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30th President · 1923–1929

Calvin Coolidge

A taciturn New Englander who championed thrift, tax reduction and limited government during the prosperity of the 1920s.

Portrait of Calvin Coolidge
Calvin Coolidge, 1924Photo: Harris & Ewing, Library of CongressPublic domainSource
Born
July 4, 1872Plymouth Notch, Vermont
Died
January 5, 1933
Home state
Massachusetts
Vice president
Charles G. Dawes

Life & Offices

Raised on a Vermont farm, Coolidge graduated from Amherst College, practiced law in Northampton, Massachusetts, and climbed methodically through nearly every rung of state politics. As governor he gained national fame in 1919 when he called out the State Guard during the Boston police strike and backed the police commissioner’s refusal to rehire the strikers, declaring that there is “no right to strike against the public safety.” The episode helped win him the Republican vice-presidential nomination in 1920.

Coolidge was visiting his family’s Vermont home when word came of Harding’s death in August 1923; his father, a notary public, administered the oath of office by lamplight in the early morning hours. Coolidge restored confidence after the Harding scandals, forcing the resignation of Attorney General Harry Daugherty, and in 1924 won election in his own right over Democrat John W. Davis and Progressive Robert La Follette.

Working with Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon, Coolidge cut income-tax rates, held down spending and ran a budget surplus every year, reducing the national debt. He signed the Indian Citizenship Act and the restrictive Immigration Act of 1924, vetoed farm price-support bills and supported the Kellogg–Briand Pact renouncing war. In 1927 he announced, “I do not choose to run for President in 1928.” He died at his home in Northampton in 1933.

Offices before the presidency

  • Massachusetts House of Representatives (1907–1908)
  • Mayor of Northampton, Massachusetts (1910–1911)
  • Massachusetts Senate (1912–1915), president of the Senate from 1914
  • Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts (1916–1918)
  • Governor of Massachusetts (1919–1921)
  • Vice President of the United States (1921–1923)

Era: V. Republicanism Between the World Wars

The Record

  • 1924

    Indian Citizenship Act

    Signed June 2, 1924, the act conferred U.S. citizenship on all Native Americans born in the United States who were not already citizens, though some states continued to keep Native Americans from voting for decades.

    Historical Record

  • 1924

    Immigration Act of 1924

    The act set permanent national-origins quotas favoring immigrants from northern and western Europe and barred immigrants ineligible for citizenship, which in practice excluded the Japanese. Coolidge signed it while objecting to the Japanese exclusion provision.

    Historical Record

  • 1924–1926

    Revenue Acts of 1924 and 1926

    The Mellon tax program cut income-tax rates across the brackets; the 1926 act lowered the top rate to 25 percent. Supporters argued that lower rates would spur investment and even increase revenue, while critics said the largest benefits went to the wealthy.

    Historical Record

  • 1923–1929

    Budget surpluses and debt reduction

    Coolidge pressed for economy in every department, and the federal government ran a surplus in every year of his presidency, substantially reducing the debt left by World War I.

    Historical Record

  • 1926

    Address on the Declaration’s 150th anniversary

    In Philadelphia on July 5, 1926, Coolidge argued that the Declaration’s principles were settled truths: “If all men are created equal, that is final.” Any attempt to go beyond its propositions, he said, would be a step backward.

    Primary Source

  • 1927–1928

    Mississippi flood relief

    After the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927, Coolidge placed Commerce Secretary Herbert Hoover in charge of relief and later signed the Flood Control Act of 1928, committing the federal government to flood control on the lower Mississippi.

    Historical Record

  • 1927–1928

    Vetoes of the McNary–Haugen farm bills

    Coolidge twice vetoed bills under which the government would have bought surplus crops to raise domestic farm prices, calling them price-fixing that would encourage overproduction.

    Historical Record

  • 1928

    Kellogg–Briand Pact

    Negotiated by Secretary of State Frank Kellogg and French Foreign Minister Aristide Briand, the pact renounced war as an instrument of national policy. The Senate approved it in January 1929 by a vote of 85 to 1.

    Historical Record

Criticism & Debate

Opposing View / Debate

Did Coolidge’s policies lay the groundwork for the Great Depression?

Coolidge left office in March 1929 at the height of the decade’s prosperity; the stock market crashed that October.

Critics

Critics argue that the administration’s faith in business and its tax cuts for high earners fed speculation and inequality, that it ignored a long depression in agriculture, and that weak oversight of banking and credit left the economy vulnerable.

Defenders

Admirers credit Coolidge with rising incomes, low unemployment, falling debt and restraint in government, and argue that the Depression’s depth owed more to Federal Reserve policy, the 1930 tariff and the tax increases enacted after he left office.

Sources

  1. Calvin Coolidge: Domestic Affairs · Miller Center, University of Virginia

Documents

Sources

  1. Calvin Coolidge · Miller Center, University of Virginia
  2. Calvin Coolidge · White House Historical Association
  3. Calvin Coolidge: Presidential Documents · The American Presidency Project, UC Santa Barbara