A pro-business fiscal conservative who was strongly in favor of anti-lunching and other civil rights legislation
Did Coolidge actually succeed in passing any anti-lynching or civil rights legislation though? As far as I know, the only race-based legislation that he signed while President was the blatantly racist Immigration Act of 1924.
He publicly called for it, but as usual, all efforts would be killed by Democrats in Congress.
Certainly, Calvin Coolidge is to be lauded for his support of civil rights, and Woodrow Wilson is to be denounced for his opposition to the same. But if Coolidge failed to materialize his views in the form of improving the rights of non-whites (with the exception of signing the Indian Citizenship Act, as Cathcon pointed out), are Wilson and Coolidge functionally different on that issue?
A pro-business fiscal conservative who was strongly in favor of anti-lunching and other civil rights legislation
Did Coolidge actually succeed in passing any anti-lynching or civil rights legislation though? As far as I know, the only race-based legislation that he signed while President was the blatantly racist Immigration Act of 1924.
It was more xenephobic than racist. At that time, America was becoming more Catholic, Jewish, Irish, and Italian. It wasn't really about race.
Most Catholic, Jewish, and Orthodox immigrants were not viewed as "white" by the native WASP majority. So it was about race, although I'll grant that it was about religion, too.
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