Taft, William Howard

Taft, William Howard (1857–1930), twenty‐seventh president of the United States, chief justice of the United States.A native of Cincinnati, Ohio, Taft graduated from Yale and the Cincinnati Law School. He married Helen Herron in 1886. After a legal career in Ohio including three years as a superior court judge, he was named solicitor general of the Justice Department in 1890 and became a federal circuit judge in 1892. President William McKinley appointed Taft to head the Philippine Commission in 1900, in which capacity he proved an effective colonial administrator. Three years later, President Theodore Roosevelt appointed him secretary of war. In 1908, having won the Republican nomination for president as Roosevelt's designated successor, Taft defeated the Democratic candidate, William Jennings Bryan.

The rotund and lawyerlike Taft did not enjoy a happy presidency. Lacking Roosevelt's sure political touch, he had poor press relations and gravitated toward the conservative wing of his party in an era of reform. He proved unable to satisfy Republican Progressives who wanted more of the political and economic reform of the Roosevelt years. His mishandling of the Payne‐Aldrich Tariff in 1909 alienated advocates of lower customs duties; the Ballinger‐Pinchot Controversy over conservation strained his friendship with Roosevelt. Republican losses in the 1910 elections reflected voter unhappiness with the administration.

During his last two years in the White House, Taft unsuccessfully pursued a reciprocal trade agreement with Canada and international arbitration treaties. Meanwhile, his relations with Roosevelt deteriorated. By early 1912, the former president was openly maneuvering to supplant Taft as the Republican nominee. A fierce struggle ensued in which Taft's command of the machinery of the Republican party enabled him to repel Roosevelt's challenge. Bitter over his defeat, Roosevelt bolted the GOP and started a third party. After a desultory campaign against both Roosevelt and the Democratic candidate, Woodrow Wilson of New Jersey, Taft came in third in the popular vote and won the electoral votes of only Vermont and Utah.

Out of office, Taft taught at Yale Law School and remained active behind the scenes in Republican politics. During World War I he served on the National War Labor Board. He advocated world organization through the League to Enforce Peace. After the Republicans under Warren G. Harding regained the White House in 1921, Taft became the chief justice of the United States. Happy at last in a position that suited him, Taft presided over the Supreme Court in an harmonious fashion, he played a large role in the selection of Supreme Court justices during his tenure and improved many of the Court's working procedures. His votes on particular cases reflected the conservatism of his later years, especially on such issues as the rights of labor unions and efforts to curb the power of corporations. Taft's presidency had creditable achievements, but his place between Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson has consigned him to the ranks of less‐than‐successful chief executives.
See also Conservation Movement; Federal Government, Executive Branch: The Presidency; Philippines; Progressive Era; Tariffs.

Bibliography

Henry F. Pringle , The Life and Times of William Howard Taft 2 vols., 1939.
Lewis L. Gould , Reform and Regulation: American Politics from Roosevelt to Wilson, 3d. ed., 1996.

Lewis L. Gould