Delivering an address on Founders Day at the Carnegie Technical Institute in Pittsburgh on April 28, 1921, Coolidge spoke of Andrew Carnegie as "a man who represented American ideals."
How closely President Coolidge is living up to the late Steel King's "ideals" is seen from the following portion of his address to the Massachusetts State Legislature inaugurating his second term as Governor: "It is fundamental that freedom is not to be secured thru disobedience to law. Government must govern. To obey is life. To disobey is death.
"We need to change our standards, not of property but of thought. If we put all the emphasis on our prosperity, that prosperity will perish, and with it will perish our civiliation. Employer and employed must find their satisfaction not in a money return but in a service rendered."
In answer to the vice-presidency notification speech of Gov. Edwin P. Morrow of Kentucky, in 1920, Pres. Coolidge further said: "No one in public life can be oblivious to the organized efforts to undermine the faith of our people in their Government, foment discord, aggravate industrial strife, stifle production, and ultimately stir up revolution. These efforts are a great public menace, not thru danger of success, but the great amount of harm they can do if ignored. The first duty of the government is to repress them, punishing wilful violations of law, turning the full light of publicity on all abuses of the right of assembly and free speech."
What the Government's proper functions are in the eyes of Coolidge was made clear in a speech he delivered at the commencement exercises at the Holy Cross College, on June 16, 1920; President Coolidge said in part: "Unless property owners had proper safeguards of constituted authority, transportation would clash, industry would shrivel up, all property be destroyed, and all incentive to effort perish. All our freedom comes from the support of the constituted authority."
Doesn't Want Woman Suffrage
When Coolidge was approached by advocates of woman suffrage to aid their cause by using his influence to have other States act favorably on the ballot for women, Coolidge replied, June 25, 1920, that he "will not interfere with other States" on the suffrage issue.
Furthermore, in one of his campaign speeches, delivered on October 20, 1920, at New Castle, Tennessee, Coolidge went on to say: "I don't know how you folks up here in Tennessee feel about suffrage, but I know how it was in my own family. My wife originally didn't want suffrage. Something far back in her New England ancestry perhaps revolted against it. But when it came, like the rest of the women, she was strongly for it."
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