Calvin Coolidge
Calvin Coolidge was the 30th president of the United States, serving from 1923 to 1929. A Republican lawyer from Massachusetts, he previously served as the 29th vice president from 1921 to 1923, under President Warren G. Harding, and as the 48th governor of Massachusetts from 1919 to 1921. Coolidge gained a reputation as a small-government conservative, with a taciturn personality and dry sense of humor that earned him the nickname "Silent Cal".
Coolidge began his career as a member of the Massachusetts State House. He rose up the ranks of Massachusetts politics and was elected governor in 1918. As governor, Coolidge ran on the record of fiscal conservatism, strong support for women's suffrage, and vague opposition to Prohibition. His prompt and effective response to the Boston police strike of 1919 thrust him into the national spotlight as a man of decisive action. The following year, the Republican Party nominated Coolidge as the running mate to Senator Warren G. Harding in the 1920 presidential election, which they won in a landslide. Coolidge served as vice president until Harding's death in 1923, after which he assumed the presidency.
During his presidency, Coolidge restored public confidence in the White House after the Harding administration's many scandals. He signed into law the Indian Citizenship Act of 1924, which granted U.S. citizenship to all Native Americans, and oversaw a period of rapid and expansive economic growth known as the "Roaring Twenties", leaving office with considerable popularity. Coolidge was known for his hands-off governing approach and pro-business stance; biographer Claude Fuess wrote: "He embodied the spirit and hopes of the middle class, could interpret their longings and express their opinions. That he did represent the genius of the average is the most convincing proof of his strength." Coolidge chose not to run again in 1928, remarking that ten years as president would be "longer than any other man has had it—too long!"
Coolidge is widely admired for his stalwart support of racial equality during a period of heightened racial tension, and is highly regarded by advocates of smaller government and laissez-faire economics; supporters of an active central government generally view him far less favorably. His critics argue that he failed to use the country's economic boom to help struggling farmers and workers in other flailing industries, and there is still much debate among historians about the extent to which Coolidge's economic policies contributed to the onset of the Great Depression, which began shortly after he left office. Scholars have ranked Coolidge in the lower half of U.S. presidents.
Early life and family history
John Calvin Coolidge Jr. was born on July 4, 1872, in Plymouth Notch, Vermont—the only U.S. president to be born on Independence Day. He was the elder of the two children of John Calvin Coolidge Sr. and Victoria Josephine Moor. Although named for his father, from early childhood Coolidge was addressed by his middle name. The name Calvin was used in multiple generations of the Coolidge family, apparently selected in honor of John Calvin, the Protestant Reformer, with Coolidge describing his ancestors as "English Puritan stock" in his Autobiography.Coolidge's earliest American ancestor, John Coolidge, emigrated from Cottenham, Cambridgeshire, England, around 1630 and settled in Watertown, Massachusetts. Coolidge also descended from Samuel Appleton, who settled in Ipswich and led the Massachusetts Bay Colony during King Philip's War. Coolidge's great-great-grandfather, another John Coolidge, was an American military officer in the Revolutionary War and one of the first selectmen of the town of Plymouth.
His grandfather Calvin Galusha Coolidge served in the Vermont House of Representatives. His cousin Park Pollard was a businessman in Cavendish, Vermont, and the longtime chair of the Vermont Democratic Party. Coolidge's mother was the daughter of Hiram Dunlap Moor, a Plymouth Notch farmer, and Abigail Franklin.
Coolidge Senior engaged in many occupations and developed a statewide reputation as a prosperous farmer, storekeeper, and public servant. He held various local offices, including justice of the peace and tax collector and served in both houses of the Vermont General Assembly. When Coolidge was 12 years old, his chronically ill mother died at the age of 39, perhaps from tuberculosis. His younger sister, Abigail Grace Coolidge, died at the age of 15, probably of appendicitis, when Coolidge was 18. Coolidge's father married a Plymouth schoolteacher in 1891, and lived to the age of 80.
Early career and marriage
Education and law practice
Coolidge attended the Black River Academy and then St. Johnsbury Academy before enrolling at Amherst College, where he distinguished himself in the debating class. As a senior, he joined the Phi Gamma Delta fraternity and graduated cum laude. While at Amherst, Coolidge was profoundly influenced by philosophy professor Charles Edward Garman, a Congregational mystic who had a neo-Hegelian philosophy. Coolidge explained Garman's ethics forty years later:At his father's urging after graduation, Coolidge moved to Northampton, Massachusetts, to become a lawyer. Coolidge followed the common practice of apprenticing with a local law firm, Hammond & Field, and reading law with them. John C. Hammond and Henry P. Field, both Amherst graduates, introduced Coolidge to practicing law in the county seat of Hampshire County, Massachusetts. In 1897, Coolidge was admitted to the Massachusetts bar, becoming a country lawyer. With his savings and a small inheritance from his grandfather, Coolidge opened his own law office in Northampton in 1898. He practiced commercial law, believing that he served his clients best by staying out of court. As his reputation as a hard-working and diligent attorney grew, local banks and other businesses began to retain his services.
Marriage and family
In 1903, Coolidge met Grace Goodhue, a graduate of the University of Vermont and a teacher at Northampton's Clarke School for the Deaf. They married on October 4, 1905, at 2:30 p.m. in a small ceremony which took place in the parlor of Grace's family's house, having overcome her mother's objections to the marriage. The newlyweds went on a honeymoon trip to Montreal, originally planned for two weeks but cut short by a week at Coolidge's request. After 25 years he wrote of Grace, "for almost a quarter of a century she has borne with my infirmities and I have rejoiced in her graces".The Coolidges had two sons: John and Calvin Jr.. On June 30, 1924, Calvin Jr. played tennis with his brother on the White House tennis courts without putting on socks and developed a blister on one of his toes. The blister subsequently degenerated into sepsis. He died a little over a week later at the age of 16.
Coolidge never forgave himself for Calvin Jr's death. His elder son John said it "hurt terribly", and psychiatric biographer Robert E. Gilbert, author of The Tormented President: Calvin Coolidge, Death, and Clinical Depression, said that Coolidge "ceased to function as President after the death of his sixteen-year-old son". Gilbert writes that after Calvin Jr.'s death Coolidge displayed all ten of the symptoms the American Psychiatric Association lists as evidence of major depressive disorder. John later became a railroad executive, helped start the Coolidge Foundation, and was instrumental in creating the President Calvin Coolidge State Historic Site.
Coolidge was frugal, and when it came to securing a home, he insisted upon renting. He and his wife attended Northampton's Edwards Congregational Church before and after his presidency.
Local political office (1898−1915)
City offices
The Republican Party was dominant in New England at the time, and Coolidge followed the example of Hammond and Field by becoming active in local politics. In 1896, Coolidge campaigned for Republican presidential candidate William McKinley, and was selected to be a member of the Republican City Committee the next year. In 1898, he won election to the City Council of Northampton, placing second in a ward where the top three candidates were elected. The position offered no salary but provided Coolidge with valuable political experience.In 1899, the city council made Coolidge city solicitor. He was elected to a one-year term in 1900 and reelected in 1901. This position gave Coolidge more experience as a lawyer and paid a salary of $600. In 1902, the city council selected a Democrat for city solicitor, and Coolidge returned to private practice. Soon thereafter, the clerk of courts for the county died, and Coolidge was chosen to replace him. The position paid well, but it barred him from practicing law, so he remained at the job for only a year.
In 1904, Coolidge suffered his sole defeat at the ballot box, losing an election to the Northampton school board. When told that some of his neighbors voted against him because he had no children in the schools he would govern, the recently married Coolidge replied, "Might give me time!"
Massachusetts state legislator and mayor
In 1906, the local Republican committee nominated Coolidge for election to the Massachusetts House of Representatives. He won a close victory over the incumbent Democrat, and reported to Boston for the 1907 session of the Massachusetts General Court. In his freshman term, Coolidge served on minor committees and, although he usually voted with the party, was known as a Progressive Republican, voting in favor of such measures as women's suffrage and the direct election of Senators.While in Boston, Coolidge became an ally, and then a liegeman, of then U.S. Senator Winthrop Murray Crane, who controlled the Massachusetts Republican Party's western faction; Crane's party rival in eastern Massachusetts was U.S. Senator Henry Cabot Lodge. Coolidge forged another key strategic alliance with Guy Currier, who had served in both state houses and had the social distinction, wealth, personal charm, and broad circle of friends Coolidge lacked, and which had a lasting impact on his political career. In 1907, Coolidge was reelected. In the 1908 session he was more outspoken, though not in a leadership position.
Instead of vying for another term in the State House, Coolidge returned home to his growing family and ran for mayor of Northampton when the incumbent Democrat retired. He was well liked in the town, and defeated his challenger by a vote of 1,597 to 1,409. During his first term from 1910 to 1911, he increased teachers' salaries and retired some of the city's debt while still managing to effect a slight tax decrease. In 1911, he was renominated and defeated the same opponent by a slightly larger margin.
In 1911, the State Senator for the Hampshire County area retired and successfully encouraged Coolidge to run for his seat for the 1912 session. Coolidge defeated his Democratic opponent by a large margin. At the start of that term, he became chairman of a committee to arbitrate the "Bread and Roses" strike by the workers of the American Woolen Company in Lawrence, Massachusetts. After two tense months, the company agreed to the workers' demands, in a settlement proposed by the committee.
A major issue affecting Massachusetts Republicans in 1912 was the party split between the progressive wing, which favored Theodore Roosevelt, and the conservative wing, which favored William Howard Taft. Although he favored some progressive measures, Coolidge refused to leave the Republican party. When the new Progressive Party declined to run a candidate in his state senate district, Coolidge won reelection against his Democratic opponent by an increased margin.
| "Do the day's work. If it be to protect the rights of the weak, whoever objects, do it. If it be to help a powerful corporation better to serve the people, whatever the opposition, do that. Expect to be called a stand-patter, but don't be a stand-patter. Expect to be called a demagogue, but don't be a demagogue. Don't hesitate to be as revolutionary as science. Don't hesitate to be as reactionary as the multiplication table. Don't expect to build up the weak by pulling down the strong. Don't hurry to legislate. Give administration a chance to catch up with legislation." |
| "Have Faith in Massachusetts" as delivered by Calvin Coolidge to the Massachusetts State Senate, 1914 |
In the 1913 session, Coolidge enjoyed renowned success in arduously navigating to passage the Western Trolley Act, which connected Northampton with a dozen similar industrial communities in Western Massachusetts.
Coolidge intended to retire after his second term, as was customary, but when the president of the state senate, Levi H. Greenwood, considered running for lieutenant governor, Coolidge decided to run for the Senate again in hopes of being elected its presiding officer. Greenwood later decided to run for reelection to the Senate, and was defeated primarily due to his opposition to women's suffrage.
Coolidge was in favor of the women's vote, and was reelected. With Crane's help, Coolidge assumed the presidency of a closely divided Senate. After his election in January 1914, Coolidge delivered a published and frequently quoted speech, Have Faith in Massachusetts, which summarized his philosophy of government.
Coolidge's speech was well received, and he attracted some admirers on its account. Towards the end of the term, many of them were proposing Coolidge's name for nomination to lieutenant governor. After winning reelection to the Senate by an increased margin in the 1914 elections, Coolidge was reelected unanimously to be President of the Senate. Coolidge's supporters, led by fellow Amherst alumnus Frank Stearns, encouraged him again to run for lieutenant governor. Stearns, an executive with the Boston department store R. H. Stearns, became another key ally, and began a publicity campaign on Coolidge's behalf before he announced his candidacy at the end of the 1915 legislative session.