I’m currently reading the fourth and final volume of James Thomas Flexner’s monumental biography of George Washington, Anguish and Farewell (1793-1799). As the title implies, it covers Washington’s second term as president, from 1793 to 1797, and the last two years of his life following his retirement from office till his death in December 1799.
Would you live out of your office–and sleep under your desk like George Costanza–for nearly three months to keep your job? In this Dispatch, Dr. Deaton discusses the conflict between President Andrew Johnson and Secretary of War Edwin Stanton and the role he played in our nation’s first impeachment in 1868.
Alexander X. Byrd is an Associate Professor of History at Rice University. In 2020 he was appointed Rice’s first Vice Provost for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. Dr. Byrd’s area of expertise is Afro America, especially Black life in the Atlantic world and the Jim Crow South. He received his Ph.D. in History from Duke University in 2001. His study of free and forced transatlantic Black migration in the period of the American Revolution, Captives and Voyagers: Black Migrants Across the Eighteenth-Century British Atlantic World (LSU Press, 2010), received the 2009 Wesley-Logan Prize in African Diaspora History. Dr. Byrd teaches courses in African-American history at Rice, where he is a four-time recipient of the George R. Brown Award for Superior Teaching. He is currently co-editing the Oxford Handbook of African American History with Dr. Celia Naylor.
Stan looks at the history of this quadrennial event that goes back 232 years, from the Bible Washington used to the only inauguration held on an airplane, the only president sworn in by a woman, two inaugurals almost cancelled by cold weather, and why there have been 9 “non-scheduled extraordinary” inaugurations.
Dr. Deaton reflects on this year’s episodes of Dispatches from Off the Deaton Path and thanks everyone who made them possible, but most of all, he thanks viewers like you! If you have ideas for future episodes, let us know. Stay safe, stay strong, and have a happy New Year—thank you for watching!