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C-SPAN SERIES, SARAH POLK, MARGARET TAYLOR, ABIGAIL FILLMORE April 09, 2014

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C-SPAN SERIES, SARAH POLK, MARGARET TAYLOR, ABIGAIL FILLMORE April 09, 2014 C-SPAN SERIES, SARAH POLK, MARGARET TAYLOR, ABIGAIL FILLMORE April 09, 2014 (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) (UNKNOWN): Sarah Polk was very up on diplomacy and her strong suit happened to be intelligent political discussion. (UNKNOWN): She made no bones about the fact and she really took an interest in politics and that she was her husband's partner. (UNKNOWN): She grew up in a political household in Tennessee. Her father was a local politician. So she grew up loving politics. She married James after he won a seat in the legislature because she would not have married him if he'd been content to be a clerk. (UNKNOWN): Unfortunately for James K. Polk, he died just three months after leaving the White House and Sarah began a 42-year widowhood. Polk Place became something of a shrine to her husband and she would invite anybody who wanted to come for a visit to see the objects that they had collected throughout their long and illustrious political career. (UNKNOWN): She lived there for many years on her own and during the Civil War generals on both sides would come and visit her to pay their respects to her. That's a very interesting commentary on what a beloved status she still held. (UNKNOWN): She was, you know, earnest about her husband's work. She went to every post she could go to within. She went through that arduous journey. The hardships were terrible; they really were. She was very well liked in the diplomatic community. They had met all kinds of people, friends and enemies, and others, and they had to make things work and things work out. They were very experienced people. Frankly, they were more sophisticated than what was around them. (UNKNOWN): She very much felt that women should develop their minds and cultivate scholarship as much as men, pretty path-breaking at that point in our history for a first lady to do. (UNKNOWN): We know today that first ladies have causes. Literacy and reading would have been Abigail Fillmore's cause. This bookshelf was part of the first White House library. (UNKNOWN): She much preferred her tie to a room with a good book than standing in a receiving line making mindless chatter. (UNKNOWN): We know that Abigail was a very wonderful seamstress. We do have her quilt here, a very colorful quilt called the tumbling block pattern. (UNKNOWN): She was one of the true intellectuals. She loved reading. She was very caught up on politics and liked very much being a part of all the cultural accoutrements that came with living in Washington. (END VIDEO CLIP) SUSAN SWAIN, HOST: Welcome to C-SPAN series "First Ladies: Influence & Image.” In this program, we'll meet three first ladies; one, her husband's trusted political adviser. The next, a steadfast general's wife; and the third, a teacher who established the first White House library. They served during the 1840s and early '50s as the country continued to grow and tensions continued to mount over the issue of slavery. To introduce us to Sarah Polk, Margaret Taylor, and Abigail Fillmore, we have two historians at the table. Meet Conover Hunt, an author and historian, and an expert in historic preservation. And Paul Finkelman is a historian and a legal scholar based at Albany Law School. He's the author of a biography of Millard Fillmore. Welcome to both of you. CONOVER HUNT, HISTORIAN: Thank you. PAUL FINKELMAN, HISTORIAN: Thank you. SUSAN SWAIN: Well, James K. Polk is sometimes described as the least-known influential president. Would you agree with that and why? PAUL FINKELMAN: Well, he's certainly not very well known and he's certainly important. When he was nominated for president, he had no public office. He had twice lost the governorship of Tennessee. Before that, he had been a one-term governor. And before that, he had been a member of Congress. So, he was a lawyer practicing law in Tennessee, and he was what is known as the dark-horse candidate, the first dark-horse candidate. He had hoped to get the vice presidential nomination. That's what he was pushing for. And suddenly in a deadlocked convention out of nowhere, Polk is the presidential nominee. Most people don't know who he is. He becomes president and almost immediately puts us in a position to have a war with Mexico. He pushes for the war. He is prepared to declare war on Mexico and in fact sends troops including Zachary Taylor who will be the next president. He sends Zachary Taylor to the Mexican border in an area that's completely disputed that all international laws says belongs to Mexico, but Polk's says is American land. And while Taylor's troops were there, he goes to his cabinet and they vote on a Saturday afternoon to ask for a declaration of war against Mexico. That night, he gets a message because it takes a long time to get information from Mexico to Washington. That night, he gets a message that Taylor's troops had been in combat. And so he rewrites his message to Congress saying, "American troops have been killed on American soil.” Abraham Lincoln would later give a speech known as a spot speech in which he would say, "Show us the spot where it took place," because it wasn't on American soil. So, he gets us into war with Mexico. We acquire Mexico. All of this is very important. It also means the complete blow-up of all of the sectional compromises and pushes the country headlong into what would ultimately be secession and Civil War. But we don't know anything about him. SUSAN SWAIN: Well, and his wife is also on frequently -- when you do modern historical surveys of influential first ladies, his wife was always on the top tier. CONOVER HUNT: Always. SUSAN SWAIN: Why is that? CONOVER HUNT: She was truly a political partner with her husband. They did not have children at a time when women were expected to be mothers, and hearth and home, the keepers of the faith. But she was very much her husband's political equal and his partner. She never went too far within the boundaries of what a proper Victorian or early Victorian lady should be in the 19th century. But everyone knew that they shared an office in the private apartments. She was active in discussions at the many state dinners they had. And he would ask her to mark newspapers and articles for him to read. She was a sounding board. Franklin Pierce become he became president told her that he -- told her husband that he would much rather talk politics with Sarah Polk than with James Polk. And yet the women of the time accepted her. She was very pious, very religious, a very strict Presbyterian. She did not allow dancing in the White House. She got rid of hard liquor. But they had wines and, of course, and brandies with the frequent dinners they had. And she was not a prude, but she was very much a woman who knew what she wanted and set her rules out and everyone had to play according to those rules. And she was respected for it. She was very, very popular. SUSAN SWAIN: Well, to introduce you to the Polks by video, we're going to take you to the Polk ancestral home. The house that the Polks lived in together no longer exists, but this historic site contains much of the history of the family. We'll take you there next. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) (UNKNOWN): This is the inaugural fan. It's an incredible piece of history. It was a gift from President Polk or President-elect Polk to his wife, Sarah. She carried it with her on the day of his inauguration. It's gilt paper with bone styles ornately carved and it features the lithographic images of the first 11 presidents from Washington all the way through James K. Polk. She carried it with her throughout the festivities of the inauguration in the spring of 1845. The back is as beautiful as the front and features a lithographic image of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. The Polks came into the White House a young vibrant couple but amidst a Democratic Party that was widely split. It was one of the reasons why James K. Polk said he would run for a single term only and then step down. So, Sarah Polk used the White House and her time as the president's wife to enhance her husband's political prestige. Dining in the Polk White House was a serious affair. Twice a week on Tuesdays and Fridays, Mrs. Polk would entertain 50 to 75 people coming to dinner. The China that they used was beautiful. The Polk china is considered some of the most beautiful of the White House' China. It features the presidential seal embossed along the side band. The dinner set is white embossed with gold. They had a tea set that was blue, and they had a dessert set in green. You'll often read that Mrs. Polk didn't allow alcohol in the White House, that her Presbyterian upbringing precluded that from happening. It's not exactly the case. She stopped the serving of whiskey punches at public levees in the Polk White House but wine was one of their largest bills during their years there. One of the more interesting objects in the collection sort of speaks to Sarah and her ability with music as well.
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