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HARDING, WARREN GAMALIEL 1865-1923

PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES, 1921-1923

A Lovable President

A former journalist and senator from Ohio, Warren G. Harding ushered in a decade of Republican ascendancy with his landslide election to the presidency in 1920. Republican hegemony lasted until 1932, when Americans finally rejected the laissez-faire Republican policies that had thrust them into the Great Depression, Unlike his Democratic predecessor, Woodrow Wilson, Harding was popular, personable, approachable, and loved by the American people. His down-home image was familiar to millions. Harding's popularity persisted despite attempts to arouse racist sentiment against him with accusations that his great-grandmother Elizabeth Madison was black and that his great-grandfather had African American ancestors. While these claims were never definitively verified, they were widely accepted in the South.

Politics of Normalcy

Harding's 1920 presidential campaign popularized the term normalcy. In defining this concept Harding explained, "I don't mean the old order, but a regular steady order of things. I mean normal procedure, the natural way, without excess." Harding wanted to create a partnership between government and business, to make government "business friendly." His administration supported higher tariffs and reduced government spending while overhauling the federal tax structure to reduce the burden on wealthy Americans. Moreover, the Republican president promoted industrial standardization, efficiency, expansion of business, and elimination of waste. Harding appealed to all Americans frustrated with Wilson and the Democrats. The slogan "Let's be done with wiggle and wobble" highlighted Harding's determination to abandon Wilson's policies and tactics.

A Cabinet of Contrasts

To fulfill his campaign promise to make government more like business, Harding brought some of the "best minds" of American business to Washington. Among the new president's most able recruits were Charles Evans Hughes as secretary of state, Henry C. Wallace as secretary of agriculture, Herbert Hoover as secretary of commerce, and Andrew W. Mellon as secretary of the treasury. Yet Harding did not confine his selection of policy advisers strictly to accomplished men with respected reputations. The former Ohio senator also appointed several political cronies who later betrayed his trust and tarnished his administration. Harding rewarded his longtime friend and campaign manager Harry M. Daugherty with the post of attorney general. He later resigned in the midst of scandal and was tried but acquitted of charges that he conspired to defraud the federal government. The most notorious corruption scandal involving the Harding administration involved another of the president's friends, Albert B. Fall, who was appointed secretary of the interior. Implicated in the notorious Teapot Dome scandal, Fall resigned, was tried for accepting bribes from private oil companies, and became the first cabinet officer in American history to be sent to prison for committing a felony.

Harding's Death

Elected to the presidency on his fifty-fifth birthday, 2 November 1920, Harding died unexpectedly on 2 August 1923, while in San Francisco during a transcontinental speaking tour. Just before and soon after his death, the scandals involving members of his administration began to erupt, revealing the degree to which Harding had been victimized by his friends. While the preponderance of evidence indicates that Harding was not an accomplice to their illegal activities, he bore the responsibility for appointing the culprits. His reputation was also damaged when Nan Britton published The President's Daughter (1927), in which she told of her affair with the president and the birth of her daughter, Elizabeth Ann, who, Britton insisted, was Harding's child.