![Aif23 Meacham Jon](https://aspenideasfestival.imgix.net/f447a8a6-2288-42b9-8343-4889c7aa8a85/AIF23_Meacham_Jon.jpg?auto=compress%2Cformat&fit=min&fm=jpg&h=290&q=80&rect=7%2C91%2C968%2C969&w=290)
Jon Meacham
Carolyn T. and Robert M. Rogers Chair, American Presidency, Vanderbilt University; Author, And There Was Light
Jon Meacham is the Carolyn T. and Robert M. Rogers Chair, American Presidency, at Vanderbilt University. A biographer, his latest book is And There Was Light: Abraham Lincoln and the American Struggle. Meacham’s other books include His Truth Is Marching On: John Lewis and the Power of Hope, Destiny and Power: The American Odyssey of George Herbert Walker Bush, and American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House, which won the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for biography. A contributing editor at TIME, he has written for The New York Times, The Washington Post, and Vanity Fair. Meacham is also a regular guest on “Morning Joe” and lectures on history, politics, and religious faith. He is a Council on Foreign Relations and Society of American Historians member.
Previously
![Afternoon of Conversation](https://aspenideasfestival.imgix.net/a24851c3-3b9b-40cf-8ed0-159d2463a9a3/53006438722_b768442f01_o.jpg?auto=compress%2Cformat&fit=min&fm=jpg&h=225&q=80&rect=0%2C172%2C8256%2C4644&w=400)
The Afternoon of Conversation is the Aspen Ideas Festival's pinnacle programming moment. Over 2,000 people gather in the Benedict Music Tent, an open-air venue with acoustics...
![A Lens on Present Day America: Abraham Lincoln and the Struggle for Democracy](https://aspenideasfestival.imgix.net/502d059c-ff98-4791-9dcd-de80bf92dd53/53009286050_fcb768c78b_o.jpg?auto=compress%2Cformat&fit=min&fm=jpg&h=225&q=80&rect=0%2C0%2C5904%2C3323&w=400)
Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer Jon Meacham shares a view of Abraham Lincoln, who managed to hold the country together despite threats to democracy and the devastations of t...
![Redemption Song?](https://aspenideasfestival.imgix.net/68434239-3b10-4261-b48b-f4947f329a36/53004936045_a81d8867b7_o.jpg?auto=compress%2Cformat&fit=min&fm=jpg&h=225&q=80&rect=0%2C419%2C6000%2C3377&w=400)
Much of the public discourse around race and our national narrative is, perhaps understandably, filled with recrimination, but if Americans are to remain a nation, we must fin...
![Are the Founders Back in Vogue?](https://aspenideasfestival.imgix.net/null43474cf6-4200-4d87-8fff-9c8ca8adf69c/35595939275_e5aa1345b3_h.jpg?auto=compress%2Cformat&fit=min&fm=jpg&h=225&q=80&rect=0%2C68%2C1600%2C899&w=400)
From Broadway to the bestseller lists, the members of the United States's founding generation are enjoying renewed popularity. But what do they have to teach the present? Join...
![Might the Past Inform Our Future?](https://aspenideasfestival.imgix.net/null1ca7bd29-07da-468f-8787-65d430d10191/35482286531_c343df5356_h.jpg?auto=compress%2Cformat&fit=min&fm=jpg&h=225&q=80&rect=30%2C273%2C1414%2C795&w=400)
Historian Jon Meacham has written extensively about the presidency, with acclaimed books on Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, Franklin Roosevelt, and most recently, George H....