March 8, 2007
A wax likeness of Millard Fillmore’s head, appearing to be for sale for $950.00.
March 8, 2007, is the 133rd anniversary of Millard Fillmore’s death.
Manus reprints the text from the New York Times story a few days later:
Buffalo, N.Y., March 8 — 12 o’clock, midnight. — Ex-President Millard Fillmore died at his residence in this city at 11:10 to-night. He was conscious up to the time. At 8 o’clock, in reply to a question by his physician, he said the nourishment was palatable; these were his last words. His death was painless.
First, I wonder how the devil the writer could possibly know whether Fillmore’s death was painless?
And second, accuracy obsessed as I am, I wonder whether this is the source of the often-attributed to Fillmore quote, “The nourishment is palatable.” Several sources that one might hope would be more careful attribute the quote to Fillmore as accurate — none with any citation that I can find. Thinkexist and Brainyquote charge ahead full speed. Wikipedia lists it. Snopes.com says the quote is “alleged,” in a discussion thread.
I’ll wager no one can offer a citation for the quote. I’ll wager Fillmore didn’t say it.
Millard Fillmore: We’d protect his legacy, if only anyone could figure out what it is.
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Posted by Ed Darrell
March 7, 2007
Millard Fillmore died on March 8, 1874, 133 years ago tomorrow.
Of course, he is interred in Buffalo, New York, his base of political power and home where he practiced those civic virtues that got him elected Vice President and nominated President. There are people who visit presidential gravesites, and here is an account of one fellow who is working to visit as many as he can. Notice the snow. It is Buffalo, after all.
Fillmore’s dying words were reputed to have been something about the ‘sustenance’ being ‘palatable.’ I suspect that, as with so much else about Fillmore, the attributed quote is not accurate. I find the word “palatable” in a subhead of one of the death notices in a newspaper, but no reporter was present. Heck, I’m beginning to wonder about Fillmore’s State of the Union speeches.
What were Fillmore’s dying words, really?
Also:
Millard Fillmore’s grave in Forest Lawn Cemetery in Buffalo, New York. Photo by Keven Petersen, via FindaGrave.com
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Posted by Ed Darrell
March 1, 2007
History is a bit more poorly told, the world is a bit less knowledgeable today. Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., died last night. He was 89.
Details at the New York Times.
Schlesinger was a model historian in some ways. He wrote well, earning two Pulitzer Prizes. He picked important, salient subjects — The Imperial Presidency, for example, came in the Nixon years, in time to analyze Nixon’s own actions and help make the case for his impeachment.
Also important, Schlesinger was no library recluse. He spent time as an advisor to President Kennedy in the best tradition of a practical, professional historian — trying to help Kennedy avoid the mistakes of the past.
A man who wrote history worth the reading, AND who made history worth the writing. Perhaps no one else other than Winston Churchill and Theodore Roosevelt could be described so, in the 20th century.
I hope you teachers will mention Schlesinger’s passing to your classes, and offer him as an example of the effect a student of history might have.
Arthur M. Schlesinger in 1994; photo courtesy of WNYC FM.
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Posted by Ed Darrell
February 2, 2007
The past few weeks have been studded with the deaths of people important to my life, or important in history. The string is a long, unnecessary reminder that there are a lot of people holding history in their memories whom more historians need to get out and interview, even (and perhaps especially) high school-age historians.
Eleanor McGovern died in Mitchell, South Dakota, last week. I wonder how many of the town’s high school history teachers ever thought to invite the woman to speak?
McGovern was the probably the first spouse of a presidential candidate to campaign alone, without the candidate along. The respectful, rather long obituary in the Los Angeles Times made that a focus point of its tribute (free subscription will eventually be required). That was the place I first got the news of her death, while I participated in a Liberty Fund seminar in Pasadena, California, last week.
I was recruited to politics by a McGovernite in early 1972, in Utah. Over the next few months we saw Eleanor McGovern look cool, calm, intelligent and charming in her husband’s losing campaign. She may not always have been so cool as we saw — the Times piece mentions she was nearly ill before the first-ever Sunday interview program solo appearance by a candidate’s wife.
That she was both pretty and smart probably scared the opposition more than anything she ever said. Read the rest of this entry »
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Posted by Ed Darrell
January 31, 2007
Great title for a sermon, yes?
Does the sermon live up to the title? The Rev. John Robinson preached the sermon on September 18, 2005, at the First Unitarian Universalist Society of San Francisco — at least, that’s what it looks like from the sermon archives where I stumbled on the thing. Fillmore was a Unitarian, so that sect might take a bit of pride in his accomplishments.
One historian said of Fillmore: “He came to the Presidency by the only road available to a man of limited ability, the death of his predecessor.” He was accused of being both pro-slavery and abolitionist. It was said he did “not have courage” “but was just inflexible.” They accused him of having “no position except equivocation,” that he was “without personal earnest conviction, personal force, or capacity for strong personal leadership.” His general rating as a president has been, until recently, below average, way below. He is judged bad or poor in his religiousness by those who judge such things. He was rejected by the religious community of which he was a member. He was a Unitarian.
There are three reasons to tell the story of Millard Fillmore: First, he illustrates the on-going tension in our free religious community, between the prophetic and the practical – the privilege of moral purity and the necessity to make real world decisions. Second, he illustrates well how difficult it is to judge our contemporaries. And third, to help restore Millard Fillmore to his rightful place in history.
I wish the good Rev. Robinson had included footnotes with the sermon.
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Posted by Ed Darrell
January 26, 2007
The first step to maintained equality of opportunity amongst our people is, as I have said before, that there should be no child in America who has not been born, and who does not live, under sound conditions of health; who does not have full opportunity for education from the kindergarten to the university; who is not free from injurious labor; who does not have stimulation to ambition to the fullest of his or her capacities. It is a matter of concern to our government that we should strengthen the safeguards to health. These activities of helpfulness and of cooperation stretch before us in every direction. A single generation of Americans of such a production would prevent more of crime and of illness, and give more of spirit and progress than all of the most repressive laws and police we can ever invent — and it would cost less.
Who said it? Who prescribed such a “socialist” plan for our children? John Dewey? Hillary Clinton? Answer below the fold.
Read the rest of this entry »
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Posted by Ed Darrell
January 24, 2007
Franklin Delano Roosevelt delivered the State of the Union speech for 1941 on January 6. Eleven months and one day later, Japan attacked the U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor, Territory of Hawaii. I have been fascinated by Roosevelt’s clear statement of the freedoms he thought worth fighting for, especially considering that most Americans at that moment did not consider it desirable or probable that the U.S. would get involved in the war that raged across the Pacific and Atlantic.
Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill, August 9, 1941; aboard the U.S.S. Augusta, in the Atlantic. Library of Congress.
Here is an excerpt of the speech, the final few paragraphs:
I have called for personal sacrifice, and I am assured of the willingness of almost all Americans to respond to that call. A part of the sacrifice means the payment of more money in taxes. In my budget message I will recommend that a greater portion of this great defense program be paid for from taxation than we are paying for today. No person should try, or be allowed to get rich out of the program, and the principle of tax payments in accordance with ability to pay should be constantly before our eyes to guide our legislation.
If the Congress maintains these principles the voters, putting patriotism ahead of pocketbooks, will give you their applause. Read the rest of this entry »
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Posted by Ed Darrell
January 23, 2007
Clay Bennett cartoon, copyright Clay Bennett. Bennett is the editorial cartoonist for the Christian Science Monitor and winner of the Pulitzer Prize in 2002 for his editorial cartoons there.
Tonight President Bush delivers his State of the Union speech to Congress. State of the Union speeches are increasingly the only time we get to see presidents live, and that may lead to the extreme crabbiness about the speech Ed Brayton shows over at Dispatches from the Culture Wars. It’s a Constitution-required exercise (Article II, section 3), though the prime-time television broadcast and other pomp and ceremony are not mentioned.
Section 3. He shall from time to time give to the Congress information of the state of the union, and recommend to their consideration such measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient; he may, on extraordinary occasions, convene both Houses, or either of them, and in case of disagreement between them, with respect to the time of adjournment, he may adjourn them to such time as he shall think proper; he shall receive ambassadors and other public ministers; he shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed, and shall commission all the officers of the United States.
In our history as a republic, presidents have done everything from just sending the details in a letter to Congress to the current pageant. My recollection is that Richard Nixon gave the first prime-time speech — before that the speeches were given during the business day, and not broadcast live — and that Ronald Reagan was the first president to give all of his SOTUs in the evening. (I’m very willing to correct that information if you have better details.)
And while they have occasionally made history, such as Franklin Roosevelt’s 1941 SOTU (the “four freedoms”), my fondness for the events is mostly personal. Read the rest of this entry »
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Posted by Ed Darrell
January 9, 2007
Manchester, New Hampshire, Union Democrat,
December 8, 1852 (?); with news of Fillmore’s State of the Union Address
Millard Fillmore was a grade school drop out. He took the path to a career that many in his day did — he apprenticed, and worked his way up. Legal education in his day (circa 1815 to 1825) required that one apprentice in a law office, to “read for the law.” In that way, Fillmore, who didn’t graduate elementary school, became a lawyer.
Lawyering requires words, of course, but Fillmore was no great writer than we know, especially compared to Teddy Roosevelt, who was a newspaper reporter, or John Kennedy, in whose name a Pulitzer Prize-winning book was published (controversy for another time; Profiles in Courage, (Perennial Classics Books, 2000). We might hope that some institution will undertake a collection of Fillmore’s legal arguments as they may be spread across New York court archives, much as the Lincoln Library has scoured Illinois for Lincoln’s writings and oral arguments.
We may assume that Fillmore participated heavily in the writing of his state of the union addresses, in a day when ghost writers were not listed in the staff books of the White House. So they would contain genuine Fillmore ideas and phrases. Fillmore’s three state of the union speeches are available at the Gutenberg Project.
I’ll be mining them for accurate quotes, you may rest assured. (Does he mention bathtubs in any of the speeches? No.) Read the rest of this entry »
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Posted by Ed Darrell
January 9, 2007
For many years my colleagues in Scouting and I have mused at the great lack of interest in flag etiquette. We have collected dozens of cases of improper flag display, usually by people who were trying to honor the flag and nation, but who went about it contrary to good taste or the flag code, or both.
A couple of days after President Ford’s death I posted a short reminder of what the flag code calls for, with a photo of a flag flying at half-staff over the White House — a photo taken in 2004, after the death of Ronald Reagan, but the only one I could find at the time. That post is by now, far and away the most popular post on this blog since we started it up last July. For the past few days the number of visits to that post continued to grow.
I don’t know why the post is so popular. I hope people are getting from it a touch of flag etiquette — that would be fitting an proper especially as a result of the funeral of Gerald Ford, supreme nice guy and Eagle Scout. But there it is.
Today I found that the White House had included a photo of the White House flag at half-staff on December 26, 2006, in honor of Gerald Ford. Here it is:
A reminder again: The flag should be hoisted quickly (as always), to the peak of the pole, and then be lowered solemnly to half-mast. When the flag is retired at the end of the day, it should be raised again to the peak, quickly, and then lowered solemnly.
See also:
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Posted by Ed Darrell
January 4, 2007
[I hear from teachers who want lesson plans dealing with Gerald Ford. Here’s one I came across from the National Archives.]
Vice President Spiro Agnew was forced to resign in late 1973 in lieu of being prosecuted for bribery. The 25th Amendment allows a president to nominate a new vice president in the event of a vacancy. It was passed after the assassination of President Kennedy, when heart-attack victim Lyondon Johnson held office for over a year with no vice president, but it had never been used. With more than two years to go on his second term, Nixon was encouraged to fill the office.
Eventually Nixon picked Gerald Ford, putting Ford in line to become the first U.S. president to hold the office without ever having been elected to either the presidency or vice presidency, though that was unknown in the fall of 1973. What Nixon needed was someone who could pass the “advice and consent” test of the U.S. Senate. He got a letter from the Republican leader in the House, Gerald Ford, a long-time Michigan congressman, who named several others.
Whose names did Ford suggest to Nixon?
That letter is the focus of a lesson plan suitable for high school U.S. history or government classes, which comes with images of the letter and suggested activities from the National Archives.
The National Archives has lesson plans for all eras of U.S. history.
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Posted by Ed Darrell
January 2, 2007
The White House Historical Association recently published a special feature on presidents’ funerals. Their website has an interactive display worth checking out. I predict the network anchors will have this site up on their computers while they talk — it carries details of several presidents’ funerals, and a nice photo display.
I found the link through an article in the Austin American-Statesman. It mentions the print version of the historical journal, but I cannot find a link to it, nor any other mention of it (if you go to the paper’s story, note that their link to the White House Historical Association site was incorrect as of early on January 2).
Some tidbits gleaned from Ms. Faulkner’s article: The official government name for pall bearers is “body bearers.” The official name for a rifle honor corps is “firing party.” On the day after the death of a president or ex-president, a gun is fired every half hour at Army installations from reveille to retreat. On the day of burial, those installations fire a 21-gun salute at noon and a 50-gun salute (one per state) at five-second intervals following the lowering of the flag.
The Army’s Military District of Washington has prime responsibility for presidential funerals, but ex-presidents and their families are involved in the planning.
“Like most men my age, I have given a thought or two to my funeral,” Ford said in a November 2005 eulogy for presidential historian Hugh Sidey. “As a former president, I’m almost required to since the military periodically updates its own plans and each presidential family is solicited for personal touches.”
Ford had originally asked retired Time Magazine correspondent Hugh Sidey to deliver the euology at the funeral, a tip of respect to journalists in general. Unfortunately, Sidey died last year. (I also cannot find Ford’s tribute to Sidey; if you find the link, please send it along.)
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Posted by Ed Darrell
January 2, 2007
Actions convey messages. Actions communicate. How one acts in regarding the U.S. flag, at different times when action is required, tells something about character — whether one was even paying attention when respect for the flag, and the ideals it portrays, was explained.
President Ford’s casket lies in the rotunda of the U.S. Capitol. New York Times photo by Todd Heisler.
Here are a few things you may observe during the services for President Ford: Read the rest of this entry »
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Posted by Ed Darrell
January 1, 2007
Gerald Ford was a very likable guy. Since his death last week, I have been impressed with the number of people who have stepped forward with different stories about how Ford was just a regular guy called to duty.
Researching the updating of the story about the sale of creationist books in the Grand Canyon, I stumbled into a press release from the National Park Service. It turns out that Ford is the only president ever to have worked as a National Park Ranger (well, the National Park Service itself has only been around since 1901, so that lets out about half the presidents from even the possibility — though, of course, Yellowstone was established in 1862 1872).
In the summer of 1936 Ford worked in Yellowstone National Park. He had duties that sound rather quaint and definitely antiquated today: Ford was a guard on the bear feeding truck. Bears have to fend for themselves in today’s National Parks. No, it’s not due to budget cuts in bear food. Bears do better as wild creatures, and so feeding was stopped to discourage them from becoming tame and dependent on humans.
Gerald Ford, ranger mensch.
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Posted by Ed Darrell
December 28, 2006
Pat Oliphant, one of my favorite cartoonists since his days at the Denver Post, has a wonderful, funny tribute to Gerald Ford — go see, here.
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Posted by Ed Darrell
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 