05.242
 uh they know their history um and in
 
 00:39:05.302 --> 00:39:08.465
 fact in these upcoming elections these
 
 00:39:08.704 --> 00:39:11.626
 midterm elections we always say you know
 
 00:39:11.746 --> 00:39:14.106
 it's the economy stupid it's the cost of
 
 00:39:14.226 --> 00:39:18.367
 eggs well yeah but if the republic is
 
 00:39:18.467 --> 00:39:22.128
 on the ballot do we wish to remain
 
 00:39:22.228 --> 00:39:25.150
 a republic is on the ballot
 
 00:39:26.827 --> 00:39:30.367
 And the answer to that question from my
 
 00:39:30.407 --> 00:39:32.449
 point of view is obviously yes,
 
 00:39:32.668 --> 00:39:33.568
 of course it is.
 
 00:39:34.550 --> 00:39:37.070
 But we are seriously contemplating or
 
 00:39:37.210 --> 00:39:41.592
 being forced to think about the very form
 
 00:39:41.632 --> 00:39:43.391
 of government that we are celebrating in
 
 00:39:43.431 --> 00:39:45.152
 this two hundred and fiftieth anniversary.
 
 00:39:48.682 --> 00:39:49.864
 It is, as Franklin said,
 
 00:39:49.884 --> 00:39:51.585
 a republic if you can keep it.
 
 00:39:53.067 --> 00:39:54.628
 That's a wonderful line, isn't it?
 
 00:39:55.248 --> 00:39:58.530
 Well, and even Lincoln at Gettysburg said,
 
 00:40:01.273 --> 00:40:01.974
 what's the phrase?
 
 00:40:04.577 --> 00:40:06.338
 That this is a form of government that
 
 00:40:06.677 --> 00:40:08.380
 might not last for long.
 
 00:40:08.599 --> 00:40:10.260
 And he was thinking the Civil War might
 
 00:40:10.362 --> 00:40:10.641
 end it.
 
 00:40:15.106 --> 00:40:16.847
 republics are inherently vulnerable
 
 00:40:16.867 --> 00:40:18.389
 because they're based on the democratic
 
 00:40:18.429 --> 00:40:21.471
 foundation and that democratic foundation
 
 00:40:22.152 --> 00:40:25.393
 is not reliable in terms of its
 
 00:40:25.434 --> 00:40:26.295
 consistency.
 
 00:40:31.119 --> 00:40:34.141
 Most republics are smaller and they only
 
 00:40:34.340 --> 00:40:36.083
 last for a short period of time.
 
 00:40:36.682 --> 00:40:40.085
 The only exception is the Roman Empire.
 
 00:40:40.126 --> 00:40:42.166
 We're now close to what the Roman Empire
 
 00:40:42.206 --> 00:40:43.789
 achieved in terms of longevity.
 
 00:40:44.728 --> 00:40:46.570
 But we're the second oldest republic in
 
 00:40:46.630 --> 00:40:47.351
 world history.
 
 00:40:48.030 --> 00:40:49.713
 And I guess the question I would ask
 
 00:40:49.992 --> 00:40:51.813
 our viewers, our listeners,
 
 00:40:53.054 --> 00:40:54.735
 do you want this to continue or do
 
 00:40:54.775 --> 00:40:58.657
 you wish to become, what,
 
 00:40:59.958 --> 00:41:01.320
 an oligarchy or whatever?
 
 00:41:03.601 --> 00:41:04.681
 Do you wish to have a king?
 
 00:41:05.742 --> 00:41:09.985
 And I think a surprising number of
 
 00:41:10.025 --> 00:41:11.306
 Americans will say yes.
 
 00:41:13.157 --> 00:41:14.677
 if the king does what I want them
 
 00:41:14.737 --> 00:41:15.277
 to do.
 
 00:41:17.297 --> 00:41:21.199
 And that might mean reduce the size of
 
 00:41:21.219 --> 00:41:23.719
 the Black population and refuse to give
 
 00:41:23.760 --> 00:41:27.621
 women full power.
 
 00:41:28.960 --> 00:41:33.141
 But I'm now behaving not like a historian,
 
 00:41:33.181 --> 00:41:36.603
 but a reporter on the events of the
 
 00:41:36.623 --> 00:41:37.023
 moment.
 
 00:41:37.722 --> 00:41:39.463
 But I do think it's undeniable
 
 00:41:40.342 --> 00:41:43.204
 that it's one of, as I said,
 
 00:41:43.264 --> 00:41:44.164
 a rich irony.
 
 00:41:44.485 --> 00:41:46.527
 We're facing a choice in the very year
 
 00:41:46.567 --> 00:41:51.771
 we're celebrating what we might lose.
 
 00:41:51.791 --> 00:41:53.612
 Well, thank you for joining us.
 
 00:41:53.693 --> 00:41:57.115
 And we've been talking with Joe Ellis.
 
 00:41:57.596 --> 00:41:59.036
 His latest book is The Great
 
 00:41:59.077 --> 00:41:59.818
 Contradiction,
 
 00:41:59.858 --> 00:42:02.179
 The Tragic Side of the American Founding,
 
 00:42:02.619 --> 00:42:04.782
 as well as a dozen or so other
 
 00:42:04.802 --> 00:42:06.663
 books about the founding period.
 
 00:42:06.702 --> 00:42:08.684
 Someone really knows this period better
 
 00:42:08.724 --> 00:42:08.844
 than
 
 00:42:10.269 --> 00:42:11.550
 better than many of us know the present
 
 00:42:11.590 --> 00:42:11.851
 day.
 
 00:42:11.871 --> 00:42:13.552
 So thank you so much for joining us.
 
 00:42:13.572 --> 00:42:16.132
 And I want to thank our- It's been
 
 00:42:16.172 --> 00:42:16.813
 my pleasure.
 
 00:42:17.074 --> 00:42:18.134
 I'm up here in Vermont.
 
 00:42:18.635 --> 00:42:20.856
 By the way, final question.
 
 00:42:20.896 --> 00:42:22.797
 What's the first state in the union,
 
 00:42:23.336 --> 00:42:24.237
 before it's a union,
 
 00:42:24.277 --> 00:42:25.918
 what's the first state to end slavery?
 
 00:42:27.960 --> 00:42:28.780
 Oh, you're asking me?
 
 00:42:28.840 --> 00:42:29.681
 And that's Vermont.
 
 00:42:29.780 --> 00:42:30.081
 Yeah.
 
 00:42:30.260 --> 00:42:31.961
 It's the, it's the, it's the, it's the,
 
 00:42:32.081 --> 00:42:32.822
 it's the,
 
 00:42:33.768 --> 00:42:34.769
 You got it.
 
 00:42:35.791 --> 00:42:36.733
 Are you from Vermont?
 
 00:42:36.753 --> 00:42:38.795
 How do you know that?
 
 00:42:38.855 --> 00:42:40.217
 Most people don't know that.
 
 00:42:40.737 --> 00:42:42.278
 Vermont not only ended slavery,
 
 00:42:42.298 --> 00:42:44.181
 it ended the property qualification to
 
 00:42:44.221 --> 00:42:46.364
 vote and assured free education for
 
 00:42:46.403 --> 00:42:47.985
 everybody up through what we would call
 
 00:42:48.025 --> 00:42:48.485
 high school.
 
 00:42:49.266 --> 00:42:51.688
 And but they weren't admitted into the
 
 00:42:51.867 --> 00:42:54.369
 Union until seventeen ninety two because
 
 00:42:54.429 --> 00:42:56.409
 southern states opposed them for fear of
 
 00:42:56.469 --> 00:42:59.211
 adding another pro slave anti-slavery
 
 00:42:59.271 --> 00:43:01.273
 state to the Congress.
 
 00:43:02.452 --> 00:43:05.074
 And New York also had rejections too.
 
 00:43:05.094 --> 00:43:06.695
 I was born in Virginia and I went
 
 00:43:06.735 --> 00:43:07.655
 to William and Mary,
 
 00:43:07.675 --> 00:43:09.275
 but I've been in New England for most
 
 00:43:09.335 --> 00:43:12.378
 of my professional life and I'm now in
 
 00:43:12.398 --> 00:43:12.978
 Vermont.
 
 00:43:13.637 --> 00:43:16.579
 And I want to sing Vermont's praises too.
 
 00:43:18.257 --> 00:43:20.338
 very good very good well thank you so
 
 00:43:20.358 --> 00:43:21.561
 thank you and thank you to all the
 
 00:43:21.581 --> 00:43:23.643
 good folks in vermont as well as to
 
 00:43:24.103 --> 00:43:26.045
 jonathan lane our man behind the curtain
 
 00:43:26.065 --> 00:43:27.768
 jonathan keeps things running and if you
 
 00:43:27.807 --> 00:43:31.231
 want to send uh some jonathan ideas about
 
 00:43:31.251 --> 00:43:33.153
 uh things we should have people we should
 
 00:43:33.193 --> 00:43:34.275
 talk to or issues we should
 
 00:43:36.083 --> 00:43:38.324
 lane at Revolution two five zero dot org
 
 00:43:38.885 --> 00:43:40.664
 and also every week Joe we thank folks
 
 00:43:40.684 --> 00:43:43.405
 who are regular listeners and everybody so
 
 00:43:43.425 --> 00:43:44.967
 if you're in one of these places and
 
 00:43:45.007 --> 00:43:47.427
 want some of our Revolution two fifty swag
 
 00:43:47.806 --> 00:43:50.228
 Jonathan is the guy Jay Lane at Revolution
 
 00:43:50.268 --> 00:43:52.728
 two five O dot org and this week
 
 00:43:52.829 --> 00:43:55.190
 I'll acknowledge our faithful listeners in
 
 00:43:55.230 --> 00:43:58.230
 Providence Rhode Island in Newport News in
 
 00:43:58.291 --> 00:43:59.650
 the Commonwealth of Virginia
 
 00:44:00.150 --> 00:44:02.652
 Niles, Illinois, Rensselaer, New York,
 
 00:44:02.934 --> 00:44:05.556
 Ambler, Pennsylvania, Gilbert, Arizona,
 
 00:44:05.615 --> 00:44:06.936
 and in Tampa, Louisville,
 
 00:44:06.976 --> 00:44:09.659
 New Taipei City in Taiwan.
 
 00:44:09.679 --> 00:44:11.300
 Thank you all for joining us in Places
 
 00:44:11.362 --> 00:44:12.362
 Between and Beyond.
 
 00:44:12.503 --> 00:44:14.264
 And now we will be piped out on
 
 00:44:14.284 --> 00:44:15.125
 the road to Boston.