On February 18, 2016 it was announced that President Barack Obama will visit Cuba. This trip will make him the first sitting U.S. president to visit the island since President Calvin Coolidge went in January 1928. This lecture about Coolidge’s Cuba excursion was given by Coolidge Foundation program associate Rushad Thomas on Presidents’ Day Weekend 2015.

Calvin Coolidge, the Puritan in Babylon, the Scrooge Who Begat Plenty, the Great Refrainer, Silent Cal. We know him by all these names. But there’s one name we rarely consider when it comes to Silent Cal: Electoral Juggernaut! This is astonishing when you consider the fact that he probably won more elections, at every level of government, than any president in American history. Yet Coolidge is often remembered only for being silent. While presidential brevity is something of a lost art, for which Coolidge can be commended, we must not forget that Coolidge was a politician who stood for election, and had to convince people to vote for him, just like politicians have done for centuries. The 1924 presidential election campaign, the last which Coolidge would fight in his life, was no different, and the story of that fascinating election sheds a great deal of light on the man Calvin Coolidge was. We will explore the story of the 1924 presidential campaign today, and hopefully draw some lessons from a tremendously interesting moment in presidential election politics.

Americans today place enormous pressure on presidents to “do something”…anything, to get the economy going. There was one president, though, Calvin Coolidge, who did “nothing” — other than shrink government. What happened? America’s economy boomed. Is there a lesson to be learned? Award-winning author, historian, and biographer Amity Shlaes thinks so.