A Citizen's Guide to Indiana

The Ku Klux Klan, in some ways, was like other 1920s advocacy groups like American Legion, the Anti-Saloon League, and the League of Women’s Voters. But, as historian James Madison, put it, it differed in “its essentially negative and wicked influence on Indiana politics, government and society.” Indiana cultivated one of the largest Klan memberships, in part by being flexible with its message and marketing by “selling them the thing they want.” The Klan in Indiana was, however, consistent in its messages of: a) American and Hoosier exceptionalism, a flag waving, Fourth of July kind of appeal; and b) Protestant Christianity. Patriotism and Protestantism was an easy sell in Indiana, particularly in the wake of the social upheaval of recent years.

But, this message was pretty easily used in an “us” versus “them” kind of way. And the Klan always likes to punch down against less privileged members of society, in 1920s Indiana, the group tended to promote a negative vision of Patriotism and Protestantism, “defending” them against Roman Catholics, the foreign born, Jews, blacks, and the old White Cap enemies: the immoral such as adulterers, gamblers, and drinkers. The Catholics, in particular, seemed to cause anxiety in the sorts of folks who joined the Klan in 1920s Indiana.

The Klan promoted its message in its newspaper, The Fiery Cross, but also used intimidation tactics such as cross burnings, marches, vandalism, and boycotts. Fortunately, there don’t seem to have been lynchings associated with the group during that period of time. Opponents were too few and generally ineffective.

The Klan opened an Indiana chapter in 1920 in Evansville. The Klan was able to recruit 5,400 men from Vanderburgh County. One of its most successful recruiters — and eventual Grand Dragon — was D.C. Stephenson. The entry fee was $10 and recruiters got to keep $4 of that. Stephenson made a fortune.  In Indiana, the membership grew to about 250,000 which represented about one-third of the white men in the state. In the 1922 election, Klan influence was beginning to be felt. One analyst concluded that its brand of anti-Catholic bigotry was felt most in the central and southern part of the state.

In 1923, a Fourth of July Celebration was held in Kokomo with 100,000 Klansmen and their families attending.  The rally is considered the largest in the nation’s history.  Doug Linder describes some of the event as follows:

That night, Stephenson, in his newly-won golden orange robe and hood, enjoyed the conclusion of the “Konklave in Kokoma.” A Klan parade, with robed high Klan officials on horseback and a dozen floats wound its way through town.  “Onward Christian Soldiers” blared from a forty-piece marching band.  When the parade was over, the crowd moved to Foster Park and sung hymns such as “The Old Rugged Cross” around a sixty-foot high fiery cross.  Fireworks streaked through the nighttime sky. Stephenson soaked it all in.  He was, he thought, soon destined to be the most powerful man in Indiana.

Now, it wouldn’t be long before Stephenson fell hard and took the Klan with him (more on that later). But, on that night, he and the Klan were on top. What brought them there was a change-weary, aggrieved native-born, white male, protestant population. It was a minority of that demographic, but a substantial one coupled with a majority that did not push back hard enough against them. The public statements were often framed in a way that allowed them to plausibly deny the hateful subtext (perhaps even to themselves). Linder, once again:

In fact, Stephenson’s speech that day was entitled “Back to the Constitution.”  He denounced political corruption, American imperialism abroad, and called for an end to deficit spending.  He ended his hour-long, enthusiastically received talk with the cry, “Where there is no vision, the people perish!”  All in all, there was scarcely a phrase in the speech that would embarrass a major party candidate today.  There were better places than a huge rally attended by media from several states to deliver the KKK’s anti-Catholic, anti-black, anti-Jewish message.

But, the Klan was not always well received in Indiana.

In South Bend on May 17, 1924, another tri-state Klan meeting and march precipitated a riot. There were many opponents of the KKK among South Bend’s large Hungarian and Polish immigrant population. Students from Catholic Notre Dame also showed up to protest the march and in the ensuing fracas most of the Klansmen were roughed up badly; only a downpour ended the affair. All the time, police looked the other way.

Governor McCray got on the Klan’s bad side. Several members of the administration were Klansmen as were a substantial number of members of the General Assembly. In 1921, the General Assembly passed a bill to approve a “Klan Day” at the state fair. McCray vetoed it. One of the Klan members of the administration was Secretary of State, Ed Jackson. In 1922, Jackson granted the Klan a state charter. McCray objected on the basis that an organization should not get a charter if its leaders were not willing to step forward publicly and receive it. D.C. Stephenson apparently directed Jackson to try to bribe McCray. McCray was wealthy and declined the bribe.

McCray’s wealth, however, was not liquid. Much of it was in land, and in the 1920s, land prices collapsed, putting McCray in a difficult situation. He  apparently arranged to have the State Board of Agriculture loan him $155,000. He paid the loan back with bank loans that were allegedly coerced. Bank presidents claimed that McCray had threatened to withdraw state deposits if he didn’t receive the loans. He was indicted November 1923 and tried in state court in April 1924. He was acquitted of the state charges but had been indicted by the federal government in February of 1924:

McCray’s trial lasted for seven days. The prosecution showed that the governor passed some some $1 million in worthless notes on the banks in Indiana and other nearby states in an attempt to regain his standing. McCray denied any intent to defraud the government, but also testified that he used his political standing to get money from the state board of agriculture and designate banks as state depositories to get loans. It took the jury only 13 minutes to return a guilty verdict on 13 counts of mail fraud. McCray resigned from office on April 29, and Lieutenant Governor Emmett F. Branch took over.

Twenty minutes after resigning, McCray was sentenced to ten years in prison. He served three years of his sentence and was released in 1927.

Emmett F. Branch (1924-1925) I’m afraid that Gov. Branch is going to get only very brief treatment here. He was lieutenant governor and served out the remainder of McCray’s term.  Branch had been a state legislator from 1902 to 1910 and served as Speaker of the House in 1907 and 1908. Of note was that he ended the practice of passing omnibus bills that joined numerous disparate bills and allowed them to be passed without debate. From 1910 until 1920, he returned to his private law practice before running for lieutenant governor in 1920.  Branch continued McCray’s work expanding the state highway system, completing the new state prison, and expanding the school for the blind. He oversaw the completion of the Riley Hospital for Children.

Warren McCray (1921-1924)  Warren McCray was born in Brook, Indiana and grew up in and around Kentland. His father and uncle had a successful livery business and became involved in banking. McCray himself grew wealthy through a variety of enterprises, including banking, the grocery business, land speculation, and mine and railroad investments. He was also a very successful cattle breeder. In 1919, he reportedly set the world record for the price of a bull sale.

Eventually, McCray came to serve on the State Board of Agriculture. That role was expanded during World War I. “Goodrich appointed him Chairman of the Food Conservation Committee of Indiana and a member of the United States Live Stock Advisory Committee to help ensure adequate army supplies and rationing during the war.”

The Republicans in the 1920 election were rejuvenated with the Progressives having returned to the fold in common opposition to the Democrats. The Republicans won 54.6% of the vote as compared to 41.2% for the Democrats. This was a bit closer than the shellacking Harding gave Cox and Roosevelt in the national election. Approximately 1.2 million Hoosiers voted, marking a high water mark for Hoosier turnout. (Keep in mind that women had just been given the right to vote).  This was out of about 2.9 million Hoosiers in the 1920 census of whom 97% were white.

Hoosiers, like other Americans, seemed tired of war, progressivism, and social upheaval. Harding’s appeal to “normalcy” had its appeal. Nobody was taking up the Progressive banner carried by governors Hanly, Marshall, Ralston, and Goodrich. At the same time, the strident conservatism of Democrats — appeals for Jeffersonian home rule and warnings against the encroachment of federal and state government — did not have overwhelming appeal. Moderate advances in public health, education, and highway construction along with promises of businesslike efficiency were enough. McCray had a mixed relationship with labor. He declined to extradite labor organizer, David Robb to West Virginia where he didn’t believe Robb would get a fair trial. But, he condemned Eugene V. Debs as a traitor and characterized United Mine Workers John Lewis as “disloyal.” “In July of 1922, he publicly supported the idea of a government takeover of Indiana mines to break a strike and produce enough coal to meet the state’s needs. After he followed through on the threat to declare martial law to guard the mines, 4,000 striking miners called a public meeting to demand his impeachment.”

In 1923, historian James Madison reports, McCray told the 1923 General Assembly, “what the people of Indiana want is a season of government economy and a period of legislative inaction and rest.” And that’s what the legislature provided. Madison characterizes the postwar decade as featuring “a stand-pat perspective and a mediocre leadership.”

Under the relatively calm surface of the 1920s politics, changes were taking place to the underlying political structure through advocacy of interest groups like the American Legion, the League of Women Voters, the American Federation of Labor, the Indiana Farm Bureau, and the Anti-Saloon League. The groups did not necessarily cut cleanly across political lines and that made things messy. One such group that would storm onto the scene in Indiana in 1920 was the Ku Klux Klan. They’d have a governor in their pocket by 1925. More on them next time. 

Continuing on with Governor Goodrich’s term, Indiana along with the rest of the nation entered World War I when Congress declared war on April 6, 1917.

Historian James Madison indicates that the momentum of the progressive cause (with which Goodrich was aligned) was blunted by American entry into World War I. Political interest was turned to campaigns for war support and “let loose a patriotic but intolerant spirit that demanded conformity and unanimity.” With respect to war support, I’ll mention that my great-grand uncle, Woodburn Masson was apparently in charge of organizing factory and big store involvement in Indianapolis “Thrift Clubs” in support of the war effort. (I was tickled to see that Woodburn had an entry in a book with some purple prose about the citizens of Indianapolis written by Jacob Piatt Dunn who received notable mention in an earlier entry as advisor to Governor Marshall with respect to passing a new Constitution.)

Before the U.S. entered the war, Hoosier opinion was divided. Neutrality was popular. Professional and business people generally supported England in the war. Farmers, Catholics, and German-Americans were more likely to favor neutrality. Opinion shifted when Germany began unrestricted submarine warfare and tried to enlist Mexico’s aid against the U.S. Indiana contributed about 130,000 troops to the cause.

Eugene Debs, the labor leader hailing from Terre Haute, was arrested on June 16, 1918 after he made a speech in Canton, Ohio, urging resistance to the draft. Charged with 10 counts of sedition, Debs was sentenced to 10 years. At his sentencing hearing, he made his famous statement:

Your Honor, years ago I recognized my kinship with all living beings, and I made up my mind that I was not one bit better than the meanest on earth. I said then, and I say now, that while there is a lower class, I am in it, and while there is a criminal element, I am of it, and while there is a soul in prison, I am not free.

President Wilson was happy to let him sit in jail, writing, “While the flower of American youth was pouring out its blood to vindicate the cause of civilization, this man, Debs, stood behind the lines sniping, attacking, and denouncing them….This man was a traitor to his country and he will never be pardoned during my administration”

That said, after the war, Debs’ imprisonment was politically troublesome. He was the Socialist candidate for President in the 1920 campaign (receiving 900,000 votes). His speech became somewhat more radical. He linked his cause to other political prisoners. He did not ask for leniency or pardon. However, “Debs remained the stubborn, frustratingly likable radical, winning the grudging admiration of his warders and other prisoners, and slowly rebuilding substantial—but not nearly universal—public sympathy.” Debs had medical problems and the Harding administration had no desire to let him die in prison. On December 23, 1921, President Harding converted his sentence to time served, and he was released on Christmas Day. Debs never regained his health after prison, however. He died on October 20, 1926, at the age of 70.

Influenza

Brutal as World War I was, the bigger killer during this period was influenza. Indiana was not spared from the pandemic. About 350,000 people caught the disease and about 10,000 Hoosiers died from it. The first instance was reported on September 20, 1918 with an epidemic developing in Evansville. On September 27, the Public Health Service suggested to local officials that, among other things, persons with colds be excluded from public gatherings. That was not a hardship for long because on October 6, the Indiana Board of Health (led by health pioneer (and eugenicist) Dr. John Hurty) banned all public gatherings. Doctors were hard pressed to keep up. Schools were closed in Marion County. The disease ebbed and flowed through the winter and spring but began to ebb in the summer of 1919.

Prohibition

World War I gave a boost to the long active Prohibition movement. Among other things, grain used for brewing was needed for the troops, and a lot of the brewers were German. There was a lot of anti-German sentiment in the nation, generally, and in Indiana. (For example,Germany, Indiana in Fulton County was renamed “Pershing.”) Former governor Frank Hanly was active on the lecture circuit, advocating prohibition. In 1918, he railed against the brewers, saying Hoosier Brewers had “the arrogance of the Hun.”

In 1918, the State passed state-wide prohibition. And, in 1919, it ratified the Eighteenth Amendment.  Said Billy Sunday, famous evangelist and former baseball player at that time based in Winona Lake, Indiana:

The reign of tears is over. The slums will soon only be a memory. We will turn our prisons into factories and  our jails into storehouses and corn-cribs. Men will walk upright now; women will smile, and the children will laugh. Hell will be forever for rent.

The jails did not close down, but many of the brewers did, among them Thieme and Wagner in Lafayette, Terre Haute Brewing Company, Madison Brewing Company, Peru Brewery and Tell City Brewing. There was a lot of corruption in Indiana, as elsewhere. As Prohibition wore on, the prohibitionists would make common cause with the Ku Klux Klan who shared their conservative politics and would use the machinery of the old White Cap organization, the Horse Thief Detective Association to enforce the prohibition laws.

At the end of his term, Goodrich was apparently anxious to be finished with the job. In addition to having had a more contentious that expected relationship with his fellow party members, “in August, 1917, he was seriously ill with typhoid fever. Then, soon after his recovery, his car was struck by a truck, and Goodrich spent several more months in the hospital with fractures of the hip, skull, ribs, collarbone, and left hand.”

Harding appointed Goodrich to the Russian Relief Commission, and it appears that his work there was personally very significant to him. He was ahead of the curve in terms of realizing that Soviet Russia was a reality and the U.S. ought to recognize the government. Additionally, he was a stronger advocate of trade with the Russians than Herbert Hoover, under whom he was working in that capacity. Goodrich remained very good at amassing wealth and continued to do so in later life, making generous contributions to Wabash College. He passed away in 1940 at the age of 76.

Governor James P. Goodrich was born in Winchester, Indiana to a Randolph County lawyer. He taught for a couple of years in the Randolph County schools to save money to go to DePauw. Demonstrating the networking advantages of such places, he became friends with future U.S. Senator Albert Beveridge who was an influence in Goodrich’s eventual involvement in politics. He studied law in the office of his fellow Winchester native and DePauw classmate James Watson (who also became a U.S. Senator).

Becoming active in Republican politics, Goodrich became state party chair (1901-1910) and a national committeeman (1912-1916)  at a difficult time for the Republicans. Senator Beveridge was trying to move the party toward the Progressives while Senator Charles W. Fairbanks was trying to steer it toward the conservatives. When Beveridge bolted the party with Teddy Roosevelt, the party spent some time in the political wilderness. Fortunately, Goodrich could comfort himself with piles of money. In addition to his law practice, Goodrich had made investments in farms, coal mines, grain elevators, and banks which apparently paid off nicely.

He announced his intent to seek the Republican nomination for governor in the 1916 campaign. He became the nominee by winning the state’s first primary. (Previously the decision had been made at state conventions.) His Democratic opponent was John Adair. The Prohibitionists ran a candidate, and the Progressives ran former governor, Frank Hanly. (Hanly had declined an opportunity to run for the Prohibitionsts to accept the Progressive nomination. His Progressive run for governor was probably not as vigorous as it could have been because he was also the Progressive Party’s presidential nominee.)  Due to his long experience in running the state party machinery, Goodrich had an advantage over Adair in terms of running a statewide campaign. This likely proved decisive, given how close the election was. Adair had been a Congressman in the eastern part of the state for ten years. Goodrich beat Adair by about 12,000 votes of about 687,000 cast. On the national ballot, two Hoosiers were nominated as vice-presidential candidates: Thomas Marshall for the Democrats and Charles W. Fairbanks for the Republicans.

The state issues were women’s suffrage, prohibition, tax reform, and  whether to call a state constitutional convention (the amendment process was deemed too difficult because the Indiana Supreme Court had decided that it was not sufficient for an amendment to receive more yes votes than no votes; rather it required that a majority of total votes cast in the election be in favor of the amendment — this holding was overruled by a subsequent Supreme Court in the 1935 case of In re Todd).

With respect to tax reform, Goodrich felt that the burden of property taxes — which was the primary source of government funding — unfairly targeted farmers and rural areas.

[Goodrich] called attention to the fact, that, under the law as it then existed, there was discrimination against the farmer in that in listing his property for taxation he was required to make a complete inventory of his livestock, grain, hay, and other farm property, a method of listing not required of any other class of taxpayers.

He felt that the wealthy citizens of urban areas were not paying their fair share. When the 1851 Constitution was adopted, most Hoosiers were farmers or small town merchants and, so, a general property tax worked well. However, the industrialization that took place after the Civil War changed the equation and, in 1917, there was a great deal of intangible wealth that was escaping taxation. This occurred as the Progressive movement was making more demands on government which, in turn, required more funding.

Thomas Marshall’s attempt to create a new Constitution was struck down by the Indiana Supreme Court, but the decision gave Goodrich reason to believe that the legislature could call a Constitutional convention. Governor Goodrich advocated legislation for an excise tax and a constitutional convention to amend the system of taxation to more equitably distribute the tax burden onto large commercial interests.  The legislature did not pass the excise tax but did pass the legislation for a convention. However, the opponents of the excise tax challenged the convention legislation in court. Marion Circuit Court upheld it at the trial level, but the Supreme Court reversed, holding that the legislature did not have the power to call a convention.

Next time: World War I

Last time, we discussed Governor Samuel Ralston and his efforts with Indiana’s Centennial. One lasting effort had to do with the state parks.

The state park initiative seems to have had its roots in a letter from Juliet Strauss to Gov. Ralston asking for his assistance in preserving Turkey Run in Parke County. Within a week after the letter, Ralston had created a Turkey Run Commission. Richard Lieber, a conservationist who was involved in early efforts to preserve land in Brown County, was made aware of the Turkey Run Commission. He proposed to Gov. Ralston that the State create a system of state parks as a permanent memorial of the centennial celebration. Lieber was appointed to the Indiana Historical Commission which promptly formed a state park memorial committee of which Lieber would be head. The Turkey Run Commission was rolled into that committee.

To win support for a system of state parks Lieber and his colleagues initiated an impressive campaign of education and persuasion. They first pointed out to Indiana citizens that the proposed park plan was the only centennial plan that would memorialize the state as a whole in 1916. But more important, they argued that a park system would be a worthwhile and dignified memorial. The state’s parks would “refresh and strengthen and renew tired people, and fit them for the common round of daily life.” No one, they asserted, could doubt the dignity of such a plan. A comprehensive system of state parks, committee members urged, “would not only memorialize the past but would build for the future. …” Indiana’s parks would “stand forever as a token of the past,” and they would also “bring health, wealth and happiness to our own generation and the many that will come after us.”

The committee took up a subscription to raise funds to buy the Turkey Run site which was going up for auction. In a bidding war, the committee’s representative bid more than the committee had to spend but, even so, was outbid by the Hoosier Veneer Company, a timber firm which bid $30,200 for the site. All was not lost. With financial contributions from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Association, the committee was able to buy the property from the Hoosier Veneer Company for $40,200.

While these negotiations were ongoing, the McCormick’s Creek site was going up for auction. The committee arranged for a bid on the site, provided that the citizens of Owen County raise a quarter of the purchase price. The State acquired the site for a bid of $5,250, giving McCormick’s Creek pride of place as the first of Indiana’s state parks.

Good Roads

The “Good Roads” movement also got a boost in Indiana thanks to the centennial celebration. At the time, Indiana lacked organization in its system of roads, did not have a Highway Department and, consequently, missed out on federal funding for roads. “Each county and each township [was] a rule unto itself.” Indiana lagged behind other states in this, but the farm population was resistant. They valued local control of the roads, felt that a state road system would benefit urban populations over rural, and did not like the idea of new taxes. Part of the problems is that such taxes would have to be paid in cash. Apparently it was not uncommon at this time for farmers to be able to contribute to the local roads in labor, rather than money — and to contribute that labor at a time that would not be detrimental to caring for the crops.

Gov. Ralston was a highway enthusiast, but he had been unable to mobilize the farm vote in the General Assembly to get behind a road bill that would have created a state highway department. Ralston declared October 12, 1916, to be “Centennial Highway Day” and laid groundwork in an effort to get Indiana eligible for part of the $75 million Congress had made available to construct rural post roads. He was able to get President Wilson to come to the state to talk about good roads. President Wilson, at the state fairgrounds, told Hoosiers, “Good roads are necessary … to draw neighbors together, to create a community of feeling, for the blood of the nation will not flow in harmonious concord unless it can flow in intimate sympathy.” This paved the way (so to speak) for a state highway department to be created in 1917.

Despite the resistance with respect to the local roads, Indiana had had some success with respect to long distance highways. At the urging of Carl Fisher (who had also been a motivating force behind the east-west Lincoln Highway), Ralston was instrumental in obtaining the cooperation of state governors to build the north-south Dixie Highway. In 1914, the governors of Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Georgia met in Chattanooga, Tennessee to discuss the project. In advocating for the road, Ralston declared that “only a completed road uniting North and South would ‘prove a blessing to unborn generations and stand as an epoch in American history.’” The highway (more a series of roads than necessarily a unified highway) was built starting in 1915. Among other things, part of the route became State Road 37 south out of Indianapolis. You can see the route reflected in major parts of I-65, I-75, and U.S. 31. In September 1916, Ralston and Fisher led a celebration in Martinsville when the route opened from Indianapolis to Miami, Florida.

At the conclusion of the Centennial Year, Ralston declared “never before . . . was Indiana prouder of … its place … in the galaxy of American states.” I am, unfortunately, not getting that sense out of Indiana in its bicentennial year.

Samuel Ralston was born in Ohio but raised in Owen County where he helped with the family farm. After the farm fell into financial difficulty, he spent time working as a butcher and a coal mine. Though he spent time teaching while in college, Ralston studied law after graduating and began his practice in Lebanon, Indiana. He ran for office several times but, as a Democrat in a Republican area, he was unsuccessful. However, he did make the acquaintance of Indiana’s Democratic party boss, Thomas Taggart during the course of those unsuccessful runs.

In 1908, Taggart supported Ralston as the party’s nominee for governor due to Ralston’s anti-prohibitionist stance. But, the party instead nominated Thomas Marshall to the position. However, it was in 1908 that Ralston obtained his first electoral victory — election to the Lebanon School Board. In 1912, he was nominated as the Democrats’ candidate for governor. During that election, Marshall’s proposed new constitution was a hot issue and the Republicans nominated former governor, Winfield Durbin to run on their behalf. However, the Republican Party was fractured at the time, with many members joining the Progressives. As part of that split, Teddy Roosevelt supporter and former Republican, Albert Beveridge ran as the Progressive Party’s candidate for governor. Beveridge had been a Senator but lost his seat when the Democrats took power in the Indiana General Assembly in 1910. With the Republican vote split, Ralston won the governor’s race by a healthy margin (48.1% versus 28.6% for Beveridge and 26.7% for Durbin. The Prohibition Party candidate took 3.1%.)

By winning this particular election, Ralston became Indiana’s “Centennial Governor” since he presided over Indiana’s centennial on December 11, 1916. It seems fair to say that Indiana made a bigger deal over its centennial than it is currently making over its bicentennial. The state’s progress during the first 100 years was remarkable, and it had a prominent standing in the country among states, particularly as compared to today when the state seems to be content to simply not be last in measures of prosperity and well-being.

In 1915, as the centennial was approaching, Ralston asked the General Assembly to create a Centennial Commission and appropriate $25,000 (about $600,000 in today’s money) for public celebration. He desired to  “jealously guard [Indiana’s] fair name and zealously labor to preserve her untarnished glory.” The Indiana Historical Commission was created. The Commission was charged with preparing and executing plans for the celebration and with collecting, editing, and publishing materials related to the history of Indiana. The Commission had a fairly extensive media campaign. For example, one of the commissioners, Charity Dye, wrote a weekly article for the Indianapolis Star called, “The Centennial Story Hour.” (The chairman of the Commission’s committee on publicity was Lew O’Bannon, grandfather to future Governor Frank O’Bannon.)

The Commission worked hard to keep centennial celebrations from being tawdry or mere excuses for profiteering. For example, it was compelled to issue several statements denouncing an outfit out of Washington D.C. calling itself the “National Patriotic League.” It’s chief goal seemed to be allowing its promoters to make money off of the civic feeling of Indiana’s citizens. Indiana secured the old capitol at Corydon as a permanent state memorial, and the Indiana Historical Commission inaugurated Indiana’s system of state parks.

Next time: state parks and good roads.

 

Warren G. Harding (1921 – 1923)  Harding was a Senator from Ohio, hailing from the town of Marion. He was not considered a leading candidate when he decided to seek the Republican nomination for the 1920 election. The Progressives having returned to the Republican Party, Theodore Roosevelt was widely expected to make another run. But, he died unexpectedly on January 6, 1919. Harding was not a leading recipient of delegates in the primary, but the leaders such as General Leonard Wood and Illinois Governor Frank Lowden could not get a majority. The bitterness that had arisen during the campaign (and before) ensured that they would not compromise with each other. Harding ended up being an acceptable compromise and received the nomination. His promise to return America to a period of “normalcy” resonated with the country, tired after war and upheaval.

Wilson wanted to be nominated to a third term by the Democrats, but the delegates knew that his health would not permit it. Vice President (and former Indiana governor) Thomas Marshall had been thought to be a contender, but his dithering and handling of Wilson’s incapacity was apparently a deal breaker. Ultimately Ohio governor James Cox was nominated along with a 38 year old assistant secretary of the navy by the name of Franklin Roosevelt.

Harding was not a dream candidate. His speeches were described as “an army of pompous phrases moving over the landscape in search of an idea.” H.L. Mencken said of a speech, “it reminds me of a string of wet sponges, it reminds me of tattered washing on the line; it reminds me of stale bean soup, of college yells, of dogs barking idiotically through endless nights. It is so bad that a kind of grandeur creeps into it. It drags itself out of the dark abysm … of pish, and crawls insanely up the topmost pinnacle of tosh. It is rumble and bumble. It is balder and dash.” Nevertheless, the electorate was tired of war, unrest, Progressivism, and Wilson. KDKA out of Pittsburgh was the first radio station to broadcast the results of a Presidential election as they came in. The power of the station was such that the station could be heard over much of the eastern United States. The result was a landslide for Harding who captured 60.3% of the popular vote and 400 electoral votes.

Harding had waffled on the League of Nations during the campaign but hardened his stance against it when he took office. His Secretary of State, Charles Evans Hughes, negotiated a peace treaty with Germany since, in the absence of ratification of the Treaty of Versailles, the U.S. was still technically at war. The U.S. also needed to get back on a postwar economic footing. Income taxes were reduced, agricultural tariffs were raised, and measures were passed to support highways, aviation, and radio.  Adoption of the automobile led to economic activity in the form of roads, rubber, steel, and construction of hotels. Harding pushed for regulation of radio licenses. Congress was slow to act, not passing legislation until 1927, but the Commerce department facilitated agreements among major broadcasters for the licensing of radio frequencies.

Harding was generally pro-business and viewed labor as a conspiracy against business. That said, he was somewhat helpful to labor — helping to negotiate an end to a mining strike in 1922 and helping with a process that led to the end of 12 hour work days (7 days a week) in the steel industry. (U.S. Steel Chairman, Elbert Gary, opposed this initiative.) He was able to appoint four pro-business conservatives to the United States Supreme Court.

The 1922 mid-term elections did not go well for Harding. The economy was still having difficulty and labor was angry over the outcome of recent strikes. Unemployment was at 11%. The Republicans retained majorities in Congress, but lost 80 seats in the House and fell to 51 seats in the Senate.

Harding took an extensive tour of the west in the summer of 1923, becoming the first President to visit Alaska. However, he took ill, experiencing heart problems and pneumonia. He died on August 2, 1923, at the age of 57. This came as a blow to the nation. He was extremely popular at the time. However, economic scandals and infidelity would come to light that retroactively tarnished his reputation — in particular, the Teapot Dome scandal. Harding’s secretary of the interior had apparently received a bribe from Sinclair Oil to lease federal oil reserves to the company at below market rates.

Calvin Coolidge (1923 – 1929) Calvin Coolidge, known as “Silent Cal” has some of the best one-liners in Presidential history. Two of my favorites:

[A] young woman sitting next to Coolidge at a dinner party confided to him she had bet she could get at least three words of conversation from him. Without looking at her he quietly retorted, “You lose.”

And:

The President and Mrs. Coolidge were being shown [separately] around an experimental government farm. When [Mrs. Coolidge] came to the chicken yard she noticed that a rooster was mating very frequently. She asked the attendant how often that happened and was told, “Dozens of times each day.” Mrs. Coolidge said, “Tell that to the President when he comes by.”

Upon being told, the President asked, “Same hen every time?”

The reply was, “Oh, no, Mr. President, a different hen every time.”

President: “Tell that to Mrs. Coolidge.”

He was born to an old New England family and eventually opened a practice as a country lawyer. He got into politics, working his way up from city and county offices to the state legislature to lieutenant governor to governor to Harding’s vice-president and, ultimately, President.

Harding died in San Francisco on August 2, 1923. Coolidge was visiting his parents’ house which didn’t have electricity or a telephone. A messenger was sent to the home to give Coolidge the news. His father was a notary public and administered the oath of office at 2:47 a.m. on August 3 by the light of a kerosene lamp.

Coolidge felt it was his duty to continue Harding’s policies and, to the extent possible, maintain his cabinet until the next election. He took a methodical approach to the scandals of the Harding administration, mainly letting the Senate investigations take their course. He did have to intervene and force the resignation of the Attorney General who was resisting the congressional probe. He approved the reduction of the income tax from a top rate of 58% to 46% and an increase in the estate and gift taxes.

In 1924, Coolidge was easily nominated as the Republican’s candidate for President, winning on the first ballot. The Democrats did not have such an easy time. It took a record setting 103 ballots over 15 days at their convention in New York. There was a war of attrition between the leading candidates, California Senator (and Woodrow Wilson son-in-law) William McAdoo and Al Smith, Governor of New York. The Klan was a significant factor in the nomination. The Democrats had a coalition that involved rural southern states and the industrial cities of the north. The city votes were behind Smith but he was Catholic, so the Klan votes were against him. When an anti-Klan plank for the party platform was rejected, Klansmen celebrated across the river  in New Jersey with masks and burning crosses and whatnot. It left an indelible mark on the convention which became known as the “Klanbake.” As vote after vote failed to advance the prospects of either man, compromises were sought. For a time, Indiana’s own former governor Sam Ralston was advanced as a possibility. He was supported by old Democratic warhorse, William Jennings Bryan and, of course, the indefatigable Indiana Democratic political boss, Tom Taggart. Taggart would later assert that enough votes had been arranged for Ralston but that Ralston — who would die the next year — had concerns about his health and that of his wife and son. Ralston withdrew before the vote in question and, ultimately, the Democrats nominated John Davis, a former ambassador and Solicitor General for the U.S. The convention nominated Nebraska governor Charles Bryan — brother of William Jennings Bryan — as Davis’ vice-presidential nominee.

The Democrats got creamed in the election, winning just 28.8% of the vote. Their electoral votes came entirely from the old Confederacy. Coolidge’s gratification at the victory was muted, however. In July of that year, his son died. Showing how much more precarious life was then — his son’s death was caused by an infected blister that Cal. Jr. developed after playing tennis with his brother John while wearing tennis shoes without socks. Coolidge said, “when he died, the power and glory of the Presidency went with him.”

During Coolidge’s second term, the rapid economic growth that came to be known as the Roaring Twenties kicked into high gear. Between Coolidge and his Secretary of Commerce, Herbert Hoover, the state of regulation was “thin to the point of invisibility.” Coolidge is famous for asserting that, “the chief business of the American people is business.”  Hoover was an enthusiastic promoter of the growth of airlines and radio.  Coolidge reduced federal income taxes, held federal spending flat, and paid down the federal debt. “By 1927, only the wealthiest 2% of taxpayers paid any federal income tax. Federal spending remained flat during Coolidge’s administration, allowing one-fourth of the federal debt to be retired in total. State and local governments saw considerable growth, however, surpassing the federal budget in 1927.”  Coolidge opposed subsidies of farmers, believing that farms should succeed or fail like other businesses. He did support efforts to modernize farming practices. At one point, he (the son of a farmer) said, “farmers never have made much money. I do not believe we can do much about it.” He also opposed federal flood control measures Congress passed in the wake of the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927, believing property owners should bear most of the cost.

In the summer of 1927, Coolidge vacationed in the Black Hills of South Dakota. Custer State Park was made his “summer White House.” It was there, he issued the terse statement, “I do not choose to run for President in 1928.” By way of explanation, he later explained:

“The Presidential office takes a heavy toll of those who occupy it and those who are dear to them. While we should not refuse to spend and be spent in the service of our country, it is hazardous to attempt what we feel is beyond our strength to accomplish.”

That would open the door for Herbert Hoover about whom we’ll talk more in Installment 9. Next time, we’ll move on to the governors: Samuel Ralston in particular.

In 1916, Wilson campaigned on the fact that he’d kept America out of war and on a progressive platform that :

highlighted federal legislation to promote workers’ health and safety, prohibit child labour, provide unemployment compensation and establish minimum wages and maximum hours. Wilson, in turn, included in his draft platform a plank that called for all work performed by and for the federal government to provide a minimum wage, an eight-hour day and six-day workweek, health and safety measures, the prohibition of child labour, and (his own additions) safeguards for female workers and a retirement program.

The Republican nominee was Charles Evans Hughes of New York who was also a progressive. The campaign was close, but Hughes was hampered by having to keep the Republican party with its fractured progressive and conservative wings intact. Wilson apparently spent more time attacking Roosevelt during the campaign than he did Hughes, the actual opponent.

The war in Europe was probably a turning point in the American economy. European wealth was being destroyed at a furious pace and were engaged in a total war that demanded resources that the Americans were able to supply.  Ultimately, the U-Boat affronts became more than the U.S. could ignore. Germany was probably aware of this, but it had to gamble on the U-boats because it didn’t have a lot of options given its position in the war. The Zimmerman Telegram certainly didn’t help matters either. Germany was going to resume unrestricted submarine warfare which, it knew, would provoke the Americans. If the U.S. joined the war against Mexico, the telegram suggested that Mexico should ally with Germany and “reconquer the lost territory in Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona.” A declaration of war was passed by Congress and signed by President Wilson on April 6, 1917. The Russian Revolution in March of 1917 removed a barrier to U.S. entry inasmuch as the U.S. would not be obliged to fight alongside an autocratic regime. Russia’s exit from the war, however, made the U.S. contribution all the more important since the Germans were able to focus more intently on the Western Front.

Near the beginning of the U.S. involvement in the war, on July 4, 1917, Col. Charles Stanton went to the tomb of the Marquis de Lafayette in Paris and said:

America has joined forces with the Allied Powers, and what we have of blood and treasure are yours. Therefore it is that with loving pride we drape the colors in tribute of respect to this citizen of your great republic. And here and now, in the presence of the illustrious dead, we pledge our hearts and our honor in carrying this war to a successful issue. Lafayette, we are here!

Consistent with the Progressive ethos of the day, the U.S. attempted to enlist a technocratic approach to mobilizing the home-front for the war. A notable example of this was future President Herbert Hoover who headed up the U.S. Food Administration during the war. Hoover sought and obtained a great deal of centralized power for the Food Administration, declaring “food will win the war.” “Hoover established set days for people to avoid eating specified foods and save them for soldiers’ rations: meatless Mondays, wheatless Wednesdays, and “when in doubt, eat potatoes”.” The agency also used price controls and licensing schemes to maximize production.

The U.S. raised an army through conscription and Wilson gave General Pershing broad authority with respect to strategy and tactics. By August 1918, the U.S. had a million soldiers in Europe.

The Democrats did not fare well in the 1918 mid-term elections, and the Republicans took control of the Congress. As the war was winding down, Wilson was in Europe for the better part of six months for the peace conference. He played a major role — advancing his Fourteen Points and pushing for the creation of a League of Nations. However, there is an argument to be made that he was more persuasive in Europe than at home. The Senate would not ratify the treaty of Versailles which incorporated the League of Nations charter. During the treaty negotiations, Wilson had suffered illness which weakened him in the face of the Senate negotiations which, being controlled by the opposing Republicans, was going to be an uphill battle regardless. Wilson then suffered a series of strokes. The Senate opposition was led by Senator Lodge. The key point of disagreement was whether the treaty would diminish the ability of Congress to declare war. Ratification was ultimately defeated.

Demobilization caused a good bit of disruption. Four million soldiers abruptly returned home without much in the way of money or benefits. Returning soldiers mixed with new workers who had been recruited during the wartime labor shortage — often these workers were blacks who were induced to move from the South to the north where the factories were. A wartime land price bubble burst, leaving many farmers deeply in debt. Strikes disrupted the economy in 1919. Race riots erupted throughout the country (with the greatest violence taking place in Chicago)  as postwar economic issues, racial tensions, labor activity, a civil rights movement, and fear of Bolshevism created a toxic mix.

The Red Scare reached its apex during 1919 and 1920. The anarchists were a problem, and the Bolshevik take over of the Soviet Union made the danger seem very real. Authorities saw the threat of Communist revolution in any number of labor events. In April and June of 1919, anarchists attempted over mail bombings. Attorney General Mitchell Palmer was targeted twice. They were not particularly effective as weapons of assassination, but they were unnerving. Palmer recruited a recent law school graduate by the name of J. Edgar Hoover to help him fight back.

Palmer launched his campaign against radicalism with two sets of police actions known as the Palmer Raids in November 1919 and January 1920. Federal agents supported by local police rounded up large groups of suspected radicals, often based on membership in a political group rather than any action taken. Undercover informants and warrantless wiretaps (authorized under the Sedition Act) helped to identify several thousand suspected leftists and radicals to be arrested.

Despite serious constitutional questions about the actions, the public largely supported the raids.

On June 4, 1919, Congress passed the Nineteenth Amendment, giving women the right to vote. The language had first been proposed in 1878. That language didn’t get a vote in the Senate until 1887 when it was rejected by a vote of 16 – 34. Then it languished for 30 years. The women’s suffrage movement saw some success, particularly in the west, during the 1910s due in part to the successes of the Progressive and socialist movements. In 1918, President Wilson advocated passage of the 19th Amendment. It received the necessary votes in the House but fell two votes short in the Senate. A second vote got it within one vote. There was a desire to obtain passage before the 1920 election. President Wilson called Congress into special session and, finally, the June 4, 1919, vote got the measure passed in the Senate. The measure was opposed by conservative Southerners (because of course it was), but it finally got the necessary state ratifications on August 18, 1920, when Tennessee narrowly passed the measure. (Indiana passed it on January 16, 1920).

During the last part of Wilson’s term, he was physically unable to perform the job. The strokes had debilitated him severely. His wife insulated him for the most part, choosing matters for his attention and delegating others to cabinet members. His situation was one of the cases that eventually led to ratification of the Twenty-Fifth Amendment which provides a process for removing the President when “the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office.”

Next time: Warren Harding promises a return to normalcy.