Warren G. Harding

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Warren G. Harding : biography

02 November 1865 – 02 August 1923

Presidential papers destroyed

Immediately after Harding’s death, Mrs. Harding returned to Washington, D.C., and briefly stayed in the White House with President and First Lady Coolidge. For a month, former First Lady Harding gathered and burned President Harding’s correspondence and documents, both official and unofficial. Upon her return to Marion, Mrs. Harding hired a number of secretaries to collect and burn Harding’s personal papers. According to Mrs. Harding, she took these actions to protect her husband’s legacy. The remaining papers were held and kept from public view by the Harding Memorial Association in Marion.Russell (April 1963), The Four Mysteries Of Warren Harding

Cabinet and Supreme Court appointments

President Harding’s first Cabinet. 1921

Judicial appointments

The Taft Court, 1925

Supreme Court

Harding appointed the following justices to the Supreme Court of the United States:

  • William Howard Taft—Chief Justice: 1921
  • George Sutherland: 1922
  • Pierce Butler: 1923
  • Edward Terry Sanford: 1923

Other judicial appointments

Harding also appointed 6 judges to the United States Courts of Appeals, 42 judges to the United States district courts, and 2 judges to the United States Court of Customs Appeals.

Personal controversies

President Harding and First Lady [[Florence Harding.Photo c.1922. Mrs. Harding was highly protective of her husband’s personal legacy.]]

In a Washington Post article, journalist Carl S. Anthony disclosed that Warren G. Harding had extramarital affairs with four women. These women included Susie Hodder and Carrie Fulton Phillips, Mrs. Harding’s personal friends; Grace Cross, Harding’s senatorial aide; and Nan Britton. Anthony stated that Harding was the father of Hodder’s daughter. In her 1927 book, The President’s Daughter, Britton asserted that Harding fathered her daughter, Elizabeth Ann, as well, during a 1919 tryst in his senatorial offices. Britton, who had a profound obsession with Harding beginning in high school, also alleged that she was his mistress before and during his administration.Russell, pp. 215, 466 Historian Henry F. Graff states that Harding was sterile and that Harding’s affair with Britton ended after Harding assumed the presidency.Graff (2002), The presidents: a reference history, p. 399Graff, p. 399

Historian Francis Russell indicates that, beginning in the spring of 1905, Harding had a 15-year relationship with Carrie Fulton Phillips, wife of businessman and friend James Eaton Phillips of Marion, Ohio.Russell, pp. 167 More than 100 intimate letters between Harding and Mrs. Philips were discovered in the 1960s, but publication of the letters was enjoined by court order in Ohio until 2024.Graff, p. 399. Russell, however, viewed the letters upon their discovery and described them as very touching and naive in some respects, erotic in others.Russell, p. ix. Russell also concluded from the letters that Phillips was the love of Harding’s life—"the enticements of his mind and body combined in one person".Russell, p.167.

Before his death, Harding had established a margin account with stockbroker Sam Ungerleider. Before the broker could get authority from Harding’s successors to liquidate the stocks purchased on loan, the account had a loss of more than $170,000. The broker was given the authority to sell, but the family refused to settle the loss and the broker declined to force collection.Russell, p. 608.

The most sensational allegations include one that Harding and Attorney General Harry M. Daugherty participated in bacchanalian orgies at the Ohio Gang’s Little Green House on K Street in Washington, D.C.; witnesses to this were considered unreliable and one was a convicted perjurer.Graff, p. 399. Also, in his 1987 book The Fiery Cross, historian Wyn Craig Wade suggested that Harding had ties with the Ku Klux Klan, perhaps having been inducted into the organization in a private White House ceremony. Evidence included the taped testimony of one of the members of the alleged induction team; however, evidence beyond that is scanty. Other historians generally dismiss these stories. However, in the 1998 History Channel documentary entitled Ku Klux Klan: A Secret History, the speculation that Harding may have joined the group is highlighted by the fact that William J. Simmons, the founder of the modern Klan, once visited the President at the White House.