I recently read David Greenberg’s Calvin Coolidge – part of the American Presidents series of short presidential biographies. I was surprised by how much I enjoyed this book. Greenberg’s biography of Coolidge is a crisp, well-balanced portrait of “Silent Cal”, our 30th president. Coolidge was a champion of limited government and a true believer in American business above all. “The chief business of the American people is business,” he famously said once. Coolidge became President on August 2, 1923 after the sudden death of Warren G. Harding, and provided a steady, cautious hand throughout his nearly six years in the White House. While he presided over an enormously prosperous period in our history during “The Roaring Twenties”, his critics felt he was at times too lax to the challenges of the times. Coolidge’s governing style (or lack thereof) failed to head off the coming of the Depression, as he always believed that the market would correct itself, without a need for government intervention. Greenberg felt that Coolidge’s values were somewhat out of place in the 20th century, but those strong values guided Coolidge and the American public loved him for it. “He did not deplore corporate capitalism, or technology, or even consumer spending; he accepted these elements of modernity while trusting in his religious faith and staying vigilant against moral decay,” writes Greenberg of Coolidge.
One interesting note: one of the first things Ronald Reagan did after taking office in 1981 was to replace a portrait of Harry Truman with one of Coolidge. Reagan noted that a popular criticism of Coolidge, that he did “nothing” as President, was perhaps one of his greatest strengths. Coolidge liked to let things play themselves out, which served him and America well during the rich 1920s, but may have failed to prevent The Great Depression which kept the Republicans out of the White House for nearly twenty years. On another note, I found it ironic that someone known for being short with words was the first President of the radio age. Coolidge’s radio addresses reached millions. By the way, “Keep Cool With Coolidge” was the 1924 campaign slogan that helped Coolidge ride to a landslide victory over John W. Davis, who totalled the lowest percentage of the vote of any Democrat in election history.
Here are a few of my favorite anecdotes and quotes from “Silent Cal”:
1) Once at a dinner while in the White House, a woman mentioned to Coolidge that she had bet her friends that she could get more than three words out of him that night.
Coolidge’s response to her ? “You lose.”
2) Reflecting his passive approach to problem-solving, Coolidge once said, “If you see ten troubles coming down the road, you can be sure that nine will run into the ditch before they reach you and you have to battle with only one of them.”
3) Greenberg gave a great example of how unassuming Coolidge was to those around him. Once while vice-president, he attempted to return to his hotel after it was evacuated by fire. He was stopped by a fire marshal.
“I’m the vice-president,” said Coolidge.
“What are you vice-president of ?” asked the marshal.
“I am the vice-president of the United States,” answered Coolidge.
“Come right down,” said the marshal. “I thought you were vice president of the hotel.”
Kudos to David Greenberg on his biography of Coolidge. What an interesting book, especially on a President I didn’t know much about or have any burning interest to learn more on.
Calvin Coolidge had three goals as president: first, reducing the great financial debt that had accumulate during WWI; second, cutting the tax rates and eliminating taxes on low wage earners; and three, maintaining tariff stability. He achieved all three of these goads. There were other goals, too, such as joining the World Court, national railraod reorganization, and reorganization of the Federal bureacracy. However, Congressional opposition, particularly from the so-called radicals or western progressive in the Senate, blocked them….The depth of the depression of the 1930s was not due to policies of the Coolidge Administration. Rather, it was the policies followed by his successor, Herbert Hoover, and the Federal Reserve Board that turned an ordinary economic slump into a disasterous depression. This situation was compounded later by Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal policies that extended the depression in the US after most of the world had returned to prosperity….Calvin Coolidge was not a great president. He fought no wars. He led no social crusades. Essentially, he was XIXth Century in his political outlook. His philosophy of government in many ways was close to that of Grover Cleveland, who he much admired. As president, however, he set out his basic goals–and he achieve them. With this, the people were satisfied. When he left Washington for Northampton, MA, the country was more prosperous than it had ever been and peace smiled down upon the land. That is not such a bad record.
By: Jerry L. Wallace on March 29, 2008
at 2:51 pm
Hi i’m writing a paper on Calvin Collidge and I don’t know much about him…
By: Sydney on March 11, 2009
at 9:10 am