The debate between US Vice President Kamala Harris and former president Donald Trump is hours away.
Harris and Trump will go head-to-head in Pennsylvania’s iconic National Constitution Center.
Trump earlier debated US President Joe Biden – who has since dropped his reelection bid.
This will be the first time Harris and Trump meet in person.
But what do we know about the history of US presidential debate? How did it all get started? Which debates have had the most memorable and iconic moments?
Let’s take a closer look:
These days, US presidential debates are a big affair with breathless coverage by the press.
The candidates themselves bicker over every aspect – where the debate will be held, the rules of the debate, whether or not there will be a live audience and if they are allowed to clap, and even over who the moderators will be and if fact-checking will be allowed.
The non-partisan Commission on Presidential Debates has organised US presidential debates since 1988.
As per Axios, the commission usually conducts three presidential debates and a vice presidential debate every four years.
The earliest debates saw candidates answer questions from a panel of journalists, while moderators would mostly keep things on track.
However, this would later change with the panels being disposed of, the moderators being put in charge and live audiences being added.
But these are all relatively new developments.
Let’s go back to the first presidential election.
In 1789, though a number of men threw their hat into the ring for America’s first president, there were no debates between the candidates.
Nor was there ever really any doubt over the outcome.
George Washington, chief of the Continental Army during the war of independence, was overwhelmingly elected America’s first president.
John Adams, who got the second most electoral votes in the Electoral College, would serve as Washington’s deputy.
It wasn’t until decades later, in 1858, when the idea behind having the two candidates debate each other first emerged.
Abraham Lincoln-Stephen Douglas
At this time, a struggling country lawyer named Abraham Lincoln was seeking the Illinois Senate seat.
Lincoln, the Republican and challenger, was going up against incumbent Democrat Stephen Douglas.
Lincoln, accepting the Republican nomination for the Illinois Senate seat, made his soon to be famous “a house divided against itself cannot stand” and “this government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free” remarks, as per Britannica.
Douglas, on the other hand, painted Lincoln as a radical on the issue of slavery and accused him of being a danger to the Union.
The men would meet in seven times across Illinois in three-hour-long debates.
While the men clashed over myriad issues, the biggest was unquestionably that of slavery, which had flared up yet again and left the fledgling country ever more divided.
Though Douglas ultimately defeated Lincoln and retained his seat, it was the challenger who gained fame as an orator – and the future of the Republican party.
Lincoln would go on to defeat Douglas in their rematch – this time for the presidency.
The Lincoln-Douglas clashes, which occurred for the Illinois Senate seat, remain the most famous of all debates between candidates and continue to capture the public’s imagination.
Adlai Stevenson-Dwight Eisenhower
The first televised debate for president occurred on November 4, 1956.
At the time, Democrat Adlai Stevenson was taking on Republican incumbent Dwight D Eisenhower.
Ironically, neither Stevenson nor Eisenhower participated in the debate themselves.
Instead, it was left up to two women – ex-First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, an icon in the Democratic party and Margaret Chase Smith, the senior Senator from Maine – to represent the candidates.
Roosevelt and Smith debated on Columbia Broadcasting System’s Face the Nation just days before the election and dealt almost entirely with the subject of foreign policy.
The results of the debate? While there was no official winner or loser, Stevenson would go on to lose to Eisenhower – the second time he would do so in a presidential election.
Richard Nixon-John F Kennedy
Perhaps the most important debate of the modern era was the first one between presidential candidates.
This occurred on September 26, 1960, between Richard Nixon and John F Kennedy.
Kennedy was seeking to break barriers as the first Catholic US president, while Nixon was seeking what he wanted all his life – respect from his peers and the public and the highest office in the land.
Yet again, it was the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) that got the plum assignment.
The candidates faced off in Chicago before a massive TV audience.
It was estimated that nearly half of those with TVs in America – around 87 per cent of the country was estimated to have at least one TV – tuned in.
Many claim that it was this debate which swung the election firmly in favour of the young, good-looking Kennedy.
Kennedy was said to look calm and cool, while Nixon was thought to have looked nervous, sweaty and uncomfortable.
Kennedy would go on to narrowly defeat Nixon and win the presidency – becoming America’s first Catholic Commander-in-Chief.
As per USA Today, journalist Theodore H White in his Pulitzer Prize-winning book The Making of the President claimed the debate being televised made the difference.
“Until the cameras opened on the senator and the vice-president,” White argued. “Kennedy had been the boy under assault and attack by the vice-president as immature, young, inexperienced. Now, obviously, in flesh and behaviour, he was the vice-president’s equal.”
Other too took the same tack.
“Kennedy went on to narrowly win the election that most say he never would have had a shot at without that first debate,” Time Magazine later wrote in a piece looking back on the debate. “Nixon’s fatal flub was in failing to recognize the power of the visual image.”
In 1994, after Nixon’s death, Max Frankel, then the executive editor of The New York Times, added, “Nixon lost a TV debate, and the Presidency, to John F. Kennedy in 1960 because of a sweaty upper lip.”
However, some suggest this is more of a narrative constructed by those of us looking back than actual fact.
Regardless, the Nixon-Kennedy debate, its outcome and the part played by television remains firmly entrenched in the American psyche.
Jimmy Carter-Ronald Reagan
Many see the 1980 debate between Republican challenger Ronald Reagan and Democratic incumbent Jimmy Carter as yet another inflection point.
Carter in 1979 as president had given his famous crisis of confidence speech – which critics would soon dub the ‘malaise speech’ (though Carter never actually uttered those words).
The 1970s had been a tough and turbulent time in America – the war in Vietnam, Nixon’s resignation, the Iranian hostage crisis, spiking unemployment and inflation and an energy crisis just to mention a few developments.
Carter, as he saw it, had attempted to sum up the national mood – but America wasn’t having it.
Enter Ronald Reagan – previously a small-time actor who had twice served as governor of California and emerged as a star in the Republican party.
The debate between the two men, which occurred a week before the election, is arguably remembered for Reagan’s famous ‘there you go again’ riposte after Carter gave an answer on the subject of healthcare.
The remark would work so well that Reagan would use it time and again including in the 1984 debate with ex-vice president Walter Mondale.
Americans would ultimately choose Reagan’s sunny disposition and lofty rhetorical skills over’s Carter prescription for a better future.
Seen by 80.6 million Americans, this tussle remains the second-most watched US presidential debate ever.
Hillary Clinton-Donald Trump
The first debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump was arguably the most anticipated showdown in US political history.
Held in September 2016, it broke all TV records for presidential debates.
Around 84 million Americans watched the two candidates go at each other, as per Nielsen Media Research.
Though many thought Clinton won the debate easily, others were impressed with Trump for looking like he belonged on stage.
Hillary would debate Trump twice more – with the last being the most contentious by far.
The third debate, in a town hall style setting, saw both candidates take questions from the audience.
Trump would make headlines for following Clinton around the stage – leading to accusations that he was trying to invade her space.
Clinton in her memoir would write that her ‘skin crawled’ and she had to resist telling Trump ‘back up, you creep.’
Trump also couldn’t stop himself from calling Hillary a ‘nasty woman’ during the end of the debate.
Though Hillary would be unanimously declared the winner by the critics all three times, it appeared to matter little to the US public who gave Trump a clear win over Clinton in the Electoral College.
Joe Biden-Donald Trump
The first 2024 presidential debate between US President Joe Biden and former president Donald Trump was arguably the most consequential in recent history.
So poor was Biden’s performance that it made his re-election bid for president untenable.
Even those within the campaign and the most ardent defenders of the president struggled to explain away Biden’s stumbles, mumbles and repeatedly losing hiss train of thought.
Biden, 81, would drop out of the race for president after initially insisting that only the almighty Lord could cause him to do so.
He was replaced by Harris, who has had a dream run since securing the Democratic nomination for president.
Trump, meanwhile, has expressed regret that he even debated Biden, saying “what was I thinking?”
In the end the Biden-Trump debate turned out to be an utter disaster.
But the question remains for whom.
With inputs from agencies
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Publish date : 2024-09-10 03:51:00
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