Calvin Coolidge

 Guest Post by Eli Norlander

Calvin Coolidge became the 30^th president of the United States following the sudden death of President Warren G. Harding in 1923. Before his role as Vice President, he had a career in both the State Senate and House of Representatives for Massachusetts. He was well regarded in both the growing Progressive Party and Republican Party. This was because he consistently ran as a Republican but had strongly held views that the Progressive Party valued, most notably, women’s suffrage. He wrote a piece titled “Have Faith in Massachusetts,” in which he appealed to the political importance of Massachusetts both to the United States and also the world in how it set the example for a strong economy and government leaders that had strong church ties. This piece was very highly thought of in his state, which propelled Coolidge to the office of Lieutenant Governor for two years and then Governor of Massachusetts for two more, before being selected as Harding’s running mate. Well documented as a shy, more introverted individual, during the campaign, Coolidge would travel throughout the northeast US, only allowing small crowds of people he was familiar with to hear his concise speeches. Also historically documented, the office of Vice President holds few powers, and this worked well for “Silent Cal.” He was the first Vice President to sit in on cabinet meetings, which allowed him to sit and observe. He was known as a well-spoken individual when he did choose to speak publicly. Warren G. Harding passed away, leaving Coolidge to take over a cabinet that included divisive individuals like Herbert Hoover, who eventually would lead the nation into the Great Depression, and Albert Fall, who was exposed for the Teapot Dome scandal.

Coolidge is relevant to the Mitchell family due to his conflict with Billy Mitchell. He was focused primarily on limiting government spending and reducing the budget of the federal government. This did not align with Billy Mitchell’s goals of establishing a separate branch of the military for air power and air travel research. It was under his administration that Billy Mitchell was court martialed, tried, and convicted of felonies due to his outspokenness and detailed press activity documenting Coolidge’s decisions. While Billy Mitchell was very outspoken in his opposition to Coolidge, the President did not respond in great volume to the criticisms from one of the Army’s most notable and well-respected leaders. For the Twitter reenactment, I will be doing a handful of the tweets as if I am tweeting from the social media team from the White House and a larger portion from Coolidge himself. Since Coolidge was not necessarily the most impactful president, I will maybe try to find a balance between being a context character, providing a character for the Billy Mitchell tweeters to make replies to, and overall attempting to seem to be avoiding the conflict and begrudgingly beginning to respond after pestering from Billy. Importantly, I will be responding after Coolidge is out of office and the country begins the Great Depression period, as someone who is apologetic and hoping to reconcile with the country who he led into financial failure.

Follow @POTUSCoolidge on Twitter.