Alice Roosevelt Longworth, a writer and the eldest child of President Theodore Roosevelt, had it right when she said, “[Warren] Harding was not a bad man. He was just a slob.” Whether he knew it or not, the 29th president's administration had been a ticking time bomb since the moment he won the presidency. He kept bad company, a group of friends and hangers-on who ran amok and enriched themselves on the Harding name. Some of the highest-profile American scandals, including Teapot Dome, happened under his watch. Sometimes he knew, sometimes he didn't; sometimes he was a participant and other times guilty only by association. Regardless, Harding died in office on August 2, 1923, and the fact that he was still extremely popular and not yet a man in disgrace gave the Republicans a lifeline.
Read Full Article »
