What's impressive is that the most prominent issues during his presidency are the same as those of today: taxes, spending, deficits and surpluses, national debt, and size of government. Coolidge met regularly with his Cabinet and Budget Director. The Budget Director's main emphasis was keeping tabs on federal agencies to keep their expenditures in line. By holding the line on spending like this, and vetoing a bunch of what he considered budget-busting bills (including veterans' bonuses), he made his share of adversaries in Republican-controlled Congresses, but he was able to keep the federal government in surpluses and pay down the national debt. As this was going on, the economy on the whole did very well, with the exception of agriculture.
BUMP
I am in the process of reading that work now, it is excellent.
What a great idea, to charge the budget director with keeping the heads of the administrative agencies in line. Brilliant!
Thanks for the ping!