Warren G. Harding, an Ohio Republican, was the 29th President of the United States (1921-1923). Though his term in office was fraught with scandal, including Teapot Dome, Harding embraced technology and was sensitive to the plights of minorities and women.
The Presidency of Warren Harding spanned the period in United States history that encompasses the events of the Prohibition era. President Warren Harding represented the Republican political party which influenced the domestic and foreign policies of his presidency including the policy of Isolationism.
Biography[]
Before his nomination, Warren G. Harding declared, “America’s present need is not heroics, but healing; not nostrums, but normalcy; not revolution, but restoration; not agitation, but adjustment; not surgery, but serenity; not the dramatic, but the dispassionate; not experiment, but equipoise; not submergence in internationality, but sustainment in triumphant nationality….”
A Democratic leader, William Gibbs McAdoo, called Harding’s speeches “an army of pompous phrases moving across the landscape in search of an idea.” Their very murkiness was effective, since Harding’s pronouncements remained unclear on the League of Nations, in contrast to the impassioned crusade of the Democratic candidates, Governor James M. Cox of Ohio and Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Thirty-one distinguished Republicans had signed a manifesto assuring voters that a vote for Harding was a vote for the League. But Harding interpreted his election as a mandate to stay out of the League of Nations.
Harding, born near Marion, Ohio, in 1865, became the publisher of a newspaper. He married a divorcee, Mrs. Florence Kling De Wolfe. He was a trustee of the Trinity Baptist Church, a director of almost every important business, and a leader in fraternal organizations and charitable enterprises.
He organized the Citizen’s Cornet Band, available for both Republican and Democratic rallies; “I played every instrument but the slide trombone and the E-flat cornet,” he once remarked.
Harding’s undeviating Republicanism and vibrant speaking voice, plus his willingness to let the machine bosses set policies, led him far in Ohio politics. He served in the state Senate and as Lieutenant Governor, and unsuccessfully ran for Governor. He delivered the nominating address for President Taft at the 1912 Republican Convention. In 1914 he was elected to the Senate, which he found “a very pleasant place.”
An Ohio admirer, Harry Daugherty, began to promote Harding for the 1920 Republican nomination because, he later explained, “He looked like a President.”
Thus a group of Senators, taking control of the 1920 Republican Convention when the principal candidates deadlocked, turned to Harding. He won the Presidential election by an unprecedented landslide of 60 percent of the popular vote.
Republicans in Congress easily got the President’s signature on their bills. They eliminated wartime controls and slashed taxes, established a Federal budget system, restored the high protective tariff, and imposed tight limitations upon immigration.
By 1923 the postwar depression seemed to be giving way to a new surge of prosperity, and newspapers hailed Harding as a wise statesman carrying out his campaign promise–“Less government in business and more business in government.”
Behind the facade, not all of Harding’s Administration was so impressive. Word began to reach the President that some of his friends were using their official positions for their own enrichment. Alarmed, he complained, “My…friends…they’re the ones that keep me walking the floors nights!”
Looking wan and depressed, Harding journeyed westward in the summer of 1923, taking with him his upright Secretary of Commerce, Herbert Hoover. “If you knew of a great scandal in our administration,” he asked Hoover, “would you for the good of the country and the party expose it publicly or would you bury it?” Hoover urged publishing it, but Harding feared the political repercussions.
He did not live to find out how the public would react to the scandals of his administration. In August of 1923, he died in San Francisco of a heart attack.
Personality[]
The character traits of President Warren Harding can be described as quiet, generous, humble and kind. Warren Harding had quite a low self-esteem and sought the good opinions and praise from people which led to his difficulty in making contentious decisions. It has been speculated that the Myers-Briggs personality type for Warren Harding is an ISFP (Introversion, Sensing, Feeling, Perception). A quiet, easygoing character with a a "live and let live" approach to life. A perfectionist, loyal to values and beliefs. Warren Harding Personality type: Practical, action-oriented and considerate.
Nicknames[]
- "Wobbly Warren"
- "Winnie"
Meaning: The nickname of President Warren Harding provides an insight into how the man was viewed by the American public during his presidency. The meaning of the derogatory nickname "President Hardly" refers to his lack of decisiveness and his inability to make hardly any important or controversial decisions during his presidency.
Election[]
1920 United States presidential election[]
Presidential elections were held in the United States on November 2, 1920. The Republican ticket of senator Warren G. Harding of Ohio and governor Calvin Coolidge of Massachusetts defeated the Democratic ticket of governor James M. Cox of Ohio and assistant secretary Franklin Roosevelt of New York. It was the first election held after the end of the First World War, and the first election after the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment gave nationwide suffrage to women. It was the first presidential election to have its results broadcast by radio.
Incumbent president Woodrow Wilson, a Democrat who had served since 1913, privately hoped for a third term despite severe physical and mental disabilities from a stroke, but he had very little support. Former president Theodore Roosevelt had been the frontrunner for the Republican nomination, but he died in 1919 without leaving an obvious heir to his progressive legacy. The major parties turned to little-known dark horse candidates from the state of Ohio, a populous swing state with many electoral votes. Cox won on the 44th ballot at the 1920 Democratic National Convention, defeating William Gibbs McAdoo (Wilson's son-in-law), A. Mitchell Palmer, and several other candidates. Harding emerged as a compromise candidate between the conservative and progressive wings of the Republican party, and he clinched his nomination on the tenth ballot at the 1920 Republican National Convention.
The election was dominated by the American social and political environment in the aftermath of World War I, which was marked by a hostile response to certain aspects of Wilson's foreign policy and a massive reaction against the reformist zeal of the Progressive Era. The wartime economic boom had collapsed and the country was deep in a recession. Wilson's advocacy for America's entry into the League of Nations, in the face of a return to non-interventionist opinion, challenged his effectiveness as president, and there were wars and revolutions overseas. At home, the year 1919 was marked by major strikes in the meatpacking and steel industries and large-scale race riots in Chicago and other cities. Additionally, the September 16, 1920, Wall Street bombing aroused fears of radicals and terrorists. The Irish Catholic and German communities were outraged at Wilson's perceived support of their traditional enemy, Great Britain, and his political position was critically weakened after he suffered a stroke in 1919 that left him severely disabled.
Harding all but ignored Cox in the race, and essentially campaigned against Wilson by calling for a "return to normalcy". Harding won a landslide victory, sweeping every state outside of the South and becoming the first Republican since the end of Reconstruction to win a former state of the Confederacy: Tennessee. Harding's victory margin of 26.2 percent in the popular vote remains the largest popular-vote percentage margin ever since widespread popular elections began in the 1820s. (However, subsequent winning candidates in 1936, 1964 and 1972 exceeded his share of the popular vote.) Cox won just 34.1 percent of the popular vote, and Socialist Eugene V. Debs won 3.4 percent, despite being in prison at the time. It was the first election in which women had the right to vote in all 48 states, which caused the total popular vote to increase dramatically, from 18.5 million in 1916 to 26.8 million in 1920.
It was the third presidential election in which both major party candidates were registered in the same home state (the others have been in 1860, 1904, 1940, 1944, and 2016). Coincidentally, the election was held on Harding's 55th birthday. Both major-party vice-presidential nominees would later succeed to the presidency: Calvin Coolidge (Republican) upon Harding's death in 1923 and Franklin D. Roosevelt (Democratic) after defeating Republican president Herbert Hoover in 1932.
Inauguration[]
The Inauguration of Warren G. Harding as the 29th president of the United States was held on Friday, March 4, 1921, at the East Portico of the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C. This was the 34th inauguration and marked the commencement of Warren G. Harding's only term as president and of Calvin Coolidge's only term as vice president. Harding died 2 years, 151 days into this term, and Coolidge succeeded to the presidency.
Chief Justice Edward D. White administered the presidential oath of office. Harding placed his hand on the Washington Inaugural Bible as he recited the oath. Coolidge was sworn in as vice president in the Senate Chamber, while Harding's swearing-in as president took place on the east portico of the Capitol, respectively, which Coolidge believed ruined "all semblance of unity and continuity." Critic H. L. Mencken described Harding's inaugural address, writing, "It is rumble and bumble. It is flap and doodle. It is balder and dash. But I grow lyrical."
This inauguration was the first in which an automobile was used to transport the president-elect and the outgoing president (Woodrow Wilson) to and from the Capitol. Wilson, still compromised by his 1919 stroke, did not attend the ceremony itself.
Presidents born during his Presidency[]
N/A
Presidents who died during his Presidency[]
N/A (Died in Office)
Cabinet[]
| The Harding cabinet | ||
|---|---|---|
| Office | Name | Term |
| President | Warren G. Harding | 1921–1923 |
| Vice President | Calvin Coolidge | 1921–1923 |
| Secretary of State | Charles Evans Hughes | 1921–1923 |
| Secretary of the Treasury | Andrew Mellon | 1921–1923 |
| Secretary of War | John W. Weeks | 1921–1923 |
| Attorney General | Harry M. Daugherty | 1921–1923 |
| Postmaster General | Will H. Hays | 1921–1922 |
| Hubert Work | 1922–1923 | |
| Harry S. New | 1923 | |
| Secretary of the Navy | Edwin Denby | 1921–1923 |
| Secretary of the Interior | Albert B. Fall | 1921–1923 |
| Hubert Work | 1923 | |
| Secretary of Agriculture | Henry Cantwell Wallace | 1921–1923 |
| Secretary of Commerce | Herbert Hoover | 1921–1923 |
| Secretary of Labor | James J. Davis | 1921–1923 |
Famous Films[]
- Nosefratu (1922)
- The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
- One Week (1920)
Accomplishments and major events[]
The major accomplishments and the famous, main events that occurred during the time that Warren Harding was president included the 1922 agreement to limit naval armaments signed by the US, France, Great Britain, Japan, and Italy. The Mellon Plan, a package of economic legislation, was introduced and the 1921 Emergency Quota Act used a percentage system to restrict immigration. The close friends favored by President Warren Harding, referred to as the "Ohio Gang", were involved in bribery and corruption. The Teapot Dome Scandal (1921-1923), involved national security, oil companies and corruption but the president died before he was implicated in the scandal.
Isolationism in the 1920's
Summary: The foreign policy of Isolationism in the 1920's was adopted by Warren Harding that aimed at self-advancement to make the United States economically self-reliant whilst retaining peace with other nations. The American foreign policy of Isolationism was also adopted by the Republican governments during the administrations of President Coolidge. The foreign policy of Isolationism was an attempt to isolate the US from the diplomatic affairs of other countries by avoiding foreign entanglements, entering into alliances, and limiting foreign competition by imposing high import tariffs.
The Mellon Plan
Summary: Andrew Mellon was a highly successful banker who was first appointed the United States Secretary of the Treasury by President Harding. He devised the Mellon Plan, a package of economic legislation, which reduced taxes on the wealthy and the corporations in America that encouraged growth and led to the boom in stock market investments. As part of the Melon Plan the Bureau of the Budget was established in 1921 as a part of the Department of the Treasury by the Budget and Accounting Act of 1921.
The Washington Conference
Summary : The Washington Conference was an international disarmament meeting called by President Warren Harding that took place from November 1921 - February 1922. The Washington Conference was hailed as a great success and led to three major treaties - the Four-Power Treaty, Five-Power Treaty and the Nine-Power Treaty.
The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier
Summary: The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier was dedicated on November 11, 1921 as a monument to all those who had fallen during the Great War. In 1921 the body of an unidentified World War 1 soldier was exhumed from a World War I American cemetery in France and buried in Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery.
The 1921 Emergency Quota Act
Summary: The 1921 Emergency Quota Act used a percentage system to restrict immigration.
The Ohio Gang
Summary: The Ohio Gang was a group of close friends favored by President Warren Harding who were exposed for being involved in financial and political scandals relating to bribery and corruption. Members of the Ohio Gang abused their positions of power. By 1923, rumors of corruption in President Warren Harding's administration and the Ohio Gang had begun to surface he began to distance himself from his old cronies.
The Lincoln Memorial
Summary: The Lincoln Memorial is opened on May 30, 1922, made to honor the 16th President Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln's only surviving son, 78-year-old Robert Todd Lincoln, was in attendance. Prominent African Americans were invited to the event and discovered upon arrival they were assigned a segregated section guarded by U.S. Marines.
The Teapot Dome Scandal
Summary: The Teapot Dome Scandal involved prominent members of the Ohio Gang, cabinet member Albert B. Fall, Secretary of the Interior and Edwin C. Denby, Secretary of the Navy, in relation to national security, oil companies and corruption. Albert Fall and Edwin Denby received "loans" (bribes) to lease land in Teapot Dome and Elk Hills to oil companies. President Warren Harding died unexpectedly of a heart attack on August 2, 1923. His reputation ruined by the activities of the Ohio Gang.
Death[]
Harding went to bed early the evening of July 27, 1923, a few hours after giving the speech at the University of Washington. Later that night, he called for his physician Charles E. Sawyer, complaining of pain in the upper abdomen. Sawyer thought that it was a recurrence of stomach upset, but Dr. Joel T. Boone suspected a heart problem. The press was told Harding had experienced an "acute gastrointestinal attack" and his scheduled weekend in Portland was cancelled. He felt better the next day, as the train rushed to San Francisco, where they arrived the morning of July 29. He insisted on walking from the train to the car, and was then rushed to the Palace Hotel, where he suffered a relapse. Doctors found that not only was his heart causing problems, but also that he had pneumonia, and he was confined to bed rest in his hotel room. Doctors treated him with liquid caffeine and digitalis, and he seemed to improve.
Hoover released Harding's foreign policy address advocating membership in the World Court, and the president was pleased that it was favorably received. By the afternoon of August 2, Harding's condition still seemed to be improving and his doctors allowed him to sit up in bed. At around 7:30 pm that evening, Florence was reading to him "A Calm Review of a Calm Man", a flattering article about him from The Saturday Evening Post; she paused and he told her, "That's good. Go on, read some more." Those were to be his last words. She resumed reading when, a few seconds later, Harding twisted convulsively and collapsed back in the bed, gasping. Florence Harding immediately called the doctors into the room, but they were unable to revive him with stimulants; Harding was pronounced dead a few minutes later, at the age of 57. Harding's death was initially attributed to a cerebral hemorrhage, as doctors at the time did not generally understand the symptoms of cardiac arrest. Florence Harding did not consent to have the president autopsied.
Funeral[]
Harding's unexpected death came as a great shock to the nation. He was liked and admired, both the press and public had followed his illness closely, and had been reassured by his apparent recovery. Harding's body was carried to his train in a casket for a journey across the nation, which was followed closely in the newspapers. Nine million people lined the railroad tracks as the train carrying his body proceeded from San Francisco to Washington, D.C., where he lay in state at the United States Capitol rotunda. After funeral services there, Harding's body was transported to Marion, Ohio, for burial.
In Marion, Harding's body was placed on a horse-drawn hearse, which was followed by President Coolidge and Chief Justice Taft, then by Harding's widow and his father. They followed the hearse through the city, past the Star building and finally to the Marion Cemetery where the casket was placed in the cemetery's receiving vault.
Gallery[]
Videos[]
Memorial[]
Presidential Firsts[]
- First president elected after women gained the right to vote
- First president to be elected while being a sitting U.S. senator
- First president to own and install a radio in the White House
- First president to use the term Founding Fathers
- First president born after the Civil War
- First president to appoint a former president (William Howard Taft) to the Supreme Court
- First president to visit Canada while in office
Congress during Presidency[]
- 67th United States Congress
- 68th United States Congress
Facts and trivia[]
- From the age of ten, Harding began working for a newspaper his father owned, learning the basics of journalism. Graduating from college at 16, by the age of 21, he owned his own newspaper.
- Harding lived in rural Ohio all his life, except when political service took him elsewhere. As a young man, he bought The Marion Star and built it into a successful newspaper.
- Harding ran for the Republican nomination for president in 1920, but was considered a long shot before the convention. When the leading candidates could not garner a majority, and the convention deadlocked, support for Harding increased, and he was nominated on the tenth ballot. He conducted a front porch campaign, remaining mostly in Marion, and allowed the people to come to him.
- Harding and his wife Florence, a divorcee, had no children together, however, she had a son, named Marshall with her first husband, Pete De Wolfe. She was also five years older than Harding.
- Harding affectionately called his wife "the Duchess" for a character in a serial from The New York Sun who kept a close eye on "the Duke" and their money. Florence Harding became deeply involved in her husband's career, both at the Star and after he entered politics.
- In the 1920 U.S. Presidential Election, Harding won by the largest landslide vote in American History. It was the also the first Presidential Election that allowed women to vote, as well as the first election to broadcast on the radio.
- Harding had an extramarital affair with Carrie Fulton Phillips of Marion, which lasted about 15 years before ending in 1920. The affair was revealed when Harding biographer Francis Russell, while researching his book in 1963, discovered letters from Harding to Phillips. The letters were donated to the Ohio Historical Society, and some there wanted the letters destroyed to preserve what remained of Harding's reputation. A lawsuit ensued, with Harding's heirs claiming copyright over the letters.
- The allegations of Harding's other known mistress, Nan Britton, long remained uncertain. In 1927, Britton, also a Marionite, published The President's Daughter, alleging that her child Elizabeth Ann Blaesing had been fathered by Harding. The book, which was dedicated to "all unwedded mothers" and "their innocent children whose fathers are usually not known to the world," was sold, like pornography, door-to-door, wrapped in brown paper. The late president's reputation had deteriorated since his death in 1923, and many believed Britton. The public was tantalized by salacious details such as Britton's claim that the two had sex in a closet near the Oval Office, with Secret Service agents posted to ward off intruders. Although part of the public believed her, a jury found against her when she alleged she was libeled by a rebuttal of her book.
- According to Harding family lore, the late president was infertile and could not have fathered a child, having suffered from mumps in childhood; Britton maintained that Harding had provided child support of $500 per month for the daughter he never met, but she had destroyed romantic correspondence from him at his request.
- Harding's biographers, writing while Britton's allegations remained uncertain, differed on their truth; Russell believed them unquestioningly while Dean, having reviewed Britton's papers at UCLA, regarded them as unproven. In 2015, DNA tests performed by Ancestry.com were used by members of the Harding and Blaesing families, which confirmed that Harding was Elizabeth's father.
- Harding's administration would eventually be known for scandals and corruption, with many of his staff members being sent to prison.
- As Florence Harding did not request an autopsy and also destroyed many of his papers, a controversial theory was put forward in a semi-fictional book The Strange Death of President Harding, claiming that Florence had poisoned her husband. However, this claim was soon debunked.
- Harding's term in office was the shortest of any 20th century president.