.
Calvin Coolidge's
Vice-Presidential
Acceptance Address
Northampton,  Massachusetts, July 27, 1920
Governor Morrow and Members of the Notification Committee:

To your now formal notification I respond with formal acceptance.
Your presence tells me of a leader and a cause; a leader in Warren G.
Harding, the united choice of a united party, a statesman of ability,
seasoned by experience, a fitting representative of the common aspirations
of his fellow citizens, wise enough to seek counsel, great enough to
recognize merit, and in all things a stalwart American; the cause of our
common country, as declared in the platform of the Republican Party, the
defense of our institutions from every assault, the restoration of
constitutional government, the maintenance of law and order, the relief of
economic distress, the encouragement of industry and agriculture, the
enactment of humanitarian laws, the defense of the rights of our citizens
everywhere, the rehabilitation of this nation in the estimation of all peoples,
under an agreement, meeting our every duty, to preserve the peace of the
world, always with unyielding Americanism under such a leader, such a
cause, I serve.

No one in public life can be oblivious to the organized efforts to undermine
the faith of our people in their government, foment, discord, aggravate
industrial strife, stifle production, and ultimately stir up revolution. These
efforts are a great public menace, not through danger of success, but
through the great amount of harm they can do if ignored.

The first duty of the government is to repress them, punishing willful
violations of law, turning the full light of publicity on all abuses of the right
of assembly and of free speech ; and it is the first duty of the public and
press to expose false doctrines and answer seditious arguments.
American institutions can stand discussion and criticism, only if those who
know bear for them the testimony of the truth. Such repression and such
testimony should be forthcoming, that the uninformed may come to a full
realization that these seditious efforts are not for their welfare, but for their
complete economic and political destruction.

To a free people the most reactionary experience, short of revolution, is
war. In order to organize and conduct military operations a reversion to an
autocratic method of government is absolutely necessary. In our own case
it was no less autocratic because voluntarily established by the people. It
was a wise and successful process for the purpose of winning the victory
of freedom, to which all else was a secondary consideration. But voluntary
autocracy was established temporarily that freedom might be established
permanently. Men submitted their persons and their property to the
complete dictation of the government that they might conquer an impending
peril.

This has always been fraught with the gravest dangers. It is along this path
that rides the man on horseback. Avarice for power finds many reasons for
continuing arbitrary action after the cause for which it was granted has
been removed.

The government of the United States was not established for the continued
prosecution, or the perpetual preparation, of all its resources for war. It has
been and intends to be a nation devoted to the arts of peace. Fundamentally
considered, its abiding purpose has been the recognition of the rights and
the development of the individual. This great purpose has been
accomplished through self-government. To the individual has been left
power and responsibility, the foundation for the rule of the people. In time
of emergency these are surrendered to the government in return for
providing the necessaries of life, and national safety. But these are and must
be temporary expedients, if we are to keep our form of government, and
maintain the supreme purpose of Americans.

The greatest need of the nation at the present time is to be rescued from all
the reactions of the war. The chief task that lies before us is to repossess
the people of their government and their property. We want to return to a
thoroughly peace basis because that is the fundamental American basis.
Unless the government and property of the nation are in the hands of the
people, and there to stay as their permanent abiding place, self-government
ends and the hope of America goes down in ruins.
This need is transcendent.

The government of the nation is in the hands of the people, when it is
administered in accordance with the spirit of the Constitution, which they
have adopted and ratified, and which measures the powers they have
granted to their public officers, in all its branches, where the functions and
duties of the three co-ordinate branches, executive, legislative, judicial, are
separate and distinct and neither one directly or indirectly exercises any of
the functions of either of the others. Such a practice and such a
government under the Constitution of the United States it is the purpose of
our party to re-establish and maintain. All authority must be exercised by
those to whom it is constitutionally entrusted, without dictation, and with
responsibility only to those who have bestowed it, the people.

The property of the nation is in the hands of the people when it is under
their ownership and control. It is true that the control of a part of the
property taken for war purposes has been returned, but there hangs over
private enterprise still the menace of seizure, blighting in its effect,
paralyzing in its result, to the public detriment. But it matters not whether
property can be taken by seizure, or through the process of taxation for
extravagant and unnecessary expenditures, there should be an end to both
operations. The reason is plain. Ultimately the control of the resources of
the people is control of the people. Either the people must own the
government or the government will own the people. To sustain a
government of the people there must be maintained a property of the
people. There can be no political independence without economic
independence.

Another source of the gravest public concern has been the reactionary
tendency to substitute private will for the public will. Instead of inquiring
what the law was and then rendering it full obedience, there has been a
disposition on the part of some individuals and of groups to inquire whether
they liked the law, and if not, to disregard it, seek to override it, suspend it,
and prevent its execution, sometimes by the method of direct action, for
the purpose of securing their own selfish ends.

The observance of the law is the greatest solvent of public ills. Men speak
of natural rights, but I challenge any one to show where in nature any
rights ever existed or were recognized until there was established for their
declaration and protection a duly promulgated body of corresponding laws.
The march of civilization has been ever under the protecting aegis of the
law. It is the strong defense of the weak, the ever-present refuge of
innocence, a mighty fortress of the righteous. One with the law is a
majority. While the law is observed the progress of civilization will
continue. When such observance ceases, chaos and the ancient night of
despotism will come again. Liberty goes unsupported or relies in its entirety
on the maintenance of order and the execution of the law.

There is yet another manifest disposition which has preyed on the
weakness of the race from its infancy, denounced alike by the letter and the
spirit of the Constitution, and repugnant to all that is American, the attempt
to create class distinctions. In its full development this means the caste
system, wherein such civilization as exists is rigidly set, and that elasticity
so necessary for progress, and that recognition of equality which has been
the aim and glory of our institutions, are destroyed and denied. Society to
advance must be not a dead form but a living organism, plastic, inviting
progress. There are no classes here. There are different occupations and
different stations, certainly there can be no class of employer and
employed. All true Americans are working for each other, exchanging the
results of the efforts of hand and brain wrought through the unconsumed
efforts of yesterday, which we call capital, all paying and being paid by
each other, serving and being served. To do otherwise is to stand disgraced
and alien to our institutions. This means that government must look at the
part in the light of the whole, that legislation must be directed not for
private interest but for public welfare, and that thereby alone will each of
our citizens find their greatest accomplishment and success.

If the great conflict has disturbed our political conditions it has caused an
upheaval in our economic relations. The mounting prices of all sorts of
commodities has put a well nigh unbearable burden on every home. Much
of this is beyond relief from law, but forces of the government can and
must afford a considerable remedy.

The most obvious place to begin retrenching is by eliminating the
extravagance of the government itself. In this the Congress has made a
commendable beginning, but although the Congress makes the
appropriations, the departments make the expenditures which are not under
legislative but executive control. The extravagant standards bred of recent
years must be eliminated. This should show immediately in reduced
taxation. The great breeder of public and private extravagance, the excess
profits tax, should be revised and recourse had to customs taxes on
imports, one of the most wholesome of all means of raising revenue, for it
is voluntary in effect, and taxes consumption rather than production. It
should be laid according to the needs of a creditor nation, for the protection
of the public, with a purpose to render us both economically and
defensively independent.

A revision of taxation must be accompanied with a reduction of that private
extravagance which the returns from luxury taxes reveal as surpassing all
comprehension. Waiving the moral effect, the economic effect of such
extravagance is to withdraw needed capital and labor from essential
industries, greatly increasing the public distress and unrest.

There has been profiteering. It should be punished because it is wrong. But
it is idle to look to such action for relief. This class profit by scarcity, but
they do not cause it.

As every one knows now, the difficulty is caused by a scarcity of material,
an abundance of money, and insufficient production. The government must
reduce the amount of money as fast as it can without curtailing necessary
credits. Production must be increased. All easy to say but difficult of
accomplishment.

One of the chief hindrances to production is lack of adequate railroad
facilities. Transportation must be re-established. A few glaring instances in
the past of improper management joined with an improper public attitude
thereby created, wrought great harm to our railroads. Government
operation left them disintegrated, disorganized, and demoralized. On their
service depends agriculture and industry, the entire public welfare. They
must be provided with credit and capital and given the power to serve. This
can only be done by removing them from speculation, restoring their
prosperity by increased revenues where necessary, thereby re-establishing
them in the confidence of the investing public. Their employees must be
compensated in accordance with the great importance of the service they
render. The whole railroad operation must be restored to public confidence
by public support.

There must be a different public attitude toward industry, a larger
comprehension of the interdependence of capital, management, and labor,
and better facilities for the prompt and reasonable adjustment of industrial
disputes. It is well to remember, too, that high prices produce their own
remedy under the law of supply and demand. Already in the great leather
and woolen industries there is a recession in the basic elements which must
soon be reflected in retail prices. When buying stops prices come down.

This condition has borne with especial severity on the agricultural interests
of the nation. To cope with it the farmers need an enlarged power of
organization whereby the original producer may profit to a larger degree by
the high prices paid for his produce by the ultimate consumer, and at the
same time decrease the cost of food. The economic strength of a country
rests on the farm. Industrial activity is dependent upon it. It replenishes the
entire life of the nation. Agriculture is entitled to be suitably rewarded and
on its encouragement and success will depend upon the production of a
food supply large enough to meet the public needs at reasonable cost.

But all these difficulties depend for final solution on the character and moral
force of the nation. Unless these forces abound and manifest themselves in
work done there is no real remedy.

There has been a great deal of misconception as to what was won by the
victory in France. That victory will not be found to be a substitute for
further human effort and endeavor. It did not create magic resources out of
which wages could be paid that were not earned, or profits be made
without corresponding service, it did not overcome any natural law, it did
conquer an artificial thralldom sought to be imposed on mankind and
establish for all the earth a new freedom and a larger liberty. But that does
not, cannot, mean less responsibility, it means more responsibility, and until
the people of this nation understand and accept this increased responsibility
and meet it with increased effort there will be no relief from the present
economic burdens.

In all things a return to a peace basis does not mean the basis of 1914. That
day is gone. It means a peace basis of the present, higher, nobler, because
of the sacrifices made and the duties assumed. It is not a retreat, it is a new
summons to advance.

Diminishing resources warn us of the necessity of conservation. The public
domain is the property of the public. It is held in trust for present and
future generations. The material resources of our country are great, very
great, but they are not inexhaustible. They are becoming more and more
valuable and more and more necessary to the public welfare. It is not wise
either to withhold water power, reservoir sites, and mineral deposits from
development or to deny a reasonable profit to such operations. But these
natural resources are not to be turned over to speculation to the detriment
of the public. Such a policy would soon remove these resources from
public control and the result would be that soon the people would be paying
tribute to private greed. Conservation does not desire to retard
development. It permits it and encourages it. It is a desire honestly to
administer the public domain. The time has passed when public franchises
and public grants can be used for private speculation.

Whenever in the future this nation undertakes to assess its strength and
resources, the largest item will be the roll of those who served her in every
patriotic capacity in the world war. There are those who bore the civil
tasks of that great undertaking, often at heavy sacrifices, always with the
disinterested desire to serve their country. There are those who wore the
uniform. The presence of the living, the example of the dead, will ever be a
standing guaranty of the stability of our republic. From their rugged virtue
springs a never-ending obligation to hold unimpaired the principles
established by their victory. Honor is theirs forevermore.

Duty compels that those promises, so freely made, that out of their
sacrifices they should have a larger life, be speedily redeemed. Care of
dependents, relief from distress, restoration from infirmity, provision for
education, honorable preferment in the public service, a helping hand
everywhere, are theirs not as a favor but by right. They have conquered the
claim to suitable recognition in all things. The nation which forgets its
defenders will be itself forgotten.

Our country has a heart as well as a head. It is social as well as individual.
It has a broad and extending sympathy. It looks with the deepest concern
to the welfare of those whom adversity still holds at the gateways of the
all-inclusive American opportunity. Conscious that our resources have now
reached a point where there is an abundance for all, we are determined that
no imposition shall hereafter restrain the worthy their heritage. There will
be, can be, no escape from the obligation of the strong to bear the burdens
of civilization, but the weak must be aided to become strong. Ample
opportunity for education at public expense, reasonable hours of
employment always under sanitary conditions, a fair and always a living
wage for faithful work, healthful living conditions, childhood and
motherhood, cherished, honored, rescued from the grasp of all selfishness
and rededicated to the noblest aspiration of the race, these are not
socialistic vagaries but the mark of an advancing American civilization,
revealed in larger social justice, tempered with an abounding mercy. In this
better appreciation of humanity the war carried the nation forward to a new
position, which it is our solemn duty not only to maintain but amplify and
extend.

There is especially due to the colored race a more general recognition of
their constitutional rights. Tempted with disloyalty they remained loyal,
serving in the military forces with distinction, obedient to the draft to the
extent of hundreds of thousands, investing $1 out of every $5 they
possessed in Liberty Bonds, surely they hold the double title of citizenship,
by birth and by conquest, to be relieved from all imposition, to be defended
from lynching, and to be freely granted equal opportunities.

Equal suffrage for which I have always voted is coming. It is not a party
question, although nearly six-sevenths of the ratifying legislatures have been
Republican. The Party stands pledged to use its endeavor to hasten
ratification, which I trust will be at once accomplished.

There are many domestic questions which I cannot discuss here, their
solution is amply revealed in the platform, such as merchant marine, an
adequate army anti navy, the establishment of a Department of Public
Works, support of the classified civil service laws, provision for public
waterways and highways, a budget system and other equally pressing
subjects. I am not unmindful of their deep importance.

The foreign relations of our country ought not to be partisan, but
American. If restored to the limitations of constitutional authority on the
one hand, and to the protection of the constitutional rights of our citizens
on the other, much of their present difficulty would disappear.
There can be no sovereignty without a corresponding duty. It is
fundamental that each citizen is entitled to the equal protection of the laws.
That goes with his citizenship and abides where he lawfully abides, whether
at home or abroad. This inherent right must be restored to our people and
observed by our government. The persons and property of Americans,
wherever they may lawfully be, while lawfully engaged, must forever have
protection sufficient to insure their safety and cause the punishment of all
who violate it. This is theirs as a plain constitutional duty. A government
disregarding it invites the contempt of the world and is on the way to
humiliation and war. Rejecting the rule of law is accepting the sword of
force.

The country cannot be securely restored to a peace basis in anything until a
peace is first made with those with whom we have been at war. The
Republicans in Congress, realizing that because of the necessary reliance of
one nation on another, there was, more than ever before, mutual need of
the sustaining influence of friendly co-operation and rapprochement, twice
attempted the establishment of such peace by offers of ratification, which
were rejected by the Democratic administration. No one knows now
whether war or peace prevails. Our Party stands pledged to make an
immediate peace as soon as it is given power by the people.

The proposed League of Nations without reservations as submitted by the
President to the Senate met with deserved opposition from the Republican
Senators. To a League in that form, subversive of the traditions and the
independence of America, the Republican Party is opposed. But our Party
by the record of its members in the Senate and by the solemn declaration of
its platform, by performance and by promise, approves the principle of
agreement, among nations to preserve peace, and pledges itself to the
making of such an agreement, preserving American independence, and
rights, as will meet every duty America owes to humanity.

This language is purposely broad, not exclusive but in inclusive. The
Republican Party is not narrow enough to limit itself to one idea, but wise
and broad enough to provide for the adoption of the best plan that can be
devised at the time of action. The Senate received a concrete proposition,
utterly unacceptable without modifications, which the publican Senators
effected by reservations, and so modified twice voted for ratification,
which the Democratic administration twice defeated. The platform
approves this action of the Senators. The Republicans insisted on
reservations which limit. The Democratic platform and record permit only
of reservations unessential and explanatory.

We have been taking counsel together concerning the welfare of America.
We have spent much time discussing the affairs of government, yet most
of the great concourse of people around me hold no public office, expect to
hold no public office. Still in solemn truth they are the government, they are
America. We shall search in vain in legislative halls, executive mansions,
and the chambers of the judiciary for the greatness of the government of
our country. We shall behold there but a reflection, not a reality, successful
in proportion to its accuracy.

In a free republic a great government is the product of a great people. They
will look to themselves rather than government for success. The destiny,
the greatness of America lies around the hearthstone. If thrift and industry
are taught there, and the example of self-sacrifice oft appears, if honor
abide there, and high ideals, if there the building of fortune be subordinate
to the building of character, America will live in security, rejoicing in an
abundant prosperity and good government at home, and in peace, respect,
and confidence abroad. If these virtues be absent there is no power that
can supply these blessings. Look well then to the hearthstone, therein all
hope for America lies.