Introduction
United States is among the nations in the world that have seen numerous presidential administrations. The success of United States is credited to policies brought about by some of these presidents. However, there are some presidents who were blamed for slowed economic growth of the country during their tenure as well as poor foreign relation of the country.
To understand the contribution of some of the past presidents, it is imperative to look at their history, policies and beliefs. This paper aims at looking at the history of some of the past Republican Presidents, how they rose to presidency, their campaign policies and beliefs as well as their achievements and failures during their presidency.
History of President Warren G. Harding
Early life of Harding
President Harding was born in 1865, in Corsica, Ohio. He hailed from a family of eight children being the eldest. His father Dr. George Tryon Harding was a teacher in a rural school while his mother Phoebe Elizabeth practiced mid wifely. In his teenage, his father bought a weekly newspaper leading to his family relocating to Caledonia, Ohio. It is from this weekly newspaper that Harding gained journalism experience. He went on advancing his printing and newspaper sales skills at college. After his graduation from college, they organized with two of his friends to save money to revive Marion Daily Star; a city newspaper that was facing extinction. They purchased the newspaper and used it to support the Republican Party (Adams, p. 78). Harding’s political ideologies led to his relationship with team that managed Marion’s local politics becoming sour.
Political career
His role as a newspaper publisher led to him becoming popular in the country. It gave him an opportunity to meet and interact with many people making it possible for him to join the country’s politics. In 1899, he vied for Ohio State Senate where he won. His for year’s service as the senator led to people elevating him to Lieutenant Governor of Ohio. In 1910, he was nominated to vie as Ohio’s Governor but lost to Judson. This did not deter him from pursuing his political ambitions. In 1912, he gave the recommendation speech for the then president William Howard and later elected as United States Senator in 1914. He served as the State’s senator till he rose to power as the country’s president (Grant pp. 479-487).
Harding went into records as the first American Senator to be elected Senator. By the time of his nomination to vie for presidency, Harding was not known to the entire country but only in his State Ohio where he was serving as the Senator. His nomination came as a result of political mechanization from his allies. After the nominating team meeting in Blackstone Hotel failed to reach into a consensus on the person to nominate, they identified Harding as the next option. By then, there were three potential candidates who failed to garner majority support. This compelled the nominating team solicit for majority support for the remaining candidate.
Harding won the majority in the tenth ballot making him nominated for presidency. The team requested him to declare if he had been involved in any controversy in past which could be used by his rivals in their presidential campaigns but he denied that he had not been involved in any controversy. This was despite him being implicated with a case of having affairs with his past friend’s wife (Morello, p. 132). The nominating team declared him their presidential candidate but later discovered that he had been implicated with this case. However, it was too late for them to make changes leading to them supporting Harding.
Harding’s campaign policies/promises/beliefs
The 1920 presidential elections saw Harding vying against Democratic candidate James Cox who was then the incumbent Governor of Ohio. To some extent, these elections were perceived as a turning point where people were to decide on whether to continue with the current system of governance which was based on Woodrow Wilson rule or to go back to McKinley way of governance based on laissez-faire. In his campaigns, Harding promised to help the country in reinstating the normalcy state that existed before. This was a rarely used term in the country by then (Fine pp. 1159-1193). His campaign motto called for termination of the unusual period of the Great War and advocated for introduction of three trends which included doing away with relying on the government in bring about reforms in the country, resurrection of nativism and introduction of isolationism when responding to the war.
His campaign drew attention from most of the citizens. It was the fist campaign in the country to receive a lot of media coverage. It also comprised of numerous celebrities from Hollywood and Broadway who featured in some photos taken for Harding and his family. Other promises that led to his triumph as the United States president was his promise that he would bring to an end the disturbing debates that existed during the rule of President Wilson. He also promised to implement the foreign policies rather than making them idealistic.
President Harding’s achievements
President served as the United States president for two years only before meeting his unprecedented death. Despite the short period, he is still remembered due to some of the achievements he made for the country. He was one of the best presidents in delegating duties to his staffs. His four major appointments in the country’s Supreme Court led to termination of an intention to transform United States into a fascist nation. During his rule, he passed the immigration bill that helped preserve the American culture. This was after world war one. Most of the people who migrated to America were required to originate from countries that practiced northern Europe culture (Tester para. 2-6). The bill also helped in regulating wages offered to Americans by reducing the number of immigrants who could have resulted to competition in employment making the hardworking Americans get little wages. His other achievement was seeing justices used in sentencing Eugene debs. Harding set free Debs who had been incarcerated for going against a draft established during World War one. He had even gone to an extent of asking people to oppose the draft landing him into the prison. Despite Harding having different political ideology from that of Debs, he went on and pardoned him.
It is during Harding’s rule that he managed to revive the country’s economic growth. He reduced the federal expenses, relieved the masses from taxation by cutting the tax rate as well as started paying debts that the country had accrued during the world war. By 1921, the country’s economy was back in track. To be able to track the federal spending, Harding came up with Bureau of the budget. Through negotiations with steel industries, Harding was able to encourage them curt down on the number of hours worked. Initially, workers were supposed to work for twelve hours in a day for seven days. This was humiliating compared to the wages they received. It was during Harding rule that he managed to strike a deal with steel industries where the number of hours worked were reduced to eight for six days per week.
President Harding also witnessed chief disarmament agreements with varied European countries which helped in strengthening the ties between United States and these countries (Murray pp. 56-79). This was despite people criticizing him for not ensuring that United States participated in the League of Nations. Harding believed in walking the talk when it came to ammeters about ensuring peace. He viewed it as waste of resources by nations embarking on developing and purchasing superior warships. Rather, he believed that negotiating for peaceful disarmament among the nations was the only way of ensuring that countries never went back to wars again. Though not acknowledged by many, it is believed that it is Harding who helped in bringing to an end the use of poisonous gas by nations in times of war. During his reign, the relationship between United States and China was not good. It is him to encouraged the country to focus on improving its relationship with China by coming up with an open door policy.
President Harding’s failures
Even though Harding was found to have achieved a lot in his short period as the United States president, he did not lack some loopholes during his rule. It was during his rule that one of the United States greatest scandals emerged. In 1923, as he was preparing to go for his trip to Alaska, his administration’s sleaze and conspiracy started being exposed to the public. It was discovered that Forbes; who had been appointed by Harding to head Veterans Bureau had been stealing from the nation by selling most of the supplies that remained after world war one and channeling all the money to his accounts (Payne pp. 597-610). Harding had also appointed one of his closes allies Albert Fall to manage oil mines referred as Teapot Dome. This gave him an opportunity secretly hand over the oil rights to one of his friends who in return gave him loans free of interest and other bribes amounting to $500,000.
All these conspiracies were discovered after Harding’s death. However, investigations found that the president had not been involved in any of the scandals and they were being conducted undercover without his knowledge. However, his predecessor blamed the scandal to the president. People do not see his contribution to the nation such as reviving the economy, improving the relationship between United States and other countries such as China and improvement of working conditions in steel industries. Rather, they attribute the scandal committed by leaders in his administration to him. With Harding being death when the scandals surfaced, it was hard to defend himself (Payne pp. 611-625). He had no opportunity to clear himself from the blame. It is with this respect that his rivals saw an opportunity to soil his good reputation.
History of President Calvin Coolidge
His early life in politics
President Coolidge was born in 1872 in Plymouth Notch. He came from a family of two being elder sibling. During his childhood, his mother died of tuberculosis leading to his father remarrying. Coolidge’s father was a popular farmer and engaged in different activities making it hard to have a lot of time with his children. Coolidge was brought up by his stepmother. He studied in Black River Academy and later Amherst College. Due to his father’s request, Coolidge shifted to Northampton, Massachusetts where he started practicing law. !897 saw Coolidge admitted to the bar giving a chance to be a country lawyer. In 1898, he opened his law firm out of what he had saved as well as inheritance from his grandfather. His good services led to his reputation growing and becoming one of the most preferred lawyers in the country (McCoy 73). Home banks and other business organizations strongly preferred his services due to his diligence.
During his time, the Republican Party had great influence in New England. Coolidge started participating in local politics where he campaigned for presidential candidates vying under the Republican Party. In 1896, he campaigned for William McKinley who vied for presidency under the Republican Party ticket. This made him known in the party giving him a chance to be integrated in Republican City Committee in 1897. In 1898, he vied for City Council position and won in Northampton. Despite the position not generating salary, it gave him an opportunity to have firsthand experience in the country’s politics. He was to be nominated for the position again in 1899 but he declined the offer and vied for City Solicitor. He served in this capacity for two years giving him an opportunity to increase his experience in politics. !902 saw a Democratic candidate win the position of City Solicitor leading to Coolidge going back to his past career as a private lawyer. Shortly, the clerk of the courts died and Coolidge was appointed to replace him.
In 1906, he was given an opportunity by the local Republican Committee to vie for state House of Representatives. He won the elections enabling him to participate in minor committees and also vote in minor processes such as in women suffrage and direct election of senators (Kelly para. 1-7). In 1910, he returned home to his parents and decided to vie for the position of Northampton mayor. This was after the incumbent mayor retired. Being famous among the people, it was not hard for him to win the position against his rivals. Hampshire County senator retired in 1911 giving Coolidge a chance to vie for the position. He defeated his Democratic contestant and was elevated to the position of chairman in a committee made to look into matters of workers strike in American Woolen Company. There emerged some state of misunderstanding in the Republican Party in 1912 which led to the party splitting into two. These were the conservative and the progressive wings. Although Coolidge supported conservative ideologies, he did not walk out of the party. The progressive party declined from staging a contestant in the state senate in Hampshire leading to Coolidge reelection. In 1915, Coolidge through the assistance of McCall was elected Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts. In 1918, he was nominated without being opposed to vie for governor of Massachusetts. He won the elections becoming the governor.
Unlike the usual method of delegate selections in Republican conventions, the 1920 selection saw the delegates selected through state party conventions rather than primaries. This led to emergence of numerous potential candidates making it hard to come up with an agreement on the most favorite candidate to chose. Coolidge was one of the potential candidates but was not taken seriously by party leaders. After numerous balloting, Harding was appointed as the most appropriate candidate to vie for presidency. The party leaders had also decided to take Irvine Lenroot as the running mate for Harding (Coolidge pp. 234-265). This left Coolidge with no position in the presidential campaigns. However, McCamant; a delegate from Oregon came up with the idea of selecting Coolidge as the running mate for Harding. This was after he had read the book by the name Have Faith in Massachusetts. After deliberation by the party leaders, Coolidge was nominated as the running mate for Harding. They emerged victorious leading to Coolidge becoming the vice president.
The death of President Harding in 1923 led to Coolidge assuming the presidency to complete the term left by Harding. During his role as the vice president, he hard not been found to participate in the country’s affairs and many believed that he could not emerge victorious in 1924 presidential elections.
President Coolidge’s campaign promises/policies/beliefs
President Coolidge was the first United States president to conduct a unique presidential campaign. Throughout his campaign, he was not found confronting or maligning his rivals. During the world war one, the country experienced high government spending, increased taxation and America got entangled in foreign countries. In his election campaigns of 1924, Coolidge promised to set America free from any entanglement. He promised to come up with policies that would help the country cut down on government spending as well as cut on the tax. He believed that tax should be lower and that not all Americans were to be subjected to taxation (Ferrell pp. 145-168). In his idea to set America free from any entanglement, Coolidge believed that the Republicans won 1920 elections due to their rejection of United States being incorporated in the League of Nations. At its state, he believed that the League of Nations reflected none of the American interests and thus the country would not benefit by joining the league.
President Coolidge’s achievement
Coolidge was seen to accomplish most of his promises that he gave during the campaign. In 1924 1nd 1926, he managed to reduce taxes which had been imposed during the First World War. He came up with policies that exempted some citizens from paying tax. This was in line with his belief that all citizens deserve to par taxes. He was also able to settle some of the federal debts as well as cutting down on federal expenses. He successfully influenced the Republicans in the Congress to supporting his ideas leading to them willing to pass the Revenue Act bill in 1924. This led to reduction in the rate of income tax as well as exempting more than two million people from taxation. In 1926, taxes were further reduced when the Congress passed Revenue Act.
Coolidge was a civil rights activist. He strongly objected to statement that America belonged to the whites and fought for the rights of African Americans and Catholics. It is during his reign as the president that Ku Klux Klan that was responsible of torturing and killing African Americans lost its powers (Brandes, p. 237). Coolidge ensured that every person found to be affiliated with the organization did not participate in his government. He believed that every American had equal rights as per the constitution regardless of the color. In 1924, he enacted the Indian Citizenship Act which gave American Indians an opportunity to become American citizens.
Coolidge is one of the presidents who were found to encourage the practice of delegating duties to his appointees. His role was more of a supervisor than a director. He helped United States experience quick economic growth in what is referred to as Roaring Twenties. He entrusted his secretary of state with all responsibilities of implementing industrial policies (Brandes 243). This led to the secretary using government support to improve business competence, establish radio stations as well as come with airlines.
Being one of the United States presidents who put the interest of the nation at heart, Coolidge was not will to let the country get involved in any international relationship that did not address its interests. This was congruent with his pledge of ensuring that America was not entangled with any country. It is with this respect that he was reluctant to allow his country be a member of the League of Nations. He believed that the League of Nations could not favor the country in any way. His major contribution in international relationship between United States and other countries include the Kellogg-Briand Pact of 1928. The Pact required United States, France, Britain, Japan, Italy and Germany to shun from engaging in wars. Despite the treaty not being effective in protecting the emergence of the Second World War, it became the foundation from which new international laws were established after the Second World War.
When Coolidge assumed the power as the United States president, the government was in the middle of problems after the previous regime’s state of corruption was revealed. However, he managed to contain the situation. He did not haste to request those leaders implicated with corruption to resign. Instead, he decided to led them continue serving the nation having been appointed by the previous president (Silver pp. 133-152). However, these leaders succumbed to public pressure and resigned. He also succeeded in improving the relationship between America and Mexico, Nicaragua and Haiti. It is during his presidency that American soldiers were recalled from Dominican Republic.
President Coolidge’s failures
Despite Coolidge entrusting his secretary of state with the responsibility of implementing economic policies as well as relieving tax from the Americans, he was not able to come up with measures to help control occurrence of economic depression. As most of the citizens were able to save money after being exempted from tax, it led to stock market in the country going down. He is also criticized for not helping the country overcome floods that rocked the country in 1927. He showed no intention of directing the central government to come up with measures to control the floods. He did not pay a visit to those who were affected by the disaster claiming that his visit would have not helped the victims in any way (Barry, p. 421). As he struggled to reduce government expenditure, he was reluctant to use government resources in helping those affected by the floods. He believed that citizens were responsible of ensuring that floods did not destroy their property and thus were supposed to bear the brunt of the floods.
History of President Herbert Clark Hoover
His early life and political career
Hoover was born in 1874 in West Branch, Iowa. His father was a famous blacksmith and also managed a store that sold farm inputs. When he was nine years old, his parents died leaving him as an orphan. This led to him being brought up by his relatives. He moved t Oregon where he lived with his uncle and studied in Friends pacific Academy. After his education, he helped his uncle in his office as an assistant. Despite being unable to join high school, Hoover enrolled for night classes where he gained experience in book keeping, mathematics and typing. In 1891, Hoover joined Stanford University. The fact that the first students were exempted from paying tuition fee gave him an opportunity to study. While at the University, he was elected to manage the baseball and football team. In 1895, Hoover completed his University studies where he graduated with a geology degree. This gave him a chance to be employed in mining him leading to his migration to Australia to work with Bewick, Moreing & Co. At the age of twenty three, he was appointed to take the responsibility of managing the mine where he facilitated in bringing more human labor from Italy to cut down operations cost.
In 1899, he married Lou Henry and they got two children. They moved to China after Hoover was employed by a private company. In 1901, he was recalled by the Australian mining company Bewick, Moreing & Co. where he was made an associate of the company (Fausold 314). During his regular administration of the mining activities, he noticed that there was presence of zinc that was being wasted as the company mined gold. This compelled him to come up with a method of extracting the zinc. In 1908, he decided to become an autonomous mining consultant where he toured different countries across the globe and give lectures on mining.
Eruption of the First World War saw Hoover abandon his career as a mining consultant and embarked on humanitarian activities. He organized for means to shipping most of the Americans back to the country from Europe. He also participated in distributing food, cash, ship ticket and clothes to the affected persons. When Belgium ran out of food as a result of attack by the Germans, Hoover joined hands with other humanitarians to supply the country with food. He headed all operations ran by the Committee for Relief in Belgium (CRB). He negotiated with the Germans to allow food to be transferred to the war victims in Belgium. This made him become popular in the world (Kane para. 1-5). When United States got involved in the war, President Woodrow Wilson appointed Hoover to manage food distribution in the country. He came up with strategies that helped in ensuring that there was no food rationing in the country while at the same time the American soldiers did not run out of food supply when at the battle field. After the war, he used his position and influence to help in shipment of relief food to hanger stricken people in Central Europe. He even supplied the Germans with relief food which led to him facing opposition from the Republicans and Senator Henry Cabot Lodge.
His first encounter with the countries politics was after he returned to America in 1919. The Democrats offered to nominate him as their presidential candidate with hopes that he could win the elections due to his popularity. As he believed that the Republicans were the most likely to win the coming presidential elections, he was reluctant to take the Democrats offer. In addition, he had a negative image towards the Democrats as he knew them as drunkards during his childhood. In 1920, he turned down the Democratic offer as he had already registered with the Republicans. This led to him declaring to vie for presidency with a Republican ticket. He contended in the California state primary but did not win. This made the party leaders not take him to be one of the most favorite contestants for the presidential position. Despite Hoover doubting the potential in Harding, he freely certified him and gave two speeches on his nomination (Barber pp. 119-143). President Harding thanked him by appointing him as the secretary of commerce. He requested to be given the mandate by the president to coordinate economic matters in the entire government. His success in his capacity led to him becoming popular than the president and his vice president.
President Hoover’s campaign promises/policies/beliefs
In 1927, President Coolidge declined to vie for the second time. This gave Hoover a chance to be nominated as the Republican presidential candidate. This was regardless of Coolidge and Hoover not being in good terms. His popularity and good reputation led to him being nominated in the first ballot. He vied for presidency against Alfred Smith who was the Democratic candidate. Both presidential candidates pledged to help the country improve its economy. Hoover promised that he would use his presidential powers to improve the life of farmers. This was because farmers had for many years not been getting profit from their labor with the past regimes buying their products at low prices (Carcasson pp. 349-365). He also promised that he could facilitate in reforming the present immigration laws to help improve the life and maintain the American culture. President Hoover promised the Americans that he would embrace the past regimes culture of nurturing isolationist foreign policy. After serving the country in the capacity of secretary of commerce, Hoover had the monetary policy fully managed by central reserves.
President Hoover’s achievements
Some of Hoover’s achievements during his tenure as the American president include introduction of the good neighbor policy. After he was elected the United States president, he embarked on a travel across the Latin American countries with a bid to improve their relationship with United States. During the tour, Hoover promised these countries that he would use his powers to ensure that he brings down the American political and military influence in these countries. Basically, he assured the countries that he was ready to ensure that they developed a sense of good neighbor with the Latin American countries. In 1928, he authorized the production of State Department paper that criticized America’s influence in Latin American states (Fausold, p. 328). To show his desire to ensure that there was a cordial relationship between United States and Latin American states, he ordered the withdrawal of American soldiers from Nicaragua in 1932. He also signed a pact with Haiti government that sought to ensure that the country was given its independence. Hoover took the responsibility of ensuring that Chile, Bolivia and Peru solved their indifference amicably where he acted as the mediator. It is from this policy that President Roosevelt built on to improve the relationship between America and Latin American states.
President Hoover’s failures
Despite Hoover being popular, he considered as one of the American presidents who greatly failed the country when their services were greatly required. His monetary policies are believed to plunge the country into depression. It was usual for American presidents to come in and the rescue the when it fall into crisis. This was not the case with Hoover. He left the Americans to struggle with the depression without letting the government give a helping hand. Being unable to overcome the crisis, America adversely suffered from the depression. Even after him helping other countries in the world when they were faced with hunger during thee First World War, Hoover did not help the Americans during the depression leading to most of the American facing starvation (Wueschner, p. 76). During his tenure, the country’s economy was seen to depreciate with more that 6.4 million people losing their jobs. It is during this period that rate of unemployment in United States rose to 24.9 percent. During his presidency, the country’s gross domestic production also depreciated by over twenty five percent.
Another failure by president Hoover is his lack of ensuring that all Americans were equally treated in the country. He never talked on matters to do with civil rights during his entire period as the American President. To him, he had a view that African Americans and other races in the country would liberate themselves by getting educated. He aimed at ensuring that all other races left their cultures and got assimilated to the white culture. Despite John Parker being criticized for passing judgments against African Americans, Hoover went on and decided to appoint him to the Supreme Court. This was met with a lot of opposition and the move was opposed in the senate making it hard for parker to be appointed to the Supreme Court. During his presidency, there were rules that denied African Americans the right to vote despite them being given the opportunity in the 15th Amendment in the country’s constitution (Hart pp. 419-444). However, Hoover was reluctant to taking the initiative of ensuring that these laws were removed from the country giving African Americans the right to vote.
As a move to revive the country from the depression, Hoover decided to return the taxation he had relieved the public. This was a double blow to the citizens as they were to incur other expenses in paying more taxes despite suffering from economic depression (Doenecke pp. 311–340). He led to estate tax being doubled and raised almost all forms of taxes that were being collected from the masses. He was criticized by his rivals for increasing the nation’s debt, heavily taxing the citizens, hampering the growth of trade in the country and increasing tariffs. This resulted to him being defeated convincingly in 1932 presidential elections.
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