Coronation of a President

We look at how we used to select our presidential candidates.

It’s easy to say that Americans don’t understand the details of how the presidential election process works.

Of course, this does not include you, my thoughtful and dedicated readership, but those who wander around the earth unaware of Okay History's existence and educational value.

You know how this election stuff works.

When Joe Biden announced that he would no longer seek a second term as president of the United States, the opposition party lost its collective mind. None of them subscribe to this mediocre newsletter-blog-thing, and it shows.

The idea that Biden could decide not to run for president while still doing the job of president is such an outrageous concept that one of the responses of the Republican party is to accuse Biden of undermining democracy.

So, the official thinking on this goes: The guy they wanted to defeat somehow did not give them a chance to defeat him, and that undermined democracy.

Not say, storming the capitol the day before my birthday.

The plot twist of this presidential election is that the Democrats have now consolidated around the new presumed nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris. She’s not the Vice President of some consulting firm or bank; she’s the Vice President of the United States and was democratically elected.

Republicans are calling Harris’s inevitable nomination a coronation because there weren’t any primaries where Democrats could vote for someone else. GOP VP nominee and accused furniture abuser JD Vance called the maneuver unfair because it gave the Democrats an advantage since the Republicans had to change their campaign strategy. I guess no one has ever had to alter campaign strategies.

Trump refuses to debate Harris because she isn’t the nominee yet, even though Trump debated Biden when neither was the nominee. Trump also implied the other day that Harris has only recently identified herself as black. Harris has her policy flaws, and instead of focusing on those, Trump and his allies are focusing on gender and race. So we are a few weeks away from coronating a black woman as president.

Sign me up.

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It got me thinking about the remaining elections I haven’t ranked and what happened when primaries weren’t a thing. Parties used to coronate at national conventions, where fewer people decided who could become president. All these white guys worked hard to come up with a political advantage and somehow not undermine democracy.

Let's dive in.

17: The Presidential Election of 1880

Election Date: November 2, 1880

The Candidates:

After the contentious election in 1876, President Rutherford B. Hayes decided not to seek reelection. The Democrats did not call on him to vacate his office. The Republicans then had a free-for-all convention, which was held in Chicago. They split into two camps – those who wanted former President Ulysses S. Grant to return to office and those who didn’t. Ultimately, a dark horse candidate, Ohio Senator James Garfield, won the nomination, viewed as a compromise between the two.

Chester Arthur, a conventional politician from the critical state of New York, was chosen as vice president.

The Democrats then nominated former Civil War general Winfield Hancock, who never held office. Garfield also fought in the war, so twenty years after the beginning of the Civil War, people were still fighting the Civil War.

Major Issue of the Day:

The Gilded Age was underway. The economy expanded quickly, and robber barons named Carnegie and Rockefeller became exceptionally rich.

There was also fear of Chinese Immigrants stealing jobs from ordinary white Americans.

I’m not kidding when I say we tend to regurgitate the same arguments throughout history. As humans, we are unoriginal in that way.

The Winner:

Compromise.

Garfield was considered equally annoying to both sides of a silly argument, which is what compromise means in Latin. I bet you didn’t know that.

The States in the Electoral College:

38. No new states entered the Union since the last election in 1876.

The Electoral College had 369 members, and the winner needed 185 votes.

This election was close except where it mattered in the electoral college, where Garfield took 214 to 155. The candidates split the 38 states, and Garfield beat Hancock by about 20,000 total votes.

The 2021 OKH Presidential Ranking:

Garfield ranks 27^th. He was only president for four months but pushed through a progressive Supreme Court Justice. His desire to end government corruption came to an end when an assassin shot him at a train station in Washington, DC, on the premise that he deserved some of that political handout.  

Why Did I Rank it Here:

Garfield is my big “what-of” president. It’s also proof that the convention system can produce a pretty good candidate, even if they screw up the VP pick.

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Over the following decades, many changes occurred throughout the country, especially regarding the rich and powerful. By the time the 1920 election rolled in, we had reeled in those robber barons, yet some Americans looked to return to the good old days—back when they thought America was great.   

Let’s dive in.

16: The Presidential Election of 1920

Election Date: November 2, 1920

The Candidates:

President Woodrow Wilson won reelection just four years earlier. But then World War I became a focus, and his initial desire to keep America out of the war had changed. Instead, over 50,000 American soldiers were lost in the fighting. Unfortunately for Wilson, the Senate refused to ratify the treaty he wanted, and he suffered a stroke, which led to questions about who was in charge for the next few years.

The Democrats were left scrambling, and they gathered in San Fransisco to figure out who to nominate. Ultimately, they passed on Vice President Thomas Marshall and instead decided on Ohio Governor James Cox, who would continue to push for Wilson’s primary foreign policy of a League of Nations. The convention also nominated United States Navy Secretary Franklin Delano Roosevelt as vice president.

Thanks to finally passing a constitutional amendment, the Republicans were eager to influence a new voting block of women. The simplest way to accomplish this, party bosses thought, was to nominate a handsome fellow, Ohio Senator Warren G. Harding. They paired this party boy with uninteresting and unequally handsome Calvin Coolidge, the governor of Massachusetts.

The 1920 election would be the only election to feature two candidates from the same state.

Major Issue of the Day:

Wilson’s health.

The end of World War I and rich people's desire to return to being super rich.

The Winner:

Influence.

Harding had many flaws as a candidate – he drank (prohibition was a thing), he gambled, and he had affairs with just about everyone, including the wife of a friend.

But in the end, he was a friend to Rich People, and when Rich People want someone in office, they will do whatever they can to get that person into office.   

The States in the Electoral College:

48. It won’t be another 30 years until we add the final two states. Then, like, I don’t know, another twenty years after that, Washington, DC, got to vote.

The Electoral College had 531 members, and the winner needed 266 votes.

Harding whipped Cox. He almost doubled his total votes, securing 60%, winning 37 states and 404 electoral votes. The people wanted that pretty party boy Harding a lot.

The 2021 OKH Presidential Ranking:

Harding comes in at 41, worse than Franklin Pierce, who was pretty bad.

Why Did I Rank it Here:

There would be three future presidents on this ballot, which is interesting.

I also like that two Ohio guys squared off, and the one with the more organized, corrupt “gang” won out.

That’s the way a coronation works, right?

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As former president and convicted felon Donald Trump likes to say, “many people” say that Trump made the wrong decision when naming JD Vance as his running mate.

JD is giving credence to that argument simply because he thinks people who have children should be considered citizens plus, and those who don’t have children are people who actually hate children.

As a Catholic, just like JD, I don’t share the idea that clergy are people who hate children. I’m sure those people serving in the military, those young, unmarried, and childless people at the moment, don’t hate children. I can’t think of any constituency that hates children. It’s a weird argument.

Even as someone who doesn’t have children, I understand the value of a healthy family structure. That family structure can be formed in various ways, but the foundation is love. All you need is love.

I feel like JD’s mom shouldn’t have an extra weighted vote over me because she birthed this ding dong. I feel like she should be docked a vote in a primary or something for not giving this bearded, diet mountain dew drinking weirdo more hugs growing up.

It's August, which means the days are starting to get shorter. I don’t know why, but I immediately feel fall’s presence after beach week. I hope the first weekend of the month is good for you and I’ll see you back on Monday.

Okay,

Chris

Blue is a handsome boy.