Calvin Coolidge: The President of Cool

By Jack Brummet, Presidents Ed.

They say he wasn't actually frosty. . .he just rarely showed emotion. In fact, when President Harding died, Coolidge was awakened after 2:00 A.M. He took the oath of office in his sitting room. He was sworn in by his father, who was a notary public. Thirteen minutes after he took the oath of office at 2:47 A.M., Calvin Coolidge went back to sleep. To sleep! His President (Warren Harding) had just died! He was The Top Banana! And he went to sleep. In that same position, I would have done something. Like:

Drink some whiskey!
Raise up a glass to the shade of Warren G. Harding.
Give orders to round up some of my enemies and have them held at The Tombs.
I would legalize something.
I would declare martial law on Detroit.
Drink more whiskey!
Declare the Roman Catholic Church a subversive organization.
Ask for the cabinet's resignations.
Order in naked dancing girls.
Throw a feast.
Make a collage.
Drive a tank through the streets of Washington.
In a radio address to the nation, quote Putney Swope: "I am not going to rock the boat; I am going to tip it over."
Watch the sunrise and the birds take to the sky on my first day as Czar  King  President.

Then maybe I'd go to bed.

Coolidge kept a poem hung on the wall in his living room, and it both illustrated how he felt and the image he wanted to project:

A wise old owl lived in an oak
The more he saw, the less he spoke
The less he spoke the more he heard
Why can’t we be like that old bird?
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