Imagine a country in which strikes by public-sector unions occupied the public square; where foreign policy wandered aimlessly as America disentangled itself from wars abroad and a potential civil war on its southern border; where racial and ethnic groups jostled for political influence; where a war on illicit substances led to violence in its cities; where technology was dramatically changing how mankind communicated and moved about—and where the educated harbored increasing contempt for the philosophic underpinnings of our republic. That country, the America of the 1920s, looked a lot like America today. One would think, then, that the President who successfully navigated these challenges, Calvin Coolidge, might be esteemed today. Instead, Coolidge’s record is little known, the result of efforts by both the left and right to distort his legacy. Why Coolidge Matters revisits the record of our most underrated president, examining Coolidge’s views on governance, public sector unions, education, race, immigration, and foreign policy. Most importantly, Why Coolidge Matters explains what lessons Coolidge—the last president to pay down the national debt—can offer the limited government movement in the post-industrial age.

This New York Times bestselling “deep dive into the terms of eight former presidents is chock-full of political hijinks—and déjà vu” (Vanity Fair) and provides a fascinating look at the men who came to the office without being elected to it, showing how each affected the nation and world. The strength and prestige of the American presidency has waxed and waned since George Washington. Eight men have succeeded to the presidency when the incumbent died in office. In one way or another they vastly changed our history. Only Theodore Roosevelt would have been elected in his own right. Only TR, Truman, Coolidge, and LBJ were re-elected. John Tyler succeeded William Henry Harrison who died 30 days into his term. He was kicked out of his party and became the first president threatened with impeachment. Millard Fillmore succeeded esteemed General Zachary Taylor. He immediately sacked the entire cabinet and delayed an inevitable Civil War by standing with Henry Clay’s compromise of 1850. Andrew Johnson, who succeeded our greatest president, sided with remnants of the Confederacy in Reconstruction. Chester Arthur, the embodiment of the spoils system, was so reviled as James Garfield’s successor that he had to defend himself against plotting Garfield’s assassination; but he reformed the civil service. Theodore Roosevelt broke up the trusts. Calvin Coolidge silently cooled down the Harding scandals and preserved the White House for the Republican Herbert Hoover and the Great Depression. Harry Truman surprised everybody when he succeeded the great FDR and proved an able and accomplished president. Lyndon B. Johnson was named to deliver Texas electorally. He led the nation forward on Civil Rights but failed on Vietnam. Accidental Presidents shows that “history unfolds in death as well as in life” (The Wall Street Journal) and adds immeasurably to our understanding of the power and limits of the American presidency in critical times.

Calvin Coolidge lived during a time of constitutional transformation – the Progressive Era and World War I – before serving as President of the United States from 1923-1929. Thomas J. Tacoma argues that Coolidge contended with this changing regime and world through as a Burkean conservative and an Americanist politician. In The Political Thought of Calvin Coolidge: Burkean Americanist, Tacoma contextualizes Coolidge’s thought in the Progressive milieu of the age and Coolidge’s own educational background in New England and then presents the core of Coolidge’s political thought: civilization. Tacoma maintains that Coolidge believed in civilization and that the traditional American political and economic order represented the highest achievements in western civilization. Coolidge’s speeches ranged across American history to defend the virtues of the American regime, and in his political career, he undertook to defend the constitutional regime he had inherited. Coolidge, famous for his emphasis on thrift, likewise situated his views on economy within his larger vision of civilization, and he mixed realism and idealism in his developed views on international relations. Through extensive research, Tacoma examines the way Coolidge responded to the challenge of upholding American civilization in the face of a changing world.

There is a widely held notion that, except for the elections of 1928 and 1960, the Irish have primarily influenced only state and local government. The Irish and the American Presidency reveals that the Irish have had a consistent and noteworthy impact on presidential careers, policies, and elections throughout American history. Using US party systems as an organizational framework, this book examines the various ways that Scots-Irish and Catholic Irish Americans, as well as the Irish who remained in eire, have shaped, altered, and sometimes driven such presidential political factors as party nominations, campaign strategies, elections, and White House policymaking.The Irish seem to be inextricably interwoven into important moments of presidential political history. Yanoso discusses the Scots-Irish participation in the American Revolution, the Whiskey Rebellion, and the War of 1812. She describes President Bill Clinton's successful Good Friday Agreement that brought peace and hope to Northern Ireland. And finally, she assesses the now-common presidential visits to Ireland as a strategy for garnering Irish-American support back home.No previous work has explored the impact of Irish and Irish-American affairs on US presidential politics throughout the entire scope of American history. Readers interested in presidential politics, American history, and/or Irish/Irish-American history are certain to find The Irish and the American Presidency enjoyable, informative, and impactful.

Calvin Coolidge: A Documentary Biography reveals the "album version" of President Calvin Coolidge, featuring extended excerpts and, indeed, often the entire texts of major Coolidge addresses-as well as presenting a host of other illuminating documents, authored both by or about America's vastly underrated thirtieth president. Calvin Coolidge: A Documentary Biography shines a searchlight on Silent Cal Coolidge's world and worldview as no previous book ever has. It's all here: * The opposites-attract love story of taciturn Cal Coolidge and his outgoing wife Grace Goodhue Coolidge. * Jack Kennedy had his Irish Mafia, Jimmy Carter had his Georgia Mafia. The story of Frank Stearns, Dwight Morrow, and Calvin Coolidge's "Amherst Mafia." * Phenomenal vote getter Coolidge won more offices than any other president. The secret of how this painfully shy man did it. His strong appeal to Democrats. * The 1919 Boston Police Strike. How a city under siege ultimately makes Calvin Coolidge president. * How a runaway 1920 GOP convention stampedes to nominate Coolidge for the vice-presidency. * Unbelievable tragedy visits in July 1924 as Calvin Coolidge stands to become president in his own right--the death of his son Cal Jr. * The Coolidge presidency: a partnership of three remarkable figures: Coolidge, Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon, and Budget Director Herbert Lord. * Coolidge vs. the Klan: reaching out to embattled minorities: Jews, blacks, Catholics. * The gutsy Coolidge vetoes.* How Coolidge chose "not to run" in 1928. Each entry also includes a revealing explanatory introduction by noted Coolidge scholar and award-winning author David Pietrusza. The book is further augmented by: * a Calvin Coolidge fact sheet. * a comprehensive Coolidge bibliography. * a detailed Coolidge time line. * a photo insert plus illustrations throughout the text. * an essay detailing recently discovered facts regarding the fabled Coolidge "Persistence" quote. In addition to numerous key speeches and texts from Coolidge himself, the volume includes contemporary readings from: * Bruce Barton * The Boston Herald * Marion Leroy Burton * First Lady Grace Goodhue Coolidge * Vice President Charles G. Dawes * Frederick H. Gillett * Al Jolson * Walter Lippmann * Judge Wallace McCamant * Treasury Secretary Andrew W. Mellon * Dwight W. Morrow * Alexandra Carlisle Pfeiffer * H. I. Phillips * The Pittsburgh Courier * Theodore Roosevelt * C. Bascom Slemp * Frank W. Stearns * R. M. Washburn PRAISE FOR DAVID PIETRUSZA'S "SILENT CAL'S ALMANACK" "Calvin Coolidge was one of the greatest presidents of the 20th century and is certainly the most underrated. This book, compiled by one of my favorite historians, will give readers a full appreciation of why Silent Cal's wisdom shines like a beacon through the fog of historical amnesia." -Jonah Goldberg, author of Liberal Fascism "an authority on the 1920s and [Calvin] Coolidge . . . David Pietrusza has brought Coolidge back to life with his volumes about the president . . ." -Amity Shlaes

A treasury of the wit and wisdom of Calvin Coolidge, America's surprisingly eloquent 30th President. Silent Cal's Almanack includes: * The ultimate distillation of Calvin Coolidge political wisdom. * A selection of Silent Cal's key speeches. * A thought-provoking original biographical essay. * A fascinating and unique 50-page portfolio of Coolidge photos, editorial cartoons and campaign memorabilia. * A Coolidge timeline. * A Coolidge bibliography. "He wrote simply, innocently, artlessly," H. L. Mencken once noted regarding Coolidge's prose, "He forgot all the literary affectations and set down his ideas exactly as they came into his head. The result was a bald, but strangely appealing piece of writing-a composition of almost Lincolnian austerity and beauty. The true Vermonter was in every line of it." Supreme Court Justice David Souter recently wrote of Calvin Coolidge: "The simple beauty of his English prose exceeds anything I could say in praise of it."

Argumentation is often understood as a coherent set of Western theories, birthed in Athens and developing throughout the Roman period, the Middle Ages, the Enlightenment and Renaissance, and into the present century. Ideas have been nuanced, developed, and revised, but still the outline of argumentation theory has been recognizable for centuries, or so it has seemed to Western scholars. The 2019 Alta Conference on Argumentation (co-sponsored by the National Communication Association and the American Forensic Association) aimed to question the generality of these intellectual traditions. This resulting collection of essays deals with the possibility of having local theories of argument – local to a particular time, a particular kind of issue, a particular place, or a particular culture. Many of the papers argue for reconsidering basic ideas about arguing to represent the uniqueness of some moment or location of discourse. Other scholars are more comfortable with the Western traditions, and find them congenial to the analysis of arguments that originate in discernibly distinct circumstances. The papers represent different methodologies, cover the experiences of different nations at different times, examine varying sorts of argumentative events (speeches, court decisions, food choices, and sound), explore particular personal identities and the issues highlighted by them, and have different overall orientations to doing argumentation scholarship. Considered together, the essays do not generate one simple conclusion, but they stimulate reflection about the particularity or generality of the experience of arguing, and therefore the scope of our theories.

The period from 1913 to 1933 is not often seen as a coherent entity in the history of the United States. It is more often viewed in terms of two distinct periods with the pre-war era of political engagement, idealism, and reform known as “progressivism” separated by World War I from the materialism, conservatism and disengagement of the “prosperous” 1920s. To many postwar observers and later historians, the entry of the United States into the European conflict in 1917 marked not just a dramatic departure in foreign relations, but also the end of an era of reform. This second edition of Historical Dictionary from the Great War to the Great Depression covers the history of this period through a chronology, an introductory essay, appendixes, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has more than 700 cross-referenced entries on important personalities, politics, economy, foreign relations, religion, and culture. This book is an excellent access point for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about a vital period in U.S. history.

Debate as Global Pedagogy: Rwanda Rising illustrates that the teaching of debate offers an ideal educational approach for the prevention and remediation of genocide. As the antithesis of propaganda, debate and argument instruction promotes the critical thinking necessary to resist processes of propaganda that enable injustice and human rights abuses. Case studies of argumentation instruction and deliberative forums worldwide demonstrate how environments of discursive complexity can be fostered through education in debate and argumentation. The central example of Rwanda recovering from genocide in 1994 with help from innovative pedagogy by iDebate Dreamers Academy provides a model for how argumentation instruction can reduce and prevent social injustices.

This innovative encyclopedia explores the life and times of America's forty-five presidents—from the first administration to that of Donald Trump. Forty-five men have served as President of the United States since George Washington swore the oath of office in 1789 in New York City. Some have proved exceptional leaders, and others have not. Some have faced serious crises, both foreign and domestic. Franklin Roosevelt was elected to four terms, leading the country through a major economic depression and a world war, while one held the office for only a single month. Each, however, played a key role in the evolution of United States history. Each of their histories therefore remains a critical civics lesson to consider. This four-volume encyclopedia provides an expansive analysis of the life and times of each United States president in chronological order from George Washington to Donald Trump. Each chapter includes a timeline, a biographical sketch, a historical overview, and an analytical essay concerning the president and his presidency. Each also includes a substantial selection of related primary documents presenting important presidential speeches and correspondence. A suggested reading list for further study of each president rounds out each entry.