With the analysis of the best scholars on this era, 29 essays demonstrate how academics then and now have addressed the political, economic, diplomatic, cultural, ethnic, and social history of the presidents of the Republican Era of 1921-1933 - Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover.
* This is the first historiographical treatment of a long-neglected period, ranging from early treatments to the most recent scholarship
* Features review essays on the era, including the legacy of progressivism in an age of "normalcy", the history of American foreign relations after World War I, and race relations in the 1920s, as well as coverage of the three presidential elections and a thorough treatment of the causes and consequences of the Great Depression
* An introduction by the editor provides an overview of the issues, background and historical problems of the time, and the personalities at play

List of Illustrations viii

Notes on Contributors ix

Acknowledgments xiv

Introduction 1
Katherine A.S. Sibley

Part I The Background of Progressivism 7

1 The Wilson Legacy, Domestic and International 9
Christopher McKnight Nichols

2 Progressivism in an Age of Normalcy: Women's Rights, Civil Service, Veterans' Benefits, and Child Welfare 34
John F. Fox, Jr.

3 US Foreign Relations under Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover: Power and Constraint 53
Alex Goodall

Part II Warren G. Harding and the Early 1920s 77

4 Harding Biographies 79
Justin P. Coffey

5 The Front Porch Campaign and the Election of Harding 94
Richard G. Frederick

6 The Harding Presidency: Scandals, Legacy, and Memory 112
Phillip G. Payne

7 The Opposition: Labor, Liquor, and Democrats 132
Kristoffer Shields

8 No Immigrants or Radicals Need Apply: Varieties of Nativism in 1920s America 151
Alexander Pavuk

9 New Technologies, Communication, and Mass Consumption 170
Jason N. Brock and R. Emmett Sullivan

Part III Calvin Coolidge and His Era 191

10 The Biographical Legacy of Calvin Coolidge and the 1924 Presidential Election 193
Jason Roberts

11 From "Coolidge Prosperity" to "Voluntary Associationalism": Andrew Mellon, Herbert Hoover, and America's Political Economy in the Republican-Era 1920s 212
Daniel Michael Du Bois

12 Country and City, 1921-1933: Fundamentalism, the Scopes Trial, Urbanization and Suburbanization, and the Middletown Study 232
Scott A. Merriman

13 Native Americans: Experiences and Culture 251
Mary Stockwell

14 Military Interventions in the Coolidge Administration: Latin America and Asia 270
Theodore J. Zeman

15 Race Relations and the Consequences of the Great Migration 291
Carol Jackson Adams

16 Eugenics, Immigration Restriction, and the Birth Control Movements 313
Ruth Clifford Engs

17 Popular Culture during the "Jazz Age" and After 338
Jennifer Frost

18 Sports and Pastimes in the 1920s 358
Martin C. Babicz

Part IV Herbert Hoover and His Era 377

19 Hoover Biographies and Hoover Revisionism 379
Brian E. Birdnow

20 The Election of 1928 397
Nicholas Siekierski and Richard G. Frederick

21 The Economic Historiography of the Great Depression (1929-1933) 417
Daniel A. Schiffman

22 The Worsening of the Great Depression: Hoovervilles, Farm Troubles, Bank Crises 444
Derek S. Hoff

23 Hoover's Vision and His Response to the Great Depression: Voluntary Efforts; Public Works; the Gold Standard; the RFC; the Farm Board; Hoover's Reputation 465
Glen Jeansonne

24 Herbert Hoover's Diplomacy Toward Latin America 484
Paul Kahan

25 Ironies of Character: Hoover's Foreign Policy with Asia 502
Michael E. Chapman

26 Women and Minorities 522
Nancy Beck Young

Part V In Retrospect 543

27 Historians' Views of the Republican Era: Was Roosevelt an Entirely New Turn? 545
Justus D. Doenecke

Index 567

Katherine A.S. Sibley is Professor of History at Saint Joseph's University, USA. She is the author of four books, most recently First Lady Florence Harding: Behind the Tragedy and Controversy (2009) and Red Spies in America: Stolen Secrets and the Dawn of the Cold War (2004). Professor Sibley is also editing a forthcoming Companion on first ladies, and serves on the editorial board of American Communist History as well as on the Historical Advisory Committee for the US State Department.