The Coolidge Week

P: Establishment of municipal airports ports in large U. S. cities was advocated by the President. Long enthusiastic about the development of aviation, the President's vacation has made him even more interested in the plane's future. He has seen the efficiency of the air mail. The pet collie dog recently (TIME, Aug. 1) presented to him made the trip from Detroit by airplane. There is a plane at Custer State Park, S. Dak., ready to rush the President to Washington in any emergency. So, remote from centres of population, the President has more than ever realized the airplane as a factor in decreasing distance.

P: The President thought that the U. S. should honor the Chamberlin flight as impressively as the Lindbergh flight. He hoped it would be legally possible to confer the Distinguished Flying Cross on Mr. Chamberlin. (Mr. Chamberlin is a civilian but would be eligible to the Cross by joining either an army or navy reserve corps. So, presumably, would Mr. Levine.)

P: Mrs. Coolidge motored from Custer State Park to Newcastle, Wyo., attended the wedding of Miss Dorothy Mondell, daughter of one-time Representative Frank Wheeler Mondell, Republican floor leader, to Alexander W. Gregg, chief counsel for the Internal Revenue Bureau. Mrs. Coolidge safely completed her 70-mile trip through one of the heaviest storms of the summer.

P: To Custer, S. Dak., went the President and Mrs. Coolidge, saw there a pageant representing scenes in Black Hills history from the time when the Great Spirit set aside the region as a place of particular beauty and sanctity. The most spectacular part of the spectacle was not on the program, but came when two horses scheduled to stage a runaway from a covered wagon attacked by Indians ran in earnest and evaded cowboys posted to round them up. Toward the packed crowd surrounding the field galloped the horses. Mrs. Coolidge covered her face with her hands. But no one was trampled. The horses found an opening in the crowd, made for it, disappeared with cowboys in pursuit. They passed some 20 feet from the presidential party.

P: At Custer, President and Mrs. Coolidge again tried their hands at gold-panning. Fortunate, they succeeded in getting enough gold to make a ten-dollar gold piece. Diplomatic, the good people of Custer had previously "loaded" the "dirt" so that the gold acquired by the distinguished visitors might not be altogether dependent upon the bounty of nature.

P: While Senators and Representatives wrangled about tax reduction (see below) President Coolidge has arrived at his own conclusions on the question. No "Mellon plan" is expected to be presented to Congress this year, nor is there to be any form of out-and-out Administration tax program. It is understood, however, that the President has "recommendations" to make, chiefly that the tax reduction should centre upon cuts in corporation taxes. The President does not contemplate reduction in the taxes paid by earners of small incomes, but believed that automobile taxes should be lowered, possibly from 3 1/2% to 2%. He also anticipated a possible elimination of taxes on theatre tickets and club dues.

P: The President went fishing, left word that he should be summoned if any important news arrived from the Geneva Arms Conference. The President appeared hopeful that Great Britain would recede from its present position (see p. 12) but felt that U. S. representatives had made all possible concessions and would permit the Conference to collapse rather than consent to the British position which would result in expansion rather than reduction of naval programs. "Big Navy" enthusiasts have never found the President receptive to their ideas.

P: "I do not choose to run for President in 1928." These were not spoken words. They were typewritten on slips of paper by Edwin Geiser, the President's stenographer.

Promptly at noon, Aug. 2, newspapermen, at the President's behest, entered his schoolroom office. Everett Sanders, his secretary, closed the door, stood guard-like. The President was smoking a cigar held in an ivory holder. He did not smile as usual, but solemnly inquired: "Is everyone 'here now?" and directed his professional visitors to file past him. As they did so, he handed each one a slip on which, a few minutes previously, Typist Gsioer had imprinted the 10 words "I do not choose to run for President in 1928."

More the President would not say. It happened to be the fourth anniversary of the death of Warren Gamaliel Harding of Marion, Ohio, 29th U. S. President. And at 2 A. M. Aug. 3, four years ago, aged John C. Coolidge, slipperless, came down the stairs of his cottage at Plymouth Notch, Vermont, to swear in his son, Calvin, as 30th U. S. President. When President Coolidge's present term expires, he will have held supreme office for five years, seven months.

Who will succeed him ? Perhaps he himself, for some insisted last week that he might accept Republican nomination against his will. But barring him as a Republican possibility in 1928, most commentators were left to exclaim with U. S. Senator Hiram Johnson: "I am astounded. The Republican race will be a free-for-all."