Category: Politics
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Harding and the Front Porch Plot
In 1920, Warren Harding ran the last true “front porch campaign,” a major party presidential candidate campaigning primarily from home… until Joe Biden for several months in 2020. This 1920 New York Times article explains the rationale for Harding, the Republican nominee, in trying to replicate the successful 1896 front porch campaign of fellow Ohio Republican…
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The Vice Presidency Comes to the Fore
“The two parties in 1920… have both nominated men of Presidential stature for Vice President,” a New York Times article that summer read. Those two men were FDR and Calvin Coolidge, who would both become president. In fact, 1920 is the only year in American history when both major-party vice presidential nominees later became president.…
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That Ideal Campaign Front Porch
On the 1920 campaign trail, future President Warren G. Harding revealed his perfect formula for eating waffles: You eat the first fourteen waffles without syrup, but with lots of butter. Then you put syrup on the next nine, and the last half-dozen you eat just simply swimming in syrup. Eaten that way, waffles never hurt…
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Penrose as Potential President Maker in Chicago
A week before the 1920 Republican convention, an article suggested Pennsylvania Sen. Boies Penrose could decide the party’s presidential nominee. As it turns out, he kind of did. Heretofore the Old Guard has had more than one man capable of playing this part behind the scenes, with the loyalty of the ingrained partisan who in…
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Gov. Frazier’s Own Story of the Non Partisan League
The first U.S. state governor ever to lose their seat in a recall election? 1921: Lynn Frazier, a socialist who led North Dakota. Frazier was affiliated with the Non-Partisan League (NPL) faction of the Republican Party, a socialist faction which only emerged in 1915 but won Frazier the 1916 election. At the time, North Dakota…
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‘Dark Horses’ in the Coming Presidential Campaign
A month out, who were the dark horses for the Republican and Democratic nominations of 1920? According to this article, here were some potential surprise candidates to keep an eye on… and how each of their fortunes turned out. Republicans Pennsylvania Senator Philander C. Knox. Never officially receiving any votes for the nomination, Knox was…
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How Inflation Touches Every Man’s Pocketbook
In 1920, inflation was rampant, with prices double what they’d been five years prior. That would quickly change: prices would peak that June, then decline, fluctuate, and not exceed their June 1920 levels again until November 1946. What was the primary cause of huge inflation from 1915 to 1920? According to Johns Hopkins political economy…
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Chauncey M. Depew on the Middle Class Union
Advocacy organizations exist for various interests: AARP for the elderly, NRA for gun rights supporters, unions for teachers and transportation workers. In 1920, many proposed a “middle class union” to advocate for the middle class on all issues. The transportation strike hit the doctor of philosophy who commuted to his classes at Columbia just as it…
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Candidates and Issues Still in Doubt
Three months before 1920’s party conventions, General Leonard Wood and former Treasury Secretary William McAdoo were the Republican and Democratic frontrunners, respectively. Neither became the nominee. For the Republicans, Wood actually earned the most votes on the convention’s first ballot, but at 29.2% didn’t claim a majority, so voting continued. He continued leading on the…
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The Anti-Wilson ‘Mania’
Woodrow Wilson was unpopular near his presidency’s end, but how would he be remembered by history? This 1920 article predicted he’d be remembered well. By 2017, a C-SPAN survey of historians ranked him the 11th-best president. The 1920 article noted that Wilson was hated by many during his own lifetime, just like Washington and Lincoln……
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