presents a conversation
and book signing with
Brenda Wineapple author of
THE IMPEACHERS: THE TRIAL
OF ANDREW JOHNSON
AND
THE DREAM OF A JUST NATION
and PBS host of "The Open Mind"
Alexander Heffner
Wednesday, February 12, 2020 at 4:00 p.m.
Henry A. Wallace Center at the
FDR Presidential Library and Home
HYDE PARK, NY -- The Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum will present a conversation and book signing with
Brenda Wineapple author of THE IMPEACHERS: THE TRIAL OF ANDREW JOHNSON AND THE DREAM OF A JUST NATION
and
PBS host of "The Open Mind" Alexander Heffner
at 4:00 p.m. on Wednesday, February 12, 2020. The program will be held in the Henry A. Wallace Center at the FDR Presidential Library and Home.
This is a free public event but registration is required.
Synopsis:
When Abraham Lincoln was assassinated, and Vice President Andrew Johnson became "the Accidental President," it was a dangerous time in America. Congress was divided over how the Union should be reunited: when and how the secessionist South should regain full status, whether former Confederates should be punished, and when and whether black men should be given the vote. Devastated by war and resorting to violence, many white Southerners hoped to restore a pre-Civil War society, if without slavery, and Andrew Johnson seemed to share their goals. With the unchecked power of executive orders, Johnson ignored Congress, pardoned rebel leaders, promoted white supremacy, opposed civil rights, and called Reconstruction unnecessary. It fell to Congress to stop the American president who acted like a king.
In
THE IMPEACHERS
, Brenda Wineapple dramatically evokes this pivotal period in American history, when the country was rocked by the first-ever impeachment of a sitting American president. And she brings to vivid life the extraordinary characters who brought that impeachment forward: the willful Johnson and his advocates -- including complicated men like Secretary of State William Seward -- as well as the equally complicated visionaries committed to justice and equality for all, like Thaddeus Stevens, Charles Sumner, Frederick Douglass, and Ulysses S. Grant. Theirs was a last-ditch, patriotic, and Constitutional effort to render the goals of the Civil War into reality and to make the Union free, fair, and whole.
Brenda Wineapple
is the author of several books including ECSTATIC NATION: CONFIDENCE, CRISIS, AND COMPROMISE, 1848-1877; WHITE HEAT: THE FRIENDSHIP OF EMILY DICKINSON AND THOMAS WENTWORTH HIGGINSON; and HAWTHORNE: A LIFE. She's received many honors including a Literature Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, two National Endowment Fellowships in the Humanities, and most recently a National Endowment Public Scholars Award. An elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and of the Society of American Historians, she regularly contributes to major publications such as the
New York Times Book Review, The New York Review of Books, The Wall Street Journal,
and
The Nation
.
Alexander Heffner
is the host of "The Open Mind" on PBS. He has covered American politics, civic life and Millennials since the 2008 presidential campaign. His work has been profiled in
The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Christian Science Monitor, Los Angeles Times,
and on NBC News, MSNBC, C-SPAN, CNN, and the BBC, among other media outlets. His essays, reviews and op-eds have appeared in TIME,
Reuters, The Wall Street Journal, The Boston Globe
and
The Root
, among other publications. He is a frequent lecturer and panel moderator at museums and institutions of learning. Heffner was the political director for WHRB 95.3 FM and host of "The Political Arena." A native New Yorker, he is a graduate of Andover and Harvard.
Please contact Cliff Laube at (845) 486-7745 with questio
ns about the event.
Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum
