i never knew what a labor camp was. we never had the opportunity because we were constantly on the move and you are shooting and fighting at the same time. we had 183 days of combat. it was just constantly go, go, go. to run into a situation like this was phenomenal to me. i just did not believe anything like that existed. >> this sunday night at 8:00 eastern, we will look into the personal lives of two first ladies from the 1850's. jane pierce and harriet lane. jane pierce uses her son in a tragic train accident. grieving, she does not attend her husband franklin pierce's inauguration and spends much of the time in the white house writing heartbreaking notes to hurt son. often that a young age, harriet lane lived with her uncle, secretary of state james

buchanan and later becomes hostess to the white house when he becomes president and the first to be called first lady in print. sundays at 8:00 p.m. eastern on american history tv on c-span3 and as i come from and as i come from a to the series, c-span's new book on the lives of 45 iconic american women available as a hardcover or an e-book through your favorite bookstore or online bookseller. >> all weekend long, american history tv is featuring lincoln nebraska. the cannot house is the oldest standing structure in lincoln.

together with our time warner cable partners, c-span's city store staff recently visited many sites exploring lincoln's rich history. learn more about lincoln all weekend here on american history tv. >> while in lincoln we spoke with republican governor pete ricketts inside his office at the nebraska state capital. >> is there an error or if event in nebraska state history that interests or resonates with you? -- is there an era or event? governor ricketts: a lot of people don't know there was a big european battle here. the spanish were claiming the high plains, and they were at war with the french. that often happened. as it turned out, french trappers came in and infringed upon their territory, so they sent an expedition from santa fe, new mexico, to come investigate and basically kicked the french trappers out of their territory.

there was about 40 soldiers and some settlers. they also brought up some pueblo and apache native americans as scouts and so forth. they actually had a spanish slave who was a poni indian who was one of the scouts as well. he disappeared and then reappeared with a tribe of connie saying he was being held prisoner. this is up around columbus, nebraska. ironic it was around columbus one of the discoverers of america. he said he was being treated ok but the poni were not going to let him come back to the spanish camp. it was rumored or speculated that the spanish slave who had been scouting for the spanish actually told the poni dash the paw -- the pawnee the best time to attack. they waited until about 10:00 when the spanish had figured it

would not going to get attacked and started on saddling the horses, and then they attacked. it was a large number -- maybe 500 -- and the spanish were wiped out almost entirely. a few managed to escape. about eight or nine made it back to new mexico, made it back to santa fe. the interesting application of this was that this really discouraged the spanish from trying to enforce their claims on the central plains and allowed the french to eventually claim the louisiana territory, which, of course was eventually sold to the united states. that simple battle may have discouraged the spanish from holding onto the central plains and allow the french to be of to sell to the united states. little events like that can trigger big things. >> looking at nebraska's political history, are there any politicians who have influenced you or your political ideals? governor ricketts: the gentleman

who founded arbor day, attentive to plant trees all across the state. first arbor day, they planted almost one million trees. this is going back to 1872. the interesting thing is he was a journalist. he owned the nebraska city news and used it to promote agriculture, which is our state's largest industry. what influenced me about that, besides fact that he's run my hometown, is that it really demonstrates he spirit of nebraskans. nebraskans are so involved in their communities in schools and churches, and they are really engaged, and he used that. he had that spirit of being involved in the community to start something that is now celebrated in all 50 states. and it is a state holiday here in nebraska. it demonstrates the power of one person getting involved in making a change in what they can do to influence a whole state even over a century later. >> the keystone pipeline proposed to pass through nebraska has resulted in what --

in much debate. what is its current status, and how do you feel about the project? governor ricketts: some people had some concerns about the route of the pipeline. we had a political process that worked. we came together. we resolved to smooth the route of the headline, and now i believe it's time to go ahead and get it built. it's going to be something that's going to be good for nebraska. it will create about the thousand jobs, and some of the jobs, like the welders that do the pipeline, that these 137 dollars an hour. those are fantastic jobs that will then flow out to the community. it will support about 300 jobs after it is being built, and the counties it runs through, it will do a tremendous amount for being able to create property taxes, which is then allows us to help pay for schools. i'm talking to one gentleman from erickson, nebraska, who was unhappy the route of the pipeline got moved because it moved out of wheeler county, and

he calculated they lost out about $15 million in property taxes. it is also something that will help us become energy independent here in north america. think about what that means for geopolitical situations. if we can be energy independent here in north america. frankly, right now, there is oil moving already and moving by rail, so this will be another way for us to help transport that oil. for a lot of reasons, i think this is great for nebraska grateful the country, and i would encourage the state department to go ahead and approve the route so we can get moving on it. >> you mentioned jobs associated with the pipeline. i had the privilege of sitting down with some lincoln high school students yesterday. one of the things they were concerned about was the proposed young student workers minimum wage cap. how would that affect workers under the age of 18? governor ricketts: the idea is we passed the minimum wage law here, but a lot of people taking those minimum-wage jobs are

teenagers at entry-level positions. if you have to pay them, it will discourage job creation, so the idea is to help teenagers by allowing businesses to create more of those jobs to help young people get into that first job to start learning how to be a work on time, how to shake somebody's hand, how do, for instance, count change if you are a counter at a fast food place, so it is really designed to create more jobs for teenagers. >> earlier this week the supreme court asked the justice department to weigh in on the case of nebraska and colorado -- nebraska versus colorado. where do you stand on the issue? governor ricketts: the lawsuit is about the supremacy clause. we have a edible government that has certain powers and the administration of dangerous drugs is one of them. the united states has said marijuana is a dangerous drug. if it is going to be used, it needs to go through the fda like

any other drug, and states do not have the ability to unilaterally make it legal, and it has had a huge impact here. we've seen a lot of trafficking coming across our borders increases in crime and so forth, so it is impacting us. the idea is basically to say "colorado, you cannot make up your own laws that are already covered by the federal government, so you need to follow federal government laws." so that is why we are tying to take this suit to court, to force the federal government to say the same thing. that includes recreational marijuana and colorado. in nebraska, we have a bill in front of our legislation right now talking about medical marijuana. my opinion is this is a dangerous substance. i was on a panel with the governor of colorado a couple of weeks ago, and he talked about how there's all sorts of neurological studies that show that use of marijuana by young people can really retard the

development of their brain. it can inhibit long-term memory, ferns and. that is a huge concern. this is why we have an fda to test drugs, to make sure they are safe and effective. it's really the process medical marijuana needs to go through. i was told last night, as a matter of fact by one of our law enforcement officials, that the fda has approved a synthetic pill that is a derivative of marijuana. so it does appear that we have alternatives to go down. the proper way to do this is to go through the fda to create whatever derivative of marijuana we want to be a drug to address specific issues and make sure they are effective issues. >> at the road to the white house comes through nebraska, what is important to nebraska voters? governor ricketts: one of the things you will hear from nebraska voters as they are very concerned about the future. they want to make sure their kids can grow up in a place

where they have a chance to pursue the american dream and they are very concerned. most nebraskans -- again, they are very engaged locally and would prefer the federal government stick to a few things and let most of the governing be done at the local level. we have added -- we have a very diverse state. we have found solutions that it locally, and that is really have nebraskans think. they are really independent, so i think any candidate that comes here is going to find that nebraskans basically want to be left alone and let us manage our own business. >> you mentioned government at the local level. nebraska state government is set up unlike any other state in the country. can you explain that? governor ricketts: we are a very different state. nebraskans are very independent piece -- independent. we have a one-house legislature put in place in the 1930's.

it is also nonpartisan. one of the benefits as i have talked to colleagues around the country is it tends to be less partisan, less polarized than other statehouses around the country, and again, nebraskans have a great history of coming together to work to solve their common problems and to cooperate. probably part of that pioneer spirit. as you are settling a new territory, you have to work together to be able to survive. i think that culture has carried down through the century and a half of our statehood to be able to get to the point where we really approach problems of trying to figure out how we can work together. >> throughout the week in, american history tv is featuring lincoln, nebraska. our city store staff traveled there to learn about its rich history. to learn more about lincoln and other stops on our you're watching american history tv, every weekend, all weekend on c-span3. >> during the civil war