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President John F. Kennedy launched a brand new period of White House communications when he hosted the first live televised presidential press conference on this day in historical past, Jan. 25, 1961.
“The fact of the matter is that [at] the time when President Kennedy started televised press conferences, there were only three or four newspapers in the entire United States that carried a full transcript of a presidential press conference,” Kennedy’s press secretary, Pierre Salinger, informed the JFK Presidential Library in an oral historical past of the thirty fifth president.
“Therefore, what people read was a distillation … We thought that they should have the opportunity to see it in full.”
The president had been sworn into workplace simply 5 days earlier.
The press conference was held on the new State Department auditorium in Washington, D.C. The Cold War hung closely over the proceedings.
The new president made a collection of three bulletins, the first associated to atomic take a look at ban discussions in Geneva, Switzerland.
Semi-general view of press conference in Washington, D.C., as President Kennedy is proven at his first press conference since taking workplace. At the conference, which was televised live from the State Department’s new auditorium, the president mentioned he was asking that the Geneva negotiations with Russia for a nuclear take a look at ban treaty be postponed till late March. (Getty Images)
He then addressed reduction efforts amid the continuing civil struggle in the Congo, which grew to become a proxy struggle between competing Soviet- and U.S.-backed factions.
Kennedy additionally introduced that U.S. Air Force officers Capt. John R. McKone and Capt. Freeman “Bruce” Olmstead had been launched by the Soviet Union after greater than six months in captivity.
Four different airmen have been killed when their RB-47 bomber was shot down by a Soviet fighter jet over disputed airspace in the Bering Sea on July 1, 1960 — simply weeks after the extra well-known U2 incident of May 1960.
The Cold War hung closely over the first televised presidential press conference.
The president then opened the ground for questions.
“Do you conceive of circumstances which might warrant the resumption of such things as the U2 flight?” a reporter requested in the first media query posed to a president earlier than a live TV viewers.
(SEE the video beneath.)
“Flights of American aircraft penetrating the airspace of the Soviet Union have been suspended since May 1960,” Kennedy responded.
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“I have ordered that they not be resumed,” he additionally mentioned.
A second reporter requested Kennedy about rumors that Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev would possibly go to the president in Washington in March to debate nuclear disarmament following United Nations conferences in New York City.
Released captains: John McKone, Bruce Olmstead, and their wives are honored on the White House by (left to proper) Vice President Lyndon Johnson, first woman Jacqueline Kennedy and President John F. Kennedy. The RB-47 bomber flown by THE U.S. airmen was shot down by a Soviet MiG fighter. (Getty Images)
“I’ve not heard officially of any proposal by Mr. Khrushchev to come to the United States,” Kennedy mentioned.
The immediacy of the occasion dramatically modified — or ought to have modified — the dynamic of the connection between the seat of federal energy and the press.
“In the period preceding the Kennedy presidency, the rules governing press conferences favored the president.” — White House Historical Association
Independent media, when performing their duties, are supposed to characterize the American folks and function a test on the president’s energy.
“In the period preceding the Kennedy presidency, the rules governing press conferences favored the president,” writes the White House Historical Association.
“The sessions were off-the-record events from Woodrow Wilson through Harry Truman. If the president said something he believed unwise, he could alter the quote.”
Woodrow Wilson held the first presidential information conference on March 15, 1913.
President Eisenhower held the first televised press conference on Jan. 19, 1955, utilizing file footage.
“President John F. Kennedy was the first to use the medium of television to address the American people live without delay or editing,” experiences the United States Government Publishing Office.
TV display picture of the presidential debates between Vice President Richard Milhous Nixon, left, and Sen. John F. Kennedy as Kennedy makes a degree. (Getty Images)
The use of tv proved important to Kennedy’s ascension to the Oval Office.
Most notably, most Americans agreed he projected higher on tv throughout a collection of debates with vice chairman Richard Nixon in the autumn of 1960.
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His made-for-TV picture proved important in an election that JFK received by the slimmest of margins — he captured 49.7% of the favored vote, in comparison with 49.6% for Nixon.
Television cemented Kennedy’s enduring picture as a younger, vibrant and energetic American chief. He served lower than three years in workplace earlier than his assassination on Nov. 22, 1963. (Getty Images)
The Kennedy-Nixon debates “shifted how presidential campaigns were conducted, as the power of television took elections into Americans’ living rooms,” the National Constitution Center factors out.
Television additionally cemented Kennedy’s enduring picture as a younger, vibrant, energetic American chief, who served lower than three years in workplace earlier than his assassination on Nov. 22, 1963.
President Kennedy was the first chief government to permit his press conferences to be televised live from the State Dept. Building — or anyplace else. (Getty Images)
“President Kennedy’s press conferences brought with them the glamour of a young leader, an activist policy agenda and a tension between the president and his press corps,” claims the White House Historical Association.
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“Young reporters flocked to Washington to cover the new president,” the identical supply mentioned.
“Reporters were more willing to challenge the new president than was true in the Eisenhower years … The U2 spy plane incident changed the relationship for many reporters with their government. It was an incident where the U.S. government was caught in a lie.”
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