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A PUBLICATION OF THE PRESIDENTIAL FOUNDATION COOLIDGE

JULY 2016 • VOLUME 1 • ISSUE 2

MESSY AND CLEAN CONVENTIONS: TWO STORIES BY GARLAND S. TUCKER III

THE FRACAS Many historic precedents of con- tentious conventions can be cited, but First, Americans heard Donald the granddaddy of them all was, without Trump crying foul at the very mention of question, the 1924 Democratic National a “contested” convention and warning om- Convention. By the time convention dele- inously of “trouble” from his supporters if gates convened in on June they were denied a rst ballot victory. Next 24, 1924, there was ample evidence that came Bernie Sanders alleging a “rigged” the Democratic Party was deeply divided. outcome and predicting a “messy” conven- As the leading quipster of the day, Finley tion if super delegates denied his claim to Peter Dunne (“Mr. Dooley”) wrote, “ e the nomination. While it has been several Dimmycratic Party ain’t on speakin’ terms decades since we have seen a contested with itself.” Former President Wilson’s convention, such conventions are not un- son-in-law, William Gibbs McAdoo was precedented in U.S. history. The parties running, campaigning on his experience have not only survived contested conven- as Wilson’s Treasury Secretary. Opposing tions, but these contested conventions McAdoo was New York governor Al have often nominated good candidates. Smith. The men squared off over the However, there are some serious warning main issues – with a generous portion of signs, and both parties, as they come face personal animosity thrown in. Each held to face with the possibility of “messy” 2016 enough delegate votes to prevent the conventions, should heed them. other from being nominated. At that time the Democratic Party labored under the requirement of a two-thirds nominating majority, and it was clear neither Smith nor McAdoo could make it. To make matters worse, the social issues of the day provoked a white-hot fervor in the candidates and their fol- lowers. Prohibition, immigration, and the were the issues, and there appeared to be no room for compromise. The convention opened with an explo- sive  oor ght over the party platform. Record-setting temperatures outside THE SCENE OF THE FIGHT: produced what reporters called “furnace- like air in the draped hall that kept fans and straw hats waiving vigorously.” By the Stanford White’s Madison Square Garden, the convention’s third day, the Washington Post site of the 1924 Democratic National Convention (Courtesy of the New-York Historical Society). was running the headline: “Delegates in Fist Fights on Floor Over Klan.”

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Al Smith and his anti-Prohibition Other nominations of McAdoo and a Second, it’s possible in the midst of forces had the whiskey flowing, while string of favorite son candidates followed bitter acrimony and division for a party to McAdoo and his pro-Prohibition del- until after 4:00 a.m. The following day nominate a good candidate. The leading egates piously called for divine retribution the balloting began. The first roll call columnist of that day, Walter Lippmann, against the “big city wets.” Former Secre- vote had McAdoo with 431, Smith with wrote this about the 1924 Democratic con- tary of the Navy and veteran Democratic 241, and the rest far behind. Because of vention: “In this case the delegates, who had warhorse Josephus Daniels wrote from the two-thirds requirement, a candidate looked into a witches’ cauldron of hatred the convention to the folks back home in would need approximately 640 delegate and disunion, yielded to a half-conscious North Carolina, “ is convention is chock votes to secure the nomination. By July 1, judgment which was far more reliable than full of religion. It eats religion, dreams it, fteen ballots had been cast with hardly their common sense. For they turned to the smokes it.” He warned the Democrats any movement among the candidates, one candidate (Davis) who embodied those not to forsake “the McAdoo: 479, very qualities for lack of which the party denunciation of Smith: 305. had almost destroyed itself.” Republicans for By July 3, the Third, although John W. Davis religious warfare convention sailed was as ne a man as ever nominated by among themselves.” past the old either party, the serious divisions brought Former U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain John After endless Democratic Party forward at the convention ruined his W. Davis, the 1924 Democratic presidential wrangling and record of fifty- general election prospects. As Franklin nominee (Courtesy of the ). grandstand- seven ballots set Roosevelt wrote to a friend in the fall of ing, the conven- in 1860, and the 1924, “We defeated ourselves in New York tion staggered to seventieth ballot in June.” With party divisions running so BORING the adoption of a was still McAdoo: deep and personal animosities between TOWARD VICTORY platform that was 415, Smith: 323. McAdoo and Smith, it was impossible for noteworthy only The acrimony the Democrats to rally around Davis and for its failure to was pervasive. In win the election. As the Republican Party prepares to confront the big historian David This final point should be sobering convene its nominating convention in issues. Nothing Burner’s words, to both the GOP and the Democratic Cleveland in July 2016, the party could of substance was “ e deadlock that Party in July 2016. Contested conven- well look back to 1924 with genuine nos- said about prohi- developed might tions have not usually been as bitter as talgia. It was also in Cleveland that the bition, immigra- as well have [been] the 1924 Democratic convention, but the party faithful gathered in 1924, but what tion, the League between the big winner in any “messy” convention has a di erence 92 years can make.  e 1924 of Nations, or the and the Imperial usually been the opposing party. Republican convention was universally KKK.  e platform Wizard of the proclaimed “one of the dullest in history,” e Painesville Telegraph reports did make a gracious from the 1924 Democratic Convention. KKK, so solidly while the 2016 convention promises to be acknowledgement did the Catholic a bit more lively. of President Hard- delegates support One thing that has not changed in 92 ing’s recent death; Smith and the years is the fact that Cleveland is a logical but even that was contested.  e original Klan delegates support McAdoo.” Some host city for the Republicans. No Re- wording stated, “Our Party stands uncov- reporters claimed even the prohibition publican president has ever been elected ered at the bier of Warren G. Harding….” forces were drunk by this point. without carrying the state of Ohio. In But and the Finally on July 9, Smith released his 1924, Cleveland symbolized the auto- prohibitionists insisted on substituting delegates and McAdoo very grudgingly motive manufacturing boom that was “grave” for “bier,” lest some of their sup- followed suit, and a compromise candi- propelling the American economy to un- porters back home take o ense! date secured the nomination on the 103rd precedented prosperity.  e Cleveland of Then came the primary task of ballot. John W. Davis, a former U.S. Am- 2016 is hardly a boomtown, but Ohio’s nominating a candidate – and the real bassador to Great Britain, was at last the electoral votes are still crucially important reworks began. Seizing his home court nominee, and the longest and bitterest to winning the presidency. advantage, packed Madison convention in American history merci- By , as the delegates began Square Garden with his supporters fully came to an end. to converge on Cleveland’s shiny new and practically blew off the roof with What can be learned from all this? 12,000-seat Public Auditorium, it was Franklin D. Roosevelt’s inspirational speech, what newspapers called “terrifying  ree points: in which Roosevelt lifted spirits and declared apparent to all that Calvin Coolidge pandemonium.” Smith’s fans warmed to First, America indeed has a history of Gov. Al Smith America’s “Happy Warrior,” would be the nominee. Coolidge was rst his civil libertarian message against racist contested conventions. Although such con- was a high point at the 1924 Democratic known as “the accidental president” as National Convention (Courtesy of the Franklin violence and prohibition. Opponents ventions can be testing, the republic and the D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum). he had ascended to the presidency at the balked at Smith’s urban liberalism. political parties have survived them. death of Warren Harding a year earlier.

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Coolidge had masterfully consoli- Old Col. Coolidge had turned down Coolidge played that hand masterfully, dated his hold on the Republican Party the invitation of the Republican National by remaining distant and low-key.  e se- during his “honeymoon period” of public Committee to attend the convention lection of Charles Dawes as vice presidential goodwill. He had managed both to push because his spring planting was “a little candidate was not as smooth as Coolidge’s forward Harding’s popular, conservative later than normal this year,” but the party nomination, but what mattered was that agenda and, at the same time, to disas- installed a new radio Dawes’s name rein- sociate himself from the scandals that in the same simple OUR RIVAL’S SON forced the matter- emerged after Harding’s death. Indeed, as living room where Politics divide, but politics also bring of-fact culture of the William Allen White was to write about son Calvin had taken Americans together. That became abun- campaign. After all, Coolidge, he was already resonating with the oath of o ce the dantly clear in, of all places, Madison Square Dawes was known the public as “this cautious, unassuming preceding year. Garden during the Democratic Conven- as an enforcer and a Vermonter who embodied the virtues of The June 13 tion.  e party was struggling in its e ort budgeteer. probity and moderation, dutifulness and New York Times to select a candidate to run against the Re- Fate also kept thrift.” headline proclaimed, publican President, Calvin Coolidge.  ere Coolidge quiet. Coolidge’s rst year had been so suc- “Colonel Coolidge was plenty of hostility being leveled at the The weeks follow- Delegates crowded in at Cleveland’s Public Grand Old Party as well, while the GOP cessful that his only challenge came from Auditorium during the 1924 Republican National In Tears Hears ing the convention friends were referring to the Democratic the most extreme fringe of the progres- Convention. President Calvin Coolidge was not Son Nominated.” witnessed the tragic among them, as sitting presidents did not ordi- convention as a “Klanbake,” to underscore sive wing of the GOP. By 1924, Senator narily attend their own nominating conventions  e article went on the presence of the Ku Klux Klan. and unexpected “Fighting Bob” La Follette of Wisconsin in those days (Courtesy of the Library of Congress). to report, “As the But at 10:50 p.m. on the night of death of Coolidge’s had concluded he had best ght outside cheers which greeted Monday, July 7, around the time the 84th 16-year-old son, the GOP and moved to revive the old the President’s name ballot failed, the chairman, Senator David Calvin, Jr. Coolidge Progressive Party of  eodore Roosevelt. Apparently the manufacturing of wire came to him through Walsh surprised the crowd by calling for spent much of the In response, Coolidge skillfully courted a nails was a Cleveland specialty. In any the air, the old man’s a pause. Something near silence lled the rest of the campaign number of the more moderate Republi- event, things got so dull that humorist eyes watered, but his Garden. Then Walsh spoke into the mi- period in mourning can progressives, especially Idaho Senator Will Rogers, the Jon Stewart of the era, nerves were steady crophone, just a few words.  e president’s – making him a , and convinced them to advised Cleveland “to open up its churches and he calmly took son, sixteen-year-old Calvin, Jr. had died distant and (to suddenly and unexpectedly. remain in the GOP. By the opening of the to liven things up a bit.” out his watch and voters) increasingly A low moan built in the hall as the Cleveland convention, La Follette’s threat The convention organizers left timed each long crowd responded to what Walsh had said. fascinating gure. from the left was decidedly fading. nothing to chance.  ere was to be only round of applause.”  e sound of the grief as it traveled around After the Cleve- As the delegates began to assemble one name placed into nomination before That picture the room, e New York Times wrote, sug- land convention, in Cleveland, there was very little excite- the balloting began. A lengthy nominat- of Col. Coolidge gested the “nearness of the the Progressives ment in the air. As one newspaper noted, ing speech was followed by nine second- by the radio was to every American home and the solicitous continued to fade. “Except for some anticipation about a ing speeches after which the convention worth a thousand regard in which all people hold their presi- While La Follette fight for the vice presidential nomina- chairman swiftly brought down his gavel pages of newsprint. dent.” A country exhausted by politics came took a handsome tion, the preparation for this conven- to close the nominations.  e most mem- The American together over the death of the boy. Wrote 16.6 percent of tion as a whole went ahead with almost orable line of the night was when one of public seemed con- the Times’ editors: “ eir sorrows are his, the popular vote as much quiet and decorum as a New the seconders thundered, “Coolidge never vinced that Calvin as he frequently testi es, but in an especial in November, the sense his grief is also theirs.” England town meeting.”  e opening cer- wasted any time, never wasted any words, Coolidge was indeed Progressive candi- emonies proceeded tediously as Harding and never wasted any public money.”  e the real thing – an date carried only was hailed as “the fallen warrior” and candidate could not have stated the case unassuming, honest, hardworking, and his home state of Wisconsin. Coolidge by Coolidge as his “most worthy successor.” better himself, and the delegates respond- thrifty New England patriot. contrast managed 54 percent, an absolute Fully 4,000 of the auditorium’s 12,000 ed by making his nomination unanimous. The dissension at New York cost the majority of the general election vote, seats were empty, the other 8,000 were Only Will Rogers seemed despondent: Democrats dearly. The Democrats dealt winning more popular support than the lled with delegates struggling to remain “I’ve been longin’ to attend a convention Coolidge a winning political hand. other two parties combined. awake. There was obviously no drama and see the excitement. Now, when I do here; for, although Coolidge would not be get a chance, I draw this one.” nominated formally until two days later in In the midst of this well-choreographed GARLAND S. TUCKER III is Chairman of Triangle Capital the week, the convention on opening day tedium, there was one amusing side note. Corporation, Raleigh, N.C., a New York Stock Exchange listed announced the delegation that would of- Ever vigilant for an opportunity to under- specialty finance company and the author of The High Tide of cially notify him of his nomination. gird the president’s homespun image, the American Conservatism: Davis, Coolidge and the 1924 Election e New York Herald Tribune headline Coolidge managers had ensured that the (Emerald Books, 2010) and Conservative Heroes: Fourteen Leaders ran, “Convention Runs as Smoothly as press was covering the president’s father, Who Shaped America – Je erson to Reagan (ISI Books, 2015). He is Machine  at Makes Nails.”  e reporter Col. John Coolidge, up in Vermont. Earlier also a trustee of the Calvin Coolidge Presidential Foundation. noted that the convention was “methodical that week, headlines announced, “Crops as a machine that makes wire nails.” Keep Coolidge’s Father From Cleveland.”

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enjoyed the prosperity of the Harding- early 1930s there were also many people “1932: THE RISE OF HITLER AND FDR” Coolidge years in the 1920s. moving over from the Communist Party su ered as a result of the defeat of the to the Nazi Party as the Nazis were on AN INTERVIEW WITH DAVID PIETRUSZA World War and the in ation of the 1920s, the verge of taking power. It’s been said which left millions of people unem- that many members of the Nazi Party, ployed. Germany was moving away from particularly the storm troopers, were like a traditional moral basis and towards steaks: “brown [Nazi] on the outside; red DAVID PIETRUSZA is a bestselling author, historian, and more modern attitudes.  e society was [Communist] on the inside.” You also saw National Advisory Board member of the Calvin Coolidge really becoming unhinged. Beyond that, that many prominent Nazis, particularly Presidential Foundation. Pietrusza has written or edited relatively few people were wedded to its Joseph Goebbels and Gregor Strasser, over three dozen books, including Silent Cal’s Almanack: e Weimar republican system, which was were very left-wing individuals. It’s Homespun Wit and Wisdom of Vermont’s Calvin Coolidge. He imposed upon it at the end of World very di cult to call them right wingers. discusses his latest book, 1932: e Rise of Hitler and FDR— War I.  e Nazis, of course, opposed the Goebbels at one early point in his career Two Tales of Politics, Betrayal, and Unlikely Destiny, in this Republic.  e ultra-nationalists opposed even described himself as a “National interview with the Coolidge Foundation. it. The Communists opposed it. The Bolshevik.” And beyond that, the Nazi (Photo Courtesy of David Pietrusza) Socialists and the Catholic Center Party Party was not merely anti-Semitic, it was supported Weimar, but they became a profoundly anti-Christian, particularly smaller and more marginal portion of the in the personalities of Alfred Rosenberg electorate as the Depression gathered force. and Martin Bormann and the early Nazi- COOLIDGE FOUNDATION of course, competed in that little matter America still supported the conven- backed presidential candidate Erich von (CCPF): You are very good at taking a called World War II.  ere are a multitude tions of its constitutional system to a large Ludendor . pivotal year and building a historical of di erences between the two men, but degree, including support for a balanced narrative from it. What is the signifi- there are also similarities. Both overcome budget and a market capitalist system. cance of that approach? adversity. Both are masters of the spoken  is is why FDR’s program and the 1932 COOLIDGE word. Both employ new technologies to Democratic Platform can appear so con- QUARTERLY DAVID PIETRUSZA (DP): People get their messages across. Both are very servative at times when compared to what EDITOR complain that history is dull. It’s not, but good at organizing political campaigns. was on o er in Germany and elsewhere a historian must confront that perception, We remember that last point about FDR. in Europe in those days. Rushad omas to convey a sense of drama, to build a nar- We tend to forget it about Hitler. DESIGNER rative around struggle, and, in this case, Both were intensely ambitious. All CCPF: You point out that was, Bergman Group around the competition of two decisive politicians are ambitious after all, some in many respects, a left-wing phenom- PRINTER elections. In discussing elections you more than others.  ey were both under- enon. How so? analyze people who are very well known. estimated. Hitler came from nothing, lit- Red House Press People know the presidents. Once you erally from the gutter, and people thought DP: Let us not forget that on the most STAFF OF THE have the combination of all that drama, of he was going to end up having nothing. basic level Nazism is, simply, “National COOLIDGE FOUNDATION the competition of an election, of person- Roosevelt emerged from a very soft, very Socialism.” It’s a variant of socialism. It alities that people know, then you can also privileged background, and even many emphasizes the collective, though with CHAIRMAN instruct readers not only on the process prominent Democrats of the time (such its very special racialist twist. Di erences Amity Shlaes and the personalities but on the back as Walter Lippmann, Bernard Baruch, or between left-wing and right-wing in the EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR story of what transpired in a particular Heywood Broun) assumed he was simply American and European models can often year, place, or era. a rich lightweight, someone lacking be very confusing. What is seen as being on Matthew Denhart any great sense of ideas, xed principles, the Right in Europe may not be what we PROGRAM AND CCPF: Hitler and FDR were chalk and or even political integrity. He was an Americans consider “conservative” at all. It EDITORIAL ASSOCIATE cheese in many respects. In what ways unknown regarding what he would do in could be authoritarian or even monarchist. Rushad omas did their lives intersect? the White House. Sometimes, it turns out, In America generally what we talk about as PROGRAM ASSOCIATE it’s not such a bad thing to be underesti- being on the Right is anti-statism. It’s small DP: There’s a significant chronological mated in politics. government. It’s constitutional. It is not Rob Hammer intersection between the lives of Adolf necessarily those things in Europe at all. EDUCATION DIRECTOR Hitler and Franklin D. Roosevelt. For CCPF: What were America and There were similarities not only Diane Kemble the purposes of this book, of course, it’s Germany like in 1932, and how did the between the Socialists and the Nazis in OFFICE ADMINISTRATOR the fact that both of them run for presi- conditions of the two countries lead to terms of government control over various dent in 1932 and assume power in early the elections of these peculiar men? aspects of the economy and life, but also Kelly Larson 1933, Hitler in late January and Roosevelt DP: Both countries were a mess because between the Nazis and the Communists. ACCOUNTING MANAGER in early March. They also died within a of the Great Depression. But Germany  ey were totalitarian.  ey were opposed Jonathan Guy matter of weeks of each other in 1945 and, was a far more wounded society. America to the Weimar Republic, and in the

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