Chapter 20 Section 2The Harding Presidency

The Harding PresidencyThe Harding Presidency

Who was Harding?

• Good-natured man with poor judgment• Ohio senator who described

“normalcy” as simpler days • His words of peace and calm

comforted a healing nation

Working for PeaceWorking for Peace

• Post WWI problems: arms control, war debts, & reconstruction

• Harding’s Washington Naval Conference (Russia left out)

Charles Evans HughesCharles Evans Hughes

• “Stop building warships for ten years”

• Asked five powers (US, GB, Japan, France, & Italy) to scrap many warships

• What will this do to the economy?

Kellogg-Briand Act 1928Kellogg-Briand Act 1928

• World Powers agree to disarm

• Renounced war as national policy (peace not war)

• No means of enforcement

High Tariffs and ReparationsHigh Tariffs and Reparations

• Harding favoring isolationism but trying to head off trouble.• Britain and France can’t debt to U.S.

($10 Billion)• Could do this in two ways: –sell goods to US –collect reparations from Germany

• Fordney-McCumber Tariff 1922 – raised taxes on US imports to 60% –Protected U.S. businesses –Made it impossible for Britain &

France to sell enough goods in the U.S. to repay the debts

What did they do?

• Demanded Germany to pay and sent in troops • To avoid war,

banker Charles Dawes went to negotiate loans

Dawes PlanDawes Plan

• American investors loan Germany $2.5 billion to pay Britain & France who in turn pay the US

• Caused resentment: –Britain and France say US not paying fair

share, US benefited from German defeat while Europeans paid for victory with lives –US considered Britain & France financially

irresponsible.

Limiting Immigration

• Fueling Nativism:–Union disputes with immigrant

anarchists and socialists–Unskilled labor jobs decreasing

Quota System

• Congress under pressure from nativists votes for the Emergency Quota Act 1921–System establishes a maximum

number of people who could enter the U.S. from certain countries. –Goal was to limit European

Immigration

• System discriminated against those from Eastern and Southern Europe (Roman Catholics and Jews)

• National Origins Act 1929 – reduced immigration further by admitting only 150,000 a year

• Law excluded Japanese immigration all together• Did not apply to Western

Hemisphere (Canada and Mexico)

Think About It:

•Does who you hang out with determine who you are?

Scandal Hits Harding’s AdministrationScandal Hits Harding’s Administration

• Harding favored limited government on domestic issues (business affairs and social reform)

• Set up Bureau of the Budget to help run government more efficiently

• Urged US steel to abandon the 12-hour day

Harding’s CabinetHarding’s Cabinet

• Charles Evans Hughes – secretary of state who became chief justice

• Herbert Hoover – secretary of commerce (goof job handling food distribution & refugee problems during war)

• Andrew Mellon – extremely wealthy, secretary of treasury (set measures to cut taxes and reduce national debt)

Ohio Gang Ohio Gang (President’s Poker Playing Cronies)(President’s Poker Playing Cronies)

Charles Forbes • Head of Veterans

Bureau, was caught illegally selling government and hospital supplies

Colonel Thomas Miller• Office of Alien

Property (caught taking a bribe)• Charged

w/defrauding government & sentenced to 18 months

The Teapot Dome ScandalThe Teapot Dome Scandal• Government had set aside oil-rich public

land at Teapot Dome, Wyoming, and Elk Hills, California, for use of the Navy

• Secretary of Interior, Albert B. Fall transferred the oil reserves from the navy to Interior Department

• Secretly leased land to 2 private oil companies

• Found guilty of bribery –first to be convicted of a felony while

holding cabinet post• Harding died shortly after of stroke• Calvin Coolidge is now president &

regained faith of people in the post of President

Scandalous Writing:

• Read the “cartoon” strip• On the back, explain how the writer was

accurate about Harding and his administration.

• When completed, put it in the bin.