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Calvin Coolidge: The Best President You Don’t Know

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Americans today place enormous pressure on presidents to do “something” when there is a national crisis. But our 30th president Calvin Coolidge did “nothing” …other than shrink the government. The result? America’s economy boomed. Is there a lesson to be learned? Renowned historian Amity Shlaes thinks there is.

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Script:

Do more.

That’s what Americans demand of their presidents these days. A real president, Democrat or Republican, knows how to use “the office.” A real president makes things happen. Or so the conventional wisdom.

But, actually, there is another model. A president can succeed through inaction, by doing as little as possible. One such president was Calvin Coolidge, who took office upon Warren Harding’s sudden death. From the time Coolidge became president in 1923 to the time he left in 1929, Coolidge served a philosophy that was simple and powerful: don’t do.

Coolidge was our great refrainer.

The leadership style matched the personal style. Coolidge did not waste words. Hence his nickname, Silent Cal.

For these quiet ways, the thirtieth president absorbed much abuse. A Washington socialite, Alice Longworth, said that Coolidge looked like he had been weaned on a pickle.

Coolidge indeed cut a sharp contrast to Alice’s father, Theodore Roosevelt, who had served a decade and a half earlier. And what a contrast Coolidge provides with another Roosevelt, Franklin, who came just a few years later.

Born on July 4th, 1872 in rural Vermont, Coolidge embodied the simple virtues of his forebears. He was hard-working, sober, and cautious. He was also fearless. A life-long civil servant, he worked his way up from city councilman to governor of Massachusetts. He made his political reputation by facing down the Boston police department when it went on strike in 1919. “There is no right to strike against the public safety by anybody, anywhere, any time,” Coolidge told strikers. Then, the Coolidge administration fired them all and built a new department from scratch. This made him a national hero—a politician with a backbone.

The refrainer brought that backbone into the White House and got the kind of results men of action long for.

Especially economic results. Low unemployment, often well below five percent. Low taxes. Higher wages. Fewer strikes. New technology for the masses—a model A, or a bell phone, or an RCA radio.

And most remarkable of all, a shrinking federal budget. If you remember just one fact about Coolidge’s presidency, let it be this: Coolidge left the federal budget lower than he found it.

How did Coolidge do it? First, he resisted taking unnecessary action himself. Second, he imposed the same discipline on Congress. That wasn’t easy.

In the early 1920s, the Progressive movement was on the march. Just as now, Progressives always wanted to do something.

Progressive plans included more aid for agriculture, encouraging unions, increasing taxes, and nationalizing important industries, such as railroads and utilities.

Coolidge blocked the Progressives, and thereby blocked their expansion of government.

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46 Comments

  14. Coolidge is the worst sort of president. Lazy to the point that he refuses to do his job. It is better for the government to do more than less. "Oh, the house is on fire, I'll just let it burn itself out. It'll all be fine." That's what this minimalistic idea amounts too.

  24. The issue here is that the president is the leader of the states and is ultimately to be held responsible for the state of his union. But that doesn't mean he needs to micromanage. A good leader doesn't make all the decision and doesn't rule exclusively by executive might. He rules by wisdom by placing people he trusts to do their jobs well in proper position and then LETTING them do that job.

  27. So the Great Depression immediately followed his presidency and somehow his inaction and laissez faire attitude was amazing? Serious question. Why is his inaction not blamed at least partly for the depression?

  33. Oh cmon, could you people not even check the year when Coolidge was president? He was president the exact years of the roaring twenties, no shit his policy of doing nothing worked. He also had a brother who drank around the White House all day. A simple fact check would've made you all realize that his presidential policy was idiotic for literally any other time period.