Date: November 9, 1928
Location: Washington, D.C.
(Original document available here)
My views on farm legislation have been set out in 1923, 1924, 1925, 1926 and 1927 in my Messages to the Congress, to which you can refer if you want to get them in detail. I don’t know of course what my next Message will contain. The Secretary of Agriculture is away for a few days. He was in the West and was going to attend some farm gatherings there or something of that kind, so that he is not returning home until after he has finished that errand. Otherwise, he would have to go right back. So I haven’t received from him any report as to what recommendation he would suggest relative to his Department. Nor have I had opportunity to confer with men in the House and the Senate what it might be possible to do in the way of farm legislation. They may think that it would be better to postpone it until the special session. Whether that will be their opinion or not, I don’t know. It would depend somewhat, I suppose, on the certainty of having a special session.
I haven’t received the report of the experts on the engineering features of the Boulder Canyon Dam. I was thinking of that a day or two ago and wondering if it was not about time for it to be in. I am going to have some inquiries made as to when their report will probably be ready. Of course, I couldn’t indicate any recommendations I might make on the subject until I got the report of the experts. While that might not necessarily be controlling, it would certainly be worthy of very careful consideration.
As has already been announced from Palo Alto, Mr. Hoover is thinking of making a trip to South America. I have wired him to advise me what he would like to have the Government do to assist him. He says he would like to have the Warship Maryland assigned for the journey and that his purpose in making the journey is to evidence the good will and desire for mutual cooperation between the United States and South America and to familiarize himself with the common problems. He says also that the matter hasn’t been finally determined. I am having the State Department make the usual inquiries as to whether the places he is expecting to visit would he agreeable to receive him. He spoke to me about this the last time I saw him as a matter that he would like to do after election. I told him I would be very glad to afford any cooperation he might require.
The Postmaster General this morning reported in the Cabinet, which has been or will be given to the press, considerable increases in the postal receipts above October of last year, 50 selected cities and 50 industrial cities running each about 60% increase. That is more encouraging than the month of September, which in many instances showed a slight decrease.
Citation: Calvin Coolidge: Remarks by the President to Newspaper Correspondents
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