geeky
The next day Coolidge returned to Washington and was sworn in again by Justice Adolph A. Hoehling Jr. of the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia. The oath was administered without fanfare at the Willard Hotel. Coolidge was a political unknown outside of his home state of Massachusetts, where he had served as Governor, and taken swift action to address a police strike. He had maintained a low profile in the Harding administration and many expected the Republicans to select another candidate in the 1924 election. Coolidge took office just as news of many of the scandals of the Harding administration were coming to light. Coolidge decided to let the Senate investigations of these scandals take their course. But he personally demanded the resignation of Attorney General Harry M. Daugherty after Daugherty refused to cooperate with the congressional probe.
Coolidge addressed Congress when it reconvened on December 6, 1923. In his speech he said that he planned to support many of Harding's policies, including Harding's formal budgeting process, the enforcement of immigration restrictions and arbitration of coal strikes ongoing in Pennsylvania. Coolidge's speech was the first presidential speech to be broadcast over the radio.
One month into his term, the Washington Naval Treaty was proclaimed and it was generally well received in the country. In May 1924, the World War I veterans' World War Adjusted Compensation Act or "Bonus Bill" was passed over his veto. Coolidge signed the Immigration Act later that year, which was aimed at restricting southern and eastern European immigration. He signed the bill, but attached a signing statement in which he expressed his unhappiness with the bill's specific exclusion of Japanese immigrants. He also signed the Revenue Act of 1924, which reduced the top marginal tax rate from 58% to 46%, as well as personal income tax rates across the board, increased the estate tax and bolstered it with a new gift tax. On June 2, 1924, Coolidge signed the act granting citizenship to all Native Americans born in the United States. By that time, two-thirds of the people were already citizens, having gained it through marriage, as military veterans of World War I (who were granted citizenship in 1919), or from land allotments that had earlier taken place.
The Republican Convention was held on June 10–12, 1924, in Cleveland, Ohio. Coolidge had become popular for his handling of the Harding scandals and as a result of a strong economy. He was nominated on the first ballot as the Republican Candidate for President. The Democrats held their convention the next month in New York City and it turned out to be a disaster. The convention took 103 ballots to nominate a candidate, with all of the leading contenders failing to garner sufficient support. The delegates finally settled on a compromise candidate, John W. Davis. During the convention, news broke of the death of his Coolidge's 16 years old younger son Calvin, from an infected blister. Coolidge became withdrawn, and later wrote that when his son died, "the power and glory of the Presidency went with him." Coolidge campaigned without mentioning his opponents by name or maligning them. It was a very subdued campaign, both because of Coolidge's grief, but also because of his naturally non-confrontational style. Coolidge won every state outside the South except Wisconsin (won by third party candidate Senator Robert La Follette of Wisconsin.) Coolidge won the election with 382 electoral votes and the popular vote by 2.5 million over his opponents' combined total.
During Coolidge's presidency, the United States experienced a period of rapid economic growth. His activist Secretary of Commerce, Herbert Hoover, used government resources to promote business efficiency and develop airlines and radio. Coolidge disliked regulation. He appointed commissioners to the Federal Trade Commission and the Interstate Commerce Commission who did little to restrict the activities of businesses under their jurisdiction. His Secretary of the Treasury, Andrew Mellon, advocated "scientific taxation", a theory that believed that lowering taxes would increase, rather than decrease, government revenue. Congress agreed, and tax rates were reduced under Coolidge. But Coolidge also reduced government spending. In addition to the Revenue Act of 1924, tax rates were reduced again in the Revenue Acts of 1926 and 1928, all the while continuing to keep spending down so as to reduce the overall federal debt. By 1927, only the wealthiest 2% of taxpayers paid any federal income tax. A quarter of the federal debt was retired under Coolidge's watch.
The most contentious issue of Coolidge's presidency was relief for farmers. Some in Congress proposed a bill designed to fight falling agricultural prices by allowing the federal government to purchase crops to sell abroad at lower prices. Agriculture Secretary Henry C. Wallace and other administration officials favored the bill when it was introduced in 1924. Many in Congress believed that the bill was unnecessary because commodity prices were rising. The bill was defeated. In 1926, with farm prices falling once more, Senator Charles L. McNary and Representative Gilbert N. Haugen, both Republicans, proposed the McNary–Haugen Farm Relief Bill. The bill proposed a federal farm board that would purchase surplus production in high-yield years and hold it for later sale. Coolidge opposed the bill. He said that agriculture must stand "on an independent business basis." Instead he favored instead Herbert Hoover's proposal to increase profitability by modernizing agriculture. Secretary Mellon also opposed the bill, saying it was likely to cause inflation. The bill was defeated.
After McNary-Haugen's defeat, Coolidge supported the Curtis-Crisp Act, which would have created a federal board to lend money to farm co-operatives in times of surplus. That bill also did not pass. In February 1927, Congress took up the McNary-Haugen bill again, this time narrowly passing it. Coolidge vetoed it the bill. In his veto message, he said that in his opinion the bill would do nothing to help farmers, benefiting only exporters and expanding the federal bureaucracy. Congress did not override the veto, but it passed the bill again in May 1928 by an increased majority. Once again, Coolidge vetoed it. Coolidge, whose father had been a farmer, said "Farmers never have made much money. I do not believe we can do much about it."
In his second term Coolidge was criticized for his actions during the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927, the worst natural disaster to hit the Gulf Coast until Hurricane Katrina in 2005. He did eventually name Secretary Hoover to a commission in charge of flood relief, but otherwise his did not view flood control as a federal issue. He did not believe that personally visiting the region after the floods would accomplish anything, and saw it as mere political grandstanding. He also did not want to incur the federal spending that flood control would require. He saw it as a state issue. Congress saw the issue differently and passed a compromise flood relief bill in 1928, which Coolidge quietly signed on May 15.
Coolidge spoke in favor of the civil rights of African-Americans, saying in his first State of the Union address that their rights were "just as sacred as those of any other citizen" under the U.S. Constitution and that it was a "public and a private duty to protect those rights." He repeatedly called for laws to make lynching a federal crime (it was already a state crime, one that was never enforced). Congress refused to pass any such legislation. In a speech in October 1924, Coolidge stressed tolerance of differences as an American value and thanked immigrants for their contributions to U.S. society, saying that they have "contributed much to making our country what it is."
Coolidge believed that Warren Harding's victory as President in 1920 was a rejection of the Woodrow Wilson's position that the United States should join the League of Nations. He believed that the League did not serve American interests, and he did not support U.S. membership. Coolidge authorized the Dawes Plan, a financial plan by Charles Dawes, to provide Germany partial relief from its reparations obligations from World War I. The plan was initially provided stimulus for the German economy. Coolidge also sponsored the Geneva Naval Conference in 1927, which failed to reach any accord due to a French and Italian boycott and ultimate failure of Great Britain and the United States to agree on cruiser tonnages. The Kellogg–Briand Pact of 1928, named for Coolidge's Secretary of State, Frank B. Kellogg, and French foreign minister Aristide Briand, was also a key peacekeeping initiative. The treaty, ratified in 1929, committed signatories—the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, and Japan—to "renounce war, as an instrument of national policy in their relations with one another." The treaty did not prevent the outbreak of World War II, but it did provide the founding principle for international law after that war.
Coolidge led the U.S. delegation to the Sixth International Conference of American States, held from January 15–17, 1928, in Havana, Cuba. It was the only international trip Coolidge made during his presidency. He would be the last sitting American president to visit Cuba until Barack Obama in 2016.
In the summer of 1927, Coolidge vacationed in the Black Hills of South Dakota. He made Custer State Park his "summer White House." While on vacation, Coolidge surprised everyone, including First Lady Grace Coolidge, when he issued a terse statement announcing that he would not seek a second full term as president. He said: "I do not choose to run for President in 1928. If I take another term, I will be in the White House till 1933. Ten years in Washington is longer than any other man has had it—too long!" In his memoirs, Coolidge wrote: "The Presidential office takes a heavy toll of those who occupy it and those who are dear to them. While we should not refuse to spend and be spent in the service of our country, it is hazardous to attempt what we feel is beyond our strength to accomplish."
After leaving office, he and Grace returned to Northampton, where he wrote his memoirs. The Republicans retained the White House in 1928 with a landslide by Herbert Hoover. Coolidge had been reluctant to endorse Hoover as his successor.Privately, he said of Hoover, "for six years that man has given me unsolicited advice—all of it bad."