Herbert Hoover

by Glen Jeansonne

  On the campaign trail, Hoover defined the economic beliefs he had developed over a lifetime of private enterprise and public service. He believed in limited regulation, stating that fair competition must be encouraged and monopolies dismantled when salutary. The federal government’s most important function in regard to the economy was to allay the boom-and-bust cycle and alleviate downturns. In agriculture, he vowed to make farming as prosperous as other occupations by providing moderate protective tariffs on select products, waterway development, and more effective marketing through cooperative farming. In labor, he upheld workers’ right to strike and called for legislation that would curtail the use of injunctions in labor disputes. Falling back on his reputation as an effective administrator, he called for a reorganization of the government by function, with bureaus and agencies that overlapped to be consolidated and unnecessary ones eliminated altogether. He vowed, if elected, to launch a massive public works program that would include waterways, highways, and public buildings, projects that would alleviate unemployment. Estimating the cost at $1 billion, he did not promise either tax cuts or additional debt reductions. He called for enforcement of Prohibition and advised those who opposed the Eighteenth Amendment to work for repeal rather than to flout the law.32

  Hoover was a strong proponent of women’s suffrage and insisted women could contribute to a higher moral tone in politics.33 As commerce secretary, he had worked for better homes and improved recreational opportunities, and as a national candidate he supported education and believed that strong families were crucial to the success of America. Hoover had been involved in movements to improve the quality of life of children for decades, and as president he would continue to advocate for children, asserting, “The greatness of any nation, its freedom from poverty and crime, its aspirations and ideas, are the direct quotient of the care of its children.”34

  Prosperity, Hoover believed, could best be preserved in a peaceful world.35 Intending to make world peace a cornerstone of his foreign policy, he pledged to cooperate with the League of Nations, though not to join it, and was prepared to disarm America’s military to the extent that other nations would disarm.

  One passage in the speech came back to haunt Hoover: “In America today we are nearer a final triumph over poverty than in any land. The poorhouse has vanished from among us,” and he added, “We have not reached that goal, but given a chance to go forward, we shall, with the help of God, be in sight of the day when poverty will be banished from this nation.”36 At the time, it might have been true that no nation had ever enjoyed such prosperity as America experienced during the 1920s. Still, Hoover took too much for granted in suggesting it would continue unimpeded, and he inadvertently provided ammunition later turned on him by his critics. His words were to prove ironic years later when the nation lay prostrate beneath the burden of the Great Depression.

  Throughout the nation, press reception of the Republican’s address was mixed. The New York Herald Tribune emphasized the speech’s patriotic commitment to American values, while the Mobile Register considered it “a genuinely human document.” The New York Times observed that the GOP nominee considered farm relief a more important priority than Prohibition. While the Chattanooga Times carped that Hoover had said nothing unexpected, the Indianapolis Star found his speech thoughtful and practical. The Cleveland Plain Dealer believed Hoover spoke directly to the common people rather than to the politicians. The Louisville Courier-Journal stated, “It differs from other Republican speeches, not in substance, but in spirit; in the elevation of its tone, in imaginative color, in pervasive idealism.”37

  Between August 11 and November 2, Hoover delivered only six major addresses, but he held numerous local meetings and greeted crowds from the rear platform of his campaign railroad car. On his return trip to the East from Palo Alto, Hoover delivered an address at his birthplace, West Branch, Iowa, presenting his program for agriculture and praising the rural way of life, including the central role of the family. Back east, he spoke at Newark, New Jersey, where he discussed the use of public works as a device to even out the business cycle and mitigate unemployment, as well as the creation of mediation methods to resolve labor-management disputes. At Elizabethton, Tennessee, a Republican enclave in the upper South, he discussed enforcement of Prohibition, use of cooperative marketing for farmers, and the need for a clean campaign, disavowing bigotry. Returning to the Northeast, the GOP candidate spoke at Boston, where he emphasized tariff protection as a major element in the Republican economic program. At New York’s Madison Square Garden, in the heart of his opponent’s bailiwick, Hoover focused on issues government should avoid, such as competing with private business in the sale of electric power. Before an unexpectedly receptive audience, he advised that Prohibition should be given a fair trial before a rush to judgment. He did not condemn alcohol on moral grounds, but he advised that repeal, not disobedience, was the proper antidote to a failed social experiment. In his final major address, in St. Louis, on his return to Palo Alto to vote, Hoover emphasized the necessity for peace and equability between labor and capital.38

  In a campaign pitting the first Quaker nominee of a major party against the first Catholic candidate, religion inevitably became an issue, though both contenders attempted to avoid it. Some Democrats claimed that no one of Hoover’s faith could be a credible commander in chief because all Quakers were pacifists. Hoover pointed out that several of his Quaker uncles had served in the Civil War and that his own father had volunteered yet had been rejected as too young. He reminded voters that he had supported American participation in the Great War. In addition, some political opponents charged that he was ineligible for the presidency because he was a British citizen, having lived in London during much of his mining career. Hoover retorted that he was an American citizen by birth, had certainly not renounced his U.S. citizenship, and had never voted anywhere but in the United States. Another frequent assertion was that as food administrator, Hoover had cheated American farmers in order to provide low food prices to the Allies. The candidate patiently explained that he had tried to balance all interests, that he had compelled the Allies to honor their agreement to buy the full 1918 harvest when they tried to renege, and that after 1918 he had disposed of much of the U.S. farm surplus as relief for Central and Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. At least one charge against Hoover was pure fabrication. Designed to hurt his chances in the South, rumors were circulated that Hoover had danced with a black woman while in Mississippi during the Great Flood of 1927. Actually, Hoover could dance only awkwardly, if at all. He pointed out that he had been in the small town where the alleged incident occurred for only three minutes and had never left his railroad car.39

  The smears against Smith were predictable, yet repeated ceaselessly, often in furtive whispering campaigns, sometimes openly. Many Protestants believed Catholics owed their first allegiance not to their country but to the pope in Rome. The issue was closely linked to Prohibition, which was supported more ardently by Protestants, who pointed out that wine was used in the Catholic mass. Although the Democratic platform was dry, Smith openly opposed Prohibition, and Hoover received the endorsement of many Protestant churches because of the Prohibition issue. Hoover publicly denounced all defamatory propaganda drawn to his attention. In late September, he stated, “Nor can I reiterate too strongly that religious questions have no part in this campaign.” He further explained, “There are important and vital reasons for the return of the Republican administration, but that is not one of them.” The following day he restated, “The glory of our American ideals is the right of every man to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience.”40

  Smith’s aggressive attacks on those who resorted to the use of religion in the campaign probably backfired. Rather than bringing him sympathy, his outrage drew attention to the matter and did not seem presidential.41 The Catholic issue hurt Smith primarily in the South, and while it might have changed some individual votes
, it did not determine the outcome. Not until 1960 was another Catholic, John F. Kennedy, nominated by a major party. Coincidentally, he was matched against another Quaker, Richard Nixon.

  Hoover came to believe that his colleague from the Wilson administration, Franklin D. Roosevelt, was not simply campaigning against him, but had stooped to circulating personal slurs and embroidering falsehoods, which the Republican considered a betrayal. Roosevelt wrote to Hoover’s colleague Julius Barnes and attempted to convince him that their common friend would make an unfit president. FDR wrote that “high ideals and a forward-looking policy—not only for this country but for the world—would stand as little chance under Mr. Hoover as they have stood under President Harding, Mr. Coolidge and Mr. Mellon.” The message angered Barnes, who wrote that “this letter, I am frank to say, greatly surprises me and disappoints me.” Barnes added that the letter “falls below my previous estimate of your character and your ideals.” Barnes went on to say that he had known Hoover for many years, had never known him to be incompetent or unethical, and intended to vote for him.42 Barnes’s rebuttal did not restrain Roosevelt, who continued to direct invective at his former friend. Shortly before Election Day, FDR told an audience that Hoover was an elitist who disdained the common people, though Roosevelt’s own ancestry and education were far more aristocratic than Hoover’s. “There is such a thing as too much engineering,” he added.43

  On Election Day, Hoover, along with Lou, Allan, and Herbert Jr., voted at the Stanford precinct, which Hoover carried 450–10. That evening, the family and about fifty local friends awaited election returns in the spacious Hoover mansion near campus, where running totals were posted on a chalkboard. Hoover sat quietly, puffed on his pipe, and remained composed. Months earlier the university had booked an outdoor performance by the great composer of marches, John Philip Sousa, and his seventy-piece band. When it became obvious that Hoover would win, the band marched to the Hoover home, clogging the streets with two thousand jubilant students, for a brief serenade that included the national anthem and the Stanford alma mater. The usually stoic Hoover greeted the students from a portico and shed tears. He retired at about eleven thirty and was awakened about half an hour later by a telegram of concession from Al Smith. Hoover informed reporters that there would be no speeches and no comments about cabinet selections until they were made. “In this hour there can be for me no feeling of victory or exultation,” he said in his first statement to the press on the day after the election. “Rather, it imposes a sense of solemn responsibility of the future and complete dependence upon divine guidance.”44

  Numerous pundits had predicted a Hoover victory, but not the scope of it. He carried forty-two states, with 444 electoral votes to Smith’s 87 votes and eight states. Hoover overwhelmed the Democrat with 58.1 percent of the popular vote in one of the most decisive victories in American history up to that time. Incredibly, Hoover won five former Confederate states, usually Democratic bastions. Smith won only Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and a tier of resolutely Southern Democratic states in the “black belt,” South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, and Louisiana. Though he had appeared a strong candidate and an energetic campaigner, Smith proved weak in every region, even where Democrats had won easily in previous contests. The defeat was nationwide and conclusive. Hoover, a more sedate, restrained campaigner, had won wet states, corn belt states, Southern states, and states that sympathized with Smith because of his religion, most by large margins. The only genuine national issue was prosperity and the desire to maintain the status quo. “Mr. Hoover, after all, was better qualified for the Presidency,” the Washington Post wrote. The magnitude of Hoover’s victory made a political comeback for Smith unlikely.45

  The morning after their victory, the Hoover couple rose early and celebrated in a typically subdued manner, strolling the foothills and meadows near Stanford where they had courted as geology students. With the strain of the election dissipating, they walked hand in hand for an hour. Returning, the president-elect plunged into thousands of congratulatory cables from well-wishers. Most would be answered by secretaries, but a few required personal responses, among them memos from Vice President Dawes and Vice President–Elect Curtis.46 Hoover knew his life would never be the same. Already, he was losing some of the privacy he craved. During his interlude as president-elect, Hoover confessed his fears privately to his friend Willis J. Abbot, the editor of the Christian Science Monitor: “My friends have made the American people think I am some kind of superman, able to cope successfully with the most difficult and complicated problems. They expect the impossible of me and should there arise in the land conditions with which the political machinery is unable to cope, I will be the one to suffer.” Hoover knew that his reputation had outgrown him and that it invited a backlash if things went wrong.47

  Despite his postelection apprehension, Hoover turned his focus toward planning his administration. His contacts with Latin American diplomats during his tenure as commerce secretary whetted his appetite to improve trade and diplomatic relations as president. He decided that a goodwill trip to Latin America would be the first major item on his diplomatic agenda. No president-elect had previously taken such a prolonged voyage to other nations. By leaving the country, Hoover also avoided upstaging Coolidge in Washington and evaded the hordes of patronage seekers pursuing him. Having campaigned to make world peace the centerpiece of his diplomacy, he decided to start in the Western Hemisphere. Hoover departed from San Pedro, California, on November 19, 1928, aboard the battleship USS Maryland, accompanied by his wife, a small group of advisers, and a party of reporters. Hoover paid his personal expenses, except for use of the battleship. The ten-week tour included Honduras, Peru, Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, and Brazil. Aboard ship, Hoover relaxed on deck, reading detective novels and Westerns as well as books about fishing. He and Lou joined the sailors in watching a treasure trove of Hollywood movies loaned by director Cecil B. DeMille.48

  The incoming president considered the voyage his first step in a reorientation of American policy toward Latin America. He delivered some twenty-five short speeches, including one in each major capital. The centerpiece of his program was that he intended to inaugurate a new approach to the United States’ relations with the Southern Hemisphere, renouncing imperialism and economic domination. American troops would not intervene in the hemisphere to collect debts or even to protect American lives, and he promised to withdraw all American troops remaining in Latin America. He vowed to upgrade the quality of the diplomatic corps assigned to Latin neighbors. No longer would ambassadorships be assigned as political sinecures or patronage rewards. Rather, able career diplomats, usually native speakers, would be assigned. He promised to settle all disputes peacefully and to inaugurate airmail delivery between the hemispheres. In nation after nation, Hoover labeled his approach the “Good Neighbor Policy,” a strategy that would be continued by Franklin Roosevelt. As part of the new overtures, he inaugurated exchanges of professors and students between the Northern and Southern hemispheres. Perhaps Hoover’s sincerity, humility, lack of pretense, and respectful attitude helped ensure more stable relations in what had been a turbulent part of the world.

  After his return from Latin America, Hoover spent time in Florida as a guest at the estate of the department store mogul J. C. Penney. There, Hoover held appointments with party leaders and fished. He visited Thomas Edison and chatted with Al Smith, also vacationing in Florida. The recent adversaries became friends who found each other’s company mutually pleasant.

  As the twilight of the Coolidge era dimmed and the dawn of the Hoover years beckoned, the nation felt refreshed, facing the future with confidence. Yet Coolidge prosperity was stumbling. The adrenaline that had propelled Wall Street and powered the engine of the economy was soon to receive a jolt that would forever change Hoover’s life and reputation—as well as the fortunes of a generation.49

  EIGHT

  Getting a Grip on the Presidencyr />
  As Herbert Hoover prepared to take the oath of office, the American public’s expectations for their new president rose. The New York Times noted that “the country is ready as it has seldom been for audacious leadership, [and] the chance for coincidence between the man and the hour seems almost too good an opportunity to waste. . . . Everyone agrees, critic and friend, that he is the best qualified President we have had for decades.”1 The San Francisco Chronicle chimed in, “No other American has ever had the breadth of experience which Herbert Hoover brings to the task confronting him.”2 Novelist Sherwood Anderson observed that the incoming president was possibly the most respected man in America and had “never known failure.”3 Only occasionally did anyone dampen the euphoria. Shortly after Hoover’s inauguration, The Outlook observed, “He is regarded as a miracle worker. That is his misfortune. He will be required by his masters, the people, to do the impossible.”4

  Hoover seemed oblivious to the deluge of attention. As his inauguration approached, he spent much of his time at his home on S Street in Washington, DC, surrounded by family, including Herbert Jr., with his wife and two babies, and Allan, a Stanford senior. On his last day as a private citizen, Hoover ate a hearty breakfast and perused the newspapers, deterred from a relaxing drive into the countryside by a rainstorm. His most comforting thought was that the campaigning was over and he could soon get to work.5