The Klan dreamed of obtaining the endorsement of a presidential candidate. It was clear that Calvin Coolidge, the incumbent, would never do this. Coolidge had become president in 1923, when his predecessor Warren Harding died. Coolidge had been vice president, and so immediately became president.
Both Coolidge and Harding had been steadily anti-Klan.
The KKK, having no hope of receiving support from the Republicans, turned to the “the Democratic convention of 1924, where many delegates were fervently pro-Klan,” as historian Charles Johnson writes.
The Democratic Party was split, half wanting to embrace the Klan, and half wanting not to publicly endorse the Klan. The debate went on for days; neither side could get a solid majority to overcome the other.
The eventual Democratic nominee was John Davis, who finally denounced the Klan, but because the Democratic Party failed to denounce the Klan, many voters “bolted from the Democratic nominee,” in the words of Charles Johnson.
John Davis denounced the Klan, but because the Democratic party didn’t, it was clear that it was a personal statement by Davis, and not the party’s view. The 1924 Democratic platform committee had discussed some statement about the KKK, but in the end, the platform said nothing about the Klan, about race, or about lynching.
Coolidge and Harding, by contrast, had both endorsed anti-lynching laws to protect Black lives.
In the midst of the Klan’s efforts to make trouble, Coolidge calmly snubbed the KKK by becoming the first U.S. President to deliver a commencement address at a historically Black college. In June 1924, Coolidge spoke in Washington, D.C., at the campus of Howard University. The Klan was enraged, and Coolidge was quietly pleased that he’d managed to do something to promote both the civil rights and the economic opportunities of African-Americans.
As Klan leaders became nearly apoplectic at Coolidge’s support of the Black community, the Coolidge campaign mocked the KKK by choosing a campaign slogan: “Keep Cool with Coolidge.” Comedians quickly changed it to “Keep Kool with Koolidge.”
In any case, African-Americans voted in large numbers for Coolidge in 1924. They weren’t the only ones voting for Coolidge. Citizens who’d formerly voted for the Democratic Party were dismayed when the Democrats failed to take a clear stance against the KKK, and so many of them also voted for Coolidge.
In the end, Calvin Coolidge won the election by an unprecedented landslide. He was enormously popular during the 1920s.
