Goodwin Examines Leadership Lessons

Doris Kearns Goodwin, world-renowned presidential historian and Pulitzer Prize-winning author, spoke about “Leadership Lessons from American Presidents” to more than 700 people at the 10th annual Westmont President’s Breakfast on March 6 in the Grand Ballroom of Fess Parker’s DoubleTree Resort.

Following the breakfast, Goodwin answered questions from four Westmont students in front of about 1,000 people during convocation in Westmont’s Murchison Gym.

Sophia Meulenberg, a double major in political science and French from Sandpoint, Idaho, asked Goodwin how much presidential leadership depends on the person themselves or the opportunity the moment gives them. “When Lincoln was a young man in his 30s, he worried there would be nothing for his generation that would be exciting and challenging,” Goodwin said. “The Founding Fathers had done everything great. The rivers, mountains and streams were named after them, and what was left for his generation but maybe a seat in Congress or even a presidency without much purpose. Of course, the anti-slavery movement develops, the Civil War comes, and he has the biggest challenge ever and becomes Abraham Lincoln.”

Theodore Roosevelt, however, said that he could never have the chance of being a president like Lincoln without a war. “It’s often said that President Clinton wished there was a war so he would have that challenge,” Goodwin said.

Goodwin mentioned that the next book she is working on will examine the leadership qualities of the presidents she’s studied over the years.

Jarret Catlin, a political science major from Upland, questioned Goodwin about the changing role journalism has played in each of the presidencies.

Goodwin mentioned the giants of journalism near the turn of the 20th century, such Ida Tarbell, who wrote about Standard Oil, Ray Baker, who exposed the corruption of the railroads, William Allen White, a nationally syndicated columnist, Lincoln Steffens, who wrote about corruption in municipal governments. “The publisher of McClure’s magazine wanted to make an impact on the life of the country so he gave (his reporters) two years to research their subjects before they had to write a single word,” she said. The reporters had huge expense accounts and were paid a salary, but often their stories led to the passing of significant laws.

“Today, in normal journalistic circles, there are very few places where you could spend a couple of years researching, writing and producing that kind of stellar work,” she said. “Today, journalism, for some people, has become more entertainment.”

Erin Levoir, a double major in biology and chemistry from Glendale, asked why Goodwin had decided to write about Lincoln in “A Team of Rivals” through the lens of his cabinet officers.

By pure luck, not long after Goodwin had begun researching Lincoln, she went to Auburn, New York, the home of William Seward, Lincoln’s secretary of state. “His house still exists in almost the form it was in then, and it’s a fabulous museum,” she said. “I got a feeling of him being alive in that place. I found out he had written thousands of letters to his wife. I started reading the letters. She didn’t want to be in Washington, so every night he would write to her.”

Later, she discovered the rest of Lincoln’s cabinet was comprised of characters like Seward, who were Lincoln’s rivals, including Salmon Chase and Edward Bates. Turns out, they both kept diaries and wrote letters. “They came alive to me before Lincoln,” she said. “All of them had written about what Lincoln had done that day. I knew about their conversations and how they felt about Lincoln. Two years into the project, I decided this is what I wanted to write about.”

Matt Browne, a history major from Santa Ana, asked Goodwin about Lincoln’s temperament. “After the deaths of so many people in his life, his melancholy began to take on a deeper sense, and the way he got himself out of it was through humor,” she said. “People would say even when he was young, he could be the saddest person in the world, and then he would start telling a story. He was a fantastic story teller. And the stories would be funny and silly, have an Aesop’s fable or moral, but once he started telling the story he would laugh larger than anybody else, and his whole face would come alive. Later, he said that he laughed so he did not weep, that a good story was better for him than a drop of whiskey.”