James Weldon Johnson, head of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Photo taken around 1920.

When it was arranged for James Weldon Johnson, the first black leader of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, to visit the White House in the early months of the Coolidge Administration, Mr. Johnson was not only glad to leave but, unfortunately, left with a completely mistaken perception of the President. Even more unfortunate, Johnson let that first impression influence future interaction with the Vermonter. Johnson wrote years later of this meeting,

“He, it appeared, did not want to say anything or did not know just what to say, I was expecting that he would make, at least, any inquiry or two about the state of mind and condition of the twelve million Negro citizens of the United States. I judged that curiosity, if not interest, would make for…

“Death and life are in the power of the tongue; and they that love it shall eat the fruit of it” — Proverbs 18:21

“A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in fittings of silver” — Proverbs 25:11

Few, especially in public life, have respected the truth of these maxims than Calvin Coolidge. He understood the power of the spoken word. It carries the ability to inspire one to greater heights of goodness and nobility or to destroy with malice and hatred. It can build up the soul or crush the spirit. It carries a potency that cannot be entirely harnessed or contained once uttered and thus dare not be exercised flippantly or with casual disregard for the responsibilities which fall to the speaker, especially as the President of the United States of America.

Coolidge wielded this power effectively during his Presidency by deploying the spoken word sparingly…

While Mr. Walker delves into an area of study oft neglected these days, he, like Eric S. Yellin in his Racism in the Nation’s Service: Government Workers and the Color Line in Woodrow Wilson’s America, indulges in more than a fair share of unwarranted generalizations, especially when it comes to the Coolidge years.

Yellin acknowledges that Coolidge had a more “sympathetic” outlook for individual blacks than Wilson did, yet he assigns Cal into the realm of insufficient action on the race issue (p.185). For Yellin to conclude that Coolidge ultimately conceded to Wilson’s departmental segregation, he must avoid the removal of Colonel Sherrill over government property, for insisting on the old prejudicial policy, replacing him with Colonel Grant, who was known for fair and even-handed dealings on racial conflicts. The claim that the Coolidge administration targeted Perry Howard for his skin color rather than his repeated violations of ethics…