Celebrity Presidential Rehab

If you've kept up with this (tragically underposted) blog, then it's probably not a stretch for you to imagine me as the kind of kid who would ask people who their favorite president was. This is the reason why whenever I think of Andrew Jackson, I think of my mother, who named him as her favorite president back when I was six or so.

This doesn't jive with my contemporary understanding of my mother, though--the mother who, along with my father, drove me and my little sister out West to visit pueblos and powwows, who, when she and my father visited me last month, picked
The National Museum of the American Indian as her number one sight to see in DC, a town she hadn't been to since 1981.

And if you've read or listened to Sarah Vowell on the subject, you know the problem of Andrew Jackson and Indian Removal. More than any president, we associate Jackson with the stealing of American lands. He's the guy on the $20 bill, but he's the original Great White Father, the man who states in his second annual message to Congress that "toward the aborigines of the country no one can indulge a more friendly feeling than myself, or would go further in attempting to reclaim them from their wandering habits and make them a happy, prosperous people."

Or, in other words, demolish their way of life in order to make them more like us.

So, cue the music: how do you solve a problem like Andrew Jackson?

Jon Meacham gives it the old college try in American Lion, which attempts (and, given its success, Pulitzer and all that, succeeds) to rehabilitate Jackson into a man for whom the Union was paramount, trumping all concerns--even those of the humanitarian sort.

Meacham writes that "in the hierarchy of Jackson's concerns, the sanctity of the Union outranked any other consideration. As long as the Indians were in the heart of the nation, they were threats--and as threats they had to be removed."

Does this work? Does framing a pretty atrocious act (Indian Removal) within the larger good (preserving the Union) count as a way of rescuing a president from the Bad list? We won't read about FDR until September of 2011, but does the general idea of protecting America from attack justify the specific idea of putting American citizens in internment camps? We won't read GWB until August of 2012, but does the general idea of protecting America from attack justify torture?

I've thought before that writing a biography is an act of love. But now I wonder what kind of love it is: is it the kind of love a child has for a parent--Daddy can do no wrong--or the kind of love a spouse has for his/her partner--I love you despite your flaws?

Skipping Over Some Ugly Details

You know you're in biographical trouble when your author starts the paragraph on your presidency this way: "It may confound some readers that biography of any American president should devote only a single chapter to his administration. Nevertheless, such brevity seems appropriate for John Quincy Adams."

Yikes. That can't be a good sign.

Nagel's right, of course: Adams does not have a good presidency by any standard (even that of his father, who, until his son matched him, was the only single-term president). What is significant about JQA's term in office is how it ends: with what we can accurately call the first real presidential campaign. In the elections leading up to 1828, candidates were generally expected to avoid campaigning--to see the idea of being elected as a noble calling that they passively received, a burden borne by those chosen. Their supporters, on the other hand, felt free to go after the other candidates with knives sharpened.

In 1828, Adams (who lost the popular vote but won in the House of Representatives) ran against the man he'd simultaneously lost to and beaten in 1824: General Andrew Jackson. Jackson, wildly popular as the winner of the Battle of New Orleans, had won the popular vote in 1824. Adams's crew went after him with vigor; not only did they accuse him of executing deserters and killing men in duels (which was, um, true), but they also went after Jackson's wife, Rachel. They accused the couple of committing bigamy, since Rachel was technically still married to another man when she and Jackson were wed (the divorce went through later, and the Jacksons had a second marriage performed to try to make up for it, although that never stopped the gossip).

The stress and strain of the campaign took its toll on both Jackson and his wife, and in the latter's case, it actually proved fatal; Rachel Jackson died in December of 1828, one month after her husband finally won the presidency.

The founding fathers feared political parties, seeing them as unnecessarily divisive. But the presidents who followed them, especially JQA, Jackson, and Van Buren--develop the idea of political party towards what it is today.

On Tour, He's at Home

One of the things I like about this project is the chance it gives me to think about American history as a thing that happens in a place; since four of the first five presidents were Virginians, as am I right now, I've taken the opportunity to go to the same places they went (Monroe's Ashlawn-Highland, you're next). There's a certain frisson I feel as a history dork when I look into the room at Mount Vernon where Washington entertained Jefferson, or look at the blots of ink on the floor of James Madison's office.

I haven't been able to do that with either Adams, though, since Boston's a little too far away to get to on a day trip, and most of our weekends are spent trying to catch up with the week. So I was pleased to get the chance to visit this John Quincy Adams site:



If you're a fan of international typefaces, you'll recognize these signs as Berlin city streets, and this intersection--not too far from Unter den Linden, one of the great streets of Europe, and even closer to an H&M, one of the great European department stores (their collaboration with Sonia Rykiel covered a massive, several hundred feet tall building in Potsdamer Platz).

We were there because of a single paragraph in Nagel's biography, referring to Louisa Adams's difficulties in pregnancy; not long after their arrival in Prussia, where JQA would serve as the American Ambassador, she miscarried. Nagel writes: "To comfort his wife, John began a search for an apartment more convenient and comfortable where she could feel at home. He found one near the Brandenburg Gate, with a landlord who played an overpowering game of chess. Eventually, they would move again, this time to the corner of Frederic and Behren Streets."

So there we were, at that same intersection. It was raining, and cold, rush hour in Berlin, and for some reason I was only wearing a single mitten (I hadn't lost its mate, but nevertheless, just had one on). And part of me wondered: here we were, a pair of Americans on a grand tour of Europe (we'd continue on from Berlin to Munich, Prague, Vienna, Venice, Kobarid, and Rome), and we were finding a spot where another pair of Americans had been. Was this the historical equivalent of finding the McDonald's near the Spanish Steps or the Hard Rock Cafe on the Via Veneto? After all, Berlin is a city with enough layers of history to overwhelm (in a way, that's what I like about it). Napoleon and Hitler had both walked through the Brandenburg Gate, but we were more interested in one of our own, a minor president.



Too much to consider, and too rainy that day. We went off in search of Haribo instead.

A Subtle Shift

What's unusual about this picture?



For starters, it's a photograph. That's a new thing. In fact, John Quincy Adams is the first president for whom we've got photographic evidence. The first five presidents: only paintings, which are never quite as mimetic as we'd like them to be. Even when a painter is as faithful as possible to the sitter's appearance, he or she still can't quite replicate the real thing. But a photograph--that's different.

It's appropriate that John Quincy Adams is our first president to be captured by the new technology--our first president for whom we've got a "real" picture. That's because he's also the first president whose entire life we can trace. He's born to a famous father (or at least a father who will be famous soon, and keeps his own diary), and, at the age of 11, starts his own diary, which he keeps off and on (like everyone else with a diary) for the rest of his long, illustrious life.

And there may not be a president who's so involved in the beginning of the Republic. Take a look at what he does during, say, the first sixty years of the United States:

--Washington appoints him (at age 26!) to be the Ambassador to the Netherlands.
--Adams (his father) appoints him to be the Ambassador to Prussia.
--Jefferson doesn't want him for his administration, so JQA becomes a Senator from Massachusetts.
--Madison appoints him as the Ambassador to Russia and later the United Kingdom.
--Monroe names him his Secretary of State. In fact, the Monroe Doctrine is written by Adams.
--Jackson defeats JQA in the election of 1830. Adams sits out two years, then runs for and wins a seat in the House, representing Massachusetts. He's there for seventeen years, through the Jackson, Van Buren, Harrison, Tyler, and Polk administrations. He collapses in the House during a vote on commemorating the Mexican-American War and dies a few days later.

From President #1 to President #11, John Quincy Adams is involved in the government of the United States (including a term as President #6). In a sense, his story is the story of the beginning of the country. It's a wonder that Nagel's book is only 419 pages.

In case you haven't noticed...

...we're behind. Well behind. As in, just starting to write about President #6 when we should be on President #10 (although, if nothing else, I'm keeping up with the reading).

So, in order to remedy the situation, I hereby announce the Inaugural (because nothing's "annual" until the second year) From George to Barack Post-Presidents' Day Post-a-Thon Extravaganza! A week's worth of daily postings, taking us through Adams and Jackson into the wilderness of the mid-19th century's parade of Ol' What's-His-Names. Follow along as you recuperate from your shopping hangover.

The Gentlemen From Virginia and Colorado

I feel bad for Gary Hart.

It's been 23 years since he told reporters that anyone who cared to tail him could, that "they'd be very bored," only to have a photo of him and Donna Rice splashed on the front pages of newspapers around the country, demolishing his presidential bid and sending Michael Dukakis into the lead for the Democratic nomination (and there's a historical "what if?" for you).

I feel bad for Hart not for his infidelity or scandal, or even for the fact that he was dumb enough to challenge the press when he knew he was doing wrong, but rather for the fact that he's gone on to better things. He's served on the bipartisan National Commission on Terrorism, which suggested a number of policy changes three years before September 11th, and he continues to advocate for more responsible energy usage and policies. He's stayed active enough in politics to have been discussed as a member of a theoretical John Kerry cabinet ("what if?" #2). And, of course, he wrote a biography of James Monroe.

I feel bad that despite the fact that he bounced back from a potentially career-killing moment, when I search for "James Monroe Gary Hart" on Google Images so that I can post a picture of the book for this blog, the page that comes up still results in no fewer than three pictures of Donna Rice (two of the famous photo of her on Hart's lap and a swimsuit shot).

It's probably worth thinking about Hart's role as a politician in writing his biography; unlike the four previous authors, his day job isn't historian. And while it's certainly easy enough to hear echoes of modern-day politics in the biographies of the Founding Fathers (the Argus being the Fox News of its day), it's Hart thinking as a politician who makes the first explicit connection I've seen to contemporary politics.

Like Frost's "The Road Not Taken," the Monroe Doctrine is an important piece of American Writing that's almost always misunderstood. You know how Frost ends his poem with "I took the road less traveled by / and that has made all the difference" (click the link if the last time you heard it was high school graduation)? Everyone loves that part! It's inspiring! "Go, young people, and follow your dreams!"

Very few people ever put the end of the second stanza on a t-shirt: "though as for that the passing there / had worn them really about the same," probably because the implication--neither road is really less traveled than the other, and they're pretty much the same road, just going in different directions--carpes a lot less diem.

Hart argues that American politics misreads the Monroe Doctrine like a sophomore waiting for the bell--we've remembered the memorable, exciting, back-the-fuck-off-Europe part, and skipped the middle stanzas. Hart points out that the Monroe Doctrine is reciprocal--not only does it state that Europe should stay out of the Western Hemisphere, it also states that America will stay out of Europe's affairs. It's not so much an assertion of power as it is a still-newborn country trying to keep its turf. Here's Hart: "Speaking today, Monroe might have reduced his foreign policy principles to a single premise: we will resist hegemony without seeking hegemony."

OK, not bad. We've been misreading it. Hart, however, starts calling out people. Here's the end of the book's penultimate chapter: "the saliency of the Monroe Doctrine in the twenty-first century is now being tested in a highly convoluted fashion. President George W. Bush's effort to expand the reach of the doctrine globally represents a radical departure from Monroe's original intent in two important ways: first, it extends U.S. hegemony from the Western Hemisphere to the entire globe; and, second, it shifts from U.S. rejection of European colonization in the Western Hemisphere to U.S. imposition of its values everywhere. Where Monroe sought to protect fledgling South American republics from European intrusion, Bush stands Monroe's doctrine on its head by extending a form of democratic imperialism into the far corners of the planet."

And here's the kicker:

"James Monroe would be the first to say that America as empire is no longer America as republic."

That's some gloves-off biographin' there. In a time when both parties seek to present themselves as the heirs of 1776, putting words in the mouth of a guy who's been dead since 1831 seems risky. But Hart, unlike the other biographers (so far), hasn't been afraid to point out how America as a political entity had shifted from the time of his subject to now. At this point, that is the road less traveled by.

Winter Recess

Yes, yes, we're behind, aren't we? I should be talking about Andrew Jackson by now, and we're not even through with James Monroe (who should be the easiest president for me to write about, considering that I live in the town he retired to and occasionally walk my dog past the James Monroe Museum).



So let's do what Congress does and take a recess. Here are two books for you to read: Paul C. Nagel's John Quincy Adams: A Public Life, a Private Life and Jon Meacham's Pulitzer winning American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House.

We'll pick back up in the new year.