Times.

 

President Warren G. Harding was President from 1921 to 1923, and he lived from November 2, 1865 to August 2, 1923. He was a member of the Republican Party and popular among many of the American people back then. After his death, many scandals were exposed like the Teapot Dome scandal and his extramarital affair with Nan Britton. He was born in Blooming Grove, Ohio. Winnie was his nickname as a small child. Harding was the oldest of 8 children to George Tryon Harding and Phoebe Elizabeth (nee Dickerson) Harding. Phoebe was a state license midwife, and Tryon was a farmer who taught school near Mount Gilead. Tryon also became a doctor with a small practice. Some of Harding's maternal ancestors were Dutch including the wealthy Van Kirk family. Harding had ancestors from England, Wales, and Scotland too. Harding's family were abolitionists, and they moved into Caledonia. Tryon acquired the local weekly newspaper called The Argus. Warren Harding was in Ohio Central College in Iberia when he was 14 years, and it was his father's alma mater. Warren worked hard, and his family moved into Marion, which is about 6 miles from Caledonia. Harding graduated from the school in 1882. Warren Harding lived on farms and small towns. He worked as a teacher, an insurance man, and studied law. Warren Harding came to the 1884 Republican National Convention where he talked with journalists and supported the Presidential nominee and Secretary of State James G. Blaine. Warren Harding worked with the Democratic Mirror. He didn't like the newspaper praising then New York Governor Grover Cleveland, who won the election. Harding build the newspaper of the Star by the late 1880's. The Star was nonpartisan. Marion, Ohio grew fast. Harding was involved in the city's civic matters. Harding was married to Florence King, the daughter of Amos King (a local banker and developer). By this time, many people said that the Hardings had African American heritage when there is no conclusive evidence of this. Harding was married on July 8, 1891 at their new home on Mount Vernon Avenue in Marion. They didn't have children. His wife helped him to go into another level in politics, possibly achieve the White House.

Warren Harding came into politics after he purchased the Star newspaper. He supported Joseph B. Foraker for governor. Harding supported Ohio Republican politics. He opposed third party advocates. Harding's work as an editor took a toll on his health. From age 23 to 35, he required five admissions to the Battle Creek Sanitorium for reasons Sinclair described as "fatigue, overstrain, and nervous illnesses." Dean ties these visits to early occurrences of the heart ailment that killed Harding at age 57. During one such absence from Marion, in 1894, the Star's business manager quit, and Florence Harding took his place. She became her husband's top assistant at the Star on the business side, maintaining her role until the Hardings moved to Washington in 1915. Her competence allowed Harding to travel to make speeches—his use of the free railroad pass increased greatly after his marriage. Florence Harding practiced strict economy and wrote of Harding, "he does well when he listens to me and poorly when he does not." In 1892, Harding traveled to Washington, where he met Democratic Nebraska Congressman William Jennings Bryan, and listened to the "Boy Orator of the Platte" speak on the floor of the House of Representatives. Harding traveled to Chicago's Columbian Exposition in 1893. Both visits were without Florence. Democrats generally won Marion County's offices in 1895, and though Harding lost the election for county auditor, he did better than expected. The following year, Harding was one of many orators who traveled across Ohio in support of the campaign of the Republican presidential candidate William McKinley, that state's former governor. According to Dean, "while working for McKinley [Harding] began making a name for himself through Ohio."

Warren Harding worked hard in politics. He had a good relationship with Republicans. He ran for state Senate in 1899. He was in a two year term as a state Senator. Warren Harding allowed his sister, Mary, to be a teacher at the Ohio School for the Blind. Warren Harding was a Ohio political leader too. Warren Harding supported Taft after Teddy Roosevelt left the Party to be part of the Bull Moose Party. The Progressive Movement was divided by the early 20th century. Warren Harding ran for Senator of the U.S. Congress, and he won by 1914. He promoted a conciliatory campaigning style. He defeated Ohio Attorney General Timothy Hogan. Democrats controlled both Houses of Congress when Warren Harding was a Senator. He had very unimportant committee assignments early on. He was a safe, conservative Republican voter on issues. Harding wanted nuanced positions on women's suffrage and on the prohibition of alcohol. He never supported votes for women until Ohio did so. Harding drank, but supported the 18th Amendment (that banned the sale and drinking of alcohol). Harding, as a politician respected by both Republicans and Progressives, was asked to be temporary chairman of the 1916 Republican National Convention and to deliver the keynote address. He urged delegates to stand as a united party. The convention nominated Justice Charles Evans Hughes. Harding reached out to Roosevelt once the former president declined the 1916 Progressive nomination, a refusal that effectively scuttled that party. In the November 1916 presidential election, despite increasing Republican unity, Hughes was narrowly defeated by Wilson. Harding supported WWI and war legislation like the Espionage Act of 1917. The problem with that law is that it violated human civil liberties. Harding opposed Wilson's Treaty of Versailles plan including Article X of it. 

By 1920, many Progressives came into the Republican Party. When Roosevelt suddenly died on January 6, 1919, a number of candidates quickly emerged. These included General Leonard Wood, Illinois Governor Frank Lowden, California Senator Hiram Johnson, and a host of underdogs such as Herbert Hoover (renowned for his World War I relief work), Massachusetts Governor Calvin Coolidge, and General John J. Pershing. Harding ran for President in 1920. Harding wanted to have a non confrontation style in his campaign. He won the Ohio primary. The 1920 Republican National Convention opened at the Chicago Coliseum on June 8, 1920, assembling delegates who were bitterly divided, most recently over the results of a Senate investigation into campaign spending, which had just been released. The report found that Wood had spent $1.8 million (equivalent to $23.25 million in 2020), supporting Johnson's claims that Wood was trying to buy the presidency. Some of the $600,000 that Lowden had spent wound up in the pockets of two convention delegates. Johnson had spent $194,000, and Harding $113,000. Many delegates believed that Johnson was behind the inquiry, and the rage of the Lowden and Wood factions put an end to any possible compromise among the frontrunners. Of the almost 1,000 delegates, 27 were women—the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, guaranteeing women the vote, was within one state of ratification, and passed before the end of August. 

The Convention took time, and Harding won the Republican nomination for President. He choose Calvin Coolidge as his Vice President. Some criticized Harding as been too moderate. The Democrats had many choices. The Democratic National Convention opened in San Francisco on June 28, 1920, under a shadow cast by Woodrow Wilson, who wished to be nominated for a third term. Delegates were convinced Wilson's health would not permit him to serve, and looked elsewhere for a candidate. Former Treasury Secretary William G. McAdoo was a major contender, but he was Wilson's son-in-law, and refused to consider a nomination so long as the president wanted it. Many at the convention voted for McAdoo anyway, and a deadlock ensued with Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer. On the 44th ballot, the Democrats nominated Governor Cox for president, with his running mate Assistant Secretary of the Navy Franklin D. Roosevelt. As Cox was a newspaper owner and editor when not in politics, this placed two Ohio editors against each other for the presidency, and some complained there was no real political choice. Both Cox and Harding were economic conservatives and were reluctant progressives at best. Harding wanted an Association of Nations, not a League of Nations as promoted by Woodrow Wilson. FDR supported the League of Nations, but not Cox that much. 

During the campaign, opponents spread old rumors that Harding's great-great-grandfather was a West Indian black person and that other black people might be found in his family tree. Harding's campaign manager rejected the accusations. Wooster College professor William Estabrook Chancellor publicized the rumors, based on supposed family research, but perhaps reflecting no more than local gossip. By Election Day, November 2, 1920, few had any doubts that the Republican ticket would win. Harding received 60.2 percent of the popular vote, the highest percentage since the evolution of the two-party system, and 404 electoral votes. Cox received 34 percent of the national vote and 127 electoral votes. Campaigning from a federal prison where he was serving a sentence for opposing the war, Socialist Eugene V. Debs received 3 percent of the national vote. The Republicans greatly increased their majority in each house of Congress. Harding was sworn in on March 4, 1921, in the presence of his wife and father. Harding preferred a low-key inauguration, without the customary parade, leaving only the swearing-in ceremony and a brief reception at the White House. In his inaugural address he declared, "Our most dangerous tendency is to expect too much from the government and at the same time do too little for it." Harding took a vacation, and then went to work as the new President. Many of his appointments were pro-League of Nations people like Charles Evan Hughes as his Secretary of States. Andrew W. Mellon, one of the rich Americans in that time, was the Treasury leader. Harding had a scandal because of Harding's Senate friend, Albert B. Fall of New Mexico, the Interior Secretary, and Daugherty, the Attorney General. Fall was a Western rancher and former miner and was pro-development. He was opposed by conservationists such as Gifford Pinchot, who wrote, "it would have been possible to pick a worse man for Secretary of the Interior, but not altogether easy." The New York Times mocked the Daugherty appointment, stating that rather than select one of the best minds, Harding had been content "to choose merely a best friend." Eugene P. Trani and David L. Wilson, in their volume on Harding's presidency, suggest that the appointment made sense then, since Daugherty was "a competent lawyer well-acquainted with the seamy side of politics ... a first-class political troubleshooter and someone Harding could trust." 

Harding wanted America to not be part of the League of Nations. The Senate didn't pass the Treaty of Versailles. Technically, America was at war with Germany, Austria, and Hungary. Peacemaking began with the Knox–Porter Resolution, declaring the U.S. at peace and reserving any rights granted under Versailles. Treaties with Germany, Austria and Hungary, each containing many of the non-League provisions of the Treaty of Versailles, were ratified in 1921. Hughes worked to fight for Britain to pay off its war debt. Germany had to pay its reparations. In 1922, passed a more restrictive bill. Hughes negotiated an agreement for Britain to pay off its war debt over 62 years at low interest, reducing the present value of the obligations. This agreement, approved by Congress in 1923, served as a model for negotiations with other nations. Talks with Germany on reduction of reparations payments resulted in the Dawes Plan of 1924. Harding refused to recognize the Bolshevik Revolution and the Soviet Union. Harding's Commerce Secretary Hoover allowed the American Relief Administration to send aid to Russia during its famine. Harding refused to support trade with the Soviets, but Hughes did. Harding talked about disarmament in the campaign, but he didn't discuss about it much as President. Some wanted fleets to be cut in America, the Uk, and Japan. 

Harding concurred, and after diplomatic discussions, representatives of nine nations convened in Washington in November 1921. Most of the diplomats first attended Armistice Day ceremonies at Arlington National Cemetery, where Harding spoke at the entombment of the Unknown Soldier of World War I, whose identity, "took flight with his imperishable soul. We know not whence he came, only that his death marks him with the everlasting glory of an American dying for his country. Hughes, in his speech at the opening session of the conference on November 12, 1921, made the American proposal—the U.S. would decommission or not build 30 warships if Great Britain did likewise for 19 vessels, and Japan for 17. Hughes was generally successful, with agreements reached on this and other points, including settlement of disputes over islands in the Pacific, and limitations on the use of poison gas. The naval agreement applied only to battleships, and to some extent aircraft carriers, and ultimately did not prevent rearmament. Nevertheless, Harding and Hughes were widely applauded in the press for their work. Senator Lodge and the Senate Minority Leader, Alabama's Oscar Underwood, were part of the U.S. delegation, and they helped ensure the treaties made it through the Senate mostly unscathed, though that body added reservations to some. America disposed of many vessels after WWI. Harding had troops in Cuba and Nicaragua. Latin America didn't like foreign occupying interventions in their lands. America intervened in Panama and in Mexico. There was the ratification of the Thomas-Urrutia Treaty with Colombia after the U.S. provoked Panamanian Revolution of 1903. 

America saw a depression from 1920-1921. Economic decline was real. Harding wanted a reduction of income taxes, an increase of tariffs on agricultural goods, and other reforms. He supported highways, aviation, and radio. Treasury Secretary Mellon also recommended that Congress cut income tax rates, and that the corporate excess profits tax be abolished. The House Ways and Means Committee endorsed Mellon's proposals, but some congressmen wanting to raise corporate tax rates fought the measure. Harding was unsure what side to endorse, telling a friend, "I can't make a d___ thing out of this tax problem. I listen to one side, and they seem right, and then—God!—I talk to the other side, and they seem just as right." Harding tried compromise, and gained passage of a bill in the House after the end of the excess profits tax was delayed a year. In the Senate, the bill became entangled in efforts to vote World War I veterans a soldier's bonus. Frustrated by the delays, on July 12, Harding appeared before the Senate to urge passage of the tax legislation without the bonus. It was not until November that the revenue bill finally passed, with higher rates than Mellon had proposed. Harding opposed the veterans' bonus. Mellon wanted lower tax rates, because he was a conservative economically. A non cash bonus for soldiers passed over Coolidge's veto in 1924. Mellon inspired Harding to cut taxes starting in 1922. Mellon said that income tax money was driven underground or abroad if income tax rates were increased, but alternatives can be made for the rich to pay their fair share of taxation. 

Deregulations increased and governmental spending dropped. Unemployment declined.  Wages, profits, and productivity increased. Mass production grew, Harding signed the Federal Highway Act of 1921. Large capital existed in the U.S. economy. He wanted a laissez faire approach involving business, and he was hostile to organized labor. Public works projects were growing but he wanted no federal money to deal massively with unemployment. This economic growth saw falling wages for some people. Labor strikes existed. On July 1, 1922, 400,000 railroad workers went on strike. Harding recommended a settlement that made some concessions, but management objected. Attorney General Daugherty convinced Judge James H. Wilkerson to issue a sweeping injunction to break the strike. Although there was public support for the Wilkerson injunction, Harding felt it went too far, and had Daugherty and Wilkerson amend it. The injunction succeeded in ending the strike; however, tensions remained high between railroad workers and management for years. Harding called for anti-lynching legislation, but he did nothing revolutionary to help African Americans. Harding wanted literacy tests for white and black votes. Harding spoke about equality but did very little to promote equality. 

Three days after the Tulsa race massacre of 1921, Harding spoke at the all-Black Lincoln University in Pennsylvania. He declared, "Despite the demagogues, the idea of our oneness as Americans has risen superior to every appeal to mere class and group. And so, I wish it might be in this matter of our national problem of races." Speaking directly about the events in Tulsa, he said, "God grant that, in the soberness, the fairness, and the justice of this country, we never see another spectacle like it." Harding supported  Congressman Leonidas Dyer's federal anti-lynching bill, which passed the House of Representatives in January 1922. When it reached the Senate floor in November 1922, it was filibustered by Southern Democrats, and Lodge withdrew it to allow the ship subsidy bill Harding favored to be debated, though it was likewise blocked. Black people blamed Harding for the Dyer bill's defeat; Harding biographer Robert K. Murray noted that it was hastened to its end by Harding's desire to have the ship subsidy bill considered. 

With the public suspicious of immigrants, especially those who might be socialists or communists, Congress passed the Per Centum Act of 1921, signed by Harding on May 19, 1921, as a quick means of restricting immigration. The act reduced the numbers of immigrants to 3% of those from a given country living in the U.S., based on the 1910 census. This would, in practice, not restrict immigration from Ireland and Germany, but would bar many Italians and eastern European Jewish people. Harding and Secretary of Labor James Davis believed that enforcement had to be humane, and at the Secretary's recommendation, Harding allowed almost 1,000 deportable immigrants to remain. Coolidge later signed the Immigration Act of 1924, permanently restricting immigration to the U.S. Harding did not to pardon Eugene Debs when he was in prison for speaking against WWI. Debs left prison after the war was over, and he met with the socialist Debs. Harding released 23 other war opponents during that time to make normalcy in his mind a reality. Harding appointed four justices to the Supreme Court of the United States. When Chief Justice Edward Douglass White died in May 1921, Harding was unsure whether to appoint former president Taft or former Utah senator George Sutherland—he had promised seats on the court to both men. After briefly considering awaiting another vacancy and appointing them both, he chose Taft as Chief Justice. Sutherland was appointed to the court in 1922, to be followed by two other economic conservatives, Pierce Butler and Edward Terry Sanford, in 1923.

By 1922, economic issues grew as unemployment was as high as 11 percent. After the midterms in 1923, Harding fought to promote his policies. The economy improved. Harding wanted to go for re-election. Harding drink, eat, and smoke too much. He had a heart condition and chronic kidney issues. He recovered from influenza in January of 1923. Harding toured the West Coast and other places. He supported the World Court. He made many speeches, and Harding visited Yellowstone and Zion National Parks. Harding toured Vancouver, British Columbia as the first sitting American President to visit Canada. Harding visited Seattle. Harding kept up his busy schedule, giving a speech to 25,000 people at the stadium at the University of Washington. In the final speech he gave, Harding predicted statehood for Alaska. The president rushed through his speech, not waiting for applause from the audience. Harding had many scandals of electing his friends in federal positions. Many people didn't know the extent of the Teapot Dome scandal (involving oil, bribery, and the Navy. Albert B. Fall went into the prison for his crimes. He was the first Secretary of the Interior) and other things until after his death. He was about to fire Jess Smith for corruption, but Smith committed suicide on May 20, 1923. Charles R. Forbes went to prison for corrupt at the Veterans' Bureau. It is no secret that Warren Harding cheated on his wife by having adultery with many extramarital affairs. 

Harding went to bed early the evening of July 27, 1923, a few hours after giving the speech at the University of Washington. Later that night, he called for his physician Charles E. Sawyer, complaining of pain in the upper abdomen. Sawyer thought that it was a recurrence of stomach upset, but Dr. Joel T. Boone suspected a heart problem. The press was told Harding had experienced an "acute gastrointestinal attack" and his scheduled weekend in Portland was cancelled. He felt better the next day, as the train rushed to San Francisco, where they arrived the morning of July 29. He insisted on walking from the train to the car, was then rushed to the Palace Hotel, where he suffered a relapse. Doctors found that not only was his heart causing problems, but also that he had pneumonia, and he was confined to bed rest in his hotel room. Doctors treated him with liquid caffeine and digitalis, and he seemed to improve. Hoover released Harding's foreign policy address advocating membership in the World Court, and the president was pleased that it was favorably received. By the afternoon of August 2, Harding's condition still seemed to be improving and his doctors allowed him to sit up in bed. At around 7:30 pm that evening, Florence was reading to him "A Calm Review of a Calm Man," a flattering article about him from The Saturday Evening Post; she paused and he told her, "That's good. Go on, read some more." Those were to be his last words. She resumed reading when, a few seconds later, Harding twisted convulsively and collapsed back in the bed, gasping. Florence Harding immediately called the doctors into the room, but they were unable to revive him with stimulants; Harding was pronounced dead a few minutes later, at the age of 57. Harding's death was initially attributed to a cerebral hemorrhage, as doctors at the time did not generally understand the symptoms of cardiac arrest. Florence Harding did not consent to have the president autopsied. His death was shock to the nation. His body traveled to the United States Capitol rotunda. He was buried at Marion, Ohio. President Coolidge, Chief Justice Taft, and Harding's widow and his father were there as his body was placed on a horse drawn hearse. His funeral was attended by Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, and Harvey Firestone. Florence Harding, his wife, was buried in the Harding Tomb being dedicated by President Hoover in 1931. President Warren G. Harding's legacy is that he wanted to get along with everybody, but he never foreseen a lot of the scandals that existed in his administration. He was a conservative on economic issues and wanted the status quo after wars and conflicts. The weakness of his administration was that its obsession with not forming bold policy action contributed to his moderate legacy (and scandals from Daugherty, Smith, Fall, and others definitely harmed America). His Presidency was short lived, but Warren Harding remains one of the most important Presidents of the 20th century. 

President Calvin Coolidge was one of the most conservative Presidents in American history. He blatantly believed in laissez faire economics. His views on civil rights were more progressive than Harding, but Coolidge's economic policies contributed to the length and intensity of the Great Depression in the United States of America. He was the 30th President of America from 1923 to 1929. He lived from July 4, 1872 to January 5, 1929. He was born in Plymouth Notch, Vermont. He was the only U.S. President born on Independence Day. His parents were  John Calvin Coolidge Sr. (1845–1926) and Victoria Josephine Moor (1846–1885). Although named for his father, John, from early childhood Coolidge was addressed by his middle name, Calvin. His middle name was selected in honor of John Calvin, considered a founder of the Congregational church in which Coolidge was raised and remained active throughout his life. His father was a famous farmer, storekeeper, and public servant. His ancestors came from the New England region. His  earliest American ancestor, John Coolidge, emigrated from Cottenham, Cambridgeshire, England, around 1630 and settled in Watertown, Massachusetts. Coolidge's great-great-grandfather, also named 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. Coolidge was also a descendant of Samuel Appleton, who settled in Ipswich and led the Massachusetts Bay Colony during King Philip's War. Calvin Coolidge attended Black River Academy and then St. Johnsbury Academy. He also enrolled at Amherst college. He knew how to debate in college. Coolidge joined the Phi Gamma Delta fraternity and graduated cum laude. Later, he went into law after being influenced by philosophy professor Charles Edward Garman (a Congregational mystic with a neo-Hegelian philosophy). 

Calvin Coolidge worked as a country lawyer in Massachusetts, and he married Grace Coodhue (a University of Vermont graduate and teacher at Northampton's Clarke School for the Deaf). They had a honeymoon trip at Montreal. 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 couple had 2 sons. Calvin Jr. died of blood poisoning. As a Republican, he worked in local politics in New England. Coolidge won the election to the City of Council of Northampton in 1898, and he continued to work as a political leader. 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 western faction of the Massachusetts Republican Party; Crane's party rival in the east of the commonwealth was U.S. Senator Henry Cabot Lodge. 

Coolidge has an alliance with Guy Currier in his political career. He won his 2nd term in 1908. Calvin Coolidge was a well known conservative, but he refused to leave the Republican Party. Theodore Roosevelt was in the progressive wing of the Republicans, and the conservative wing of the party supported William Howard Taft.  Coolidge by 1913 was in the Republican Party power structure. He supported investments in Massachusetts. He soon became Lieutenant Governor and Governor of Massachusetts from 1916 to 1921. He was lieutenant governor with Samuel W. McCall as governor. He won the 1918 election for Governor of Massachusetts. His running mate was Channing Cox or the Boston lawyer and Speaker of the Massachusetts House of Representatives. Coolidge ran on a platform of being fiscal conservative, a vague opposition to Prohibition, support for women's suffrage, and support for American involvement in World War I. The issue of war was divisive, but he won the election. As Governor, he opposed the Boston police to form a union. He responded to Samuel Gompers' pro-labor, pro-union words. Coolidge lost many friends from organized labor because of his decision to use National Guard troops to promote Curtis to office in the Boston police. Yet, he promoted law and order. He ran for re-election as Governor in 1918.

By the time Coolidge was inaugurated as Governor  on January 2, 1919, the First World War had ended, and Coolidge pushed the legislature to give a $100 bonus (equivalent to $1,493 in 2020) to Massachusetts veterans. He also signed a bill reducing the work week for women and children from fifty-four hours to forty-eight, saying, "We must humanize the industry, or the system will break down." He signed into law a budget that kept the tax rates the same, while trimming $4 million from expenditures, thus allowing the state to retire some of its debt. Coolidge vetoed many bills as Governor. Her personally opposed to Prohibition, but he enforced the 18th Amendment because it was the law of the land. He was Vice President from 1921 to 1923 under President Warren G. Harding. Harding won Tennessee in the election which was the first time a Republican ticket won a Southern state since Reconstruction. Coolidge was mostly quiet as Vice President. He gave many speeches. 

Coolidge often seemed uncomfortable among fashionable Washington society; when asked why he continued to attend so many of their dinner parties, he replied, "Got to eat somewhere." Alice Roosevelt Longworth, a leading Republican wit, underscored Coolidge's silence and his dour personality: "When he wished he were elsewhere, he pursed his lips, folded his arms, and said nothing. He looked then precisely as though he had been weaned on a pickle." Coolidge and his wife, Grace, who was a great baseball fan, once attended a Washington Senators game and sat through all nine innings without saying a word, except once when he asked her the time. After Warren Harding's unexpected death from a heart attack in San Francisco, Calvin Coolidge was President immediately. Coolidge was at his Vermont home with his family when the news came to him. His father, a notary public and justice of the peace, administered the oath of office in the family's parlor by the light of a kerosene lamp at 2:47 a.m. on August 3, 1923, whereupon the new President of the United States returned to bed.

Coolidge returned to Washington the next day, and was sworn in again by Justice Adolph A. Hoehling Jr. of the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia, to forestall any questions about the authority of a state official to administer a federal oath. This second oath-taking remained a secret until it was revealed by Harry M. Daugherty in 1932, and confirmed by Hoehling. President Calvin Coolidge kept a low profile. 

Coolidge addressed Congress when it reconvened on December 6, 1923, giving a speech that supported many of Harding's policies, including Harding's formal budgeting process, the enforcement of immigration restrictions and arbitration of coal strikes ongoing in Pennsylvania. The address to Congress was the first presidential speech to be broadcast over the radio. The Washington Naval Treaty was proclaimed just one month into Coolidge's term, and was generally well received in the country. In May 1924, the World War I veterans' World War Adjusted Compensation Act or "Bonus Bill" was passed over his veto. Coolidge signed the Immigration Act later that year, which was aimed at restricting southern and eastern European immigration, but appended a signing statement expressing his unhappiness with the bill's specific exclusion of Japanese immigrants. Just before the Republican Convention began, Coolidge signed into law the Revenue Act of 1924, which reduced the top marginal tax rate from 58% to 46%, as well as personal income tax rates across the board, increased the estate tax and bolstered it with a new gift tax. On June 2, 1924, Coolidge signed the act granting citizenship to all Native Americans born in the United States. By that time, two-thirds of them were already citizens, having gained it through marriage, military service (veterans of World War I were granted citizenship in 1919), or the land allotments that had earlier taken place. Coolidge won the 1924 election against John W. Davis and Robert M. LaFollette, a Republican Progressive politician from Wisconsin. After his son Calvin died, Calvin Coolidge was never the same. 

President Calvin Coolidge ran his campaign and run. He wasn't confrontational. Calvin Coolidge saw the rapid economic growth in the Roaring Twenties. Herbert Hoover was the Secretary of Commerce back then. Coolidge disdained regulation and demonstrated this by appointing commissioners to the Federal Trade Commission and the Interstate Commerce Commission who did little to restrict the activities of businesses under their jurisdiction. The regulatory state under Coolidge was, as one biographer described it, "thin to the point of invisibility." Historian Robert Sobel offers some context of Coolidge's laissez-faire ideology, based on the prevailing understanding of federalism during his presidency: "As Governor of Massachusetts, Coolidge supported wages and hours legislation, opposed child labor, imposed economic controls during World War I, favored safety measures in factories, and even worker representation on corporate boards. Did he support these measures while president? No, because in the 1920s, such matters were considered the responsibilities of state and local governments." I disagree, because the federal government has every right to ban child labor, have labor rights, and do other things to regulate the economy. Coolidge supported the taxation policies of Andrew Mellon. He cut taxes. He reduced federal expenditures. Only the richest 2 percent of taxpayers paid any federal income tax by 1927. Coolidge even opposed to farm subsidies. Farmers were suffering, and Coolidge refused to support the federal government to purchase crops to sell abroad at lower prices. Agriculture Secretary Henry C. Wallace and other administration officials favored the bill of the federal government to help farmers when it was introduced in 1924, but rising prices convinced many in Congress that the bill was unnecessary, and it was defeated just before the elections that year.

In 1926, with farm prices falling once more, Senator Charles L. McNary and Representative Gilbert N. Haugen – both Republicans – proposed the McNary–Haugen Farm Relief Bill. The bill proposed a federal farm board that would purchase surplus production in high-yield years and hold it (when feasible) for later sale or sell it abroad. Coolidge opposed McNary-Haugen, declaring that agriculture must stand "on an independent business basis", and said that "government control cannot be divorced from political control." Instead of manipulating prices, he favored instead Herbert Hoover's proposal to increase profitability by modernizing agriculture. Secretary Mellon wrote a letter denouncing the McNary-Haugen measure as unsound and likely to cause inflation, and it was defeated. Coolidge has often been criticized for his actions during the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927, the worst natural disaster to hit the Gulf Coast until Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Although he did eventually name Secretary Hoover to a commission in charge of flood relief, scholars argue that Coolidge overall showed a lack of interest in federal flood control. Coolidge did not believe that personally visiting the region after the floods would accomplish anything, and that it would be seen as mere political grandstanding. He also did not want to incur the federal spending that flood control would require; he believed property owners should bear much of the cost. On the other hand, Congress wanted a bill that would place the federal government completely in charge of flood mitigation. When Congress passed a compromise measure in 1928, Coolidge declined to take credit for it and signed the bill in private on May 15. Calvin Coolidge spoke in making lynching a federal crime, but he did nothing revolutionary to help African Americans. During his time as Presidents, lynchings of African Americans decreased and millions of people left the Klan. Coolidge disliked the Klan. Charles Dawes criticized the Klan. 

Coolidge spoke in favor of the civil rights of African-Americans, saying in his first State of the Union address that their rights were "just as sacred as those of any other citizen" under the U.S. Constitution and that it was a "public and a private duty to protect those rights." On June 6, 1924, Coolidge delivered a commencement address at historically black, non-segregated Howard University, in which he thanked and commended African-Americans for their rapid advances in education and their contributions to U.S. society over the years, as well as their eagerness to render their services as soldiers in the World War, all while being faced with discrimination and prejudices at home.  On June 2, 1924, Coolidge signed the Indian Citizenship Act, which granted U.S. citizenship to all American Indians living on reservations. (Those off reservations had long been citizens). Coolidge spoke of tolerance of differences. He worked in foreign policy affairs too. Coolidge wanted the World Court but not the League of Nations as not serving American interests. He wanted the Dawes Plan to give partial relief to Germany in paying off their reaprations from WWI. Coolidge refused to recognize the USSR. Coolidge worked with Mexico and allowed the occupation of Nicaragua plus Haiti. He ended the occupation of Dominican Republic in 1924. Coolidge talked with Latin American leaders. For Canada, Coolidge authorized the St. Lawrence Seaway, a system of locks and canals that would provide large vessels passage between the Atlantic Ocean and the Great Lakes. His cabinet including judicial appointments existed. By the 1928 election, Coolidge didn't run for re-election. Herbert Hoover won in a landslide by 1928. The Republicans had a landslide. Calvin Coolidge retired and lived in Northampton. He was an honorary president of the American Foundation for the Blind, a director of New York Life Insurance Company, president of the American Antiquarian Society, and a trustee of Amherst College. Calvin Coolidge supported Herbert Hoover's re-election campaign in 1932. Hoover lost, and Coolidge promoted his autobiography, newspaper column, etc. 

Coolidge died suddenly from coronary thrombosis at "The Beeches", at 12:45 p.m., January 5, 1933, at age 60. Shortly before his death, Coolidge confided to an old friend: "I feel I no longer fit in with these times." Coolidge is buried in Plymouth Notch Cemetery, Plymouth Notch, Vermont. The nearby family home is maintained as one of the original buildings on the Calvin Coolidge Homestead District site. The State of Vermont dedicated a new visitors' center nearby to mark Coolidge's 100th birthday on July 4, 1972. Calvin Coolidge's 2nd inauguration was the first Presidential inauguration broadcast on the radio. He helped to expand radio regulation too. When When Charles Lindbergh arrived in Washington on a U.S. Navy ship after his celebrated 1927 trans-Atlantic flight, President Coolidge welcomed him back to the U.S. and presented him with the Medal of Honor; the event was captured on film. The legacy of President Calvin Coolidge was that was he was more of a shy man who sincerely believed in laissez faire economic policies. He was still sincerely wrong on economic issues, and the federal government utilized to enrich the lives of the people directly is righteous. Coolidge didn't live to see the era of WWII, but Coolidge was the transitional President after WWI but before WWII that caused another expansion of the federal government since the days of Reconstruction.

The story of my relatives are very extensive. The followtin information is new information that I discovered about my distant cousins (by late March of 2022) who are descendants of Sarah Claud. Sarah Claud was my 4th great grandmother. Sarah Claud married Tom Hill (1838-1915). They had a child named Adaline Hill (1862-1930). Adaline Hill married John Henry Williams (1857-1921) on May 17, 1877 at Southampton County, Virginia. One of their sons were Peter Percy Williams (1880-1949). He married Hattie E. Joyner (1881-1959) and had many children like Johnnie Thomas Williams (1912-1977). Johnnie Thomas Williams was my 2nd cousin, and he married Irene Turner (1921-1994) on March 24, 1940 at Drewryville, Virginia. Their children are Johnnie McCory Williams (b. 1940. He married Beatrice Lavonne Walker on July 25, 1966 at Nansemond, Virginia), Kermit Keesee Williams Sr. (b. 1942. He married Faye Diana Duck on June 8, 1968 at Suffolk, Virginia), Shelton Williams Sr. (b. 1944), Jackie Williams (1946-2018), Joan Williams (1948-2021), Larry W. Williams (1953-1978), Calvin Ricardo Williams Sr. (b. 1955), Wanda Penelope Williams Hughes (b. 1957), Frieda Elaine Williams (b. 1959), Andrew Sharrod, and Sandra Williams Gaskins. 

My late 3rd cousin Joan Williams Wilson lived from May 17, 1948 to November 29, 2021. She was born in Suffolk, Virginia. Joan attended Norfolk State University and majored in math. Later, Joan worked as a tax accountant for H&R Block for several years. She later worked as a certified nurse's assistant.  Her last job was at Walmart where she worked as a greeter/cashier for over five year. People always loved her great personality. She married Williams Alfred Wilson Jr. (1946-2005) on December 23, 1973 at Norfolk, Virginia. Their children are Kenya Yolanda Chillie Wilson (b. 1974. She married Christopher Lamont Neal on March 9, 2002 at Charlottesville, Virginia. Their children are Victoria Alexis Neal being born in 2007, Jamal Neal, and De-Quan Marguise Neal (He is married to Diana Neal), William Alfred Wilson III (b. 1979. His children are Kweli WIlson, Jeremiah Wilson, William Alfred Wilson IV, and Angelina Wilson). Andre Sharrod Wilson Sr.(he is married to GiGi Wilson. Their child is Andre Wilson Jr.), and Tiffany Shannon Wilson (who was born on May 23, 1981 at Norfolk, Virginia). Destiny is also Joan's grandchild. Joan Wilson's great grand kids are Max, Ezra, Emory (who passed away), and Chloe. Joan's grand daughter's Mariah is deceased. 

My 3rd cousin Frieda Elaine Williams was born on June 21, 1959 at Southampton County, Virginia. She married Allen Dewayne Cason on March 18, 1989 at Portsmouth, Virginia. Their daughter is my 4th cousin Victoria Joi Cason being born on August 19, 1993 at Portsmouth, Virginia. Sandra Williams-Gaskins is my 3rd cousin who married the late Gary Gaskins (1949-2015).  Their children are: Angelicque Carol Gaskins Downs (b. 1969. She is married to Gerard Downs), Kari Gaskins McDonough (b. 1977. She is married to Jerry McDonough, and their children are Elle McDonough and Gerald Thomas McDonough IV), Gary McKenney Gaskins Jr. (b. 1979. He is married to Quondra L. Jeffers, and she was born in 1979), Justin Elliot, Deshaun Hall, and Craig Gaskins. My 3rd cousin Jackie Williams lived from June 1, 1946 to October 13, 2018. She was married to Warren Ware, and their children are Wade M. Ware (b. 1974) and Racquel Ware (b. 1978). 

By Timothy