June 30, 1921: The Job Taft Really Wanted

June 30, 1921: President Warren G. Harding appoints former President William Howard Taft to be the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. He had wanted the job for as long as he could remember.

A graduate of Yale Law School, the son of former Attorney General Alphonso Taft, and, like his father, the U.S. Secretary of War, Taft wanted to be on the Supreme Court. He had served as U.S. Solicitor General under President Benjamin Harrison. That wouldn't have been an omen at the time, but he did go on to become the 1st holder of that office to be appointed to the Supreme Court. He has been followed as such by Stanley Reed, Robert H. Jackson, Thurgood Marshall and Elena Kagan. Another, Robert Bork, was appointed to the Court, but rejected by the Senate.

Taft and his wife Helen were invited to the White House by President Theodore Roosevelt early in 1908. TR had already announced he would not run for what would have amounted to a 3rd term, and kiddingly told Taft that he could see the future. He saw a large man taking a great job -- but was it the Presidency, or the Chief Justiceship?

Will Taft said, "Let it be the Chief Justiceship."

Helen Taft, always more ambitious than her husband, said, "Let it be the Presidency."

The Presidency it was, and Will Taft was easily nominated at the 1908 Republican Convention in Chicago, and was elected in a landslide. But he took a more conservative course than TR did, and TR tried to regain the Republican nomination for President in 1912. When he failed, he ran a 3rd-party campaign, and, having said some very nasty things about Taft, finished ahead of him, but was unable to defeat the Democratic nominee, Woodrow Wilson. Taft and TR made up before the latter's death in 1919.

In 1920, Senator Warren G. Harding was elected President. A fellow Republican from Ohio, Harding invited Taft to his home in Marion after the election, and promised him a Supreme Court appointment. Taft knew that Edward D. White, whom he had appointed Chief Justice in 1910, was ill, and told Harding that he didn't want to be an Associate Justice, only the Chief Justice.

White died in office on May 19, 1921. Harding was a weak man, who basically did everything his 1920 campaign manager, Harry Daugherty, told him to do, including to make Daugherty himself the U.S. Attorney General. Taft knew this, and lobbied Daugherty for the post. It worked: On June 30, 1921, Harding appointed Taft to be the new Chief Justice of the United States. Without holding a single hearing, and with a brief debate, the U.S. Senate confirmed him that very same day. The vote was 61-4, the "Nay" votes coming from a Southern Democrat and 3 progressive Republicans who had supported Roosevelt over him in 1912.

He was sworn in on July 11, and, to this day, he remains the only person to serve as both President of the United States and a Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, let alone the Chief Justice.

Charles Evans Hughes was unsuccessfully nominated by the Republicans in 1916, after he was an associate Justice but before he was Chief Justice. Earl Warren ran for the Republican nomination in 1944 and 1948, and was unsuccessfully nominated for Vice President in 1948, and was later named Chief Justice.

Taft led the Court through the 1920s, a very conservative period that saw very conservative decisions by the Court. He was a great deal happier in his new job, and his weight, once a Presidential record 340 pounds -- possibly broken by Donald Trump, but his Administration wouldn't tell us the truth -- dropped to 244 by 1929.

However, by that point, his heart and liver were failing. He had delivered the Oath of Office correctly to President Calvin Coolidge when he was inaugurated for a full term on March 4, 1925: "...and will, to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States." But at President-elect Herbert Hoover's Inauguration on March 4, 1929, Taft, as great a constitutional scholar as was alive at that point, misquoted the Oath as stated in the Constitution: "and will, to the best of your ability, that you will preserve, and maintain, and defend the Constitution of the United States?"

(Hoover, unusually, instead of repeating the Oath entirely, as Franklin D. Roosevelt did the next 4 times, or phrase by phrase as given him by the Chief Justice, as every President since has done, simply said, "I do.") 

Taft realized his mind was no longer sharp. A trip home to Cincinnati for his brother Charles' funeral in January 1930 damaged his physical health further. He asked Hoover to promise him that his replacement as Chief Justice would be Hughes, who had been Secretary of State under Harding and Coolidge, rather than the more liberal Harlan Stone, a Coolidge appointee. Hoover agreed, and Taft resigned on February 3.

He died on March 8, 1930, at the age of 72. Because he was still living in Washington, he became the 1st President -- and also the 1st Supreme Court Justice -- to be buried in Arlington National Cemetery. (The only President so honored since has been John F. Kennedy. Presidents tend to be buried in their hometowns, or at their Presidential Libraries -- usually, the Library is in their hometown.) His wife Helen lived on until 1943.

Taft is regarded as one of the better Chief Justices, but not as one of the better Presidents. He would have agreed with both assessments.

His son, Robert A. Taft, would serve Ohio in the U.S. Senate, and run for President 3 times, though he never got the Republican nomination. He was so conservative, he would be known as "Mr. Republican." He died in 1953, in office as Senate Majority Leader. His son, Robert Taft Jr., served Ohio in both houses of Congress. And his son, Bob Taft, served 2 terms as Governor of Ohio.

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June 30, 1921 was a Thursday. There were 4 baseball games played that day:

* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Cincinnati Reds, 5-3 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh.

* The Detroit Tigers beat the Cleveland Indians, 6-3 at League Park in Cleveland. Ty Cobb went 3-for-4 with a walk and 2 RBIs. Tris Speaker went 1-for-4 with a walk. Each man was now his team's player-manager.

* And the St. Louis Browns swept a doubleheader from the Chicago White Sox, 6-1 and 1-0 at Sportsman's Park in St. Louis. Ray Kolp pitched a 4-hit shutout in the nightcap. Eddie Collins made only 1 plate appearance, as an unsuccessful pinch-hitter in the nightcap. Over the 2 games, George Sisler went 4-for-8.