29th president of the United States from 1921 to 1923"Warren Harding" redirects here. For other uses, see Warren Harding (disambiguation).

Warren Gamaliel Harding (November 2, 1865 – August 2, 1923) was the 29th president of the United States serving from 1921 until his death in 1923. He was a member of the Republican Party and one of the most popular sitting U.S. presidents. After his death, a number of scandals were exposed, including Teapot Dome, as well as an extramarital affair with Nan Britton, which diminished his regard.

Harding lived in rural Ohio all his life, except when political service took him elsewhere. As a young man, he bought The Marion Star and built it into a successful newspaper. Harding served in the Ohio State Senate from 1900 to 1904, and was lieutenant governor for two years. He was defeated for governor in 1910, but was elected to the United States Senate in 1914, the state's first direct election for that office. Harding ran for the Republican nomination for president in 1920, but was considered a long shot before the convention. When the leading candidates could not garner a majority, and the convention deadlocked, support for Harding increased, and he was nominated on the tenth ballot. He conducted a front porch campaign, remaining mostly in Marion, and allowed the people to come to him. He promised a return to normalcy of the pre-World War I period, and won in a landslide over Democrat James M. Cox, to become the first sitting senator elected president.

Harding appointed a number of respected figures to his cabinet, including Andrew Mellon at Treasury, Herbert Hoover at Commerce, and Charles Evans Hughes at the State Department. A major foreign policy achievement came with the Washington Naval Conference of 1921–1922, in which the world's major naval powers agreed on a naval limitations program that lasted a decade. Harding released political prisoners who had been arrested for their opposition to World War I.

Harding's Interior Secretary, Albert B. Fall, and his Attorney General, Harry Daugherty, were each later tried for corruption in office. Fall was convicted though Daugherty was not. These and other scandals greatly damaged Harding's posthumous reputation; he is generally regarded as one of the worst presidents in U.S. history. Harding died of a heart attack in San Francisco while on a western tour, and was succeeded by Vice President Calvin Coolidge.

Contents

• 1 Early life and career
  • 1.1 Childhood and education
  • 1.2 Editor
  • 1.3 Marriage
  • 1.4 Start in politics
• 2 Rising politician (1897–1919)
  • 2.1 State senator
  • 2.2 Ohio state leader
  • 2.3 U.S. senator
    • 2.3.1 Election of 1914
    • 2.3.2 Junior senator
• 3 Presidential election of 1920
  • 3.1 Primary campaign
  • 3.2 Convention
  • 3.3 General election campaign
• 4 Presidency (1921–1923)
  • 4.1 Inauguration and appointments
  • 4.2 Foreign policy
    • 4.2.1 European relations and formally ending the war
    • 4.2.2 Disarmament
    • 4.2.3 Latin America
  • 4.3 Domestic policy
    • 4.3.1 Postwar recession and recovery
    • 4.3.2 Mellon's tax cuts
    • 4.3.3 Embracing new technologies
    • 4.3.4 Business and labor
    • 4.3.5 Civil rights and immigration
    • 4.3.6 Eugene Debs and political prisoners
    • 4.3.7 Judicial appointments
  • 4.4 Political setbacks and western tour
• 5 Death and funeral
• 6 Scandals
  • 6.1 Teapot Dome
  • 6.2 Justice Department
  • 6.3 Veterans' Bureau
• 7 Extramarital affairs
• 8 Historical view
• 9 See also
• 10 Notes
• 11 References
• 12 Bibliography
• 13 External links

Early life and career

Childhood and education

Harding's home in Marion, Ohio

Warren Harding was born on November 2, 1865, in Blooming Grove, Ohio. Nicknamed "Winnie" as a small child, he was the eldest of eight children born to George Tryon Harding (1843–1928; usually known as Tryon) and Phoebe Elizabeth (née Dickerson) Harding (1843–1910). Phoebe was a state-licensed midwife. Tryon farmed and taught school near Mount Gilead. Through apprenticeship and a year of medical school, Tryon became a doctor and started a small practice. Some of Harding's maternal ancestors were Dutch, including the wealthy Van Kirk family. Harding also had ancestors from England, Wales and Scotland.

It was rumored by a political opponent in Blooming Grove that one of Harding's great-grandmothers was African American. His great-great-grandfather Amos Harding claimed that a thief, who had been caught in the act by the family, started the rumor in an attempt at extortion or revenge. In 2015, genetic testing of Harding's descendants determined, with more than a 95% chance of accuracy, that he lacked sub-Saharan African forebears within four generations.

In 1870, the Harding family, who were abolitionists, moved to Caledonia, where Tryon acquired The Argus, a local weekly newspaper. At The Argus, Harding, from the age of 11, learned the basics of the newspaper business. In late 1879, at the age of 14, Harding enrolled at his father's alma mater—Ohio Central College in Iberia—where he proved an adept student. He and a friend put out a small newspaper, the Iberia Spectator, during their final year at Ohio Central, intended to appeal to both the college and the town. During his final year, the Harding family moved to Marion, about 6 miles (10:km) from Caledonia, where he joined them upon graduation in 1882.

Editor

In Harding's youth, the majority of the population still lived on farms and in small towns. He spent much of his life in Marion, a small city in rural central Ohio, and became closely *ociated with it. When Harding rose to high office, he spoke of his love of Marion and its way of life, telling of the many young Marionites who had left and enjoyed success elsewhere, while suggesting that the man, once the "pride of the school", who had remained behind and become a janitor, was "the happiest one of the lot".

Upon graduating, Harding had stints as a teacher and as an insurance man, and made a brief attempt at studying law. He then raised $300 (equivalent to $8,700 in 2021) in partnership with others to purchase a failing newspaper, The Marion Star, the weakest of the city's three papers, and its only daily. The 18-year-old Harding used the railroad p* that came with the paper to attend the 1884 Republican National Convention, where he hobnobbed with better-known journalists and supported the presidential nominee, former Secretary of State James G. Blaine. Harding returned from Chicago to find that the paper had been reclaimed by the sheriff for outstanding debts. During the election campaign, Harding worked for the Marion Democratic Mirror and was annoyed at having to praise the Democratic presidential nominee, New York Governor Grover Cleveland, who won the election. Afterward, with the financial aid of his father, the budding newspaperman redeemed the paper.

Through the late 1880s, Harding built the Star. Although the city of Marion tended to vote Republican (as did Ohio), Marion County was Democratic. Harding therefore adopted a tempered editorial stance, declaring the daily Star nonpartisan and circulating a weekly edition that was moderate Republican. This policy attracted advertisers and put the town's Republican weekly out of business. According to his biographer, Andrew Sinclair:

The success of Harding with the Star was certainly in the model of Horatio Alger. He started with nothing, and through working, stalling, bluffing, withholding payments, borrowing back wages, boasting, and manipulating, he turned a dying rag into a powerful small-town newspaper. Much of his success had to do with his good looks, affability, enthusiasm, and persistence, but he was also lucky. As Machiavelli once pointed out, cleverness will take a man far, but he cannot do without good fortune.

The population of Marion grew from 4,000 in 1880 to twice that in 1890, increasing to 12,000 by 1900. This growth helped the Star, and Harding did his best to promote the city, purchasing stock in many local enterprises. Although a few of these turned out badly, he was a successful investor, with an estate of $850,000 in 1923 (equivalent to $13.52:million in 2021). According to biographer John Dean, Harding's "civic influence was that of an activist who used his editorial page to effectively keep his nose—and a prodding voice—in all the town's public business". He became an ardent supporter of Republican Governor Joseph B. Foraker. He is the only U.S. president to have had full-time journalism experience.

Marriage

Harding first came to know Florence Kling as the daughter of Amos Kling, a local banker and developer. He was a man accustomed to getting his way, but Harding attacked him relentlessly in the paper. Amos involved Florence in all his affairs, taking her to work from the time she could walk. As hard-headed as her father, Florence Kling came into conflict with her father after returning from music college. She eloped with Pete deWolfe, and returned to Marion without deWolfe, but with an infant, Marshall, Amos agreed to raise the boy, but would not support Florence, who made a living as a piano teacher; one of her students was Harding's sister Charity. By 1886, Florence Kling had obtained a divorce, and she and Harding were courting.

A truce between the Klings was snuffed out by the budding match. Amos Kling believed that the Hardings had African American blood, and was also offended by Harding's editorials. He started to spread rumors of Harding's supposed black heritage, and encouraged local businessmen to boycott Harding's business interests. When Harding found out what Kling was doing, according to Dean, Harding warned him "that he would beat the tar out of the little man if he didn't cease".}}

The Hardings were married on July 8, 1891, at their new home on Mount Vernon Avenue in Marion, which they had designed together in the Queen Anne style. The marriage produced no children. Harding affectionately called his wife "the *ss" for a character in a serial from The New York Sun who kept a close eye on "the Duke" and their money. Florence Harding became deeply involved in her husband's career, both at the Star and after he entered politics. Exhibiting her father's determination and business sense, she helped turn the Star into a profitable enterprise through her tight management of the paper's circulation department. She has been credited with helping Harding achieve more than he might have alone; some have suggested that she pushed him all the way to the White House.

Start in politics

Soon after purchasing the Star, Harding turned his attention to politics, supporting Joseph B. Foraker in his first successful bid for governor in 1885. Foraker was part of the war generation that challenged older Ohio Republicans, such as Senator John Sherman, for control of state politics. Harding, always a party loyalist, supported Foraker in the complex internecine warfare that was Ohio Republican politics. Harding was willing to tolerate Democrats as necessary to a two-party system, but had only contempt for those who bolted the Republican Party to join third-party movements. He was a delegate to the Republican state convention in 1888, at the age of 22, representing Marion County, and was most often elected a delegate until becoming president.

Harding's work as an editor took a toll on his health. From age 23 to 35, he required five admissions to the Battle Creek Sanitorium for reasons Sinclair described as "fatigue, overstrain, and nervous illnesses". Dean ties these visits to early occurrences of the heart ailment that killed Harding at age 57. During one such absence from Marion, in 1894, the Star's business manager quit, and Florence Harding took his place. She became her husband's top *istant at the Star on the business side, maintaining her role until the Hardings moved to Washington in 1915. Her competence allowed Harding to travel to make speeches—his use of the free railroad p* increased greatly after his marriage. Florence Harding practiced strict economy and wrote of Harding, "he does well when he listens to me and poorly when he does not".

In 1892, Harding traveled to Washington, where he met Democratic Nebraska Congressman William Jennings Bryan, and listened to the "Boy Orator of the Platte" speak on the floor of the House of Representatives. Harding traveled to Chicago's Columbian Exposition in 1893. Both visits were without Florence. Democrats generally won Marion County's offices in 1895, and though Harding lost the election for county auditor, he did better than expected. The following year, Harding was one of many orators who traveled across Ohio in support of the campaign of the Republican presidential candidate William McKinley, that state's former governor. According to Dean, "while working for McKinley began making a name for himself through Ohio".

Rising politician (1897–1919)

Further information: Electoral history of Warren G. Harding

State senator

Harding tried again for elective office. Though he was a longtime admirer of Foraker, who by then had been elected to the U.S. Senate, he also maintained good relations with the party faction led by the state's other senator, Mark Hanna, who was McKinley's political manager, and chairman of the Republican National Committee (RNC). With the support of Foraker and Hanna, Harding ran for state Senate in 1899, gained the Republican nomination, and was easily elected to a two-year term.

Harding began his tenure in the state senate a political unknown, but ended it as one of the most popular figures in the Ohio Republican Party. He displayed calm and humility, characteristics that endeared him to fellow Republicans even as he overtook them in his political climb. Legislative leaders consulted him on difficult problems, and though it was then usual for state senators in Ohio to serve only one term, Harding was renominated in 1901. After the **ination of McKinley in September, the appe*e for politics was temporarily lost in Ohio, but that November Harding won a second term, more than doubling his margin of victory to 3,563 votes.

As was then customary for politicians, Harding accepted patronage and graft as repayment for political favors. He arranged for his sister Mary (who was legally blind) to be appointed as a teacher at the Ohio School for the Blind, although there were better-qualified candidates. He also offered publicity in his newspaper in exchange for free railroad p*es for himself and his family. According to Sinclair, "it is doubtful that Harding ever thought there was anything dishonest in accepting the perquisites of position or office. Patronage and favors seemed the normal reward for party service in the days of Hanna."

Soon after Harding's initial election as senator, he met Harry M. Daugherty, who *umed a major role in his political career. Daugherty was a perennial candidate for office, who served two terms in the state House of Representatives in the early 1890s, and became a political fixer and lobbyist in Columbus, the state capital. After first meeting and talking with Harding, Daugherty commented, "Gee, what a great-looking President he'd make."

Ohio state leader

In early 1903, Harding announced he would run for Governor of Ohio, prompted by the withdrawal of the leading candidate, Congressman Charles W. F. Dick. Hanna and George Cox felt that Harding was not electable due to his work with Foraker—as the Progressive Era commenced, the public was starting to take a dimmer view of the trading of political favors and of bosses such as Cox. Accordingly, they persuaded Cleveland banker Myron T. Herrick, a friend of McKinley's, to run. Herrick was also better-placed to take votes away from the likely Democratic candidate, reforming Cleveland Mayor Tom L. Johnson. With little chance at the gubernatorial nomination, Harding sought nomination as lieutenant governor, and both Herrick and Harding were nominated by acclamation. Foraker and Hanna (who died of typhoid fever in February 1904) both campaigned for what was dubbed the Four-H ticket. Herrick and Harding won by overwhelming margins.

Senator Joseph B. Foraker in 1908, his final full year as senator before his re-election defeat

Once he and Harding were inaugurated, Herrick made ill-advised decisions that turned crucial Republican cons*uencies against him, such as alienating farmers by opposing the establishment of an agricultural college. On the other hand, according to Sinclair, "Harding had little to do, and he did it very well." His responsibility to preside over the state Senate allowed him to increase his growing network of political contacts. Harding and others envisioned a successful gubernatorial run in 1905, but Herrick refused to stand aside. In early 1905, Harding announced he would accept nomination as governor if offered, but faced with the anger of leaders such as Cox, Foraker and Dick (Hanna's replacement in the Senate), announced he would seek no office in 1905. Herrick was defeated, but his new running mate, Andrew L. Harris, was elected, and succeeded as governor after five months in office on the death of Democrat John M. Pattison. One Republican official wrote to Harding, "Aren't you sorry Dick wouldn't let you run for Lieutenant Governor?"

In addition to helping pick a president, Ohio voters in 1908 were to choose the legislators who would decide whether to re-elect Foraker. The senator had quarreled with President Roosevelt over the Brownsville Affair. Though Foraker had little chance of winning, he sought the Republican presidential nomination against his fellow Cincinnatian, Secretary of War William Howard Taft, who was Roosevelt's chosen successor. On January 6, 1908, Harding's Star endorsed Foraker and upbraided Roosevelt for trying to destroy the senator's career over a matter of conscience. On January 22, Harding in the Star reversed course and declared for Taft, viewing Foraker as defeated. According to Sinclair, Harding's change to Taft "was not:... because he saw the light but because he felt the heat". Jumping on the Taft bandwagon allowed Harding to survive his patron's disaster—Foraker failed to gain the presidential nomination, and was defeated for a third term as senator. Also helpful in saving Harding's career was the fact that he was popular with, and had done favors for, the more progressive forces that now controlled the Ohio Republican Party.

Harding sought and gained the 1910 Republican gubernatorial nomination. At that time, the party was deeply divided between progressive and conservative wings, and could not defeat the united Democrats; he lost the election to in*bent Judson Harmon. Harry Daugherty managed Harding's campaign, but the defeated candidate did not hold the loss against him. Despite the growing rift between them, both President Taft and former president Roosevelt came to Ohio to campaign for Harding, but their quarrels split the Republican Party and helped *ure Harding's defeat.

The party split grew, and in 1912, Taft and Roosevelt were rivals for the Republican nomination, with the 1912 Republican National Convention bitterly divided. At Taft's request, Harding gave a speech nominating the president, but the angry delegates were not receptive to Harding's oratory. Taft was renominated, but Roosevelt supporters bolted the party. Harding, as a loyal Republican, supported Taft. The Republican vote was split between Taft, the party's official candidate, and Roosevelt, running under the label of the Progressive Party. This allowed the Democratic candidate, New Jersey Governor Woodrow Wilson, to be elected.

U.S. senator

Election of 1914

Further information: 1914 United States Senate election in Ohio

Congressman Theodore Burton had been elected as senator by the state legislature in Foraker's place in 1909, and announced that he would seek a second term in the 1914 elections. By this time, the Seventeenth Amendment to the United States Cons*ution had been ratified, giving the people the right to elect senators, and Ohio had ins*uted primary elections for the office. Foraker and former congressman Ralph D. Cole also entered the Republican primary. When Burton withdrew, Foraker became the favorite, but his Old Guard Republicanism was deemed outdated, and Harding was urged to enter the race. Daugherty claimed credit for persuading Harding to run: "I found him like a turtle sunning himself on a log, and I pushed him into the water." According to Harding biographer Randolph Downes, "he put on a campaign of such sweetness and light as would have won the plaudits of the angels. It was calculated to offend nobody except Democrats." Although Harding did not attack Foraker, his supporters had no such scruples. Harding won the primary by 12,000 votes over Foraker.

Read The Menace and get the dope,
Go to the polls and beat the Pope.

Slogan written on Ohio walls and fences, 1914

Harding's general election opponent was Ohio Attorney General Timothy Hogan, who had risen to statewide office despite widespread prejudice against Roman Catholics in rural areas. In 1914, the start of World War I and the prospect of a Catholic senator from Ohio increased nativist sentiment. Propaganda sheets with names like The Menace and The Defender contained warnings that Hogan was the vanguard in a plot led by Pope Benedict XV through the Knights of Columbus to control Ohio. Harding did not attack Hogan (an old friend) on this or most other issues, but he did not denounce the nativist hatred for his opponent.

Harding's conciliatory campaigning style served him well; however, one Harding friend regarded the candidate's stump speech during the 1914 fall campaign as "a rambling, high-sounding mixture of pla*udes, patriotism, and pure nonsense". Dean notes, "Harding used his oratory to good effect; it got him elected, making as few enemies as possible in the process." Harding won by over 100,000 votes in a landslide that also swept into office a Republican governor, Frank B. Willis.

Junior senator

When Harding joined the U.S. Senate, the Democrats controlled both houses of Congress, and were led by President Wilson. As a junior senator in the minority, Harding received unimportant committee *ignments, but carried out those duties *iduously. He was a safe, conservative, Republican vote. As during his time in the Ohio Senate, Harding came to be widely liked.

On two issues, women's suffrage, and the prohibition of alcohol, where picking the wrong side would have damaged his presidential prospects in 1920, he prospered by taking nuanced positions. As senator-elect, he indicated that he could not support votes for women until Ohio did. Increased support for suffrage there and among Senate Republicans meant that by the time Congress voted on the issue, Harding was a firm supporter. Harding, who drank, initially voted against banning alcohol. He voted for the Eighteenth Amendment, which imposed prohibition, after successfully moving to modify it by placing a time limit on ratification, which was expected to kill it. Once it was ratified anyway, Harding voted to override Wilson's veto of the Volstead Bill, which implemented the amendment, *uring the support of the Anti-Saloon League.

Harding, as a politician respected by both Republicans and Progressives, was asked to be temporary chairman of the 1916 Republican National Convention and to deliver the keynote address. He urged delegates to stand as a united party. The convention nominated Justice Charles Evans Hughes. Harding reached out to Roosevelt once the former president declined the 1916 Progressive nomination, a refusal that effectively scuttled that party. In the November 1916 presidential election, despite increasing Republican unity, Hughes was narrowly defeated by Wilson.

Harding spoke and voted in favor of the resolution of war requested by Wilson in April 1917 that plunged the United States into World War I. In August, Harding argued for giving Wilson almost dictatorial powers, stating that democracy had little place in time of war. Harding voted for most war legislation, including the Espionage Act of 1917, which restricted civil liberties, though he opposed the excess profits tax as anti-business. In May 1918, Harding, less enthusiastic about Wilson, opposed a bill to expand the president's powers.

In the 1918 midterm congressional elections, held just before the armistice, Republicans narrowly took control of the Senate. Harding was appointed to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Wilson took no senators with him to the Paris Peace Conference, confident that he could force what became the Treaty of Versailles through the Senate by appealing to the people. When he returned with a single treaty establishing both peace and a League of Nations, the country was overwhelmingly on his side. Many senators disliked Article X of the League Covenant, that committed signatories to the defense of any member nation that was attacked, seeing it as forcing the United States to war without the *ent of Congress. Harding was one of 39 senators who signed a round-robin letter opposing the League. When Wilson invited the Foreign Relations Committee to the White House to informally discuss the treaty, Harding ably questioned Wilson about Article X; the president evaded his inquiries. The Senate debated Versailles in September 1919, and Harding made a major speech against it. By then, Wilson had suffered a stroke while on a speaking tour. With an incapacitated president in the White House and less support in the country, the treaty was defeated.

Presidential election of 1920

Main article: 1920 United States presidential election

Primary campaign

Harding c. 1919

Most Progressives had rejoined the Republican Party, and their former leader, Theodore Roosevelt, was the overwhelming favorite for the 1920 Republican presidential nomination. When Roosevelt suddenly died on January 6, 1919, a number of candidates quickly emerged. These included General Leonard Wood, Illinois Governor Frank Lowden, California Senator Hiram Johnson, and a host of underdogs such as Herbert Hoover (renowned for his World War I relief work), M*achusetts Governor Calvin Coolidge, and General John J. Pershing.

Harding, while he wanted to be president, was as much motivated in entering the race by his desire to keep control of Ohio Republican politics, enabling his re-election to the Senate in 1920. Among those coveting Harding's seat were former governor Willis (he had been defeated by James M. Cox in 1916) and Colonel William Cooper Procter (head of Procter & Gamble). On December 17, 1919, Harding made a low-key announcement of his presidential candidacy. Leading Republicans disliked Wood and Johnson, both of the progressive faction of the party, and Lowden, who had an independent streak, was deemed little better. Harding was far more acceptable to the "Old Guard" leaders of the party.

Daugherty, who became Harding's campaign manager, was sure none of the other candidates could garner a majority. His strategy was to make Harding an acceptable choice to delegates once the leaders faltered. Daugherty established a "Harding for President" campaign office in Washington, run by his confidant, Jess Smith. Daugherty also managed a network of Harding friends and supporters, including Frank Scobey of Texas, clerk of the Ohio State Senate during Harding's years there. Harding tried to s* up his support through incessant letter-writing. Despite the candidate's work, according to Russell, "without Daugherty's Mephistophelean efforts, Harding would never have stumbled forward to the nomination".

America's present need is not heroics, but healing; not nostrums, but normalcy; not revolution, but restoration; not agitation, but adjustment; not surgery, but serenity; not the dramatic, but the disp*ionate; not experiment, but equipoise; not submergence in internationality, but sustainment in triumphant nationality.

Warren G. Harding, speech before the Home Market Club, Boston, May 14, 1920

There were only 16 presidential primary states in 1920, of which Ohio was the most crucial to Harding. He needed loyalists at the convention to have any chance of nomination, and the Wood campaign hoped to knock Harding out of the race by taking Ohio. Wood campaigned in the state, and his supporter, Procter, spent large sums. Harding spoke in the non-confrontational style he had adopted in 1914. He and Daugherty were so confident of sweeping Ohio's 48 delegates, that the candidate went on to the next state, Indiana, before the April 27 Ohio primary. Harding carried Ohio by only 15,000 votes over Wood, taking less than half the total vote, and won only 39 of 48 delegates. In Indiana, Harding finished fourth, with less than ten percent of the vote, and failed to win a single delegate. He was willing to give up and have Daugherty file his re-election papers for the Senate, but Florence Harding grabbed the phone from his hand and said, "Warren Harding, what are you doing? Give up? Not until the convention is over. Think of your friends in Ohio!" On learning that Daugherty had left the phone line, the future First Lady retorted, "Well, you tell Harry Daugherty for me that we're in this fight until Hell freezes over."

After he recovered from the shock of the poor results, Harding traveled to Boston, where he delivered a speech that, according to Dean, "would resonate throughout the 1920 campaign and history". There, he stated that "America's present need is not heroics, but healing; not nostrums, but normalcy; not revolution, but restoration;..." Dean notes, "Harding, more than the other aspirants, was reading the nation's pulse correctly."

Convention

Further information: 1920 Republican National Convention

The 1920 Republican National Convention opened at the Chicago Coliseum on June 8, 1920, *embling delegates who were bitterly divided, most recently over the results of a Senate investigation into campaign spending, which had just been released. The report found that Wood had spent $1.8 million (equivalent to $24.35:million in 2021), supporting Johnson's claims that Wood was trying to buy the presidency. Some of the $600,000 that Lowden had spent wound up in the pockets of two convention delegates. Johnson had spent $194,000, and Harding $113,000. Many delegates believed that Johnson was behind the inquiry, and the rage of the Lowden and Wood factions put an end to any possible compromise among the frontrunners. Of the almost 1,000 delegates, 27 were women—the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Cons*ution, guaranteeing women the vote, was within one state of ratification, and p*ed before the end of August. The convention had no boss, most uninstructed delegates voted as they pleased, and with a Democrat in the White House, the party's leaders could not use patronage to get their way.

Reporters considered Harding unlikely to be nominated due to his poor showing in the primaries, and relegated him to a place among the dark horses. Harding, who like the other candidates was in Chicago supervising his campaign, had finished sixth in the final public opinion poll, behind the three main candidates as well as former Justice Hughes and Herbert Hoover, and only slightly ahead of Coolidge.

After the convention dealt with other matters, the nominations for president opened on the morning of Friday, June 11. Harding had asked Willis to place his name in nomination, and the former governor responded with a speech popular among the delegates, both for its folksiness and for its brevity in the intense Chicago heat. Reporter Mark Sullivan, who was present, called it a splendid combination of "oratory, grand opera, and hog calling". Willis confided, leaning over the podium railing, "Say, boys—and girls too—why not name Warren Harding?" The laughter and applause that followed created a warm feeling for Harding.

I don't expect Senator Harding to be nominated on the first, second, or third ballots, but I think we can well afford to take chances that about eleven minutes after two o'clock on Friday morning at the convention, when fifteen or twenty men, somewhat weary, are sitting around a table, some one of them will say: "Who will we nominate?" At that decisive time, the friends of Senator Harding can suggest him and afford to abide by the result.

Harry M. Daugherty

Four ballots were taken on the afternoon of June 11, and they revealed a deadlock. With 493 votes needed to nominate, Wood was the closest with 3141⁄2; Lowden had 2891⁄2. The best Harding had done was 651⁄2. Chairman Henry Cabot Lodge of M*achusetts, the Senate Majority Leader, adjourned the convention about 7:p.m.

The night of June 11–12, 1920 became famous in political history as the night of the "smoke-filled room," where legend has it, party elders agreed to force the convention to nominate Harding. Historians have focused on the session held in the suite of Republican National Committee (RNC) Chairman Will Hays at the Blackstone Hotel, at which senators and others came and went, and numerous possible candidates were discussed. Utah Senator Reed Smoot, before his departure early in the evening, backed Harding, telling Hays and the others that as the Democrats were likely to nominate Governor Cox, they should pick Harding to win Ohio. Smoot also told The New York Times that there had been an agreement to nominate Harding, but that it would not be done for several ballots yet. This was not true: a number of participants backed Harding (others supported his rivals), but there was no pact to nominate him, and the senators had little power to enforce any agreement. Two other participants in the smoke-filled room discussions, Kansas Senator Charles Curtis and Colonel George Brinton McClellan Harvey, a close friend of Hays, predicted to the press that Harding would be nominated because of the liabilities of the other candidates.

Headlines in the morning newspapers suggested intrigue. Historian Wesley M. Bagby wrote, "Various groups actually worked along separate lines to bring about the nomination—without combination and with very little contact." Bagby stated that the key factor in Harding's nomination was his wide popularity among the rank and file of the delegates.

The re*embled delegates had heard rumors that Harding was the choice of a cabal of senators. Although this was not true, delegates believed it, and sought a way out by voting for Harding. When balloting resumed on the morning of June 12, Harding gained votes on each of the next four ballots, rising to 1331⁄2 as the two front runners saw little change. Lodge then declared a three-hour recess, to the outrage of Daugherty, who raced to the podium, and confronted him, "You cannot defeat this man this way! The motion was not carried! You cannot defeat this man!" Lodge and others used the break to try to stop the Harding momentum and make RNC Chairman Hays the nominee, a scheme Hays refused to have anything to do with. The ninth ballot, after some initial suspense, saw delegation after delegation break for Harding, who took the lead with 3741⁄2 votes to 249 for Wood and 1211⁄2 for Lowden (Johnson had 83). Lowden released his delegates to Harding, and the tenth ballot, held at 6:p.m., was a mere formality, with Harding finishing with 6721⁄5 votes to 156 for Wood. The nomination was made unanimous. The delegates, desperate to leave town before they incurred more hotel expenses, then proceeded to the vice presidential nomination. Harding wanted Senator Irvine Lenroot of Wisconsin, who was unwilling to run, but before Lenroot's name could be withdrawn and another candidate decided on, an Oregon delegate proposed Governor Coolidge, which was met with a roar of approval from the delegates. Coolidge, popular for his role in breaking the Boston police strike of 1919, was nominated for vice president, receiving two and a fraction votes more than Harding had. James Morgan wrote in The Boston Globe: "The delegates would not listen to remaining in Chicago over Sunday:... the President makers did not have a clean shirt. On such things, Rollo, turns the destiny of nations."

General election campaign

Harding begins his front porch campaign by accepting the Republican nomination, July 22, 1920.

The Harding/Coolidge ticket was quickly backed by Republican newspapers, but those of other viewpoints expressed disappointment. The New York World found Harding the least-qualified candidate since James Buchanan, viewing the Ohio senator as a "weak and mediocre" man who "never had an original idea". The Hearst newspapers called Harding "the flag-bearer of a new Senatorial autocracy". The New York Times described the Republican presidential candidate as "a very respectable Ohio politician of the second cl*".

The Democratic National Convention opened in San Francisco on June 28, 1920, under a shadow cast by Woodrow Wilson, who wished to be nominated for a third term. Delegates were convinced Wilson's health would not permit him to serve, and looked elsewhere for a candidate. Former Treasury Secretary William G. McAdoo was a major contender, but he was Wilson's son-in-law, and refused to consider a nomination so long as the president wanted it. Many at the convention voted for McAdoo anyway, and a deadlock ensued with Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer. On the 44th:ballot, the Democrats nominated Governor Cox for president, with his running mate *istant Secretary of the Navy Franklin D. Roosevelt. As Cox was a newspaper owner and editor when not in politics, this placed two Ohio editors against each other for the presidency, and some complained there was no real political choice. Both Cox and Harding were economic conservatives, and were reluctant progressives at best.

"How Does He Do It?" In this Clifford Berryman cartoon, Harding and Cox ponder another big story of 1920: Babe Ruth's record-setting home run pace.

Harding chose to conduct a front porch campaign, like McKinley in 1896. Some years earlier, Harding had remodeled his front porch to resemble McKinley's, which his neighbors felt signified presidential ambitions. The candidate remained at home in Marion, and gave addresses to visiting delegations. In the meantime, Cox and Roosevelt stumped the nation, giving hundreds of speeches. Coolidge, who spoke in the Northeast and then in the South, was not a significant factor in the election.

In Marion, Harding ran his campaign. As a newspaperman himself, he fell into easy camaraderie with the press covering him, enjoying a relationship few presidents have equaled. His "return to normalcy" theme was aided by the atmosphere that Marion provided, an orderly place that induced nostalgia in many voters. The front porch campaign allowed Harding to avoid mistakes, and as time dwindled towards the election, his strength grew. The travels of the Democratic candidates eventually caused Harding to make several short speaking tours, but for the most part, he remained in Marion. America had no need for another Wilson, Harding argued, appealing for a president "near the normal".

Harding's vague oratory irritated some; McAdoo described a typical Harding speech as "an army of pompous phrases moving over the landscape in search of an idea. Sometimes these meandering words actually capture a straggling thought and bear it triumphantly, a prisoner in their midst, until it died of servitude and over work." H. L. Mencken concurred, "it reminds me of a string of wet sponges, it reminds me of tattered washing on the line; it reminds me of stale bean soup, of college yells, of dogs barking idiotically through endless nights. It is so bad that a kind of grandeur creeps into it. It drags itself out of the dark abysm:... of pish, and crawls insanely up the topmost pinnacle of tosh. It is rumble and bumble. It is balder and dash." The New York Times took a more positive view of Harding's speeches, stating that in them the majority of people could find "a reflection of their own indeterminate thoughts".

Wilson had stated that the 1920 election would be a "great and solemn referendum" on the League of Nations, making it difficult for Cox to maneuver on the issue—although Roosevelt strongly supported the League, Cox was less enthusiastic. Harding opposed entry into the League of Nations as negotiated by Wilson, but favored an "*ociation of nations," based on the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague. This was general enough to satisfy most Republicans, and only a few bolted the party over this issue. By October, Cox had realized there was widespread public opposition to Article X, and stated that reservations to the treaty might be necessary; this shift allowed Harding to say no more on the subject.

Harding campaigning in 1920

The RNC hired Albert Lasker, an advertising executive from Chicago, to publicize Harding, and Lasker unleashed a broad-based advertising campaign that used many now-standard advertising techniques for the first time in a presidential campaign. Lasker's approach included newsreels and sound recordings. Visitors to Marion had their photographs taken with Senator and Mrs. Harding, and copies were sent to their hometown newspapers. Billboard posters, newspapers and magazines were employed in addition to motion pictures. Telemarketers were used to make phone calls with scripted dialogues to promote Harding.

During the campaign, opponents spread old rumors that Harding's great-great-grandfather was a West Indian black person and that other blacks might be found in his family tree. Harding's campaign manager rejected the accusations. Wooster College professor William Estabrook Chancellor publicized the rumors, based on supposed family research, but perhaps reflecting no more than local gossip.

By Election Day, November 2, 1920, few had any doubts that the Republican ticket would win. Harding received 60.2:percent of the popular vote, the highest percentage since the evolution of the two-party system, and 404 electoral votes. Cox received 34:percent of the national vote and 127 electoral votes. Campaigning from a federal prison where he was serving a sentence for opposing the war, Socialist Eugene V. Debs received 3:percent of the national vote. The Republicans greatly increased their majority in each house of Congress.

Presidency (1921–1923)

Main article: Presidency of Warren G. Harding

Inauguration and appointments

Harding takes the oath of officeFurther information: Inauguration of Warren G. Harding

Harding was sworn in on March 4, 1921, in the presence of his wife and father. Harding preferred a low-key inauguration, without the customary parade, leaving only the swearing-in ceremony and a brief reception at the White House. In his inaugural address he declared, "Our most dangerous tendency is to expect too much from the government and at the same time do too little for it."

After the election, Harding had announced he was going on vacation, and that no decisions about appointments would be made until he returned to Marion in December. He went to Texas, where he fished and played golf with his friend Frank Scobey (soon to be Director of the Mint), then took ship for the Panama C* Zone. He went to Washington when Congress opened in early December, where he was given a hero's welcome as the first sitting senator to be elected to the White House. Back in Ohio, he planned to consult the "best minds" of the country on appointments, and they dutifully journeyed to Marion to offer their counsel.

Harding chose pro-League Charles Evans Hughes as his Secretary of State, ignoring the advice of Senator Lodge and others. After Charles G. Dawes declined the Treasury position, he chose Pittsburgh banker Andrew W. Mellon, one of the richest people in the country. He appointed Herbert Hoover as United States Secretary of Commerce. RNC Chairman Will Hays was made Postmaster General, then a cabinet post; he left after a year in the position to become chief censor to the motion picture industry.

The two Harding cabinet appointees who darkened the reputation of his administration by their involvement in scandal were Harding's Senate friend, Albert B. Fall of New Mexico, the Interior Secretary, and Daugherty, the Attorney General. Fall was a Western rancher and former miner, and was pro-development. He was opposed by conservationists such as Gifford Pinchot, who wrote, "it would have been possible to pick a worse man for Secretary of the Interior, but not altogether easy". The New York Times mocked the Daugherty appointment, stating that rather than select one of the best minds, Harding had been content "to choose merely a best friend". Eugene P. Trani and David L. Wilson, in their volume on Harding's presidency, suggest that the appointment made sense then, since Daugherty was "a competent lawyer well-acquainted with the seamy side of politics:... a first-cl* political troubleshooter and someone Harding could trust".

Harding's original Cabinet, 1921

Foreign policy

European relations and formally ending the war

Warren G. Harding explains his unwillingness to have the U.S. join the League of Nations

Harding made it clear when he appointed Hughes as Secretary of State that the former justice would run foreign policy, a change from Wilson's hands-on management of international affairs. Hughes had to work within some broad outlines; after taking office, Harding hardened his stance on the League of Nations, deciding the U.S. would not join even a scaled-down version of the League. With the Treaty of Versailles unratified by the Senate, the U.S. remained technically at war with Germany, Austria, and Hungary. Peacemaking began with the Knox–Porter Resolution, declaring the U.S. at peace and reserving any rights granted under Versailles. Treaties with Germany, Austria and Hungary, each containing many of the non-League provisions of the Treaty of Versailles, were ratified in 1921.

This still left the question of relations between the U.S. and the League. Hughes' State Department initially ignored communications from the League, or tried to byp* it through direct contacts with member nations. By 1922, though, the U.S., through its consul in Geneva, was dealing with the League, and though the U.S. refused to participate in any meeting with political implications, it sent observers to sessions on technical and humanitarian matters.

By the time Harding took office, there were calls from foreign governments for reduction of the m*ive war debt owed to the United States, and the German government sought to reduce the reparations that it was required to pay. The U.S. refused to consider any multilateral settlement. Harding sought p*age of a plan proposed by Mellon to give the administration broad authority to reduce war debts in negotiation, but Congress, in 1922, p*ed a more restrictive bill. Hughes negotiated an agreement for Britain to pay off its war debt over 62 years at low interest, reducing the present value of the obligations. This agreement, approved by Congress in 1923, served as a model for negotiations with other nations. Talks with Germany on reduction of reparations payments resulted in the Dawes Plan of 1924.

A pressing issue not resolved by Wilson was U.S. policy towards Bolshevik Russia. The U.S. had been among the nations that sent troops there after the Russian Revolution. Afterwards, Wilson refused to recognize the Russian SFSR. Harding's Commerce Secretary Hoover, with considerable experience in Russian affairs, took the lead on policy. When famine struck Russia in 1921, Hoover had the American Relief Administration, which he had headed, negotiate with the Russians to provide aid. Leaders of the U.S.S.R. (established in 1922) hoped in vain that the agreement would lead to recognition. Hoover supported trade with the Soviets, fearing U.S. companies would be frozen out of the Soviet market, but Hughes opposed this, and the matter was not resolved under Harding's presidency.

Disarmament

Main article: Washington Naval Conference Charles Evans Hughes, former Supreme Court justice and Harding's Secretary of State

Harding urged disarmament and lower defense costs during the campaign, but it had not been a major issue. He gave a speech to a joint session of Congress in April 1921, setting out his legislative priorities. Among the few foreign policy matters he mentioned was disarmament; he said the government could not "be unmindful of the call for reduced expenditure" on defense.

Idaho Senator William Borah had proposed a conference at which the major naval powers, the U.S., Britain, and *an, would agree to cuts in their fleets. Harding concurred, and after diplomatic discussions, representatives of nine nations convened in Washington in November 1921. Most of the diplomats first attended Armistice Day ceremonies at Arlington National Cemetery, where Harding spoke at the entombment of the Unknown Soldier of World War I, whose iden*y, "took flight with his imperishable soul. We know not whence he came, only that his death marks him with the everlasting glory of an American dying for his country."

Hughes, in his speech at the opening session of the conference on November 12, 1921, made the American proposal—the U.S. would decommission or not build 30 warships if Great Britain did likewise for 19 vessels, and *an for 17. Hughes was generally successful, with agreements reached on this and other points, including settlement of disputes over islands in the Pacific, and limitations on the use of poison gas. The naval agreement applied only to battleships, and to some extent aircraft carriers, and ultimately did not prevent rearmament. Nevertheless, Harding and Hughes were widely applauded in the press for their work. Senator Lodge and the Senate Minority Leader, Alabama's Oscar Underwood, were part of the U.S. delegation, and they helped ensure the treaties made it through the Senate mostly unscathed, though that body added reservations to some.

The U.S. had acquired over a thousand vessels during World War I, and still owned most of them when Harding took office. Congress had authorized their disposal in 1920, but the Senate would not confirm Wilson's nominees to the Shipping Board. Harding appointed Albert Lasker as its chairman; the advertising executive undertook to run the fleet as profitably as possible until it could be sold. Few ships were marketable at anything approaching the government's cost. Lasker recommended a large subsidy to the merchant marine to facilitate sales, and Harding repeatedly urged Congress to enact it. The resulting bill was unpopular in the Midwest, and though it p*ed the House, it was defeated by a filibuster in the Senate, and most government ships were eventually scrapped.

Latin America

Intervention in Latin America had been a minor campaign issue, though Harding spoke against Wilson's decision to send U.S. troops to the Dominican Republic and Haiti, and attacked the Democratic vice presidential candidate, Franklin Roosevelt, for his role in the Haitian intervention. Once Harding was sworn in, Hughes worked to improve relations with Latin American countries who were wary of the American use of the Monroe Doctrine to justify intervention; at the time of Harding's inauguration, the U.S. also had troops in Cuba and Nicaragua. The troops stationed in Cuba were withdrawn in 1921, but U.S. forces remained in the other three nations throughout Harding's presidency. In April 1921, Harding gained the ratification of the Thomson–Urrutia Treaty with Colombia, granting that nation $25 million (equivalent to $379.8:million in 2021) as settlement for the U.S.-provoked Panamanian revolution of 1903. The Latin American nations were not fully satisfied, as the U.S. refused to renounce interventionism, though Hughes pledged to limit it to nations near the Panama C*, and to make it clear what the U.S. aims were.

The U.S. had intervened repeatedly in Mexico under Wilson, and had withdrawn diplomatic recognition, setting conditions for reinstatement. The Mexican government under President Álvaro Obregón wanted recognition before negotiations, but Wilson and his final Secretary of State, Bainbridge Colby, refused. Both Hughes and Fall opposed recognition; Hughes instead sent a draft treaty to the Mexicans in May 1921, which included pledges to reimburse Americans for losses in Mexico since the 1910 revolution there. Obregón was unwilling to sign a treaty before being recognized, and worked to improve the relationship between American business and Mexico, reaching agreement with creditors, and mounting a public relations campaign in the United States. This had its effect, and by mid-1922, Fall was less influential than he had been, lessening the resistance to recognition. The two presidents appointed commissioners to reach a deal, and the U.S. recognized the Obregón government on August 31, 1923, just under a month after Harding's death, substantially on the terms proffered by Mexico.

Domestic policy

Postwar recession and recovery

Main article: Depression of 1920–1921 Charles Dawes—the first budget director and later, vice president under Coolidge

When Harding took office on March 4, 1921, the nation was in the midst of a postwar economic decline. At the suggestion of legislative leaders, Harding called a special session of Congress, to convene April 11. When Harding addressed the joint session the following day, he urged the reduction of income taxes (raised during the war), an increase in tariffs on agricultural goods to protect the American farmer, as well as more wide-ranging reforms, such as support for highways, aviation, and radio. It was not until May 27 that Congress p*ed an emergency tariff increase on agricultural products. An act authorizing a Bureau of the Budget followed on June 10, and Harding appointed Charles Dawes as bureau director with a mandate to cut expenditures.

Mellon's tax cuts

Treasury Secretary Mellon also recommended that Congress cut income tax rates, and that the corporate excess profits tax be abolished. The House Ways and Means Committee endorsed Mellon's proposals, but some congressmen wanting to raise corporate tax rates fought the measure. Harding was unsure what side to endorse, telling a friend, "I can't make a damn thing out of this tax problem. I listen to one side, and they seem right, and then—God!—I talk to the other side, and they seem just as right." Harding tried compromise, and gained p*age of a bill in the House after the end of the excess profits tax was delayed a year. In the Senate, the bill became entangled in efforts to vote World War I veterans a soldier's bonus. Frustrated by the delays, on July 12, Harding appeared before the Senate to urge p*age of the tax legislation without the bonus. It was not until November that the revenue bill finally p*ed, with higher rates than Mellon had proposed.

Secretary of the Treasury Andrew W. Mellon advocated lower tax rates.

In opposing the veterans’ bonus, Harding argued in his Senate address that much was already being done for them by a grateful nation, and that the bill would "break down our Treasury, from which so much is later on to be expected". The Senate sent the bonus bill back to committee, but the issue returned when Congress reconvened in December 1921. A bill providing a bonus, though unfunded, was p*ed by both houses in September 1922, but Harding's veto was narrowly sustained. A non-cash bonus for soldiers p*ed over Coolidge's veto in 1924.

In his first annual message to Congress, Harding sought the power to adjust tariff rates. The p*age of the tariff bill in the Senate, and in conference committee became a feeding frenzy of lobby interests. When Harding signed the Fordney–Mc*ber Tariff Act on September 21, 1922, he made a brief statement, praising the bill only for giving him some power to change rates. According to Trani and Wilson, the bill was "ill-considered. It wrought havoc in international commerce and made the repayment of war debts more difficult."

Mellon ordered a study that demonstrated historically that, as income tax rates were increased, money was driven underground or abroad, and he concluded that lower rates would increase tax revenues. Based on his advice, Harding's revenue bill cut taxes, starting in 1922. The top marginal rate was reduced annually in four stages from 73% in 1921 to 25% in 1925. Taxes were cut for lower incomes starting in 1923, and the lower rates substantially increased the money flowing to the treasury. They also pushed m*ive deregulation, and federal spending as a share of GDP fell from 6.5% to 3.5%. By late 1922, the economy began to turn around. Unemployment was pared from its 1921 high of 12% to an average of 3.3% for the remainder of the decade. The misery index, a combined measure of unemployment and inflation, had its sharpest decline in U.S. history under Harding. Wages, profits, and productivity all made substantial gains; annual GDP increases averaged at over 5% during the 1920s. Libertarian historians Larry Schweikart and Michael Allen argue that, "Mellon's tax policies set the stage for the most amazing growth yet seen in America's already impressive economy."

Embracing new technologies

The 1920s were a time of modernization for America—use of electricity became increasingly common. M* production of the motor car stimulated other industries as well, such as highway construction, rubber, steel, and building, as hotels were erected to accommodate the tourists venturing upon the roads. This economic boost helped bring the nation out of the recession. To improve and expand the nation's highway system, Harding signed the Federal Highway Act of 1921. From 1921 to 1923, the federal government spent $162:million (equivalent to $2.6:billion in 2021) on America's highway system, infusing the U.S. economy with a large amount of capital. In 1922, Harding proclaimed that America was in the age of the "motor car", which "reflects our standard of living and gauges the speed of our present-day life".

Harding urged regulation of radio broadcasting in his April 1921 speech to Congress. Commerce Secretary Hoover took charge of this project, and convened a conference of radio broadcasters in 1922, which led to a voluntary agreement for licensing of radio frequencies through the Commerce Department. Both Harding and Hoover realized something more than an agreement was needed, but Congress was slow to act, not imposing radio regulation until 1927.

Harding also wished to promote aviation, and Hoover again took the lead, convening a national conference on commercial aviation. The discussions focused on safety matters, inspection of airplanes, and licensing of pilots. Harding again promoted legislation but nothing was done until 1926, when the Air Commerce Act created the Bureau of Aeronautics within Hoover's Commerce Department.

Business and labor

Harding's official White House portrait, c. 1922 by Edmund Hodgson SmartFurther information: Great Railroad Strike of 1922

Harding's at*ude toward business was that government should aid it as much as possible. He was suspicious of organized labor, viewing it as a conspiracy against business. He sought to get them to work together at a conference on unemployment that he called to meet in September 1921 at Hoover's recommendation. Harding warned in his opening address that no federal money would be available. No important legislation came as a result, though some public works projects were accelerated.

Within broad limits, Harding allowed each cabinet secretary to run his department as he saw fit. Hoover expanded the Commerce Department to make it more useful to business. This was consistent with Hoover's view that the private sector should take the lead in managing the economy. Harding greatly respected his Commerce Secretary, often asked his advice, and backed him to the hilt, calling Hoover "the smartest 'gink' I know".

Widespread strikes marked 1922, as labor sought redress for falling wages and increased unemployment. In April, 500,000 coal miners, led by John L. Lewis, struck over wage cuts. Mining executives argued that the industry was seeing hard times; Lewis accused them of trying to break the union. As the strike became protracted, Harding offered compromise to settle it. As Harding proposed, the miners agreed to return to work, and Congress created a commission to look into their grievances.

On July 1, 1922, 400,000 railroad workers went on strike. Harding recommended a settlement that made some concessions, but management objected. Attorney General Daugherty convinced Judge James H. Wilkerson to issue a sweeping injunction to break the strike. Although there was public support for the Wilkerson injunction, Harding felt it went too far, and had Daugherty and Wilkerson amend it. The injunction succeeded in ending the strike; however, tensions remained high between railroad workers and management for years.

By 1922, the eight-hour day had become common in American industry. One exception was in steel mills, where workers labored through a twelve-hour workday, seven days a week. Hoover considered this practice barbaric and got Harding to convene a conference of steel manufacturers with a view to ending the system. The conference established a committee under the leadership of U. S. Steel chairman Elbert Gary, which in early 1923 recommended against ending the practice. Harding sent a letter to Gary deploring the result, which was printed in the press, and public outcry caused the manufacturers to reverse themselves and standardize the eight-hour day.

Civil rights and immigration

Harding addresses the segregated crowd in Birmingham, Alabama, October 26, 1921

Although Harding's first address to Congress called for p*age of anti-lynching legislation, he initially seemed inclined to do no more for African Americans than Republican presidents of the recent past had; he asked Cabinet officers to find places for blacks in their departments. Sinclair suggested that the fact that Harding received two-fifths of the Southern vote in 1920 led him to see political opportunity for his party in the Solid South. On October 26, 1921, Harding gave a speech in Birmingham, Alabama, to a segregated audience of 20,000 Whites and 10,000 Blacks. Harding, while stating that the social and racial differences between Whites and Blacks could not be bridged, urged equal political rights for the latter. Many African-Americans at that time voted Republican, especially in the Democratic South, and Harding stated he did not mind seeing that support end if the result was a strong two-party system in the South. He was willing to see literacy tests for voting continue, if applied fairly to White and Black voters. "Whether you like it or not," Harding told his segregated audience, "unless our democracy is a lie, you must stand for that equality." The White section of