Ohio History Journal

190 OHIO HISTORY

27. Gladys Baker and others, Century of Service, the First 100 years of The United

States Department of Agriculture (Washington, D. C., 1963), 109-113.

28. Letter, Harding to Wallace, October 14, 1922. Box 1, Harding Papers.

29. Stenographic Report of the Conference called by Secretary H. C. Wallace in

Washington, February 13, 1922, "To Consider Means of Re-establishing a Price Ratio of

Exchange Between Farm Products and Other Products," Typewritten Copy in USDA

Library, p. 64, as quoted by Taylor, Agricultural Economics, 590; Henry C. Taylor,

"Henry C. Wallace And The Farmers' Fight For The Right," Unpublished Manuscript

(1925), in Taylor Papers, State Historical Society of Wisconsin, Madison; Henry A.

Wallace, New Frontiers (New York, 1934), 147-149.

30. Letter, Hoover to J. R. Howard, July 23, 1921. Copy in Box 4, Department of

Commerce-Agriculture Department, Hoover Papers, Herbert Hoover Archives, West

Branch, Iowa.

31. Letter, Hoover to C. C. Teague, December 1, 1924. Copy in Box 4, Hoover Archives.

32. Letter, Hoover to E. D. Funk, May 31, 1924. Copy in Box 3. See also "Memoran-

dum," undated [circa 1924] and marked "not to be given out." Box 4, Hoover Archives.

33. Letter, Hoover to Representative Sydney Lenroot, February 23, 1923; Hoover

to Senator Arthur Capper, September 17, 1924. Copies in Box 4, Hoover Archives.

34. Address by Herbert C. Hoover at the Cooperative Meeting, San Francisco, Novem-

ber 6, 1924. Box 4, Hoover Archives.

35. "Memorandum," undated [circa 1924]. Hoover Archives,

36. Congressional Record, 68th Cong., 1st sess., vol. 69, Part I, 100; Coolidge's complete

adherence to the doctrines of laissez faire was stated even more bluntly to the Inter-

national Live Stock Convention at Chicago on December 4, 1924, when the President

asserted the farmer's "business and his welfare are all governed by natural and inevitable

laws," Quoted in Congressional Digest, IV (October, 1925), 261.

37. Homer Walten to Brown, October 20, 1921. Copy in Case File 1-1A1, Calvin

Coolidge Papers.

38. Letter, Wallace to Brown, January 16, 1923. Copy in Case File 1-1A1, Coolidge

Papers.

39. Wallace stated his objections to the bill in a letter to Senator W. L. Jones, Chair-

man of the Commerce Committee, June 2, 1924. Copy in Coolidge Papers.

40. Such rumors were given periodic official denials: Letter, C. Bascom Slemp (Secre-

tary to the President) to L. A. Andrew, September 12, 1923; Bascom to L. French,

March 6, 1924; and Slemp to William Hirth, July 30, 1924. Copies in Coolidge Papers.

41. Letter, Wallace to Coolidge, April 8, 1924. Copy in Box 2, Hoover Archives.

42. "What They Said At Galesburg Meeting" Prairie Farmer, January 26, 1924, p. 94.

43. U. S. House of Representatives, Committee on Agriculture, Hearings, on H. R.

5563, 68th Cong., 1st Sess., 1924 (Washington, D. C. 1924), 119. Reprint in Hoover

Archives.

44. Henry C. Taylor, "Henry C. Wallace and the Farmer's Fight," unpublished

manuscript in Taylor Papers; State Historical Society of Wisconsin, Madison. Other

farm leaders felt the same way; see Gilbert C. Fite, George Peek And The Fight For

Farm Parity (Norman, 1954), 106.

45. James W. Murphy, ed., Last Speeches of President Warren G. Harding (Washing-

ton, D. C., 1923), 79.

HARDING ADMINISTRATION AND

RECOGNITION OF MEXICO

1. James Morton Callahan, American Foreign Policy in Mexican Relations (New

York, 1932), 581. See also Fernando Iglesias Calderon to Myron M. Parker, October 5,

1920. Box 478, Warren G. Harding Papers, Ohio Historical Society. Calderon describes

an interview with Fall and tells about Fall's ideas on recognition.

2. Report of interview of Alvaro Obregon with George T. Summerlin, September 13,

1920, in "Relations Between the United States and Mexico, 1910-1929," 812.00/246421/2

Microfilmed State Department Records. Many of the State Department dispatches cited

herein also appear in Foreign Relations of the United States (Washington, D. C., 1936)

for the years 1921-22-23.

3. Bainbridge Colby to Roberto Pesqueira, November 20, 1920, 812.00/²⁴⁷⁰¹¹/2. See

also, John W. F. Dulles, Yesterday in Mexico: A Chronicle of the Revolution, 1919-1936

(Austin, Texas, 1961), 91.

4. George Creel, The People Next Door: An Interpretive History of Mexico and the

Mexicans (New York, 1926), 358.

5. Stuart Alexander MacCorkle, American Policy of Recognition Towards Mexico

in the Johns Hopkins University Studies in Historical and Political Science (1933), LI, 94.

6. Memorandum of A. J. Pani, April 30, 1923, 711.1211/189.

7. Creel, The People Next Door, 358. See also Arthur Russell Jones to Warren G.

NOTES 191

Harding, October 28, 1920. Box 478, Harding Papers. Jones describes an interview with

Obregon and how Obregon looked forward to the election of Harding.

8. Dulles, Yesterday in Mexico, 159.

9. Creel, The People Next Door, 358-359.

10. Obregon to Foreign Office, April 2, 1921, 712.00/3. Obregon's translated statement

to Mexican Foreign Office enclosed.

11. Summerlin to Obregon, Draft Treaty of Amity and Commerce, May 27, 1921,

711.1211/45.

12. Charles Evans Hughes to Summerlin, June 8, 1921, 711.1211/8a.

13. Charles Evans Hughes, Our Relations to the Nations of the Western Hemisphere

(Princeton, 1928), 38-39.

14. Ibid., 39-42.

15. Hughes Address, Chamber of Commerce, May 26, 1922, 711.12/479.

16. Henry P. Fletcher to Harding, November 14, 1921; Harding to Fletcher, November

19, 1921. Box 167, Harding Papers. Also in Henry P. Fletcher Papers, Library of

Congress, Washington, D. C.

17. Hughes to Harding, March 25, 1922; Harding to Hughes, April 1, 1922. Box 167,

Harding Papers.

18. Summerlin to Hughes, May 28, 1921, 711.12/333.

19. Summerlin to Hughes, June 10, 1921 (enclosure), 711.1211/19.

20. Obregon to Harding, June 11, 1921, 812.00/26059.

21. Harding to Hughes, July 21, 1921. Box 167, Harding Papers.

22. Harding to Obregon, July 21, 1921, 812.00/25114 1/2; and Obregon to Harding,

August 18, 1921, 812.00/26098.

23. Dulles, Yesterday in Mexico, 147-148; and Charles Wilson Hackett, "The Mexican

Revolution and the United States, 1910-1926," World Peace Foundation Pamphlets

(Boston, 1926), IX, 352-353.

24. Pani to Summerlin, November 19, 1921 (enclosure), 412.11/458; also in Box 172,

Charles Evans Hughes Papers, Library of Congress, Washington, D. C.

25. Hughes to Summerlin, February 4, 1922, 711.1211/28.

26. Pani to Summerlin, February 9, 1922, 711.1211/31; also in Box 172, Hughes

Papers.

27. Discussion continued but little happened. Hughes to Summerlin, April 15, 1922,

711.1211/31 (for some reason this dispatch has the same number as that in note 26

above, only the date is different); memorandum to Pani, April 20, 1922 (enclosure),

711.1211/36; Pani to Summerlin, May 4, 1922 (enclosure), 711.1211/36; Summerlin to

Pani, May 16, 1922 (enclosure), 711.1211/36; and Pani to Summerlin, May 24, 1922

(enclosure), 711.1211/39. Most of these dispatches are also in Box 172, Hughes Papers.

28. J. Fred Rippy, Fundamentals in Our Mexican Relations (Greencastle, Indiana,

1926), 24.

29. Thomas W. Lamont-Adolfo de la Huerta Exchanges, July and August, 1922,

711.12/460. On this same trip de la Huerta stopped in Washington for an interview with

Hughes, but the Secretary seemed to stand behind his official position; interview of

July 18, 1922. Box 176, Hughes Papers.

30. Hughes to Summerlin, July 28, 1922, 711.1211/39; Pani to Summerlin, March 31,

1923, 711.1211/60. Also in Box 167, Harding Papers and Box 172, Hughes Papers. See

also a very interesting letter from Hughes to Fletcher, February 28, 1923. Fletcher

Papers.

31. J. A. Ryan to Harding, April 13, 1923. Box 167, Harding Papers. See also Dulles,

Yesterday in Mexico, 162. All evidence points to the fact that Harding acted independ-

ently in this instance. Neither the Hughes Papers, Harding Papers or other sources

show the Secretary of State being involved in the Harding-Obregon-Ryan conversations.

While no documents containing Ryan's invitation for this negotiation have been un-

covered, his correspondence with Harding points to the fact that he acted directly with

the Chiefs of State of the United States and Mexico. There is a good deal of informa-

tion on Ryan in Senator Holm O. Bursum (New Mexico) to Calvin Coolidge, September

12, 1923. Case File 146, Calvin Coolidge Papers, Library of Congress, Washington, D. C.

32. Dulles, Yesterday in Mexico, 162-163.

33. Memorandum of Pani, April 19, 1923, 711.1211/89.

34. American Commissioners named, May 2, 1923, 711.12/501. See also Dulles, Yester-

day in Mexico, 162.

35. Hughes to John B. Payne and Charles B. Warren, May 5, 1923, 711.1211/86, A

and B. The original, with Hughes's written comments, is in Box 172, Hughes Papers.

36. The Department of State, Proceedings of the United States-Mexican Commission

Convened in Mexico City, May 14, 1923 (Washington, D. C., 1925), and "The Beerits

Memo" on the Recognition of Mexico, both are in Box 172, Hughes Papers. See also

Dulles, Yesterday in Mexico, 164-172; and MacCorkle, American Policy of Recognition

Towards Mexico, 96.

37. Warren to Hughes, July 25, 1923, 711.1211/134.

192 OHIO HISTORY

38. "The United States Renews Relations with Mexico," State Department Announce-

ment, August 31, 1923, 711.1211/154; and William Phillips, Under Secretary of State,

to Coolidge. Case File 146, Coolidge Papers. See also Hughes to Payne, September 11,

1923. Box 38, Hughes Papers. See also Hughes to Warren, September 11, 1923, ibid.,

Box 47.

PRESIDENT HARDING AND INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATION

1. The Marion Star, March 2, 1921. See also New York Times, March 3, 1921.

2. Cited in "Tremendous Problems That Face Harding," Literary Digest, March 5,

1921, p. 8.

3. New York Times, March 3, 1921; editorial, "Mr. Harding's Administration,"

March 4, 1921.

4. The Memoirs of Herbert Hoover: The Cabinet and the Presidency, 1920-1923

(New York, 1952), 13.

5. Various items, Box 421, Warren G. Harding Papers, Ohio Historical Society. This

general impression was concretely established by taking twenty-four letters for the period

November 3, 1920 to February 1, 1921 and discovering that eighteen were against, six

for the Versailles League. Quite interestingly to note, Harding received human nature

arguments against ending war and racial arguments for not entering the world organiza-

tion, see Daniel Moreau Barringer to W. G. Harding, December 7, 1920 with enclosure

dated March 19, 1919. Ibid., Box 119.

6. Ibid., Frank Brandegee to Harding, December 28, 1920 (typed copy), Box 694; for

a Harding rejoinder to one of his prominent petitioners, see Harding to Henry Cabot

Lodge, December 29, 1920, Box 655.

7. Ibid., C. B. Miller to Harding, December 13, 1920.

8. Ibid., J. E. Todd to H. D. Mannington, December 27, 1920.

9. Ibid., Myron H. Bent to Harding, December 1, 1920, Box 421.

10. Ibid., William E. Anderson to Harding, January 22, 1921 (typed copy), Box 693.

Another clergyman, Dr. James L. Barton, on January 14, 1921, wrote in his three

powerful capacities as National Chairman of the Near East Relief, Senior Foreign

Secretary of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, and Moderator

of the International Decennial Congregational Council, ibid.

11. Hamilton Holt to Harding, December 10, 1920; Harding to Holt, December 22,

1920, Holt Papers, cited in Warren F. Kuehl, Hamilton Holt: Journalist, Internationalist,

Educator (Gainesville, 1960), 155. Kuehl also has a perceptive synthesis of Holt's

relationship to Harding on the League of Nations issue, 151-175. One reader of The

Independent sent clippings of Holt's editorial criticism of Harding's evasiveness on the

League to the future President, see O. L. Deming to Harding, December 24, 1921. Box

119, Harding Papers.

12. New York Times, March 4, 1921.

13. Ibid., March 3, 1921.

14. Samuel Hopkins Adams, The Incredible Era: The Life and Times of Warren

Gamaliel Harding (Boston, 1939), 35.

15. Hiram Johnson to Harding, August 9, 1921; Harding to Johnson, September 6,

1920. Box 502, Harding Papers. The exchange showed that the two Senators were

professionally proud of their skills at verbal imprecision. This ignorance of Harding's

deliberate vagueness on touching political matters let the vitriolic Henry L. Menckin to

assert that the Ohioan's muddled sentences in political writing or speaking were

occasioned by ignorance. Sometimes they were. Often, they were not. The Baltimore

Sun cynic went on to state that he overheard the former editor of the Marion Star

deliver a speech to the Elks which was "clear, logical, forceful" with even "a touch of

wild, romantic beauty." But the Elks speech was on a simple subject--hence Harding's

clarity. It is strange that the clever Menckin did not go deeper into wondering why

the politician could write so clearly on matters that were unimportant while the real

concerns of the day involving consequences for America and himself were dealt with

so vaguely. Surely Menckin, so clever in the use of words himself and a serious writer

on the American Language, should have suspected another clever writer was at work.

The quotations from Menckin are cited in David Shannon, ed., Progressivism and

Postwar Disillusionment: 1898-1928 (New York, 1966), 280.

16. For an impressive demonstration of how precisely and clearly Harding could

write, see Harding to Richard Washburn Child, letters of December 12, 1921; July 24,

1922; and April 16, 1923. Box 694, Harding Papers.

17. Ibid., Harding to Lodge, December 29, 1920. Box 655.

18. Ibid., Harding to Miss Mollie Conners, May 17, 1919. Box 757.

19. Shannon, Progressivism and Postwar Disillusionment, 280.

20. New York Times, March 5, 1921.

21. Kuehl, Hamilton Holt, 155.