U.S. Elections of 1924

Identification: The Event: U.S. presidential and congressional elections

Date: November 4, 1924

President Calvin Coolidge, who had taken office the year before following the death of President Warren G. Harding, was elected in 1924 over Democrat John Davis and Progressive Robert La Follette. Thus, in the absence of any major national crises, the 1924 election ratified the pro-business policies ascendant since the Republicans took control of both the White House and Congress at the start of the decade.

Vice President Calvin Coolidge assumed the presidency on August 2, 1923, upon the death of Warren G. Harding, whose two-and-a-half-year term had been beset by allegations of political corruption and personal impropriety. Coolidge, a former governor of Vermont and man of few words, had been a surprise nominee for the vice presidency in 1920. Coolidge and Harding were both pro-business conservatives, but Coolidge, unlike Harding, epitomized New England Puritanism; thus, his administration offered to set a new tone.

The Republican Convention

For a time it was thought that someone other than the reserved Coolidge might receive the 1924 Republican presidential nomination, but Coolidge’s peers underestimated his ambition and political skills. Coolidge supporters successfully controlled events at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio—the first presidential convention to be broadcast on the radio—and there was in the end little challenge to his nomination. Coolidge’s campaign platform was predictable: tax cuts, a protective tariff, opposition to the League of Nations but support for the World Court, and the pursuit of prosperity, stability, and morality. Joining him on the ticket was vice presidential nominee Charles Dawes, former head of the Bureau of the Budget under Harding.

The Democratic Convention

In 1924, the Democrats were divided, not only politically but culturally as well. The two leading contenders for the presidential nomination, William Gibbs McAdoo, former secretary of the treasury and son-in-law of Woodrow Wilson, and New York governor Al Smith, were both moderate Progressives, but their similarities ended there. Smith, a Roman Catholic opposed to Prohibition, was the overwhelming choice of most urban Democrats, including those from New York City, where the Democratic National Convention took place. McAdoo’s support came from rural and small-town Democrats in the West and South who by and large supported Prohibition. However, the differences between the two candidates were perhaps epitomized in the revived Ku Klux Klan, which had grown to five million members by 1924, and whose racist, anti-immigrant, anti-Catholic, and prohibitionist appeals resonated most strongly in the South but also the West—McAdoo’s geographical bases of support.

Most Democratic delegates were willing to endorse a convention platform supporting civil liberties and religious freedom, but Smith’s supporters demanded that the Klan be condemned by name. This debate destroyed any hope for party unity. In the nomination balloting, McAdoo almost achieved a majority, but was far from reaching the required two-thirds necessary for nomination. The McAdoo and Smith sides refused to negotiate their differences. Finally, after a record 103 ballots had been cast, a compromise candidate was selected: John W. Davis, a lawyer with Wall Street ties whose pro-business positions differed little from those of Coolidge. Smith would have to wait until 1928 to receive the nomination.

Liberal Nebraska governor Charles Bryan, brother of three-time Democratic candidate William Jennings Bryan, was chosen as the vice presidential candidate in an attempt to balance Davis’s conservatism. The Democratic platform supported antitrust laws, tariff reductions, farm relief, and a referendum on the League of Nations. The Democratic convention was also broadcast on the radio, and the bitter public dispute over repudiating the Klan did not help the Democrats in their appeal to the nation’s voters.

La Follette and the Progressives

Wisconsin senator Robert M. La Follette was one of the last icons of the Progressive movement led by U.S. presidentsTheodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson. La Follette had long coveted the presidency, and the state of the nation seemed to him conducive to a Progressive alternative to the conservative administrations of Harding and Coolidge: Although there had been broad economic recovery by 1924, the American agricultural sector was suffering because of declining farm prices, and the renewed prosperity was not trickling down in the form of higher wages for labor. In addition, the political scandals linked to Harding’s presidency had not only damaged the Republicans but also the Democrats: McAdoo had business ties to figures involved in the Harding administration’s Teapot Dome scandal. La Follette offered an obvious contrast to the major-party candidates and the problems associated with their policies.

La Follette, a Republican for most of his career, first mounted a challenge to Coolidge at the 1924 Republican Convention. When that failed, La Follette helped organize an independent Progressive Party, whose presidential nomination he immediately accepted. The party represented a number of reform groups, including socialists though not Communists: La Follette vehemently spurned the latter organization. La Follette was especially interested in issues surrounding economic monopolies. His platform, which largely reiterated demands of earlier Populists and Progressives, also called for public ownership of electric utilities and railroads, government aid to farmers, stronger labor laws, curbs on the power of the Supreme Court, and a mandatory popular referendum on declarations of war.

The Election

Coolidge was favored to win the 1924 presidential election. Except for Woodrow Wilson’s two terms, the Republicans had controlled the White House since the 1890s. Despite the complaints of farmers and labor, the country was generally prosperous, and business and industrial interests largely favored the high tariff policies associated with the Republican Party. Additionally, the Coolidge campaign had greater financial resources than the opposition: $4.3 million, as compared to $800,000 for Davis and only $200,000 for La Follette. Finally, La Follette’s third-party Progressive campaign siphoned liberal votes away from the Democrats.

The Democrats’ internal divisions contributed to their resounding defeat in the election. Although La Follette campaigned extensively, his financial resources were too few and he lacked the necessary political organization. The Progressives had no illusions that their candidate might win outright, but some held out hope of preventing both Coolidge and Davis from achieving a majority in the electoral college, thus throwing the final decision to the House of Representatives.

Election Day resulted in a Republican landslide, however. Coolidge won 15.7 million votes (54 percent), as compared to 8.4 million (28.8 percent) for Davis and 4.8 million (16.6 percent) for La Follette, who carried his home state of Wisconsin and ran second in eleven other states. In the congressional elections, the Republicans strengthened the majority that they held throughout the decade, grabbing twenty-two seats from Democrats in the House and four in the Senate.

Impact

In 1924, most Americans wanted prosperity and peace so that they could enjoy the silent movies with actors Rudolph Valentino and Clara Bow, drive their readily available Model T Fords, dance the Charleston, and ignore the rest of world. They wanted to “keep cool with Coolidge,” as the president’s campaign slogan encouraged. Thus, despite farmer and labor discontent nibbling around the edges of the major parties, the Republican ascendancy moved forward in 1924. The Coolidge administration focused on improving American economic health and not interfering in foreign affairs. Over the course of his one-and-a-half terms, Coolidge made significant reductions in national debt, appointed a number of judges to U.S. courts, and made moves to promote the civil rights of African Americans, Roman Catholics, and American Indians.

Bibliography

Harbaugh, William H. Lawyer’s Lawyer: The Life of John W. Davis. New York: Oxford University Press, 1973. The major biography of the 1924 Democratic nominee.

Hicks, John D. Republican Ascendancy, 1921–1933. New York: HarperRow, 1960. A volume in the New American Nation series.

McCoy, Donald R. Calvin Coolidge: The Quiet President. New York: Macmillan, 1967. A biography discussing Coolidge’s strengths and weaknesses.

Murray, Robert K. The 103rd Ballot: Democrats and Disaster in Madison Square Garden. New York: Macmillan, 1976. A comprehensive study of the 1924 Democratic Convention.

Ranson, Edward. The Role of Radio in the American Presidential Election of 1924. Lewiston, N.Y.: Edwin Mellen Press, 2010. An analysis of the impact of radio on the 1924 election.