Teapot Dome was a federal facility where the U.S. navy drilled for and stored oil. In 1922, Fall leased the facility to two oil companies that paid him $400,000. Fall went to jail for his actions in 1929.
Reacting to all the scandals in his administration, Harding said, “My god, this is a hell of a job! I can take care of my enemies all right. But my damn friends, my g - - - - - - friends . . . they’re the ones that keep me walking the floor nights!”
Succeeding despite himself
Harding had his moments. His administration was successful in a few areas, where his accomplishments included
Reducing income taxes
Protecting U.S. industries from foreign competition with the Fordney McCumber Act — an act that increased tariffs
Restricting immigration from Europe with the Immigration Act of 1921
Allowing blacks in federal government positions
Signing a separate peace treaty with Germany, officially ending the war in Europe
Calling the Washington Conference
In 1921, Harding called for a conference in Washington between the great powers. The Washington Conference resulted in the Five Power Treaty, which limited the number of ships and aircraft carriers that the five great powers in the world could have. (The five great powers at the time were the United States, Great Britain, France, Japan, and Italy.) The conference further established the Four Power Treaty, signed by the United States, Japan, Great Britain, and France. In it, the four countries pledged to recognize each other’s possessions in the Pacific. The conference proved to be the most notable achievement of the Harding administration.
Dying suddenly
By 1923, Harding had fallen into despair. All the scandals, involving some of his best friends, got to him. He decided to tour Alaska. He suddenly became ill on his trip home, so he stopped in San Francisco to rest. He died there on August 2, 1923, of a possible stroke.
Mrs. Harding didn’t allow an autopsy. So nobody really knows what Harding died of. At the time, there were rumors that Mrs. Harding had poisoned him after finding out about all the affairs her husband had. So far, these rumors haven’t been substantiated.
Quietly Doing Nothing: John Calvin Coolidge
Calvin Coolidge’s nickname was “Silent Cal.” How appropriate! As president, Coolidge didn’t do much. The United States was at peace and doing well during his term. So Coolidge, shown in Figure 15-2, enjoyed the presidency — he slept a lot and was fairly anti-social. Instead of trying to prevent the approaching Great Depression, Coolidge sat back, believing that the government had no role in the economy.
Figure 15-2: Calvin Coolidge, 30th president of the United States.
Courtesy of the Library of Congress
Coolidge’s early career
Coolidge won his first public office, a seat on the city council in Northampton, Massachusetts, by going door to door. He wooed the electorate with the catchy phrase, “I want your vote. I need it. I shall appreciate it.” He followed up his first public office with the positions of city solicitor, clerk of courts, mayor of Northampton, and member of the Massachusetts legislature.
A true Puritan
Calvin Coolidge was born on July 4, 1872. His father owned a small shop in Vermont and was deeply religious. Young Coolidge adopted his father’s values and followed them throughout his life. Coolidge believed in conservatism, honesty, thrift, and religion. He became a quiet, shy young man, who didn’t like to interact with people.
While studying at Amherst College, Coolidge enjoyed the social sciences and the arts. Like many presidents, Coolidge studied law. He opened his own practice in Northampton, Massachusetts.
In 1905, he met the love of his life, Grace Anna Goodhue. She was outgoing and friendly, and she loved people. Who says opposites don’t attract?
In 1912, the people elected Coolidge to the state senate, where he served four years. Coolidge became the lieutenant governor of Massachusetts in 1916 and governor in 1918.
Governing Massachusetts
As governor, Coolidge didn’t do much. But one event defined his term and turned him into a household name. In 1919, police officers in Boston formed a union and asked for more money. When the city refused, they went on strike. The mayor of the city suspended the union leaders and relied on state troopers to police the city. The mayor’s plan wasn’t sufficient. The crime rate went up. Criminals had a field day without the normal police force in place.
On the third day of the strike, Governor Coolidge called out the National Guard. He sent cavalry to Boston and beefed up the state troopers. He even went as far as to threaten the strikers with the use of federal troops. The officers returned to work the next day, and Coolidge refused to rehire the suspended strike leaders, saying, “There is no right to strike against the public safety by anybody, anywhere, anytime.”
President Wilson applauded Coolidge’s actions, as did businesses nationwide. The resulting publicity helped him win reelection easily.
Becoming vice president
At the Republican convention in 1920, the Massachusetts delegation pushed Coolidge for the presidential nomination. They failed to get him nominated, although he did get the vice-presidential slot as a consolation prize. Coolidge accepted the bid happily. In 1920, he was elected vice president after resigning as governor. As vice president, Coolidge regularly joined Harding’s cabinet meetings — the first vice president to do so.
When President Harding got sick in 1923, his advisors told Vice President Coolidge that the president was fine. So Coolidge went to Vermont to spend some time with his father. When Harding died, Coolidge was unreachable because his father didn’t own a phone. So messengers were sent to inform Coolidge of the president’s death. They arrived late at night when Coolidge was asleep. Coolidge got up, had his father, a notary public, give him the presidential oath, and then went back to sleep.
President Calvin Coolidge (1923–1929)
When Coolidge became president, he dealt with the scandals of Harding’s administration by firing the attorney general, Daugherty, and forcing the resignation of the secretary of the navy. He then proceeded to appoint well-qualified, incorruptible people to office. His best appointment was Frank Kellogg as secretary of state.
In keeping with his values, Coolidge went straight to the people to explain the changes. Coolidge held many press conferences and had his State of the Union addresses reported live on radio.
In 1924, the economy was booming, and Coolidge was a shoo-in for reelection. The Republican Party renominated him. He easily defeated Democrat John W. Davis. Coolidge received almost twice as many popular votes as Davis, as well as 382 electoral votes.
In 1924, Coolidge used the slogan, “Keep cool with Coolidge,” as his campaign motto. The people loved it. They reelected him for a second term.
Serving a second term
In 1925, the world was good. The U.S. economy was doing well, and there were no major international conflicts. Coolidge reduced the national debt and fought government intrusion in the economy. He repeatedly vetoed farm bills that would have allowed the government to purchase agricultural surpluses and keep prices for these goods high. His motto was simple: If it’s not broken, why fix it.
President Coolidge required a lot of sleep. He went to bed at 10 p.m. and slept until 7 a.m. But that wasn’t enough. In addition, the president took one two- to four-hour nap every afternoon.
Showing his racism
On social policy issues, Coolidge held fairly racist views. He supported restrictions on immigration and publicly stated that Nordic races deteriorate when mixed with other races. In his view, the United States, being a Nordic country, had to restrict immigration from other non-Nordic countries.
Excelling in foreign policy
Coolidge’s greatest accomplishment came in the area of foreign policy. The subject bored him, but his secretary of state Frank Kellogg excelled in it. The passage of the Kellogg-Briand Act in 1928 was Coolidge’s crowni
ng achievement in foreign policy. Secretary of State Kellogg received the Nobel Peace Prize for his accomplishments.
The 63 signatories of the Kellogg-Briand Act of 1928 renounced the use of war as an instrument of foreign policy and instead relied upon peaceful means, such as diplomacy, to settle disputes. (Aristide Briand was the foreign minister of France.)
Choosing not to run
Coolidge was immensely popular. Had he decided to run for the presidency in 1928, he could have easily won. Instead, he issued a brief statement while on vacation in the summer of 1927, saying, “I do not choose to run for President in 1928.” There were no explanations attached to his message. Coolidge had just had enough. With the death of his son in 1924, Coolidge stopped enjoying the presidency. He believed that it was time to step down.
Coolidge was upset that Herbert Hoover was the Republican selection for president in 1928. At one point, Coolidge said, “This man has offered me unsolicited advice for six years, all of it bad.” But Coolidge didn’t do anything to prevent Hoover’s nomination.
Coolidge retired in 1929 and wrote his autobiography. He sat on the boards of several corporations and became a trustee at his alma mater, Amherst College. Coolidge died of a heart attack in January 1933.
A Great Humanitarian, but a Bad President: Herbert Hoover
Herbert Hoover, shown in Figure 15-3, is the most maligned president in U.S. history. Many blame him for the Great Depression, which is quite unfair. He actually set the foundation for Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal policies (see Chapter 16 for more on these policies). Too bad his efforts weren’t better publicized. Hoover wasn’t a politician — he never ran for office before becoming president — and he didn’t know how to reach out to the public and explain his policies. Not hearing anything different, the average U.S. citizen didn’t think that the president cared. So he was voted out of office.
On the other hand, Hoover was quite a man. He was a self-made millionaire and a great humanitarian. Hoover not only organized relief efforts to Europe during and after World War I, but he also became active after World War II when President Truman called him back into service. With these efforts, Hoover literally saved millions of Europeans from starvation.
Hoover was a mediocre president and a great human being. While serving his country, Hoover refused to take a salary and instead donated the money to charities. He deserved his title as the “Great Humanitarian.”
Figure 15-3: Herbert Hoover, 31st president of the United States.
Courtesy of the Library of Congress
Hoover’s early career
Hoover was in London when WWI broke out. Right away, he wanted to help. His first task was to bring home the thousands of U.S. citizens that were stranded in Europe. (He assisted over 120,000 U.S. citizens.) Hoover then took on the more demanding job of feeding and clothing thousands of Europeans. From 1914 to 1919, Hoover headed the Commission for the Relief of Belgium. He supervised the distribution of millions of tons of aid to Belgium and northern France.
President Wilson was impressed with Hoover’s activities, so in 1917, he called him back home to become the U.S. food administrator. This position required Hoover to make sure that the United States could feed its military and the Allied troops in Europe. Hoover was so successful that Wilson sent him back to Europe after WWI to help starving Europeans. As the head of the American Relief Administration, Hoover provided food to 300 million people across Europe. By 1920, his job was done. It was time to move on.
Entering politics
When the Republicans retook the White House in 1921, President Harding appointed Hoover secretary of commerce. Hoover reorganized the department and extended federal control over the public airwaves and the airline industry. He also standardized sizes for basic items such as tires, nuts, and bolts.
In addition, Hoover continued to be active in the area of disaster relief. He organized aid to Russia and later took on the Mississippi river flood relief. By 1928, the Great Humanitarian was known to every U.S. citizen.
Overcoming hardships and misery
Herbert Hoover was born in the state of Iowa in 1874. Hoover grew up in a Quaker family. He was given up for dead at the age of two. When his parents pulled a sheet over his head, thinking that he was dead, his uncle, a doctor, came to the rescue and resuscitated him.
Hoover lost both of his parents by the time he was nine. Relatives divided up Hoover and his siblings, and Hoover went to Oregon to live with an uncle. He worked on his uncle’s farm and studied at night, but he never graduated from high school.
Hoover became fascinated by the field of engineering after running into an engineer. Hoover was too poor to afford tuition, so he applied to what today is Stanford University. Stanford had just opened it doors in 1891. It was a well-financed private school, so it was waiving its tuition for the freshmen class to attract students. Hoover studied geology, necessary to become a mining engineer, at the university and worked many menial jobs on the side. In 1895, he graduated and started an engineering career in San Francisco.
Hoover then moved to London to work for a British mining company. His job allowed him to travel the world. He went to Australia, China, and Burma. Hoover proved to be a genius at making old mines profitable. He received a cut of the proceeds every time he succeeded and became a very wealthy man.
In 1899, Hoover married his college sweetheart, Lou Henry, the first women to graduate from Stanford with a geology degree. She accompanied him on his many trips. The Hoovers lived through the Boxer rebellion in China (see Chapter 13) and then settled in London. Hoover and his wife spoke fluent Chinese. Whenever they didn’t want people in the White House to know what they were saying, they would speak to each other in Chinese.
By 1914, Hoover was one of the most respected engineers in the world. His book, Principles of Mining, was required reading in every college engineering class. Hoover was worth $4 million in 1914, but instead of trying to amass more money, he decided to use his money to help people. His career as a great humanitarian had begun.
Becoming president
In 1927, President Coolidge shocked the nation when he refused to run for reelection. Hoover was ready to become president, so he sought the Republican nomination. He received the nomination on the first ballot with no opposition.
The general election was even easier for Hoover. The Democrats nominated Governor Al Smith of New York for the presidency. Smith was Catholic. This topic became a hot campaign issue. Many in the United States believed that a Catholic wouldn’t be loyal to the Constitution because he owed loyalty to the pope. The solid Democratic South was heavily Protestant, and it refused to back a Catholic. When the results of the presidential election came in, Hoover had won in a landslide. He won 444 electoral votes, including five Southern states not carried by a Republican since the end of Reconstruction.
President Herbert Clark Hoover (1929–1933)
In his acceptance speech at the Republican national convention, Hoover proclaimed that poverty had come to an end in the United States, saying, “The poorhouse is vanishing among us. We in America today are nearer to the final triumph over poverty than ever before in the history of the land.” For the first six months, things went well. Then the Great Depression started. At first, Hoover believed that the depression was temporary, and he didn’t act. As late as spring 1930, he assured the public that the recession would be over soon. Things went differently.
Dealing with the Great Depression
By spring 1930, the Great Depression was in full swing. Hoover dealt with the economic situation by implementing the following programs:
The Agricultural Marketing Act (1929): This act, passed before the Great Depression started, allowed the federal government to make loans to farmers in need. The act also allowed the government to buy their surplus goods, keeping prices for these goods high.
The Hawley-Smoot Tariff (1930): This tariff increased charges on foreign goods. It led to an international trade war and hurt the world ec
onomy.
The Reconstruction Finance Corporation (1932): This agency provided federal money to banks, railroads, insurance companies, and, later, local and state governments in need.
The Glass-Steagall Act (1932): This act released government gold reserves to stimulate the economy.
The Federal Home Loan Bank Act (1932): This act provided for low interest loans to homeowners who needed money to make their mortgage payments.
Despite all of Hoover’s efforts, the Great Depression got worse. Hoover refused to implement unemployment benefits because he believed that local governments could take care of unemployed citizens. Local governments were, however, broke. Now, 12 million U.S. citizens were unemployed, 5,000 banks had gone bankrupt, and 32,000 businesses had gone under. Hoover’s political career was over.
Burning down Hooverville
The last straw in Hoover’s presidency occurred in 1932. About 15,000 WWI veterans marched to Washington, D.C. to redeem monetary certificates they received in 1924 as payment for their military service. The certificates were not cashable until 1945.
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