Warren Harding: Damaged

01VOA Learning English presents America's Presidents.

02Today we are talking about Warren Harding.

03He was the 29th President of the United States.

04Harding was very different from the 28th President, Woodrow Wilson.

05Wilson supported change.

06Harding promised a return to normalcy.

07Wilson took steps to protect American workers.

08Harding often worked to protect business owners.

09Wilson was slow in supporting voting rights for women and in accepting African American people as equal to whites.

10Harding supported women's suffrage and civil rights for African Americans.

11Yet both men were popular during their years in office.

12Today, however, historians usually think of Wilson as one of America's best presidents.

13But Harding is remembered as one of the worst.

14Warren Harding was the 8th President from the state of Ohio.

15His parents were both doctors.

16Harding spoke about having a happy childhood, growing up on a farm with his brothers and sisters.

17Some of his favorite early activities were performing in a band and working on his college newspaper.

18Later, Harding, along with two friends, bought a newspaper.

19It became successful for several reasons.

20Harding was kind to his employees and shared the company's profits with them.

21He also tried not to publish stories that criticized politicians or politics from any party.

22Finally, he married a woman who had an excellent head for business.

23Florence Klingharding led the newspaper's circulation department.

24She also helped to direct her husband's political career.

25In time, Warren Harding became a state senator, a lieutenant governor of Ohio, and then a member of the U.S.

26Senate.

27He especially liked being a senator, and many of the other lawmakers liked him.

28One reason is because Harding rarely took a controversial position on any issue.

29Instead, he accepted most of the ideas of the Republican Party.

30He was also good-looking and had an excellent speaking voice.

31These qualities helped earn him the Republican presidential nomination in 1920.

32A few months later, he easily won the national election.

33President Harding took office shortly after World War I ended.

34He promised to make Americans feel calm again and also improve the nation's prosperity.

35Two of Harding's goals were to support business and to limit immigration.

36He succeeded on both issues.

37His administration reduced taxes for big businesses and wealthy people.

38It also increased tariffs, taxes on foreign imports.

39And the Harding administration put in place new rules on immigration.

40The rules made it easier for immigrants from Northern Europe to enter the country, but harder for immigrants from Russia, Eastern, and Central Europe.

41Harding also took steps to improve the effectiveness of the federal government.

42But his administration is remembered mostly for its problems.

43At the beginning of his term, Harding reportedly told friends that the job of being president was too much for him.

44He appeared to want to do well, and he worked hard.

45But he turned over most of the responsibility to his friends in the cabinet.

46A few were very able, but some were dishonest.

47They abused their positions to gain wealth for themselves and their families.

48One of the most famous examples of corruption during Harding's administration is known as the Teapot Dome scandal.

49The name Teapot Dome comes from a rock in the state of Wyoming.

50The rock looked like a teapot.

51Scientists correctly believed that oil could be found in the ground underneath it.

52At the time, the U.S.

53Navy depended on oil to fuel its ships.

54So, the federal government claimed the land in case the Navy needed to use the oil in an emergency.

55But a cabinet official, who was a friend of Harding, took control of the land.

56He gave a private company permission to search for oil on it in exchange for a large amount of money.

57Some lawmakers became suspicious, so they opened an investigation.

58In time, lawyers proved the act of corruption.

59Harding's friend was the first person to be found guilty of a crime while serving as a cabinet official.

60But President Harding did not live to see his friend go to jail.

61The investigation was just beginning when Harding took a trip to the West Coast to campaign for his policies.

62Some say that Harding was also trying to escape the problems in his administration.

63He reportedly told one reporter that worrying about what his friends were doing kept him awake at nights.

64During the trip, Harding showed signs of not being in good health.

65Doctors thought he could have food poisoning or pneumonia.

66He was taken to a hotel in San Francisco, California.

67For a day, he appeared to be feeling better.

68He was sitting up in bed.

69And then, suddenly, his body shook and collapsed.

70He died instantly.

71Reports at the time differed on the cause of Harding's death.

72Some even said that his wife poisoned the president to protect him from being punished for the wrongdoing in his administration.

73But most historians think that he had long suffered from heart failure and was struck by a heart attack.

74He was 57.

75Millions of Americans mourned over Warren Harding's death.

76They stood beside railroad tracks as his body traveled from California back to Washington, D.C.

77The following year, Florence Harding also died.

78She and her husband are buried together under a grand memorial in their hometown in Ohio.

79But in the years after his death, Harding's public image worsened.

80More corruption scandals in his administration came to light.

81And some historians have criticized him for not having a clear idea about how he wanted to lead the country.

82In 1927, a woman published a book saying she had a long but secret relationship with Harding, both before and during his presidency.

83She also said he was the father of her daughter.

84Genetic testing has confirmed her claim.

85More than 30 years after her book was published, a lawyer discovered love letters from Harding to a different woman.

86They confirmed that he had a long romantic affair with the wife of one of his friends.

87Harding had also been married at the time.

88These reports, as well as the corruption during his administration, damaged Harding's public image.

89But he also seemed to know that he would not be remembered as one of the best occupants of the White House.

90Instead, he tried to be likable and modest.

91He called himself a man of limited talents who was not fit for the office of president.

92I'm Kelly Jean Kelly.

93I'm Kelly Jean Kelly.

94I'm Kelly Jean Kelly.

95I'm Kelly Jean Kelly.

96I'm Kelly Jean Kelly.