Coolidge [Paperback]

Robert Sobel (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 2000

In 1998, the late Robert Sobel, author of more than 30 books on business and politics, wrote the first biography of Calvin Coolidge in a generation. Neglected by historians, Coolidge's influence has been immense--both on American presidents like Ronald Reagan (who replaced Truman's portrait with Coolidge's in the White House cabinet room), and on the increasing libertarian spirit of American politics.

Product Details

• Paperback: 462 pages
• Publisher: Regnery Publishing; 1 edition (October 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0895262479
• ISBN-13: 978-0895262479
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #66,894 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A quite & unaasumming President, October 17, 2002

By 

Zecon - See all my reviews

This review is from: Coolidge (Paperback)

There aren't too many biographies about the life of Calvin Coolidge. This is an absorbing book that is sure to shatter many myths about Coolidge. I highly recommend it for your reading list.

President Coolidge was not a man accustomed to tooting his horn. He is well known for his economical use of words. Without a doubt moderate or conservative in personal behavior, President Coolidge should not be confused with modern political conservatives. While his personal behavior was clearly conservative, his political beliefs were more identifiable with those associated with modern libertarianism. President Coolidge was one who believed that government should exercise restraint and not limit liberty. Despite this belief that government should exercise restraint, President Coolidge's Administration suffered very little from scandal.

Modern historians often portray Coolidge as a minor figure and trivialize his time as President. Often portrayed as a lackey for big business and for not doing anything to prevent the Great Depression, this biography puts holes in the myth that he was in the pocket of big business and responsible for the Depression. President Coolidge was neither lazy, unintelligent, nor an accidental President. Coolidge understood the concept of restraint and approached life as President from that perspective. Not concerned with the outward trappings of power, Coolidge stayed true to his Vermont roots.

You will find that Coolidge was neither indolent nor unintelligent after reading this book. President Coolidge is just the kind of President we need today.

22 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Our most forgetabble, understated president, September 16, 2003

By 

Seth J. Frantzman (Jerusalem, Israel) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Coolidge (Paperback)

Calvin Cooliedge. Who remmembers him? not very many people. This book will explain why Coolidge's simple ways made him one of the most imporant presidents of the 20th century, not because he accomplished alot but prescisely because he set out to do as little as possible.

Reagan thought Coolidge was an American hero. Why? This book will explain the great enigma of Calvin Coolidge. Coolidge emerged as an American hero when he stood up to the Boston Police department when they went on strike. He fired them and hired new officers because this was a time of anarchy in the city and the people needed security.

As president Coolidge vowed to keep his hands off government, off taxes and away from the public space. He beleived what was good for business was good for America, and he helped support the rising market. Coolidge wanted to pass as few laws as possible so as to keep the government from encroaching on the people. He was a true Jeffersonian.

Coolidge was sworn in with his family bible. He never travelled abroad(except Cuba) and never flew in an airplane or went down in a submarine. He was the last of a dying breed of simple politicians who valued the simple american life. This is an important addition to any collection of American political biography and an important read for someone perplexed with the current governments invasion into our daily lives.

15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The real Coolidge, February 23, 2004

By 

Jon Hunt "musician, teacher" (Old Greenwich, Ct. USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Coolidge (Paperback)

The late author, Robert Sobel, has done a fine job in peeling away the crusty layers of our thirtieth president. Known for his taciturn and somnolent personality, Calvin Coolidge is revealed in this book to have had more substance than one might have given him credit.

Biographers of presidents who are generally regarded as average or below average often write about their subjects with a bent of pushing them up a notch or two in history. A current biography of Warren G. Harding written by John Dean of Watergate fame, for instance, lays out a theme of trying to lift Harding out of the cellar of presidential comparison. Sobel is a bit less interested in Coolidge's lasting reputation although he would like the reader to be reminded that Coolidge did have some accomplishments while in the White House and that his administration, in stark contrast to Harding, his predecessor, was scandal free and that Coolidge, himself, was a man of tremendous virtue.

The myth that Coolidge was a hard worker is not quite dispelled in Sobel's book. One can surmise that the only midnight oil Calvin Coolidge ever burned was on the night of his sudden inauguration at his father's home in Vermont following Harding's death..... the oath being administered by Coolidge's father.

Sobel spends a little too much time on analyzing the country's finances during the Coolidge administration. At these times the author's writing becomes bogged down in detail and his prose begins to sound like that of his subject...humorless and dry.

That said, I would recommend this book to those who are not only interested in the period between the two World Wars but also in the juxtaposition of the Harding and Coolidge administrations. I also think that reading the Dean biography on Harding in conjunction with the Sobel book on Coolidge would give a fairly accurate, if not overly deep sense of the United States during this period.

One cannot imagine a Coolidge as president during World War II (or for that matter during the depression) any more than one might look at Franklin D. Roosevelt as president during the 1920s. The point of this book seems not to be so much about the successes of Coolidge policy but rather an effort to glimpse the president in a slightly more favorable light. To this end Sobel triumphs. Yet he reminds us in the end that Coolidge was a man who was decent, sometimes shrewd and who filled his role as president in a detached but popular way. Perhaps Calvin Coolidge was indeed the right fit for his times.