Coolidge by Amity Shlaes (PDF)

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Amity Shlaes, author of The Forgotten Man, delivers a brilliant and provocative reexamination of America’s thirtieth president, Calvin Coolidge, and the decade of unparalleled growth that the nation enjoyed under his leadership. In this riveting biography, Shlaes traces Coolidge’s improbable rise from a tiny town in New England to a youth so unpopular he was shut out of college fraternities at Amherst College up through Massachusetts politics. After a divisive period of government excess and corruption, Coolidge restored national trust in Washington and achieved what few other peacetime presidents have: He left office with a federal budget smaller than the one he inherited. A man of calm discipline, he lived by example, renting half of a two-family house for his entire political career rather than compromise his political work by taking on debt. Renowned as a throwback, Coolidge was in fact strikingly modern—an advocate of women’s suffrage and a radio pioneer. At once a revision of man and economics, Coolidge gestures to the country we once were and reminds us of qualities we had forgotten and can use today.

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⭐John Calvin Coolidge, Jr. was born in 1872 in Plymouth Notch, Vermont. His family were among the branch of the Coolidge clan who stayed in Vermont while others left its steep, rocky, and often bleak land for opportunity in the Wild West of Ohio and beyond when the Erie canal opened up these new territories to settlement. His father and namesake made his living by cutting wood, tapping trees for sugar, and small-scale farming on his modest plot of land. He diversified his income by operating a general store in town and selling insurance. There was a long tradition of public service in the family. Young Coolidge’s great-grandfather was an officer in the American Revolution and his grandfather was elected to the Vermont House of Representatives. His father was justice of the peace and tax collector in Plymouth Notch, and would later serve in the Vermont House of Representatives and Senate.Although many in the cities would consider their rural life far from the nearest railroad terminal hard-scrabble, the family was sufficiently prosperous to pay for young Calvin (the name he went by from boyhood) to attend private schools, boarding with families in the towns where they were located and infrequently returning home. He followed a general college preparatory curriculum and, after failing the entrance examination the first time, was admitted on his second attempt to Amherst College as a freshman in 1891. A loner, and already with a reputation for being taciturn, he joined none of the fraternities to which his classmates belonged, nor did he participate in the athletics which were a part of college life. He quickly perceived that Amherst had a class system, where the scions of old money families from Boston who had supported the college were elevated above nobodies from the boonies like himself. He concentrated on his studies, mastering Greek and Latin, and immersing himself in the works of the great orators of those cultures.As his college years passed, Coolidge became increasingly interested in politics, joined the college Republican Club, and worked on the 1892 re-election campaign of Benjamin Harrison, whose Democrat opponent, Grover Cleveland, was seeking to regain the presidency he had lost to Harrison in 1888. Writing to his father after Harrison’s defeat, his analysis was that “the reason seems to be in the never satisfied mind of the American and in the ever desire to shift in hope of something better and in the vague idea of the working and farming classes that somebody is getting all the money while they get all the work.”His confidence growing, Coolidge began to participate in formal debates, finally, in his senior year, joined a fraternity, and ran for and won the honour of being an orator at his class’s graduation. He worked hard on the speech, which was a great success, keeping his audience engaged and frequently laughing at his wit. While still quiet in one-on-one settings, he enjoyed public speaking and connecting with an audience.After graduation, Coolidge decided to pursue a career in the law and considered attending law school at Harvard or Columbia University, but decided he could not afford the tuition, as he was still being supported by his father and had no prospects for earning sufficient money while studying the law. In that era, most states did not require a law school education; an aspiring lawyer could, instead, become an apprentice at an established law firm and study on his own, a practice called reading the law. Coolidge became an apprentice at a firm in Northampton, Massachusetts run by two Amherst graduates and, after two years, in 1897, passed the Massachusetts bar examination and was admitted to the bar. In 1898, he set out on his own and opened a small law office in Northampton; he had embarked on the career of a country lawyer.While developing his law practice, Coolidge followed in the footsteps of his father and grandfather and entered public life as a Republican, winning election to the Northampton City Council in 1898. In the following years, he held the offices of City Solicitor and county clerk of courts. In 1903 he married Grace Anna Goodhue, a teacher at the Clarke School for the Deaf in Northampton. The next year, running for the local school board, he suffered the only defeat of his political career, in part because his opponents pointed out he had no children in the schools. Coolidge said, “Might give me time.” (The Coolidges went on to have two sons, John, born in 1906, and Calvin Jr., in 1908.)In 1906, Coolidge sought statewide office for the first time, running for the Massachusetts House of Representatives and narrowly defeating the Democrat incumbent. He was re-elected the following year, but declined to run for a third term, returning to Northampton where he ran for mayor, won, and served two one year terms. In 1912 he ran for the State Senate seat of the retiring Republican incumbent and won. Coolidge sought a third term in 1914 and won, being named President of the State Senate with substantial influence on legislation in the body.In 1915, Coolidge moved further up the ladder by running for the office of Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts, balancing the Republican ticket led by a gubernatorial candidate from the east of the state with his own base of support in the rural west. After being re-elected to the office in 1915 and 1916 (statewide offices in Massachusetts at the time had a term of only one year), with the governor announcing his retirement, Coolidge was unopposed for the Republican nomination for governor and narrowly defeated the Democrat in the 1918 election.Coolidge took office at a time of great unrest between industry and labour. In early 1919 an ugly general strike in Seattle idled workers across the city, and the United Mine Workers threatened a nationwide coal strike for November 1919, just as the maximum demand for coal in winter would arrive. In Boston, police officers voted to unionise and affiliate with the American Federation of Labor, ignoring an order from the Police Commissioner forbidding officers to join a union. On September 9th, a majority of policemen defied the order and walked off the job.Those who question the need for a police presence on the street in big cities should consider the Boston police strike as a cautionary tale, at least as things were in the city of Boston in the year 1919. As the Sun went down, the city erupted in chaos, mayhem, looting, and violence. A streetcar conductor was shot for no apparent reason. There were reports of rapes, murders, and serious injuries. The next day, more than a thousand residents applied for gun permits. Downtown stores were boarding up their display windows and hiring private security forces. Telephone operators and employees at the electric power plant threatened to walk out in sympathy with the police.Governor Coolidge acted swiftly and decisively. He called up the Guard and deployed them throughout the city, fired all of the striking policemen, and issued a statement saying “The action of the police in leaving their posts of duty is not a strike. It is a desertion. … There is nothing to arbitrate, nothing to compromise. In my personal opinion there are no conditions under which the men can return to the force.” He directed the police commissioner to hire a new force to replace the fired men. He publicly rebuked American Federation of Labor chief Samuel Gompers in a telegram released to the press which concluded, “There is no right to strike against the public safety by anybody, anywhere, any time.”When the dust settled, the union was broken, peace was restored to the streets of Boston, and Coolidge had emerged onto the national stage as a decisive leader and champion of what he called the “reign of law.” Later in 1919, he was re-elected governor with seven times the margin of his first election. He began to be spoken of as a potential candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in 1920.Coolidge was nominated at the 1920 Republican convention, but never came in above sixth in the balloting, in the middle of the pack of regional and favourite son candidates. On the tenth ballot, Warren G. Harding of Ohio was chosen, and party bosses announced their choice for Vice President, a senator from Wisconsin. But when time came for delegates to vote, a Coolidge wave among rank and file tired of the bosses ordering them around gave him the nod. Coolidge did not attend the convention in Chicago; he got the news of his nomination by telephone. After he hung up, Grace asked him what it was all about. He said, “Nominated for vice president.” She responded, “You don’t mean it.” “Indeed I do”, he answered. “You are not going to accept it, are you?” “I suppose I shall have to.”Harding ran on a platform of “normalcy” after the turbulence of the war and Wilson’s helter-skelter progressive agenda. The election was a blow-out. Harding and Coolidge won the largest electoral college majority (404 to 127) since James Monroe’s unopposed re-election in 1820, and more than 60% of the popular vote. Harding carried every state except for the Old South, and was the first Republican to win Tennessee since Reconstruction. Republicans picked up 63 seats in the House, for a majority of 303 to 131, and 10 seats in the Senate, with 59 to 37. Whatever Harding’s priorities, he was likely to be able to enact them.The top priority in Harding’s quest for normalcy was federal finances. The Wilson administration and the Great War had expanded the federal government into terra incognita. Between 1789 and 1913, when Wilson took office, the U.S. had accumulated a total of US$2.9 billion in public debt. When Harding was inaugurated in 1921, the debt stood at US$24 billion, more than a factor of eight greater. In 1913, total federal spending was US$715 million; by 1920 it had ballooned to US$6358 million, almost nine times more. The top marginal income tax rate, 7% before the war, was 70% when Harding took the oath of office, and the cost of living had approximately doubled since 1913.Harding had campaigned on introducing a formal budget process and made this his top priority after taking office. He called an extraordinary session of Congress and, making the most of the Republican majorities in the House and Senate, enacted a bill which created a Budget Bureau in the executive branch, empowered the president to approve a comprehensive budget for all federal expenditures, and even allowed the president to reduce agency spending of already appropriated funds. The budget would be a central focus for the next eight years.Harding also undertook to dispose of surplus federal assets accumulated during the war, including naval petroleum reserves. This, combined with Harding’s penchant for cronyism, led to a number of scandals which tainted the reputation of his administration. On August 2nd, 1923, while on a speaking tour of the country promoting U.S. membership in the World Court, he suffered a heart attack and died in San Francisco. Coolidge, who was visiting his family in Vermont, where there was no telephone service at night, was awakened to learn that he had succeeded to the presidency. He took the oath of office by kerosene light in his parents’ living room, administered by his father, a Vermont notary public. As he left Vermont for Washington, he said, “I believe I can swing it.”As Coolidge was in complete agreement with Harding’s policies, if not his style and choice of associates, he interpreted “normalcy” as continuing on the course set by his predecessor. He retained Harding’s entire cabinet (although he had his doubts about some of its more dodgy members), and began to work closely with his budget director, Herbert Lord, meeting with him weekly before the full cabinet meeting. Their goal was to continue to cut federal spending, generate surpluses to pay down the public debt, and eventually cut taxes to boost the economy and leave more money in the pockets of those who earned it. He had a powerful ally in these goals in Treasury secretary Andrew Mellon, who went further and advocated his theory of “scientific taxation”. He argued that the existing high tax rates not only hampered economic growth but actually reduced the amount of revenue collected by the government. Just as a railroad’s profits would suffer from a drop in traffic if it set its freight rates too high, a high tax rate would deter individuals and companies from making more taxable income. What was crucial was the “top marginal tax rate”: the tax paid on the next additional dollar earned. With the tax rate on high earners at the postwar level of 70%, individuals got to keep only thirty cents of each additional dollar they earned; many would not bother putting in the effort.Half a century later, Mellon would have been called a “supply sider”, and his ideas were just as valid as when they were applied in the Reagan administration in the 1980s. Coolidge wasn’t sure he agreed with all of Mellon’s theory, but he was 100% in favour of cutting the budget, paying down the debt, and reducing the tax burden on individuals and business, so he was willing to give it a try. It worked. The last budget submitted by the Coolidge administration (fiscal year 1929) was 3.127 billion, less than half of fiscal year 1920’s expenditures. The public debt had been paid down from US$24 billion go US$17.6 billion, and the top marginal tax rate had been more than halved from 70% to 31%.Achieving these goals required constant vigilance and an unceasing struggle with the congress, where politicians of both parties regarded any budget surplus or increase in revenue generated by lower tax rates and a booming economy as an invitation to spend, spend, spend. The Army and Navy argued for major expenditures to defend the nation from the emerging threat posed by aviation. Coolidge’s head of defense aviation observed that the Great Lakes had been undefended for a century, yet Canada had not so far invaded and occupied the Midwest and that, “to create a defense system based upon a hypothetical attack from Canada, Mexico, or another of our near neighbors would be wholly unreasonable.” When devastating floods struck the states along the Mississippi, Coolidge was steadfast in insisting that relief and recovery were the responsibility of the states. The New York Times approved, “Fortunately, there are still some things that can be done without the wisdom of Congress and the all-fathering Federal Government.”When Coolidge succeeded to the presidency, Republicans were unsure whether he would run in 1924, or would obtain the nomination if he sought it. By the time of the convention in June of that year, Coolidge’s popularity was such that he was nominated on the first ballot. The 1924 election was another blow-out, with Coolidge winning 35 states and 54% of the popular vote. His Democrat opponent, John W. Davis, carried just the 12 states of the “solid South” and won 28.8% of the popular vote, the lowest popular vote percentage of any Democrat candidate to this day. Robert La Follette of Wisconsin, who had challenged Coolidge for the Republican nomination and lost, ran as a Progressive, advocating higher taxes on the wealthy and nationalisation of the railroads, and won 16.6% of the popular vote and carried the state of Wisconsin and its 13 electoral votes.Tragedy struck the Coolidge family in the White House in 1924 when his second son, Calvin Jr., developed a blister while playing tennis on the White House courts. The blister became infected with Staphylococcus aureus, a bacterium which is readily treated today with penicillin and other antibiotics, but in 1924 had no treatment other than hoping the patient’s immune system would throw off the infection. The infection spread to the blood and sixteen year old Calvin Jr. died on July 7th, 1924. The president was devastated by the loss of his son and never forgave himself for bringing his son to Washington where the injury occurred.In his second term, Coolidge continued the policies of his first, opposing government spending programs, paying down the debt through budget surpluses, and cutting taxes. When the mayor of Johannesburg, South Africa, presented the president with two lion cubs, he named them “Tax Reduction” and “Budget Bureau” before donating them to the National Zoo. In 1927, on vacation in South Dakota, the president issued a characteristically brief statement, “I do not choose to run for President in nineteen twenty eight.” Washington pundits spilled barrels of ink parsing Coolidge’s twelve words, but they meant exactly what they said: he had had enough of Washington and the endless struggle against big spenders in Congress, and (although re-election was considered almost certain given his landslide the last time, popularity, and booming economy) considered ten years in office (which would have been longer than any previous president) too long for any individual to serve. Also, he was becoming increasingly concerned about speculation in the stock market, which had more than doubled during his administration and would continue to climb in its remaining months. He was opposed to government intervention in the markets and, in an era before the Securities and Exchange Commission, had few tools with which to do so. Edmund Starling, his Secret Service bodyguard and frequent companion on walks, said, “He saw economic disaster ahead”, and as the 1928 election approached and it appeared that Commerce Secretary Herbert Hoover would be the Republican nominee, Coolidge said, “Well, they’re going to elect that superman Hoover, and he’s going to have some trouble. He’s going to have to spend money. But he won’t spend enough. Then the Democrats will come in and they’ll spend money like water. But they don’t know anything about money.” Coolidge may have spoken few words, but when he did he was worth listening to.Indeed, Hoover was elected in 1928 in another Republican landslide (40 to 8 states, 444 to 87 electoral votes, and 58.2% of the popular vote), and things played out exactly as Coolidge had foreseen. The 1929 crash triggered a series of moves by Hoover which undid most of the patient economies of Harding and Coolidge, and by the time Hoover was defeated by Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1932, he had added 33% to the national debt and raised the top marginal personal income tax rate to 63% and corporate taxes by 15%. Coolidge, in retirement, said little about Hoover’s policies and did his duty to the party, campaigning for him in the foredoomed re-election campaign in 1932. After the election, he remarked to an editor of the New York Evening Mail, “I have been out of touch so long with political activities I feel that I no longer fit in with these times.” On January 5, 1933, Coolidge, while shaving, suffered a sudden heart attack and was found dead in his dressing room by his wife Grace.Calvin Coolidge was arguably the last U.S. president to act in office as envisioned by the Constitution. He advanced no ambitious legislative agenda, leaving lawmaking to Congress. He saw his job as similar to an executive in a business, seeking economies and efficiency, eliminating waste and duplication, and restraining the ambition of subordinates who sought to broaden the mission of their departments beyond what had been authorised by Congress and the Constitution. He set difficult but limited goals for his administration and achieved them all, and he was popular while in office and respected after leaving it. But how quickly it was all undone is a lesson in how fickle the electorate can be, and how tempting ill-conceived ideas are in a time of economic crisis.This is a superb history of Coolidge and his time, full of lessons for our age which has veered so far from the constitutional framework he so respected.

⭐CoolidgeAmity Shlaes ©2013A short book report by Ron HousleyNow comes “Coolidge,” a biography of the 30th President of the United States.Amity Shlaes gave us a substantive account of what really happened during the Great Depression in her previous book, “The Forgotten Man.” In “Coolidge,” we get a prequel, of sorts.All these many years, as a student in the government schools, I was taught that the Roaring Twenties, the decade when Coolidge was President, was nothing but capitalism run amok; an economic bubble created by the greedy rich, raping the economy.Nothing could be further from the truth.But nearly all of my classmates from the government schools still believe the myth. They still believe that the Great Depression was an outgrowth of capitalism rather than the creation of the Federal Reserve Bank combined with some ill-timed and draconian legislation (think: Smoot-Hawley tariff).COOLIDGE’s UNDERSTANDINGAs for Coolidge himself, his heart was in the right place, his thinking was mostly in the right place; but he lacked the perspective to frame a defense of free commerce in moral terms; i.e., in terms which would counter the Leftist (Progressive) moral argument of the day: that coercive redistribution of wealth was the right thing to do.He understood at a deep level “that commerce could bypass all obstacles” (p. 194), but he could not articulate why free commerce was morally right.For want of that moral defense, statism has prevailed: it has prevailed in the words of Progressive politicians and intellectuals; it has prevailed in the minds of unthinking voters (today referred to as “low information voters”); and it has prevailed as the primary cultural force in the decades since Coolidge.Coolidge’s belief in “commerce” blinded him to his philosophic adversaries at every step. It was true that commerce, spurred on by lower tax rates, would raise everybody’s standard of living. But what Coolidge never grasped was that his opponents embraced coercive egalitarian redistribution of wealth, regardless of how efficiently it was produced through commerce. It was a force that Coolidge never learned to oppose.The great surge of American statism continued its march, in spite of Coolidge’s attempt to throw up obstacles. Year after year, decade after decade, Republicans and Democrats would wage the same battle. And the statists would always gain and the advocates of liberty would always lose.Republicans were called “conservative,” but in practice they oversaw an unstoppable march away from liberty and toward a coercive utopian tyranny.COOLIDGE & TAXESFrom the vantage point of 2013, we can see the magnitude of what we have lost in the years since Coolidge .Coolidge (and Mellon) strongly felt that all Americans should have skin in the game, should have to pay “some,” even if nominal, tax (p338). But today, nearly half of all Americans pay no income tax at all; and most receive some handouts from the rest — completely contrary to the Coolidge culture.Secretary of the Treasury Mellon’s plan to increase government revenues by lowering tax rates was known as: “scientific taxation.” (p. 364) In spite of the plan’s spectacular success, the Progressives (then and now) hated it. In current day, Obama said it is “unfair,” because it allows too many producers to keep what they’ve earned, whereas the implied “fair” alternative is to take much of what was earned and distribute it to the non-producers, to spend as they like. This latter view is now held by the majority of voters.COOLIDGE & SPENDINGShlaes makes only scant mention about the big recession of the early 1920’s (p. 339). And I was surprised, since she had been articulate on this point in her other writing, that she didn’t more clearly point out the connection between the dramatic lowering of tax rates and the rapidity of the recovery.The Progressives’ relentless calls to spend were never answered with a principled stand citing the imperative to uphold individual rights(!). Instead, every time Coolidge struck down another proposed federal subsidy, he was always accused of wanting to hurt yet another deserving and needy group: the farmers; the children; the veterans; and on and on.”Meanwhile, the Progressives duly made the expected advances.” (p. 345) Always advances, always moving further and further to the left; never even one-millimeter of movement to the right, not ever one time.Republicans have not, in all these many years, learned to properly answer the Progressive’s demagoguery.COOLIDGE & THE FARM BILLAnd so we got “….yet another farm bill.” (p. 351) The Progressives kept pushing; each time they got their foot in the door, the country inched further to the left, as the money given away always increased and as the entitled recipient list always increased as well.Slowing the lurch by 1% would always be demagogued a “draconian cut” intended to hurt whichever recipient group was under consideration. The leftward march continued for the rest of the 20th century; the Republicans could find no principles upon which to base an objection.So, the Democrats could always buy more votes by giving goodies to more and more recipients.When Coolidge vetoed the farm bill (the agricultural subsidy), “the farm bloc blustered and roared.” They roared with demagoguery, just like they do in the present day.The Republicans were always disarmed intellectually, both then and now.The injustice of it all was that the farmers were being hurt by higher prices caused by government tariffs. But instead of eliminating tariffs, the Republicans could think of no counter argument against the proposed price supports (forced higher prices) and subsidies.Today we still hear a frenzy of screams that eliminating any subsidy would “hurt somebody” and “hurt children.” We always hear cries about “the children” whenever someone proposes to eliminate a subsidy. So, in 2013, the Republicans supported yet another farm bill(!).They learned nothing from Coolidge; they barely even remember his name, yet alone grasp his legacy.COOLIDGE’S LEGACYIt might be said that Shlaes “Coolidge” is the story of one man with his thumb in the dike, absent the philosophic background to garner a meaningful following even in his own generation. He tried; he vetoed spending; he knew that commerce was the answer. He knew that the “business of America is business.” But he didn’t know how to make his case stick; he didn’t make the moral case.In the end, Coolidge lost the battle for fiscal responsibility to the political fervor to spend federal dollars on stuff, any stuff for which an excuse could be found. (p. 390)Even though flood control was one obvious excuse to spend, the real reason, as always, was to buy votes in the next election. This story is told over and over, in many of American’s decades. It always makes me sad to realize how utterly unprincipled our national rulers have so often shown themselves.I had expected Shlaes to make it far clearer what a significant stabilizing force Coolidge had been, in contrast to Hoover’s spending, to Hoover’s support for new regulations on business, to Hoover’s return to a national deficit.The Great Depression was ushered in amidst the raising of the tax rates above 60%; amidst debilitating tariffs (Smoot-Hawley); amidst the Fed manipulating the money supply.Coolidge understood the misconception of the market value of “speculators,” without which there could be no market. When the Democrats railed against speculators, Coolidge was unable to articulate his case supporting the speculators.Shlaes does remind us that Hoover spent large, like a Democrat. She did not, however, draw the parallel with George W. Bush who spent large, like a Democrat. These two Presidents illustrate the point that in any contest, it is the more consistent who wins. In each case, the Democrat was the more consistent spender; in each case, the Democrat successor spent more than ever.And in each case, the spending was allegedly for the poor — i.e., it was to buy votes in the next election. Stimulus spending to buy votes would become the norm by the 21st century. The technique was launched all those many years ago.The Shlaes biography makes it all too clear how the American republic of Coolidge’s day has degenerated into the democracy of today. Her biography brings into focus an important dimension in the decline of the West.

⭐Excellent and sensitive biography of a little known or loved president, it would have been interesting to see how Coolidge would have dealt with the Crash had he chosen to run for a second full term.

⭐Calvin Coolidge, der 30. Präsident der Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika, war von 1923 bis 1929 im Amt. Gemäß seinem Spitznamen „Silent Cal“ (schweigender Cal) ist er bekannt (oder auch nicht so bekannt) als der Präsident, der überzeugt war, dass mehr geschaffen wird, wenn man vieles in der Politik unterlässt. Diese Philosophie lebte er und übte es in seinen politischen Ämtern aus. Für unsere Zeit unvorstellbar (und leider auch unvorstellbar, dass wir Bürger so jemanden wählen würden; erwarten doch viel zu viele, dass „die da oben etwas tun“).Coolidge übte viel Disziplin aus (was sich auch auf den Amerikanischen Kongress abfärbte), indem er weder in die Wirtschaft noch in das Leben der Bürger eingriff. Seine Laissez-faire-Haltung begünstigte Steuersenkungen, sinkende Arbeitslosigkeit, eine stark wachsende Wirtschaft, steigende Löhne, Verringerung der Staatsschulden (!!!) und einen niedrigeren Bundeshaushalt als zu Beginn seiner Amtszeit. Anders gesagt, er hinterließ einen Haushaltsüberschuss als er aus dem Amt des Präsidenten ausschied. Er widersprach so jedem Gesetzesentwurf, dass aus der Feder der Progressiven kam und bloß zu einem Erstarken und Anwachsen der Regierung geführt hätte. Er war ein Präsident, der eher unterließ als irgendeinen Aktionismus zu zeigen.Für jemandem wie mich, die das ständige Einmischen seitens der Politiker in unser aller Leben (und das schon laaange vor der C-Virus-Pandemie von 2020 an) und deren Unart, tief in unsere Taschen zu greifen (bei jedem anderen wird dieses Verhalten Diebstahl genannt), unverschämt und unerträglich empfindet, klingt ein Staatsoberhaupt wie Calvin Coolidge wie ein Traum. Natürlich wollte ich mehr über diesen Mann wissen.Während ich Amity Shlaes Arbeit Achtung zolle, muss ich leider sagen, dass es sehr mühselig war, diese Coolidge-Biografie zu lesen. War es zu trocken geschrieben und/oder langweilig? Ich kann es nicht sagen. Bei der Hälfte angekommen, begann ich nebenbei „The Devil in the White City“ von Erik Larson zu lesen und hatte es im Nu durch, so unterschiedlich waren die Schreibstile. Ich brauchte ewig, bis ich dieses Buch fertig las. Mit Wohlwollen gebe ich drei Sterne, weil es wichtig ist, über Coolidge zu wissen.Entdeckte gerade, dass letztes Jahr seine Autobiografie veröffentlicht wurde, hoffe, diese ist besser geschrieben. Ansonsten würde ich mich sehr freuen, wenn eine Biografie über Calvin Coolidge herausgebracht wird, die sich flüssiger lesen lässt. Verdient hat es dieser beachtliche Präsident. Coolidge sollte jeder kennen und lernen, dass es auch anders geht beim Regieren.Calvin Coolidge, der dreißigste Präsident der Vereinigten Staaten, ist heute fast in Vergessenheit geraten. Im Gegensatz zu Franklin D. Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy oder Ronald Reagan ist “Silent Cal“, wie er aufgrund seiner Schweigsamkeit genannt wurde, nie zu den wirklich großen Amtsinhabern gezählt worden.Um dies ein wenig zu ändern, hat die amerikanische Publizistin Amity Shlaes eine umfangreiche Biographie über den Mann aus Vermont vorgelegt, der sich wie kein zweiter Präsident im 20. Jahrhundert darum bemühte, den Staatshaushalt zu konsolidieren und die Regierungstätigkeit einzuhegen.Coolidge, Jahrgang 1872, stammte aus bescheidenen Verhältnissen. Die kleine Ortschaft, in der er aufwuchs, wurde nicht einmal an das regionale Eisenbahnnetz angeschlossen. Durch den frühen Tod seiner Mutter und seiner Schwester lernte er schon in jungen Jahren, mit harten Schicksalsschlägen umzugehen.Die Zeit, die er am Amherst College verbrachte, wurde für ihn gleichfalls zu einer prägenden Erfahrung. Danach absolvierte er eine juristische Ausbildung zum Anwalt und ließ sich in Northampton (Massachusetts) nieder, wo er auch seine zukünftige Ehefrau Grace kennen lernte. Viele fragten sich bereits damals, wie ein auf den ersten Blick so unscheinbarer Mensch wie Coolidge, eine derart attraktive Frau für sich gewinnen konnte. Die, die so fragten, unterschätzten “Silent Cal“ ganz erheblich; ein Umstand, der ihn in seinem Leben noch oft begegnen sollte.Seine politische Karriere startete er bei den Republikanern in der örtlichen Kommunalpolitik. Er begann als Stadtrat, wurde Abgeordneter im Repräsentantenhaus von Massachusetts und schließlich Gouverneur des Bundesstaates. In diesem Amt erlangte er auch nationale Berühmtheit, als er 1919 beim Polizistenstreik in Boston standhaft blieb und lieber die Nationalgarde mobilisierte, als den Forderungen der Polizisten nachzugeben.Coolidge verdankte seinen Erfolg einigen grundlegenden Prinzipien: Er verhielt sich loyal gegenüber seiner Partei und er hatte einflussreiche Förderer, von denen er sich aber nicht abhängig machte. Außerdem versprach er in seinen Wahlkämpfen nie das Blaue vom Himmel. Er verkörperte wie kein anderer Politiker in seiner Generation den Normalbürger, weshalb er der ideale Vertreter für die “schweigende Mehrheit“ wurde.Sein Grundsatz, dass es wichtiger sei, schlechte Gesetze zu verhindern als gute zu verabschieden, war für die progressive Ära mehr als außergewöhnlich. Dasselbe gilt für seine Angewohnheit, sich möglichst kurz zu fassen.Coolidges Nominierung zum Vizepräsidentschaftskandidaten kam deshalb nicht völlig überraschend. Zusammen mit Warren Harding, der im März 1921 die präsidialen Amtsgeschäfte übernahm, vertrat Coolidge als neuer Vizepräsident die Ansicht, dass es nach den kriegsbedingten Exzessen der staatlichen Machtausübung wieder ein “Zurück zur Normalität“ geben müsse. Ein schlankerer Staat, der weniger Aufgaben übernimmt und den Steuerzahler weniger kostet, schien das Gebot der Stunde zu sein.Eine tatsächliche Verschlankung des Staates war allerdings alles andere als einfach umzusetzen. Lobbygruppen, zu denen etwa die einflussreichen Veteranenverbände gehörten, machten ihre kostspieligen Ansprüche geltend. Die Legislative neigte ihrerseits zur Verabschiedung von teuren Gesetzespaketen, die natürlich zulasten des Steuerzahlers gingen. Hardings Regierung verstrickte sich zudem in eine ganze Reihe von Skandalen, die bei einer allgemeinen Günstlingswirtschaft begannen und bei handfesten Bestechungs- und Unterschlagungsvorwürfen endeten.Durch den plötzlichen Tod von Harding ergab sich für Coolidge 1923 die unerwartete Möglichkeit, die Konsolidierung der Staatsfinanzen als Präsident selbst zu gestalten. Gemeinsam mit seinem Finanzminister sorgte er für eine effektive Wirtschaftlichkeit und Sparsamkeit, die den Bundeshaushalt real entlastete. Der häufig zu hörende Vorwurf, Coolidge hätte mit dieser Politik maßgeblich zum Ausbruch der “Großen Depression“ von 1929 beigetragen, wird von der Autorin überzeugend zurückgewiesen.Außenpolitisch stellte die Unterzeichnung des Briond-Kellogg-Paktes am 27.08.1928 in Paris ein Meilenstein seiner Präsidentschaft dar. Als Jurist vertraute er auch im Bereich der internationalen Beziehungen auf die Kraft des Rechts. Der Krieg sollte endgültig als ein Mittel der Interessendurchsetzung zwischen den Staaten geächtet werden. Coolidge und sein Außenminister Frank Kellogg arbeiteten dementsprechend unermüdlich daran, dass der ambitionierte Vertrag im Senat eine Mehrheit zur Ratifizierung finden würde. Im Gegensatz zu Woodrow Wilson, der mit seinem Projekt des Völkerbundes genau daran scheiterte, gelang Coolidge das politische Kunststück. Der allgemeinen Ächtung des Krieges war bekanntlich weniger Glück beschieden.Coolidge, der 1924 noch einen überragenden Wahlsieg für die “Grand Old Party“ errungen hatte, entschied sich gegen eine zweite Amtszeit und überließ 1928 seinem wenig geschätzten Parteifreund Herbert Hoover das Feld für eine eigene Präsidentschaftskandidatur. Neben privaten Sorgen und Nöten, zu denen der tragische Verlust seines jüngsten Sohnes, Eheprobleme mit Grace und eine angeschlagene Gesundheit gehörten, spielte seine Grundüberzeugung, dass nämlich jedes öffentliche Amt nur temporär ausgeübt werden sollte, eine zentrale Rolle bei seiner einsamen Entscheidung.Die letzten Jahre seines Lebens verbrachte Coolidge, der Anfang Januar 1933 im Alter von sechzig Jahren an Herzversagen verstarb, unter anderem mit dem Schreiben von Zeitungskolumnen. Zu seiner Persönlichkeit passend, fand die Beisetzung in aller Stille und Bescheidenheit statt.Shlaes ist es mit ihrer Arbeit gut gelungen, das Leben und Wirken des dreißigsten US-Präsidenten wieder in Erinnerung zu rufen. Kritisch bleibt lediglich anzumerken, dass sie der Außen- und Sicherheitspolitik von Coolidge, der mit seinem völkerrechtlichen Idealismus und seiner chronischen Unterfinanzierung der Streitkräfte die Verteidigungsbereitschaft seines Landes schädigte, mit zu viel Verständnis begegnet. Reagan, der Coolidge ansonsten sehr schätzte, beging diesen strategischen Fehler in den achtziger Jahren nicht mehr.Davon abgesehen ist das Buch von Amity Shlaes auf jeden Fall empfehlenswert.Jürgen RuppAmity Schlaes has been criticized for having a skewed view of her subject, Calvin Coolidge, because of a strong right wing bias. This is an unfair characterization, though it is apparent from the detailed and intensely analytical work on the life of the 30th President of the United States that she has a very strong admiration (bordering on adulation) for her subject and that she identifies strongly with the same values espoused by “Silent Cal.” It is a mistake however to conclude that the author has skewed the facts or has been inaccurate in reporting the events of Coolidge’s presidency, though she is quick to come to his defense at times when history has been most critical of Coolidge.Calvin Coolidge is an odd duck and an enigma, and the author is very direct in pointing this out. From his time at Amherst College when he is described as an “Ouden” (a student unable to gain acceptance into a fraternity), this becomes apparent, though it does not prevent him from forging strong friendships with fellow students who will become leaders in their fields. In the meantime, the author gives a very good portrayal of Coolidge’s New England upbringing of “all work and no play” that makes Cal a dull boy. Yet in spite of characteristics that are not conducive to social climbing, Coolidge somehow thrives in all aspects of life. He builds a successful career as a lawyer, followed by success in a series of political offices forming part of what Coolidge himself calls a “meteoric rise”. He is also successful in wooing his wife, the ebullient Grace Goodhue, whose personality is in many ways a polar opposite to that of her husband.As Governor of Massachusetts, Coolidge’s star shines nationally with his handling of the Boston Police Strike of 1919, showcasing his firm conviction that “there is no right to strike against the public safety by anybody, any time, anywhere.” This in turn leads to his consideration for the GOP nomination for the presidency in 1920, his selection as Warren Harding’s running-mate and subsequent election to the Vice-Presidency, and his becoming President upon the death of Harding in 1923.As President, Coolidge maintains a steady resolve (some might call it a fixation) in favour of fiscal conservatism. Throughout his presidency, he is looking for ways to reduce government spending, lower taxes, increase the surplus and reduce the national debt which accumulated during world war one. This leads to a constant struggle with a congress that has other plans for how to spend the savings found by Coolidge and his budget director General Herbert Mayhew Lord. One of his most bitter opponents is his fellow Massachusetts Republican Henry Cabot Lodge. Sometimes Coolidge must use the veto, other times he is forced to hold his nose and approve legislation that runs contrary to his principles (such as an immigration law targeting Japanese immigrants.) Schlaes uses Coolidge’s success in budgeting as support for Ronald Reagan’s principle that decreasing taxes increases revenues. Whether or not this is so, the theory held true on Coolidge’s watch.There are a number of other issues that Coolidge is forced to confront in which his strong-willed principles make him appear to be uncaring. He is adamantly opposed to government spending for bonuses to veterans of the first world war or for farm subsidies. For Coolidge the higher priority is for the government to get its fiscal house in order. Even when the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 hits (the worst natural disaster to hit the Gulf Coast until Hurricane Katrina), Coolidge is firm in his position that this is a problem for the states, not the federal government.Schlaes does a wonderful job of giving us insight into the type of person that Coolidge was, in spite of her subject’s guarded nature. He was terse, truculent at times, jealous and controlling of his spouse. But he was also very principled and held himself to high standards. (For example, when he wrote a series of 10 articles for a magazine and only 6 were used, he took it upon himself to refund the money for the unused ones.) The author gives a good accounting of Coolidge’s grieving process following the unexpected death of his 16 year old son Calvin Jr.It is a mistake to conclude that the author is biased in her accounting of the life of Calvin Coolidge. Rather, it is her accurate description of Coolidge himself and in his dogged determination to maintain a steadfast loyalty to conservative principles that can lead to the false conclusion of an ideological bias on the part of the author. Schlaes portrays Coolidge, warts and all. From that accurate portrayal emerges a story of a man unwavering from his beliefs that place fiscal conservatism at the forefront.This is an excellent accounting of a forgotten president, his life and times. It is a wonderful study of a president firmly confronting competing social and economic values and issues. Whether or not one agrees with Coolidge’s approach to these issues, no criticism is deserved by the author, who does a superb job of informing the reader in an intelligent and insightful manner.

⭐Calvin Coolidge has been misjudged by historians. He’s typically been portrayed as a lucklustre President who was a mere pawn of big business and/or Wall St.His actual record was far more significant but he remained unappreciated by most pundits and historians. One of Coolidge’s few fans was Ronald Reagan; it was no accident that Ronald Reagan ordered a Cabinet Room portrait of Harry Truman to be replaced with a portrait of Coolidge.This biography should play a major role in setting the historical rtecord straight and elevating Calvin Coolidge to his rightful place among the top tier of American Presidents.This is a very well written and researched biography of an under appreciated President. It’s one of the best political biographies I’ve read in quite a while. Highly recommended.

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