Coolidge, Harding, Effects of WWI Mr. Williams 10th Grade U.S. History

Economic Philosophy Conservative: Laissez-Faire Market will take care of itself, not the governments responsibility Tax cuts for upper-income Americans and business Individuals would invest their tax savings Business would use this to expand and hire new workers

“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 dispassionate; not experiment, but equipoise; not submergence in internationality, but sustainment in triumphant nationality.” –Warren G.Harding 1920

Teapot Dome Scandal Ohio Gang: Lower-Level government agents that were convicted of taking bribes Secretary of Interior Albert Fall accepted bribes in return for allowing oil companies to drill federal oil reserves in Wyoming

Calvin Coolidge Became President after Harding’s Death in 1923 “Those who build a factory build a temple of worship. Those who work in the factory, worship there.”

Government took away resources business could use Lowering taxes, and reducing the federal budget which did not increase from 1923-29 Vetoed a bill for a bonus for WWI veterans, did not want to use Govt. to help farmers

What about Farmers? Fordney-McCumber Tariff Raising cost of foreign-grown products Helped in short term, but also hurt European market

Immediate Effects of WWI Nation desired “Normalcy” U.S. becomes dominant economic power in the world European countries unable to pay war debts Desire to avoid future war

“My best judgment of America’s needs is to steady down, to get squarely on our feet, to make sure of the right path. Let’s get out of the fevered delirium of war, with the hallucination that all the money in the world is to be made in the madness of war and the wildness of its aftermath. Let us stop to consider that tranquility at home is more precious than peace abroad, and that both our good fortune and our eminence are dependent on the normal forward stride of all the American people.” –Warren G. Harding

Long-Term Effects Harding and Coolidge elected Fordney-McCumber Tariff: European market unable to pay war debts U.S. becomes “banker” to Europe U.S. sponsors Naval Conference and signs Kellogg-Briand Pact

Washington Naval Conference Arms Race: competing nations build more and more weapons in order to avoid one nation gaining a clear advantage To solve this, Conference was called in 1921

Major naval powers of the world were invited Nations agreed to cut back on the sizes of their navies Also agreed to plans to avoid competition over China

Kellogg-Briand Pact More than 60 nations signed this agreement Renounced war as an instrument of national policy Held together only by promise

“The High Contracting Parties solemnly declare in the names of their respective peoples that they condemn recourse to war for the solution of international controversies, and renounce it, as an instrument of national policy in their relations with one another.”

War Debt Europeans Countries struggle to rebuild after WWI Countries in turn demanded that Germany pay back their reparations Inflation/Unemployment Unable to pay these back, so U.S. began to loan Germany money