Naive Biographies

(2 of 2)

"One day he came in here, and after sitting where you are for the longest time, he said, out of a clear sky: 'Do you know, I've never really grown up? It's a hard thing for me to play this game. In politics, one must meet people, and that's not easy for me.' "

"He has had as little newspaper notice as any man of his prominence. This has been because he has avoided it. ... His political strength is largely because the public have been curious to study the personality of the only man of that kind they have seen. . . He is a student of political economy. . . . He is a student of philosophy."

"He now holds the highest office on earth by virtue of a title greater than that of any electorate. God made him President."

The book of Mr. Whiting, while bearing evidence of more painstaking accuracy, is also witness to the fact that at times a journalist can be less interesting than a politician. One suspects an industrious correspondent of poring over back newspaper files and making a conscientious if uninspired summary. At times he is distressingly literal and like Mr. Washburn submits frequent homilies on the humbler virtues. He does not vapor, however, about the broodings of Fate. Some extracts:

"Calvin Coolidge has been called a second Lincoln.' He is not. There is no second Lincoln. Abraham Lincoln was distinctively an individual. ... If Mr. Coolidge, by his keen common-sense and his accurate perceptions, recalls in any way the figure of Lincoln, that is as far as the suggestion can carry."

"When he went to the state Legislature he took a letter of introduction to the Speaker of the House: '. . . Like the singed cat, he is better than he looks.'"

"It will not pass unnoticed that at this stage of his career Mr. Coolidge was actively interested in some very 'liberal' legislation. The antimonopoly bill certainly represented the antithesis of standpattism; so also, the anti-discrimination bill; and so particularly the anti-injunction bill, which he effectively championed on the floor of the House. We may properly repeat here a line of comment from the Northampton Daily Herald of April 24, 1908, which said: 'Mr. Coolidge is entitled to the thanks of the wage laborers of his district for his manly defense of their interests.'"

"To say that but for the [Boston police] strike Mr. Coolidge would not have attained national position is idle. We do not know what would have happened; but we may fairly suppose that those qualities which were and are his would have found manifestation sooner or later in some way that would capture the attention of the country."

There are the two existing summaries of Calvin Coolidge. As biographies they have their limitations. They tell the outstanding facts. Both are favorable to the President. But he remains a tough nut for his biographers to crack; they have not the leverage of distance.

^{*CALVIN COOLIDGE — R. M. Washburn — Small, Maynard
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† PRESiDENT COOLIDGE—Edward Elwell Whiting—Atlantic Monthly Press
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