"The business of America is business."
"Calvin 'Silent but Sexy' Coolidge."
Sworn in by his father, a Justice of the Peace, late at night, on the Coolidge family bible, after hearing of Harding's death,
John Calvin Coolidge, Jr. (1872 – 1933) may have represented the real return to normalcy his
predecessor had called for; one of his slogans was "Keep Cool With Coolidge." He was popular in his day, but due to his lack of charisma he's not remembered much now. Most people remember Prohibition and the rest of
The Roaring Twenties instead.
When people
do remember him it is most often for his
legendarily taciturn temperament, which earned him the nickname "Silent Cal". Like most old-fashioned New Englanders, he never used twenty words when one would do the trick, and never used ten words when a simple nod would suffice. President Coolidge's wife, Grace, once recounted the story of a young woman who, seated next to Silent Cal at a dinner party, confided to him that she had made a bet that she could get at least
three words out of Coolidge. Coolidge had simply looked at her and replied, "You lose." However, Coolidge wasn't quite as silent as his reputation suggests - he was the first President to have his inauguration broadcast on radio, and he met with the press and reporters hundreds of times while he was in office.
This tendency towards minimalism which Coolidge demonstrated in speech was also reflected in his philosophy of governance, to do as little as necessary. Coolidge was of the belief that 90% of impending problems would solve themselves before they ever became serious (a philosophy that reportedly made him
Ronald Reagan's favorite president). Ultimately, this hands-off philosophy has led to him being considered more relevant as a source of amusing anecdotes than as a president. Coolidge was also somewhat ahead of his time when it came to race - he spoke in favor of full rights for African Americans, he criticized those who thought America was merely a "white man's" country, and signed the law which finally granted full citizenship to all Native Americans.
His son, Calvin Coolidge Jr., died of septicemia after a blister on his foot became infected. He had been playing tennis in the White House gardens while wearing new shoes without socks. This may or may not have had something to do with his inaction during the presidency, as Coolidge, like
two presidents before him, was never quite the same after his son's death.
There is a psychological/biological condition named after him - the "Coolidge effect." It refers to situations where someone (
almost always male) has renewed sexual interest and energy because new... uh,
stimulus has entered his life. The story goes that Coolidge and his wife were given separate tours of a government farm. When Mrs. Coolidge got to the roosters, she saw that the male was mating a lot and asked if this was common. The guy in charge of that section replied "Dozens of times." She told him to "Please tell that to the President." When Calvin Coolidge was told about the male rooster, he asked "Same hen every time?" The attendant answered with "Oh no, Mr. President. A different one each time." Coolidge replied by saying
"Tell that to Mrs. Coolidge."
He is the only American President whose birthday is July 4th. Coolidge was the President who dedicated the Statue of Liberty when it was made a National Monument in 1924. He's also the President who chose which presidents would appear on Mount Rushmore:
George Washington,
Thomas Jefferson,
Theodore Roosevelt, and
Abraham Lincoln.
For other awesome moments click
here
Tropes that describe Coolidge
- Alliterative Name
- Badass Nickname: Silent Cal.
- Crowning Moment of Awesome: Socialist author and reknown wit Dorothy Parker teased Coolidge about his silent demeanour at a party, telling him "Mr. Coolidge, I've made a bet against a fellow who says that it's impossible to get more than two words out of you". Coolidge's response? "You lose".
- Crowning Moment of Heartwarming: For Vermonters, Calvin Coolidge's "Brave Little State of Vermont" speech is this. It is now inscribed upon the wall of the Vermont State House.
September, 1928: "Vermont is a state that I love. I could not look upon the peaks of Ascutney, Whittier and Mansfield without being moved in a way that no other scene could move me. It was here that I first saw the light of day; here that I received my bride. Here my dead lie buried, pillowed among the everlasting hills... If ever the spirit of liberty should vanish from the rest of the Union, and support of our institutions should languish, it could all be replenished from the generous store held by the people in this brave little State of Vermont."
- For Mr. Coolidge Sr., probably administering the Oath of Office to his own son (Coolidge was later sworn in by William Howard Taft—Chief Justice at the time—as it wasn't clear if a mere Justice of the Peace had the authority).
- Before his son died, Coolidge brought a rabbit to see him, knowing he loved them.
- Deadpan Snarker: "You lose".
- Not Good with People: He was a shy man who didn't like talking very much, but he absolutely LOVED animals. He owned 26 pets throughout his six years in the White House.
- The Quiet One: There is a whole host of stories and jokes about how taciturn he was; the most famous is the one listed among the quotes. Among others were the following:
- While Vice-President, on being asked his opinion of the many fancy formal state dinners he was forced to attend.
"Gotta eat somewhere."
- His entire speech in thanks for having received a ceremonial rake made of "oak" wood. It should be noted that the public official who gave him this rake gave a long-winded speech in praise of the sturdiness and strength of oak, and the great symbolism of giving an oaken rake.
"Ash."
- He was very well educated, which led to the quip that he "could be silent in five languages."
- Once his wife Grace was sick and couldn't join him for church, so he went alone. Later: it led to this funny exchange.
Grace: "What did the reverend speak about?"
Calvin: "Sin."
Grace: "But what did he say about sin?"
- Shrinking Violet: The real reason for his taciturnity.
- Tsundere: No, really. His fits of rage didn't exactly involve busting a mallet out of Hammerspace (in fact they were quite quiet), but there certainly wasn't any doubt to be had that they happened.
- The Voiceless: Not really, but he was pretty much the personification of the Laconic Wiki.
Calvin Coolidge in fiction
- Mr. Burns of The Simpsons mentions having had a friendship with Coolidge.
- Crimson Skies. Coolidge is President of Columbia, the bastion of the former federal government.
- Appears in one episode of Histeria, with the famous "you lose" incident (casting Pepper Mills as Dorothy).
- The school in Up The Down Staircase is named after Coolidge.
- Singin' in the Rain: "I've got more money than Calvin Coolidge! Put together!"
- He found a clue leading to a treasure in National Treasure: Book Of Secrets. He had it photographed and destroyed.
- Coolidge himself is from both the wrong century and the wrong country to appear in Lost In Austen, but the "you lose" incident makes it in, transferred to Mr. Darcy.
- In Ozy And Millie, when Llewellyn is on the campaign trail, he says something about how the reporters "must have found the photographs of me and Mrs. Calvin Coolidge with all the whipped cream."
- A novel, Seeing Calvin Coolidge in a Dream, features a Chinese protagonist who sees Coolidge as the ideal Confucian leader.
- In Harry Turtledove's Timeline-191, he gets elected President of the USA in a landslide as a Democrat, unseating the incumbent Socialist Hosea Blackford as the Depression hit during his term. However, he dies before he can be inaugurated, with the presidency passing to his Vice-President, Herbert Hoover.
