Ten days before the election of Barack Obama to the White House, the Hammer hosted New York-based artist-in-residence Sharon Hayes; Lincoln scholar, Huntington Fellow, and UCLA visiting faculty member Ronald C. White Jr.; and the UCLA and University of Southern California (USC) debate teams for a two-day event exploring the 1858 Illinois Senate campaign debates between Stephen A. Douglas and Abraham Lincoln. In this video, Hayes speaks about the inception of her performance and her interest in language, speech, politics, and rhetoric and how these modes intersect to shape our understanding of the world.