Coolidge

by Robert Sobel

  In microcosm this is, in fact, the Coolidge presidential philosophy. His ideas on government finance were conservative; he had gotten them from his father, his teachers, and his readings—from the very air of Vermont and western Massachusetts. His views combined political philosophy with the lessons of personal experience.

  Grace quickly became pregnant, and their first son, John, was born on September 7, 1906. Coolidge was married and a father, thirty-four years old, a practicing attorney, and he still had to rely upon occasional remittances from his father.

  By then Coolidge had started to consider a race for the Massachusetts House of Representatives, the lower house of the state legislature known as the General Court. The pay was meager, only $750 a year plus mileage, meaning Coolidge could be home weekends. The term was for one year, so candidates had to be perennial campaigners. The legislature met from January to June, leaving members free to pursue other interests the rest of the time, which most did.

  This was considered an entry position for those interested in advancement. House members could meet politicians from other parts of the state, trade favors, win reputations, and perhaps go on to the state senate, or even to Washington. A diligent and clever representative could catch the eye of businessmen and enter the commercial world. A lawyer might come into contact with future clients. The shrewd Coolidge surely considered such possibilities.

  In his Autobiography Coolidge wrote that he was still learning the law and reading literature. “Because I thought the experience would contribute to this end I became a candidate for the Massachusetts House of Representatives.” Maybe, but for more than ten years he had been cultivating the Northampton electorate and earning a reputation for probity, fairness, and integrity. He did not make promises and pledges he would not and could not keep. Even those who ran against him had good words for Calvin Coolidge. On the other hand, outside of conventional Republicanism, he stood for no cause, and displayed little enthusiasm for the political issues of the time.

  Coolidge was cagey about running, as he was in all of his subsequent races. He took no chances, and made certain in advance that even if rejected, he would come out ahead in terms of respect for his loyalty and, perhaps, additional clients. On September 15, 1906, a shrewd reporter for the Daily Hampshire Gazette wrote an item entitled “Calvin Coolidge Willing But Not Anxious.” Only seven days before filing, Coolidge had still not made up his mind.

  He says he would like to go to the legislature sometime. At present, he thinks, because of business conditions, he would prefer to wait, but adds there will always be something of that kind, so perhaps now would be as favorable for him as any time. He says he does not care enough about it to fight for the nomination, and that if some prominent party men such as ex-mayors Hallett or Mather want the nomination he would gladly stay out and put his shoulder to the wheel. And even then, if he doesn’t have to fight for the nomination, he adds that he cannot say whether he would accept. “If the party wants me, however, I will consider the matter,” says Mr. Coolidge.

  The party wanted him; there was no rival in the field. This was the Coolidge way in politicking; he replicated it in all of his other state campaigns.

  The Democrats renominated Moses Bassett, who in the previous election had barely squeaked out a victory and was considered a weak candidate. In addition, Bassett had been feuding with Michael McCarthy, who had opposed him for the nomination in 1905 and who now vowed to work against his reelection. The Hampshire Gazette, nonetheless, seemed to think Bassett would win the election.

  Coolidge campaigned vigorously. Field prepared a short biography that was mailed to every Northampton voter, and the candidate carried on a door-to-door campaign, concentrating on Democratic households. He was a speaker at a Republican rally attended by the party’s candidates for governor and the House of Representatives, Curtis Guild, Jr., and Frederick Gillett, respectively. He made several campaign speeches, the first of his life in his own behalf. It was a successful campaign, and Coolidge won by a margin of 1,329 to 1,065, a large increase over the party’s vote the previous year. It was a Republican year, as Guild defeated Democrat John B. Moran by a margin of 222,518 to 192,295. Guild had been lieutenant governor under his predecessor, William L. Douglas, and according to tradition in the state, had moved up a notch in the next election.

  Winning election to General Court marked the true beginning of the Coolidge political career, for those earlier positions—Republican delegate, city councilman, city solicitor, clerk of courts—were either ancillary or nonpolitical.

  He took the new position quite seriously. Dick Irwin, who had campaigned for Coolidge, provided him with a letter of introduction to Speaker of the House John T. Cole. “Like the singed cat, he is better than he looks. He wishes to talk with you about committees.” Henry Field, who knew his way about the legislature, accompanied Coolidge to Boston and introduced him to some of his fellow legislators. This done, Coolidge took a small room at the Adams House, an inexpensive hotel in a line of buildings on Washington Street, whose time of glory had been in the 1870s, when it was one of Boston’s leading hostelries. By the early twentieth century it was faded, favored primarily by legislators like Coolidge—those from the provinces seeking cheap lodgings. His room had hot and cold running water, but no bath or toilet and only a small window looking out on an inner court.

  Those who have never seen the House chambers in Boston might be forgiven for thinking it a grand place. It was not. The room was small—some might think it “cozy”—which made for close contacts. The members all knew one another quite well. Even so, Coolidge was an inconspicuous figure in the legislature that year. Martin Lomasney, a leading Boston Democrat, remarked, “This fellow is either a schoolteacher or an undertaker from the country. I don’t know which.” Coolidge served on the mercantile affairs and constitutional amendments committee, neither of which was important, and rarely was heard from on the floor. He tended to vote the straight party line, and didn’t make waves or an impression. Coolidge voted for the direct election of U.S. senators and came out in favor of the Women’s Suffrage Amendment. And, despite his later conservatism, Coolidge at this time was viewed as one of the more progressive Republicans. One of his legislative colleagues, Roland D. Sawyer, later on wrote that Coolidge was “uncomfortably progressive for some of his constituents in Northampton.”

  Coolidge did not have the kind of temperament to enter any political fray without calculating costs and benefits. But he did have more inviolable principles than most politicians, then and now, and many of these might be classified as advanced. The trouble with the term “progressive” is that it is often used as shorthand for a wide variety of concepts and programs. Coolidge understood this and eschewed labels, refusing to be so categorized. He best expressed his views on the subject in a 1924 press conference:I don’t think I can give any definition of the words “reactionary” and “progressive” that would be helpful…. Sometimes the person is not well thought of and he is labeled as a reactionary. Sometimes he is well thought of and he is called a progressive. As a matter of fact all the political parties are progressive. I can’t conceive of a party existing for any length of time that wasn’t progressive, or of leadership being effective that wasn’t progressive.

  Coolidge took his seat in the Massachusetts House of Representatives at the flood tide of Rooseveltian Progressivism, and the state GOP reflected it. But it might be more accurate to say that, in some ways, Theodore Roosevelt represented forces long at work in Massachusetts, which had been a national leader in social legislation. At the time a child labor amendment to the federal Constitution was being debated; Massachusetts had child labor legislation in 1836. It passed the first factory inspection act in 1866, and in 1874 limited the workday for women and minors to ten hours. The state had pure food and drug laws before Roosevelt recommended them to Congress. And it had laws for the recall of judges. Reflecting on this in 1914, Roosevelt wrote, “It is rather funny to think that if the Massachusetts and Ver
mont methods of electing and removing judges were advanced by men, I should be denounced as almost a communist.” Governor Guild spoke out and worked for civil service reform, further regulation of utilities, limitations on campaign expenditures, and state laws to protect savings accounts. Most important from Coolidge’s standpoint, Guild favored economy in government, and cut the state’s debt by 12 percent his first year in office.

  Around this time Coolidge met and became friendly with Winthrop Murray Crane, who was a former Massachusetts governor and current junior senator. Crane lived long enough to see Coolidge elected vice president in 1920, and five years later, when he was in the White House, Coolidge wrote the preface for a Crane biography. It was one of Coolidge’s characteristically opaque pieces, but he did touch upon Crane’s most important trait:Ever since I have been in Massachusetts I have known of Mr. Crane, but I did not come into personal relation with him until I had entered public life in Boston. The more I saw of him the more I came to admire him. This was the almost unbroken experience of every person that came into contact with him. He was a most difficult person to describe. His influence was very great, but it was of an intangible nature. I do not recall that he ever volunteered any suggestion to me in relation to any public duty which I had to perform. He never made any request concerning legislation. He never recommended anyone for appointment. Yet I think everyone who knew him recognized that he was a positive influence for sound legislation and the selection of qualified persons to fill public office. His actions were never moulded to serve any private interest of his own, but always with a desire to promote what he believed to be the public welfare.

  This giant that Coolidge and others described was a small, sad-eyed, and balding man, unimpressive and forgettable in looks, quiet and calm in demeanor. A friend of both men thought Crane made Coolidge look positively gabby. A Washington newsman said, “He never writes if he can talk, and he never talks if he can nod.”

  Nevertheless, Crane had remarkable abilities and influence. New York Senator Chauncey Depew, who served in Congress from 1900 to 1911, wrote, “He never made a speech. I do not remember that he made a motion. Yet he was the most influential member of that body.” President William Howard Taft seconded this, saying that, although Crane entered the Senate without legislative experience, “he became its most influential member.” Michael E. Hennessy, a perspicacious contemporary observer of the Massachusetts political scene, added, “Mr. Crane was a unique figure in Massachusetts politics. He lacked much of what people generally regard as necessary in a successful man in politics. He had not a commanding presence nor was he given to the glad hand habit, so common among public men, but he possessed many attractive personal qualities which endeared him to his neighbors and friends.”

  Crane was admired and courted by many young legislators. This was the period when state political bosses were dominant figures, ruling their domains like feudal barons, often but not always in alliances with business interests. Crane was such a boss, but different from the others. He was not power hungry or venal, did not make demands on his allies and followers, and was not personally ambitious. Perhaps because of this he was able to sway others to his way of thinking by force of character rather than through promises and threats. He usually tried to resolve differences with compromise, often behind the scenes. Crane cared little whether a suggestion was progressive or conservative, whether it came from a Republican or Democrat. If he thought it sensible, he would support it. By seeming nonpartisan, however, Crane was able to advance Republicanism more than had he been a doctrinaire partisan. He would not, moreover, move on a matter unless he was certain he was right. Often he would say to those who asked his advice, “Do nothing.” His credo was, “It is more important that the law be permanently fixed than that experiments in new legislation should be tried.” This was Crane’s modus operandi—and would become Calvin Coolidge’s as well.

  Crane was a member of one of the most distinguished families in western Massachusetts. In 1799 one of his forebears founded a paper mill in Dalton, some thirty miles from Northampton. Having decided not to attend college, Murray Crane (as he was known) entered the family business, and several years later won the contract to provide the federal government with paper used to produce currency, which it still retains. Crane also became involved in AT&T and Otis Elevator.

  Crane’s bêtes noires were the aristocrats of eastern Massachusetts. The state’s senior senator was Henry Cabot Lodge, whose very name dripped Massachusetts history, an austere man who guarded his power and privilege and brooked no challenges. Certainly not from the likes of Crane, a man from the provinces who was in trade, and thus not a true gentleman. Not only hadn’t Crane attended Harvard, he wasn’t even a college man.

  Like his father and grandfather, Crane was active in politics, and in 1892 was made a member of the Republican National Committee, on which he served for more than twenty years. In 1896 he was elected lieutenant governor, and then served as governor from 1900 to 1902, achieving a reputation for businesslike actions in government. Only thirty-seven years old when he took office, Crane’s inaugural address was the first time he had spoken before a public assembly of this kind.

  Crane’s three terms as governor showed his concern with economy in government and efficiency. In the progressive tradition of Massachusetts, he strengthened the pure food and drug laws, further limited the hours worked by women and children, and handled teamsters’ and railroad workers’ strikes by bringing the sides together in marathon negotiations. Crane was so successful in this that President Roosevelt called on him to help resolve the coalminers’ strike, and employed the Crane techniques himself. A few months after leaving office Crane went to Washington as senator to replace the deceased Walter Hoar.

  Crane was, for Coolidge, the ideal. Of course, Crane wasn’t his first mentor. There had been his father, whom Coolidge would always love and cherish, but he did not want to be a small-town tycoon. At Black River Academy he had been influenced by George Sherman, but Coolidge was not attracted to secondary education. The impact of Charles Garman on him was certainly important, but he did not intend to embark upon a life of philosophical contemplation. Henry Field was a fine counselor, and but his reach did not extend beyond local politics. It isn’t possible to understand Coolidge without realizing the kind of men he modeled himself after. From his father to Crane they all were of a type—stolid, conservative, distrusting of government but willing to participate in the political process, patriotic, trusting of the American individual, and above all, reluctant to act until all expedients were exhausted. Most curious, none of these men made strenuous attempts to win Coolidge to a particular philosophy. Rather, they did so subtly, by example.

  By 1907 Coolidge was in Boston, the center of the New England universe, hobnobbing with men whose exploits he had read about in Northampton but had never expected to meet. Now he was one of them, a minor figure to be sure, ignored or joked about, but he was used to this. Crane took note of him; the two men consulted on state matters. Murray Crane, the powerful businessman and national political figure—it must have been heady for Coolidge. His future was in politics, tied to the coattails of Murray Crane.

  Despite his social, educational, and geographic differences with Lodge, when Crane entered politics he did so with Lodge’s support and even friendship. Not until 1912, when Crane endorsed William Howard Taft for a second presidential term while Lodge dithered over the Roosevelt candidacy, did their relationship become strained, and it was never the same, especially after Crane came out for the League of Nations.

  In his prime Crane was a greater power in Massachusetts than Lodge. In part this was due to his grip on western Massachusetts, where there were few Democrats, while Lodge had to worry about the immigrant and Irish threats, embodied in the Democratic Party, in the east. By 1900 more than 60 percent of the Massachusetts population was foreign born or of foreign-born parents, and most of them were in the eastern part of the state. There had been socialists in the Gene
ral Court and socialist mayors of towns—like Haverhill and Brockton, both in eastern Massachusetts. The Republican position in the eastern end was being challenged, and demography was on the side of the Democrats. But for the moment, the GOP was able to capture a large share of the Irish–American vote outside of Boston, which was typified by Coolidge’s popularity with them in Northampton.

  Crane was a more judicious politician than Lodge, who offended people with his imperious ways. Lodge’s friendship with Roosevelt was legendary; but TR offered Crane the positions of secretary of the treasury, postmaster general, and secretary of the interior, all of which he rejected. Moreover, when Lodge died, a Crane protégé, William Butler, took his place in the U.S. Senate.

  In 1907 Coolidge, with Crane’s support, ran for a second legislative term. His opponent, Alfred Preece, a Northampton alderman, was considered a weak candidate. Coolidge ran on the record of his votes, including several pro-labor measures:If there are any body of our citizens who ought to feel satisfied with my efforts in their behalf, it is our working people. I have no doubt they are. I have never heard a word of complaint from a union man. It has all come from someone who desires to ride into office through their dissatisfactions. I have no doubt the workingmen of Northampton are too well informed to be caught by misrepresentation.

  The Northampton Daily Herald, a Republican newspaper, came out for him. “Mr. Coolidge is entitled to the thanks of the wage laborers of his district for his manly defense of their interests.” In those years, when Theodore Roosevelt was in the White House, Calvin Coolidge acted, talked, and voted like a Rooseveltian. He won reelection, and, more secure and confident, and with some seniority and Crane’s support, he was able to obtain a position he wanted on the Judiciary Committee. Coolidge now spoke out in favor of and voted for laws requiring employers to provide their workers with a six-day work week, a measure restricting the hours of labor for women and children, another to provide half-fares on streetcars for schoolchildren, and other “progressive” measures. In a period when there was some doubt regarding the future of the Massachusetts GOP, Coolidge may have been hedging his bets, as would almost any prudent politician.