Jon Meacham Interview: On the Struggles that Define America
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Published 2021-01-04
Jon Meacham is a renowned presidential historian, contributing writer for The New York Times Book Review, contributing editor at TIME, and a Pulitzer Prize-winning author. A member of the Council on Foreign Relations and of the Society of American Historians, Meacham is a distinguished visiting professor at Vanderbilt University. He has written for The New York Times op-ed page, The Washington Post, Vanity Fair, and Garden & Gun. Meacham is also a regular guest on “Morning Joe” and other broadcasts. Born in Chattanooga in 1969, Meacham graduated from The University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee, with a degree in English literature. He previously worked as a reporter for the Chattanooga Times, an editor-in-chief at Newsweek, and an executive editor at Random House. A trustee of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, The McCallie School, and The Harpeth Hall School, Meacham chairs the National Advisory Council of the John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics at Washington University.
From the HBO / Kunhardt Film Foundation (KFF) Documentary “The Soul of America.” Based on Jon Meacham's bestseller that illuminates our present-day fraught political reality by exploring historical challenges, including the women's suffrage movement, the incarceration of Japanese Americans, McCarthyism, and the fight for Civil Rights.
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Jon Meacham, Presidential Biographer and Historian
Interviewed by: Katie Davison
Chapters:
00:00 Intro
00:07 Importance of implication
01:04 History out of conflict
02:25 The Constitution
04:18 The American experiment
07:09 Reconstruction
09:33 Appomattox
11:46 The Lost Cause
13:19 Uniting the Union
14:42 Lincoln
15:46 Andrew Johnson
17:13 The Civil War
18:22 Unite the Right rally
19:36 War of ideas
23:40 Confederate monuments
25:02 White supremacy
25:32 Religion in The Lost Cause
27:02 Fighting The Lost Cause
30:06 Importance of history
32:16 The KKK
43:55 Woodrow Wilson
44:51 The NAACP
45:32 W.E.B. Du Bois
47:40 Al Smith
48:58 Nativism
49:46 The Red Scare
51:58 Attacks on the press
53:39 Five elements that shape an era
55:30 Scopes trial
57:17 Fall of the KKK
01:00:31 Harding and Coolidge on race and equality
01:04:01 Women’s suffrage movement
01:10:22 Women’s rights today
01:11:51 Patience and persistence
01:15:29 Listening to activists
01:16:39 FDR
01:26:09 Ego in the presidency
01:26:55 Populism in the 1930s
01:30:41 Fear in the 1930s
01:32:11 Totalitarianism
01:33:12 Woodrow Wilson and the Lost Cause
01:34:17 Birth of a Nation
01:35:39 Overcoming stereotypes
01:36:47 Growing up in the South
01:40:16 Cultivating curiosity
01:42:23 Grandfather’s influence
01:45:06 Journalism
01:48:23 Relationship with politics
01:50:57 Career trajectory
01:52:55 Finding journalism
01:54:54 Soul of America
01:57:21 Being a writer
01:59:13 Perennial forces in the 1920s
02:00:07 Politicians and their base
02:01:03 FDR
02:03:03 The presidency
02:04:11 Internment of Japanese Americans
02:06:26 The isolationist movement of the 1940s
02:08:42 Handling crisis
02:10:08 FDR’s death
02:12:15 Eleanor Roosevelt
02:13:42 The dual nature of reality
02:14:34 Joseph Stilwell
02:15:16 Learning from history
02:17:12 Social reform
02:18:35 Private and public working together
02:20:54 America’s extremes
02:21:55 McCarthyism
02:24:27 Politics as entertainment
02:25:08 Failure of McCarthyism
02:26:26 Conservative movements of the 1950s
02:27:33 Conspiracy theories of the 1950s
02:28:09 The Civil Rights Act
02:30:50 Civil Rights in the post-war era
02:32:08 Lyndon B. Johnson
02:40:06 Cause for change
02:41:53 MLK
02:42:34 The Selma Marches
02:45:54 George Wallace
02:50:35 Lyndon B. Johnson’s last speech
02:51:30 Divisiveness in American
02:53:51 Progress made between the 1860s and the 1960s
02:55:32 LBJ not running for re-election
02:56:23 Lessons
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All Comments (21)
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I don’t know why this video keeps playing randomly overnight, but I’m not at all annoyed by it. Jon Meacham’s such an impressive and appealing human.
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Every president should have a grasp of history that this man does.
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I wish everyone in the US would watch this and remember history. I can’t sleep because so many people don’t know history which dooms us to repeat it. Please pass this on. I am praying that we learn from the past and make a better future. Thank you for reminding everyone about what we have already been through.
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To answer that cliché question, "Who would you like to be seated next to at a dinner party?" I often reply, "Jon Meacham". His calm, rational, academically rich, life's work has educated, informed and grounded me often during recent turbulent times. I tip my hat, Mr. Meacham.
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It’s unfortunate that we, as humans,are so incapable of admitting when we ARE wrong, considering it’s true more often than not.
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An incredible intellect, historian and story-teller. Wow!
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How amazing is Jon Meacham?!
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Thank you Mr.Jon for telling us about our historical USA development ..I could listen to you every week as a series...I would gladly sit with my grandchildren of age just as if watching a cartoon...
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I would love to see John and Ken Burns have a conversation!
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What a lovely speaking voice: wisdom, gravitas and concern embodied.
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I was born in the summer of 1965; just after the Civil Rights Act and just before Voting Rights. Although we didn't know it at the time, we grew up privileged in suburban Southern California. NONE of what the esteemed Mr. Meacham is saying here mattered AT ALL to us as kids when we were growing up. All we wanted to do back then was smoke weed, listen to Zeppelin, and surf. We literally all thought racism was over and just something in the history books that didn't matter to us. Our parents were born in 1928, grew up during the Great Depression, and graduated High School in 1945; just as WW2 ended. They would try to talk to us, but we didn't listen. Watching this, I feel like I'm sitting at Grandpa Floyd's knee as he's telling me about "the olden days". Only this time, I'm actually listening to him. "How did we get here?" Well, let's look at where we've been. I'm only 40 minutes into this post and am loving every second of it. THANK YOU SO MUCH MR. MEACHAM for sharing your incredible wealth of knowledge here. It's three hours long, and I already know I'm going to be watching the entire thing several more times !!! thanks again. Sincerely, -mike 👏👏👏👍✌🌊
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Jon is a national treasure. This video ought to be required in civics classes which we desperately need. Thank u for following your fate Jon. I always learn so much and develop more empathy and patience for our wild time. 💝💝
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Thankyou Jon Meacham
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brilliant analysis of various president's and their motivation!
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Jon Meacham is a National Treasure ❤
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If only we could learn from the lessons we have lived in my lifetime of 64 years....History is key to be taught and understood so that we may evolve.
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This should have so much more views.
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Jon you have done so much to explain the story of your Country! I admire and respect you very much! ❤️🇨🇦
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EXCELLENT! Thank you, kind Sir!
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Very calming in the mist of all this chaos on a rainy day here in TN.
