CALVIN COOLIDGE An Interpretation BY ROBERT A. WOODS Author of "The Neighborhood in Nation Building" Boston and New York HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 1924 E792 COPYRIGHT, 1924. BY ROBERT A. WOODS ALL RIGHTS RESERVED The Riverside Press PRINTED IN THE U.S.A. THE PREPARATION OF CHAPTER I APPROACHES FOR WRITER AND READER CALVIN COOLIDGE went through a more consistent and complete preparation for the presidency than any previous incumbent of the office. This has been pointed out by two wise men independently of each other Frederick H. Gillett, Speaker of the National House of Representatives, and Dr. L. Clark Seelye, who built up Smith College. Each of them has been in position to follow Mr. Coolidge's course at first hand. One has been Congressman for his district, the other a near neighbor, since Mr. Coolidge established himself in Northampton in the autumn of 1895. Starting with the Common Council soon after his admission to the bar, he has gone up a steadily ascending scale of office, legislative and executive; partly paralleled, partly interrupted, by an attorney's experience with the judiciary branch of government. He has entered with a rare individual quality of penetration into the duties of every office |