Date: December 29, 1925
Location: Washington, D.C.
(Original document available here)
Report has been made to me by the Federal Trade Commission on its investigation of the tobacco growers and merchandisers. It is a very voluminous report. I don’t know that there is anything in it that indicates wrongdoing on the part of anyone, so I have sent it to the Attorney General to analyze for the purpose of discovering whether it reveals any situation that requires any action. Now I don’t want any inference to be drawn that it has revealed any such situation. The only thing that I have done is to send it there for analysis.
I have a number of inquiries about farm legislation. I have stated my position as best I could in my message to the Congress and in the somewhat more extended statement that I made in the address at Chicago I have noticed what I thought was some confusion in the past in relation to my position, and if any one wants to know just what it is he can best find out by reading the message and the address. I think the confusion has arisen by reason of the fact that some times more emphasis is put on one portion of my address and some times more emphasis is put on another portion of it. They all go together and state as best I could my position.
I haven’t any idea now that I shall consult General Pershing relative to the appeal that has been made by Chile from, I think it is, technically, from a decision that I made or a resolution that was passed by the Committee. I should expect that the only people that it would be appropriate to consult would be the interested parties, which would be done in the usual formal way of having briefs filed.
The matter of attending the conference at Geneva seems to be progressing favorably. Such inquiries as I have made of members of the Senate and House indicate that they look on it favorably, and I haven’t found any one there yet whom I have consulted that has any objection to make to an appropriation. Nothing has been done about the personnel that may be used, as to those that may be sent over from here or those that are already in the service there and would be available, and any reports in the press here, and especially abroad, of course are merely speculation. I can’t prevent those – I am not making any criticism of them, but of course I don’t want to be held responsible for them.
There will not be any withdrawal of the President as arbitrator in the Tacna-Arica matter. The arbitration is proceeding, and so far as I have any information will continue to proceed.
Senator Robinson and Governor Jackson of Indiana came in to pay respects. The Governor and I talked sympathetically with each other of some of the troubles that executives have, and quite naturally I reminisced some of my experiences when I was holding the office of Governor of a state.
I haven’t any speaking engagements that I know of.
I judge that my father’s condition is about what can be expected. His years and his troubles come on about as we had expected they might come. He has had some trouble with his leg. That is nothing new. It is sometimes more acute than at others. That may clear up as it has before.
I don’t know of anything I can say about the coal strike other than to express gratification that there seems to be a prospect of adjustment between the interested parties. I noticed that President Green of the American Federation spoke very hopefully, and I have no doubt that he spoke from more accurate information than I have relative to the bright prospects of a settlement.
The reports that we receive relative to general business conditions are the same as those which have already been noted in the past. The immediate prospect seems to be good, underlying conditions seem to be sound, speaking in a general way. There are certain areas and certain lines of business that are not so good, due to drought, failure to readjust, but in the industrial world readjustments seem to be proceeding most hopefully.
I expect that the report of the Federal Trade Commission on tobacco will be made public in due time. But I don’t want to speak authoritatively on that. I haven’t in mind just what was in the resolution that directed the report to be made to me. That might govern in some way what ought to be done with it in the way of publicity.
Citation: Calvin Coolidge: Remarks by the President to Newspaper Correspondents
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