WI: Coolidge Runs in 1928

Coolidge likely makes at least some of Hoover's biggest errors, namely signing the Tariff Act into law.

And I don't think Coolidge would have authorized Hoover's proto-New Deal measures like the Hoover Dam or the RFC. So the Great Depression actually might have been worse.
 
If Smith does decide to run for Governor in 1930 and beats out FDR then who do you think the Democrats run for president in 1932. I can't see them running Smith again after the drubbing he took in 1928, McAdoo is probably too old, and Garner probably too southern and anti-labor to get the nomination.
Im not really sure. Perhaps Garner does manage to get it, or maybe Huey Long throws his hat into the ring. Id say it depends on how bad the depression is. Maybe an "outsider" like William Randolph Hearst decides to run
 

Vidal

Donor
Im not really sure. Perhaps Garner does manage to get it, or maybe Huey Long throws his hat into the ring. Id say it depends on how bad the depression is. Maybe an "outsider" like William Randolph Hearst decides to run

Alben Barkley maybe?
 
It would be interesting to see what a non President Hoover would be doing in a FDR Administration.
 
It would be interesting to see what a non President Hoover would be doing in a FDR Administration.

Had Hoover not been President, he might be more associated with the activist views he had as Commerce Secretary than the conservative positions he took from 1929-1933. Though I think he would be a critic of the New Deal. If he leaves office in 1929, and therefore isn't associated with Coolidge's unpopular response to the Depression, he would be in a good position to say "when I was Commerce Secretary I helped revive the economy without sacrificing free enterprise or individual freedoms," putting him in a good position to be nominated for President in 1936 or 1940.
 
Had Hoover not been President, he might be more associated with the activist views he had as Commerce Secretary than the conservative positions he took from 1929-1933. Though I think he would be a critic of the New Deal. If he leaves office in 1929, and therefore isn't associated with Coolidge's unpopular response to the Depression, he would be in a good position to say "when I was Commerce Secretary I helped revive the economy without sacrificing free enterprise or individual freedoms," putting him in a good position to be nominated for President in 1936 or 1940.
Couple of things. Hoover was a progressive. He was considered for the Democratic ticket in 1920. He didn't take conservative positions in 1929-1933. He was just less radical then FDR. People forget the recession of 1920-1921. The government response was to cut taxes and spending and tighten the money supply. Recovery was fast. Hoover responded to the crash of 29 by actively making things worse. He "encouraged" businesses to not cut back, turning a financial crisis into a generally weak economy. He signed Smoot Hawley in 1930. He signed the income tax act of 1932. This created 50 tax brackets and raised the top tax rate from 25% to 63%. Hoover turned a bog standard market correction into the great depression. Coolidge would have kept it as a standard downturn.
 
Couple of things. Hoover was a progressive. He was considered for the Democratic ticket in 1920. He didn't take conservative positions in 1929-1933. He was just less radical then FDR. People forget the recession of 1920-1921. The government response was to cut taxes and spending and tighten the money supply. Recovery was fast. Hoover responded to the crash of 29 by actively making things worse. He "encouraged" businesses to not cut back, turning a financial crisis into a generally weak economy. He signed Smoot Hawley in 1930. He signed the income tax act of 1932. This created 50 tax brackets and raised the top tax rate from 25% to 63%. Hoover turned a bog standard market correction into the great depression. Coolidge would have kept it as a standard downturn.
I agree with you that Hoover did not act as a conservative as president. However I disagree with you that tightening the money supply even further would've helped the issue. In fact, I would argue that was one of the major contributing factors to the depression getting as bad as it got. Hoover absolutely did make things worse, and there are plenty of bad decisions that Coolidge may not have made.
 
I agree with you that Hoover did not act as a conservative as president. However I disagree with you that tightening the money supply even further would've helped the issue. In fact, I would argue that was one of the major contributing factors to the depression getting as bad as it got. Hoover absolutely did make things worse, and there are plenty of bad decisions that Coolidge may not have made.
The money supply thing was for 1920. The Fed actually did tighten the money supply in 1929-1930, disastrously.
 
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let's be honest that would have been a nail-biter if Coolidge had to run again
it would be an interesting turn of events I don't think Huey Long would be the Democratic nominee though
Al Smith most likely gets the nomination again John Nance Garner is most likely his running mate
this is only happening if Franklin delanor Roosevelt does not win the governorship of New York in 1928

also with the added stress Coolidge could die since he died from a blood clot to the heart

does Coolidge do a better job then Hoover personally I'm inclined to think he does but I don't know.

something I do know he will do is not have the same running mate as he did in 1924
 
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let's be honest that would have been a nail-biter if Coolidge had to run again
There's no real reason to think Coolidge would have done better in New York than Hoover did in 1928. Few people today realize how high Hoover's prestige was in 1928--even among ethnic voters inclined to support Smith for religous/Prohibition reasons. For example, the Polish-Americans:

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https://books.google.com/books?id=dt1hXjPYgxAC&pg=PA127

Moreover, while I don't think the "third term" issue would have cost Coolidge many votes, it would probably have cost him some. As I once wrote:

***

I discovered a very interesting thing in reading *The Third-Term Tradition: Its Rise and Collapse in American Politics* [the "collapse" part was obviously premature--the book was published in 1943] by Charles W. Stein: During the mid- to late 1920's, when it was discussed whether President Coolidge would run again in 1928--and many people thought he would, even after the famous "I do not choose to run" statement--the question was usually put as whether Coolidge would seek a "third term" in 1928. There was much debate as to whether the anti-third-term tradition would stand in his way.

Now at first that surprised me, because Coolidge had served only nineteen months of Harding's term. But then it occurred to me: I was approaching the matter wrongly because I was unconsciously assuming that the Twenty-Second Amendment's definition of the anti-third-term rule ("for more than two years of a term for which some other person was elected President" etc.) had already been agreed to. But of course it hadn't been! The Amendment was in the distant future; the anti-third-term tradition was just that--a *tradition*, with no law to define its extent. Hence, people could and did differ on what a "third term" was. (At least prior to Grant's failure to get the GOP nomination in 1880, one could argue that the tradition only prohibited three *consecutive* terms--and of course TR tried to revive that interpretation in 1912, one problem being that it seemed to clash with what he himself had said on Election Night in 1904. [1]) Some argued that the whole no-third-term traditon was silly and should be scrapped, anyway. Others said that the tradition was sacred and should prevent Coolidge from seeking a third term. What would today seem an obvious position--that the tradition was valid, but that Coolidge had not served enough of Harding's term for it to be applicable--was indeed taken by some commentators, but was not quite as widely accepted as might be imagined. Incidentally, one advocate of another term for Coolidge proposed that he should promise if elected to resign on August 2, 1931, so that he would not have served more than eight years!

***

If, as I think, Coolidge would have done no better than Hoover in New York, there is no reason FDR would not have won the governorship. As in OTL, all he would have had to would be to do a little bit better than Smith statewide and get enough Protestant votes Upstate to cancel out the slight advantage Ottinger had (compared to other Republicans) among Jewish voters in New York City.

BTW, any comparison of Coolidge's 1924 showing in New York with Hoover's 1928 perfromance is misleading because in 1924 there was widespread resentment in New York that Smith had been passed over for the nomination for (it was thought) religious reasons. Many New York City Democrats in 1924 voted both for Coolidge for president and Smith for governor--"Cal and Al." Coolidge of course would not have this advantage in 1928.
 
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One partial term (1 year, 7 months, and 2 days), followed by one full term is not a third term 5 years 7 months 8 days. if he was still alive now he would still be able to run again considering a large portion of the American population was more than willing to vote for Theodore Roosevelt in the 1912 presidential election. his was more of a talking point for his political opponents than anything else like how dare they do that and then they turn around and go yeah we're doing what we told you not to do so what typical political BS in my opinion

Calvin Coolidge could pull more minority votes to the Republican party then Hoover could ever hope to do though he was not vocal about it much he was a staunch supporter of civil rights and was an avid enemy of the KKK not to mention the Democratic party is still living with the Specter of Woodrow Wilson support of KKK and with the difference of only 26000 votes in the New York also Calvin Coolidge probably wins Massachusetts and Rhode Island in this scenario considering he was born in Vermont and was the Massachusetts governor and he has a lot more sway within the New England area al Smith's connection to Tammany Hall and although there is no evidence to prove that he was part of the corruption of Tammany Hall being associated with it will hurt his chances.
so I think Calvin Coolidge's coattails could actually pull the Republican over the Finish Line for governor

this is my two cents
 
One partial term (1 year, 7 months, and 2 days), followed by one full term is not a third term 5 years 7 months 8 days. if he was still alive now he would still be able to run again considering a large portion of the American population was more than willing to vote for Theodore Roosevelt in the 1912 presidential election. his was more of a talking point for his political opponents than anything else like how dare they do that and then they turn around and go yeah we're doing what we told you not to do so what typical political BS in my opinion

Calvin Coolidge could pull more minority votes to the Republican party then Hoover could ever hope to do though he was not vocal about it much he was a staunch supporter of civil rights and was an avid enemy of the KKK not to mention the Democratic party is still living with the Specter of Woodrow Wilson support of KKK and with the difference of only 26000 votes in the New York also Calvin Coolidge probably wins Massachusetts and Rhode Island in this scenario considering he was born in Vermont and was the Massachusetts governor and he has a lot more sway within the New England area al Smith's connection to Tammany Hall and although there is no evidence to prove that he was part of the corruption of Tammany Hall being associated with it will hurt his chances.
so I think Calvin Coolidge's coattails could actually pull the Republican over the Finish Line for governor

this is my two cents

I'm not so sure. While Coolidge performed noticeably better than Hoover in New York in 1924, that was against divided opposition during an economic boom. (And as @David T mentioned, the Democratic ticket was harmed in NY by voters who felt that Smith was robbed of the nomination). In 1928, Coolidge would be running against the popular New York Governor. Coolidge had won NYC in 1924, but I doubt he would pull this off in 1928. While Davis had been a conservative West Virginian who was perceived as weak on the KKK, Smith was a New Yorker born and raised who joked that he and the Brooklyn Bridge grew up together. As I have previously mentioned, Hoover's promise to end poverty and his reputation as a progressive would have been more appealing to NY voters than Coolidge's taciturn conservatism. While the economy was roaring in 1928, there had been a recession from 1926 to 1927 and Smith could use this to attack Coolidge.

Because of this, I'm not convinced that Coolidge would have done better than Hoover. In fact, I think he would be less likely to win the state. While I agree that Coolidge would probably win his home state of Massachusetts and Rhode Island, I can also see Smith carrying his own home state of New York. BTW, Coolidge's landslide victory in New York did not result in Theodore Roosevelt Jr defeating Smith in 1924. (TR Jr was actually the only Republican to lose statewide in 1924 despite his famous lineage, war service, and Coolidge's endorsement).
 
Calvin Coolidge could pull more minority votes to the Republican party then Hoover could ever hope to do though he was not vocal about it much he was a staunch supporter of civil rights and was an avid enemy of the KKK

Coolidge did not even condemn the Klan by name in his 1924 campaign--something that even John W. Davis eventually did. He did support anti-lynching legislation "although without great effort" https://books.google.com/books?id=YdNlCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA168 But remember that his secretary (a position roughly similar to later White House chiefs of staff) was C. Bascom Slemp, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._Bascom_Slemp a Virginia ex-congressman and a firm segregationist.

In spite of this, Coolidge would no doubt win the great majority of the Black vote. But so did Hoover--not only in 1928 but in 1932! The majority of Catholic voters would support Smith out of religious pride and oposition to Prohibition against either Hoover or Coolidge, but Hoover's reputation from his humanitarian work in Europe would give him an advantage among ethnic voters that Coolidge did not have.

Again, I do not doubt that Coolidge would win. But there is no reason to think he would do better than Hoover--whose 1928 image as the poor Iowa farm boy who made good, the brilliant businessman-engineer-adminstrator, the great humanitarian, etc. has been eclipsed for subsequent generations by his failures as president.
 
Coolidge did not even condemn the Klan by name in his 1924 campaign--something that even John W. Davis eventually did. He did support anti-lynching legislation "although without great effort" https://books.google.com/books?id=YdNlCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA168 But remember that his secretary (a position roughly similar to later White House chiefs of staff) was C. Bascom Slemp, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._Bascom_Slemp a Virginia ex-congressman and a firm segregationist.

He wasn’t called Silent Cal for nothing. He was, however, a strong supporter of civil rights.

 
Hoover absolutely did make things worse, and there are plenty of bad decisions that Coolidge may not have made
There are two things that would have occurred under Coolidge regardless: Tariff Act - given Coolidge's hard protectionist view, he would not have vetoed it; and second, Fed's monetary policy, because we all know that the Fed made its policies independently from the President, and Silent Cal doesn't look like someone who would have bossed the Fed around. Both of them would have made the Great Depression a true depression.
 
I'd say a 56-22 "no third term" resolution in the Senate (with many Republican supporters) shows the issue did have some support.

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https://books.google.com/books?id=tH_mYP6NuIkC&pg=PA76

I don't think we can say that the third term issue didn't hurt TR in 1912; after all, he was denied the GOP nomination, and the issue was constantly cited by his opponents; even if it was only an excuse, they obviously regarded it as a powerul one. I do not think the issue would have prevented Coolidge from winning renomination and re-election in 1928; but again, it might well have cost him some votes. Not everyone thought that the fact that Coolidge had served much less of Harding's term than TR had of McKinley's should be decisive.

Again, Coolidge is not likely to do better than Hoover in NY - and this reinforces my belief that if anything he is likely to do worse. Smith may very well win New York, and FDR would have little reason to worry about defeat any more than he did IOTL.
 
One interesting thing about these comparisons of Coolidge to Hoover is that they almost never touch on foreign policy. Coolidge compared to Hoover looks almost like an old-fashioned TR-style imperialist in US relations with Latin America, sending Marines to Honduras in 1924 and of course to Nicaragua in 1927, where they stayed for years, trying to hunt down Sandino. Hoover and Stimson gradually wound down the Nicaraguan intervention (as well as the occupation of Haiti which dated back to the Wilson administration), published the Clark Memorandum (which separated the so-called Roosevelt Corollary from the Monroe Doctrine) and helped lay the foundations for FDR's Good Neughbor Policy. Even before his inauguration, Hoover visted Latin America, seeking to improve relations.

One should aslso note that Coolidge failed to make progress in naval disamament at Genevaa in 1927, resulting in something of a new naval arms race. In contrast, Hoover succeeded in London in 1930 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Naval_Treaty although it may well be seen as a pyrrhic victory. But I am not sure that it was the differences between Coolidge and Hoover that were decisive here; rather, after the Wall Street crash, neither the US nor the UK was in a mood for a naval arms race.
 

marktaha

Banned
Film called.Margie set in 1928 featured high school debate on whether or not to take the Marines out of Nicaragua, !
 
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