“No man was ever meanly born. About his cradle is the wondrous miracle of life. He may descend into the depths, he may live in infamy and perish miserably, but he is born great. Men build monuments above the graves of their heroes to mark the end of a great life, but women seek out the birthplace and build their shrine, not where a great life had its ending but where it had its beginning, seeking with a truer instinct the common source of things not in that which is gone forever but in that which they know will again be manifest. Life may depart, but the source of life is constant” — Vice President-Elect Calvin Coolidge, January 23, 1921.
The President and Mrs. Coolidge with Suzanne Boone at John Ringling’s circus
birthday
Happy Birthday, George Washington!
February 22nd marks the two hundred and eighty-second anniversary of George Washington’s birthday. In the 1920s the first president became a favorite target among literary elites who employed “historical debunking” to impugn the legitimacy of the Founding by criticizing the man, his leadership and legacy. Since then, time has witnessed more than one recurrence of those same supposedly “new” yet regurgitated attacks upon his genuinely great character and exceptional wisdom. Once asked a question about President Washington in the same cynical tone as those attempting to “debunk” the supposed myth of the Founders’ greatness, Coolidge raised his arm and pointed out the nearest window, offering the simple retort, “His monument is still out there” (The Talkative President p.14). What made Washington great, worthy of our appreciation and study, continues to outlast his harshest critics. Coolidge, on another occasion, once said, “It takes maturity to comprehend Washington.” Yes, it does.
This maturity is sorely lacking in too many of those who, flush with self-righteous indignation, campaign against Washington and his generation for failing to live up to our current politically correct standards. They give full vent to the condescension and vitriol they nurse toward the Founding and those who accomplished it. They seek to discredit America’s exceptional beginnings because it is not perfect enough. The maturity that appreciates and honors great men like Washington requires far more than the close-minded bigotry of far too many school faculties and boards of historical institutions. It demands that we reckon with the people and times in which they lived on their terms, not superimposing our prejudices and biases on those who triumphed over hardships and uncertainties of which we rarely experience today. Modernity, by itself, has not given us a special insight into human nature never before understood. We are not so enlightened as we may think just as they were not so backward and provincial as we assume they were. It is by severing ties with the wisdom of the past — as if slavery, economic disparity and all the other trite catch-phrases of political correctness cannot co-exist with anything worth learning from the past, however wholesome, right or truthful — that we now face a future living in denial of all standards, even the realness of reality.
To know who we are again, it takes maturity to return and consider Washington, not as the straw man set up by “debunkers” to be easily knocked down: as either the impeccable demi-god of the Revolution nor the rich, white Southern slave owner whose hypocrisy overshadows whatever he has to teach us. In reality, he is to be appreciated as the faithful and humble man who achieved great things not because of privilege or perfection but because he held fast to character and God as his ultimate strength, overcoming time and time again what could have been permanent handicaps and lasting failures. Greatness is not a matter of birth or even breeding. Greatness is not found in never encountering failure. Greatness is discovered by persevering through failure. Greatness is manifested in one’s character, exercising the courage and conviction to rise above the expedience of the moment for the accomplishment of what is right in the end. Washington’s faith in Almighty God equipped him with the resolve to continue each day. It was a faith not resting on empty promises but rationally grounded in God’s reliable nature. It vindicates the wisdom of integrity, teaching what is essential regardless of what century it is or how far we progress technologically. As Coolidge reflected on the value of the Bible and those timeless moral lessons from Washington and others found within the books of his boyhood, he wrote, “Amid all the conflict and change which we call progress, amid the rise and fall of the contending forces of the earth, the really important relations of life remain fairly constant. After all, the older people of my boyhood, in assuming the stability and permanence of essentials, had a wisdom which experience has demonstrated to be more sound than it formerly appeared.”
Included in such sound wisdom is the virtue and valor of George Washington even now. He possessed a greatness stemming not from the accolades or privileges others gave him but from the kind of man he prepared himself to be, the discipline he exercised to master himself rather than be enslaved by an absence of moral standards, and the will to serve (not himself) but the good of others. He still stands because character outlasts time itself. Happy Birthday, George Washington!
On September 21, 1976
While today marks the 103rd anniversary of Ronald W. Reagan’s birth, he would appreciate the focus not upon him but the reappraisal that is underway of an exceptional, yet far underrated, predecessor. A thoughtful admirer of Calvin Coolidge, President Reagan proved that “Silent Cal’s” economic model is anything but outmoded or theoretical: universal tax cuts spur growth and expand opportunity for everyone. The accomplishments of the 1980s, while by no means complete or consistent with Coolidge’s full record, demonstrated that moving back toward individual liberty and away from a massive government bureaucracy still works. It accomplishes genuine results, establishes peaceful progress and preserves opportunity to move forward and upward as free individuals. “Big Government” can only promise material goods without substantive delivery, disrupt social advances and destroy individual potential. Coolidge’s example — slashing tax rates four times combined with drastic annual reductions in Federal spending while paying down the national debt, $5 billion paid during his tenure alone — will work anywhere, anyplace, anytime. It only requires the will and courage to translate those principles into policy. The current administration, hostile to these proven precepts, continues to pull America further from its roots, the fertile soil of bold and disciplined leaders like Coolidge.
Heading into the election of 1976, as the nation stood poised to elect Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan (four years before the Presidency) took the occasion of his radio broadcast to deliver one of the most cogent expositions of why Coolidge still matters. His words, spoken almost forty years ago, ring truer now than they did at the time,
“The names of some Presidents are invoked by spokesmen of both political parties as ‘men for all seasons,’ epitomizing the greatness of America, Washington, Lincoln, Jefferson etc. Then there are Presidents whose names are brought in party circles, hailed as great but, if acknowledged by the other party at all with NOT quite the same enthusiasm.
“There are also two lists of Presidential names – one for each party, usually held up to view for strictly partisan purposes. Each party lists past Presidents of the opposing party as examples of that party’s terrible record.
“The Democrats for example get laughs by mentioning Silent Cal Coolidge. And truth is many Republicans chuckle a little and go along with the idea that he was a do nothing President. Sometimes I wonder if he really was a ‘do nothing’ or was he a little like a Life Guard on the beach who also seems to be doing very little when there is no emergency. If you take a closer look he is quietly being watchful.
“Cal Coolidge is good for laughs but not all of them are at his expense. There was the press conference where a persistent reporter asked the President if he had anything to say about prohibition? Cal said ‘No.’ ‘Any comments on the world court?’ – ‘No.’ – “What about the farm situation?” Again the answer was ‘no.’ The reporter said, ‘You don’t seem to have any comment about anything.’ Coolidge said, ‘No comment & don’t quote me.’
“Probably no President has ever lived in the White House and maintained so unchanged his previous life style. Which in Coolidge’s case was the simple, even frugal life he had lived on a New England farm.
“Shortly after he became President he sent his teenage son into the tobacco fields to work in the summer as he always had. One of the other workers surprised at this said to the young Coolidge, ‘if my father were President I wouldn’t be out here working in the field.’ Young Coolidge said, ‘If my father were your father, you would.’
“But while ‘Silent Cal’ seemed to be doing nothing as President, the federal budget actually went down and so did the national debt. Consumer prices fell but unemployment stayed at the figure we only dream of – 3.5 % which means everyone who wanted a job had one. Federal taxes were cut four times.
“The number of automobiles on our streets and highways tripled during his years in the White House and radio sales went up 1400%.
“In just the 5 years from 1922 to 27 the purchasing power of wages rose 10%. It was a kind of ‘Golden Era,’ in other ways. Hollywood would never again be more glamorous and there were giants in the sports arenas whose names are still legend – the Manassas Mauler, Jack Dempsey, Knute Rockne, The 4 Horsemen, Red Grange, Babe Ruth and Big Bill Tilden. No I’m not saying President Coolidge was responsible for them but they were larger than life figures that went with America’s place in the world.
“So what if he was a ‘do nothing” President. Do you suppose doing nothing had something to do with reducing the budget, redu’ing the debt, and cutting taxes 4 times?
“This is Ronald Reagan. Thanks for listening.”
Taken from Reagan’s Path to Victory:The Shaping of Ronald Reagan’s Vision: Selected Writings (pp.72-74).
Portrait of Coolidge with Rob Roy by DeWitt M. Lockman, 1931. Commissioned for the New York Historical Society.
The Importance of the Obvious 