Coolidge (82 page)

205   “I find the underlying thing”: “Harding Men Aim to Shift League as Chief Issue,”
The New York Times
, August 11, 1920.

205   “Women’s ingrain silk stockings”:
Boston Herald
advertisement, September 6, 1920.

205   The paper roasted Harding: The editors of another paper,
The Wyoming State Tribune
, reprinted part of
The Daily Star
’s erroneous editorial in “A Real Boomerang,” July 19, 1920, 4.

205   Coolidge went to Portland: The text of his Portland speech is quoted and discussed in many papers, including “Coolidge’s Criticism of League Cheered at Portland Rally,”
Boston Herald
, September 9, 1920, 1.

206   “The first half”: “Sees Only Straddle by Republicans,”
The New York Times
, September 12, 1920.

206   “Judge nothing can prevent”: Quoted in Robert K. Murray,
The Harding Era: Warren G. Harding and His Administration
(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1969), 62.

207   “financial orgy”: “Harding Demands Federal Economy,”
The New York Times
, September 19, 1920.

207   One ticker: Beverly Gage,
The Day Wall Street Exploded: A Story of America in Its First Age of Terror
(New York: Oxford University Press, 2009), 36.

208   “You will make”: Quoted in Morello,
Selling the President, 1920
, 92.

208   “Had he been”: Calvin Coolidge to John C. Coolidge, October 8, 1920, in Latham, ed.,
Your Son, Calvin Coolidge
, 169.

208   “I came to bury”: William Allen White,
A Puritan in Babylon: The Story of Calvin Coolidge
(New York: Macmillan, 1938), 219.

208   The Germans, for example: Harold Jefferson Coolidge and Robert Howard Lord,
Archibald Cary Coolidge: Life and Letters
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1932), 242.

209   “in this time”: “Coolidge Agrees to Sit in Cabinet at Harding’s Wish,”
The New York Times
, December 17, 1920.

210   “oblivious to rank”: Calvin Coolidge,
The Price of Freedom: Speeches and Addresses
(New York: C. Scribner’s Sons, 1924), 13.

210   “The universal demand”: 1924 Republican Party Platform, American Presidency Project at University of California/Santa Barbara.

211   “The finance success”: “Harding’s Cabinet All That Could Be Desired,”
The Wall Street Journal
, March 1, 1921, 1.

213   “Mr. Coolidge, a medium-sized man”: Henry Fountain Ashurst,
A Many-Colored Toga
, ed. George F. Sparks (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1962), 137.

213   “I take up”: Coolidge,
The Price of Freedom
, p. 34.

213   “By Calvin Coolidge Jr.”: “My Impressions,”
Boston Sunday Advertiser
, March 5, 1921.

214   “Owing to mechanical device”: “President Pledges to Restore Ideals of Our Fathers,”
The Washington Post
, March 5, 1921.

214   Someone suggested to Coolidge: Robert H. Ferrell,
The Strange Deaths of President Harding
(Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1998), 109.

215   “He could smoke”: Watson,
As I Knew Them
, 226.

215   Mellon would have to take his oath: The fact that Mellon was sworn in first is reported in “Mellon Takes Oath and Begins Work,”
The Boston Globe
, March 5, 1921; the fact that the oath was deemed invalid is reported in David Cannadine,
Mellon: An American Life
(New York: Knopf, 2006), 272.

Chapter 9: “A Most Insignificant Office”

216   The coat and tails lay: The specific suite number is available in Cynthia D. Bittinger,
Grace Coolidge: Sudden Star
, Presidential Wives Series (New York: Nova History Publications, 2005), 43.

216   These were the overalls: The comparison of dress clothing to overalls in Coolidge’s service as vice president is made in Edward Lowry,
Washington Close-ups: Intimate Views of Some Public Figures
(New York: Republic Books, 1930), 24.

216   “to distinctly subordinate”: The quote on the intent to keep Union Station low can be found in “Building Height Limitation Staff Report of the Committee on the District of Columbia, U.S. House of Representatives,” April 1, 1976, p. 2.

216   “Imagine five hundred or more women”: Quoted in William McAdoo,
Crowded Years: The Reminiscences of William G. McAdoo
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1931), 263.

217   “putting all celebration aside”: Warren G. Harding, telegram to Edward B. McLean, Evalyn Walsh McLean Papers, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

217   Three long tables: Evalyn Walsh McLean describes the dinner in detail, as well as Coolidge’s stomachache, in Evalyn Walsh McLean,
Father Struck It Rich
(Fort Collins, Colo.: First Light Publishing, 1996), 192.

217   “Let ’em look in”: Robert K. Murray,
The Harding Era: Warren G. Harding and His Administration
(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1969), 113.

217   the tails of six quadrupeds: A photo featuring Mrs. Harding’s furs in the inaugural can be found in the Library of Congress American Memory Collection, National Photo Company Collection, no. 12443, 2.

217   Edward McLean’s efforts: A wonderful account of Washington from the point of view of the McLeans, including the story of the
Enquirer
’s endorsement, can be found in McLean,
Father Struck It Rich
, 184.

218   Grace won the general over: Much material on Grace’s time, including this discussion with Pershing, can be found in Ishbel Ross,
Grace Coolidge and Her Era
(Plymouth, Vt.: Calvin Coolidge Memorial Foundation, 1988).

218   the lack of formality: Coolidge described his experience of the inauguration in his autobiography. Calvin Coolidge,
The Autobiography of Calvin Coolidge
(New York: Cosmopolitan Book Corporation, 1929), 156–158.

219   “So the fellow”: Quoted in Ben Yagoda,
Will Rogers: A Biography
(New York: Knopf, 1993), 189.

220   Washingtonians noted approvingly: A good sketch of Grace, including this quote and others, can be found in Ross,
Grace Coolidge and Her Era.

220   That Grace deemed unfair: Robert Ferrell,
Grace Coolidge: The People’s Lady in Silent Cal’s White House
(Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2008), 52.

220   “This way”: Grace Coolidge,
Grace Coolidge: An Autobiography
, ed. Lawrence E. Wikander and Robert H. Ferrell (Worland, Wyo.: High Plains Publishing, 1992), 59.

220   In a letter to Foster Stearns: Ross,
Grace Coolidge and Her Era
, 66.

221   “You lose”: This anecdote is retold often, and the fact that Grace herself retold it is reported in Ross,
Grace Coolidge and Her Era
, 162.

222   Harry Daugherty was there: Good photos of the cabinet can be found at the Library of Congress, Prints and Records Division.

222   the board of the Federal Reserve: The Federal Reserve System as created by the 1913 Federal Reserve Act differed from the modern system in that the Treasury secretary and the comptroller of the currency sat on the Fed board. A good short history of the Fed, Roger T. Johnson, “Historical Beginnings . . . The Federal Reserve,” is at http://www.bos.frb.org/about/pubs/begin.pdf.

222   no “stallion dollar”: Lowry,
Washington Close-ups
, 179.

223   “The Senate would do”: Coolidge,
The Autobiography of Calvin Coolidge
, 162.

224   Grace and Calvin, Jr., popped corn: Margaret Jane Fischer,
Calvin Coolidge, Jr., 1908–1924
(Plymouth Notch, Vt.: Calvin Coolidge Memorial Foundation, 1981), 14.

225   Beside his bed was a table: The
Michigan Library Bulletin
of September 1923 contains an article on the vice president’s reading material. Included on Coolidge’s reading list are the Bible, fifteen volumes on the tariff, several volumes on the U.S. Constitution, Bridgeman’s
New England
, and
A Prophet of Universal Peace
, a biography of Whitelaw Reid. See “What Coolidge Reads,”
The Michigan Library Bulletin
14, no. 4 (1923), 12.

226   “Fellow workers”: Charles G. Dawes,
The First Year of the Budget of the United States
(New York: Harper and Brothers, 1923), 5–6.

226   Harding backed up: An example of Harding’s economy by executive order was his December 1921 order that employees at the Panama Canal be charged for their own rent and fuel. “Orders Panama Economy,”
The New York Times
, December 18, 1921.

227   Mrs. Harding, called “the Duchess”: Alice Roosevelt Longworth mentioned the nickname in her interview with Michael Teague in Alice Roosevelt Longworth and Michael Teague,
Mrs. L.: Conversations with Alice Roosevelt Longworth
(Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1981), 170.

227   “the general atmosphere”: Ibid., 170.

227   golf cabinet: References to the “golf cabinet” are in articles such as “Two Members of Harding Golf Cabinet Are Being Voted On,”
Fort Worth Star-Telegram
, June 19, 1922.

227   poker cabinet: The papers politely avoided writing about the poker cabinet during Harding’s tenure, but staff members and presidential historians have noted its existence, as in James W. Davis,
American Presidency
(Westport, Conn.: Praeger Press, 1995), 199.

227   The poker cabinet averaged: Irwin Hood Hoover,
Forty-two Years in the White House
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1934), 250.

228   Norris deemed this slipup: The story is told in Donald R. McCoy,
Calvin Coolidge: The Quiet President
(New York: Macmillan, 1967), 135, and also in the Senate biography of Coolidge, “Calvin Coolidge, 29th Vice President,” http://www.jcp.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/generic/VP_Calvin_Coolidge.htm.

229   “One of his favorite”: George W. Pepper,
Philadelphia Lawyer: An Autobiography
(New York: Lippincott, 1944), 149.

229   The articles were remarkably: Calvin Coolidge, “Enemies of the Republic,”
The Delineator
, June 1921.

230   “I am not qualified to discuss educational matters”: Coolidge letter to Dwight Morrow, May 16, 1914, Coolidge correspondence, Dwight W. Morrow Collection, Amherst College Archive, Amherst, Mass.

230   “It tends to bring about”: “A Teapot Tempest,” editorial,
The Anaconda Standard
, May 30, 1921.

231   “Only the most polished finesse”: The
Los Angeles Times
wrote of “scenes of disorder and near violence never paralleled within the memory of the oldest senator.” “Bonus Bill Is Beaten: McCumber and Reed Are Near Battle While Coolidge Stands Powerless,”
Los Angeles Times,
July 16, 1921.

231   “I love every stick”: Quoted in Cynthia D. Bittinger,
Grace Coolidge: Sudden Star
, Presidential Wives Series (New York: Nova History Publications, 2005), 44.

231   That summer Coolidge: “Coolidge Appoints Neighbor’s Son,”
Springfield Republican
, July 16, 1921; and “Other Half Knows Little of Life on Coolidge Side,”
The Advocate
, March 30, 1929. Thomas Plummer returned to civilian life after several years at West Point.

232   “liked it because”: Coolidge’s church habits are detailed in Jason Noble Pierce, “Coolidge’s Past Got Invitations to Dinner at the White House,”
Baltimore Afro-American
, February 18, 1933.

232   Grace became a fan: Ross,
Grace Coolidge and Her Era
, 149.

233   President Harding changed the policy: “Resolutions of League,”
Good Government
, vol.
37–39 (1921).

233   On top of his note: Calvin Coolidge to Frank W. Stearns, September 28, 1921, Stearns Family Papers, College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, Mass.

235   Kinsley asked Coolidge: Earle S. Kinsley,
Recollections of Vermonters in State and National Affairs
(Rutland, Vt.: privately printed, 1946), 117.

235   “he can differentiate”: Frank W. Stearns to Calvin Coolidge, December 29, 1921, Stearns Family Papers, College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, Mass.

236   “Secretary Mellon is a businessman”: “Dawes Waves Brooms in Wrath,”
The Washington Post
, February 4, 1922.

236   On February 16: Frank W. Stearns, telegram to Calvin Coolidge, February 16, 1922, Stearns Family Papers, College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, Mass.

237   When Coolidge discussed: Barron transcribed his interviews in his notebooks in the voice of the person he interviewed. This quotation in regard to Coolidge’s question can be found in the August 25, 1921, entry in Clarence Barron,
They Told Barron: Conversations and Revelations of an American Pepys in Wall Street
, ed. Arthur Pound and Samuel Taylor Moore (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1930), 247. Barron’s accessible writings offer wonderful insights into the workings of the financial world.

237   “were very much pleased”: Frank W. Stearns to Calvin Coolidge, January 20, 1922, Stearns Family Papers, College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, Mass.

237   “I came away”: Frank W. Stearns to Calvin Coolidge, March 16, 1922, Stearns Family Papers, College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, Mass.

237   “It makes me”: Ibid.

237   “Your letters all received”: This angry letter from 1922 to Stearns from Coolidge is cited in Claude M. Fuess,
Calvin Coolidge: The Man from Vermont
(Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1976), 303.

239   Clarence Barron commented: Barron reckoned that in 1917 3 million barrels of the Mexican Petroleum Company’s oil went to New England and 3 million to Standard Oil of New Jersey, whereas only 4 million went to South America. Clarence Walker Barron,
The Mexican Problem
(New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1917), 92.