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Presidential Election of 1924

THE REPUBLICAN INCUMBENT Calvin Coolidge, the successor to deceased President Warren Harding, won the presidential election of 1924 with 382 electoral votes to his Democratic opponent John W. Davis's 136 electoral votes and Progressive Party candidate Robert LaFollette's 13 electoral votes. Coolidge dominated not only the Electoral College, but also the popular vote, receiving nearly double the popular vote of the Democratic candidate and more votes than all other candidates combined (Coolidge collected almost 16 million votes with Davis and LaFollette receiving over eight million and almost five million, respectively).

Republican Selection Process

Prior to his election as vice president, Coolidge won national fame as governor of Massachusetts when he quashed the Boston Police strike in 1919. As vice president, Coolidge earned the nickname Silent Cal because of his quiet, reserved nature. Many political analysts believed that the Republicans were vulnerable in the 1924 election due to the late-breaking and far-reaching scandals of the Harding administration. Coolidge did not assuage those fears because he refused to demand the resignations of any of the cabinet members, instead proclaiming he would follow through on the plans of Harding, the man Americans elected. He supported immigration restriction and lowering the income tax.

While a few Republicans wished to be selected as the new Republican standard-bearer, party loyalists decided to remain with the steadfast Coolidge, who had been president since August 1923. Silent Cal won the Republican nomination in Cleveland on the first ballot with all but 44 of the 1,109 votes cast. Frank O. Lowden, governor of Illinois and a front-runner for the presidential nomination in 1920, became the first man in the 20th century to turn down the vice presidential nomination. On the next ballot, Idaho Senator William Borah became the second. On the third ballot, the delegates decided on Illinois banker Charles G. Dawes, the first director of the Bureau of the Budget and the principal architect of the World War I reparations payment plan. Pundits gave Dawes the nickname Hell and Maria based on his outburst during Senate hearings related to his spending as Brigadier General of the Seventeenth Engineers during World War I.

Democratic National Convention

The Democratic Party's convention in New York City proved the most tumultuous in American history. Cali-fornian William G. McAdoo, former secretary of the treasury and the son-in-law of President Woodrow Wilson, was the party favorite for years. In fact, his father-in-law's desire for a third term was likely the greatest obstacle to him securing the party's nomination in 1920. In 1924, McAdoo was the clear favorite, with solid support especially from southern, rural, dry, and Protestant delegates. McAdoo, however, faced equally formidable opponents in the 1924 convention. His relation to Wilson alienated him from many ethnic Americans, especially Irish and Germans who opposed American alignment during World War I. He earned the enmity and opposition of state party bosses by entering into primary campaigns instead of deferring to them. Finally, refusal to distance himself from anti-Catholicism won him the nickname the Klandidate from his ideological opponents in the party.

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