the fellow doing it that year was warren harding, who had been chair of the convention. but he's undecided. even his family members and his closest associates are not sure what he's going to do. now, there had been people in the early days of the republic who had resigned from the court to take other positions. there had been a david davis on the court, '70s and '80s in the 19th century who took a senatorial nomination out in illinois, but not since then and certainly not since hughes. >> and can you speak, add if you are also familiar with this, but he had been a politician before he came to the court. how was he hughes a national campaigner? >> that campaign is probably the worst thing he ever does in his life, his life really, not just his public career because he excels at everything. but that campaign, he's getting off the mark slowly. it's -- he's doing a dance and it's the dance that jack kennedy and richard nixon do in 1960. we've got the black vote in the north. we've got the southern white votes. what do we do? and nick kennedy carries both. the same thing occu

the problem for al smith is you've had eight years of republican rule, first warren harding and followed by calvin coolidge. so the republicans sort of have a leg up on the prosperity front. you have the 1920s, a boom decade for wall street, for large segments of the economy, although less for farmers and agriculture at that point. that's our second p. that's our second "p." i think the darkest part of this election and the reason i said it really is one of the most vicious elections in american history is our third "p." is the question of prejudice. and al smith -- i think most americans today are probably more familiar with john kennedy as a catholic candidate. and even in 1960, that causing a real stir, a real set of questions about the presidency, but al smith raised all of those questions much earlier in 1928 which already had been a decade that has been seized with a lot of questions about immigration, immigration reform, the rise of the ku klux klan and those come into play in his candidacy. >> john evers, the role of catholicism in the 1928 election, how did it play out? >> well,

they were used to calvin coolidge, warren harding, herbert hoover. >> if you were elected governor of new york in this time, were you a shoo-in or automatic for consideration on the national stage? >> absolutely. al smith was nominated -- it was always the favorite son candidacies. in 1920 they nominated al smith for president in 1920. it went one round. of course they dropped the votes and they go with -- eventually it was cox from ohio. in 1924 they really went out for smith. it was in new york city, 103 ballots. eventually he had to with withdraw and they had a compromise candidate, also a new yorker. in 1928, of course, he wins the nomination. all through history, the new york governor, this is even modern history, the new york governor is considered presidential material. if you look at the people who have run and won and those who have run and lost, you'll see new yorkers all through history. >> i'll jump in there. new york was incredibly important. there really were two key political states, new york was one of them. ohio was the other one. they kept producing president after p

just as they vet now, it is often a hit and miss process with warren harding. the story goes that george harvey who is putting together a group of senators -- there's a harding, it's you, we're going to you, and is there anything in your background that would keep you from being president? harding is like, -- and it takes 10 minutes to to answer. that should have been their first cause for alarm because there were all those women in trouble, but there were those. nothing of personal corruption. there were those. that nonfarm harding during his presidency. >> host: this e-mail from michael. do you think charles evans hughes would've made a good president? he was an amazingly capable individual. >> guest: he was a capable individual, i was on c-span talking about it. we will be on tonight on american history tv, they are re-airing that. >> host: that is right yes mackey is amazingly capable as an individual. he might've been more liberal or progressive. under harding, even though he served under both the secretary of state, he was a fairly conservative chief justi

thisapres the pc t92nvtionch i icve w -- warren harding. .. the boss ridden convention which gives us warren harding, it is stpe fr h orih hto my ree u o antiwar he is supposed to be the nominee. the chaf the cnven inkshat guyis because -- i nominated a great leader for massachuses, but now othegrmsacset er goevi ol. brlysysett, thnvons id for it is almost figuratively and theso,tey hndpndth p okng aea man. coolh will be prest before that term is up. >>t:'r acinc-n prm.monly eth guisidtr. asttoo bu 19201948 and 1960 elections, as well as a book bout arnd rothstein and several books on thmberare the scre. e ne c o ph, iip. >> caller: good afternoon, thank you for taking my call. i have a question about hebrews, in the hall of ame, will it ever happen. w isnsta repy gog ket p >>st: the rose question is one i have been taking him it for quite a while, but i don't know about the instant replay. its dierenin acole wh uted al weldd ee,, t eu people markum who is the master statistician. he would do the rankings of the great ballplayers. the great on

[laughter] >> host: warren harding is often ranked as one of the worst presidents. >> guest: yeah.nd, um, kind of three things to look at there. um, one, the perm scandals which if we're going to rank presidents based on personal scandals, i don't know if he's the only one who should be held to that standard. but certainly a mess, a mess where he's even being blackmailed during that 1920 election which as far as i know is unique in presidential annals. and they have to send his former mistress and her husband off to japan until the election is over on a business trip. >> host: who saved those letters? because you quote some of the letters that he wrote. >> guest: i think, i think that comes from the phillips' family. and those letters have an -- >> host: nan phillips. >> guest: yeah. they were originally in the shadow of blooming grove by francis russell, d the were massive lawsuits about what he could print and what he couldn't print and why, you know, there was stuff redacted out. the second part of his, of his presidency is, of course, the scandals of the people around him. albe

eamari bot grhulucore stngma o odw wilson, energy of theodore roosevelt for the amiability of warren harding or the grinning charm of frali my it y est utete cos really has this remarkable career of achievement and aris i azisty. on boyrom iwh cl and his parents died with a dime in his pocket. goes toirst css ldesevti carnaua, ring an up getting richer and richer in to china whe he construs beg a great gineeran om b rentssa vell oli americans stranded in europe when war breaks out. no one knows how to do it. d gomyatndth avateor atasf or siof fy eu i14 bugot those folks out and saved people after the war who arngsadpl i oproaronnd a very energetic secretary of commerce under harding and coolidge aer this election b t , en- ofeans frinsemeacss like gangbusters in the depression with these fireside vi on to he act he is followingd >> host: "1948: harry truman's improbable victory and the year that transformed america" published last year you write ctory is a thousand faers d aton. y trma folen heme outplayed repulsive after it. democrats faulted hiand not thfects of 16 years of tir rus thdee.

>> guest: theodore roosevelt, woodrow wilson, warren hard ca coodge,er hr h hhe oth volved? >> guest: t are would have bee the nominee of the republican party but dies in his sleep in january of 1919. endi f nepe iwis the nomination, calvin coolidge, a tampe ma himice estate 20 gohehaingie wow on psi t united states and invalid think. woodrow lspresidenof the taedthonioise tw hin he >>t:s s the chance? >> guest: he is in a wheelchair. some days he functions and some days he n't. cry omes ec in20. franklin roosevelt, democrats secretary of state for secretary of the navy under wilson, d lewa h re th mi nut it sounded better. >> host: do they matt? wn to the wire. counting vote after vote 1976 reagan and ford there was e bam thingog . le purint aneday i got to roli. my sick daughter in south 0 ty ill un al yla aicre of cvin coolidge and it looked like his tweet 2 sons. year-ago i w pering some old pape and camacss a un t dthf wt paed h en presidency if it did. >>uest: we are coming up on annirsathnli l b tewemom plymouth not. the older son was calvin jr.. they are playing on t

warren harding saw this maybe a little quicker than he did. but hughes recognized the truth of that, that it was really a fool's error to go back there. the senate was not going to approve that. but he moves on from that. he stays. he thought about resigning. he stays. he has -- really, he pioneers an international disarmament, and a groundbreaking navy treaty caps the ratio of 10-10-6, the unite states, the united kingdom and japan. this is a good deal for the united states, because with our congress we were not about to spend the money on the military. we would have lost ground to japan in that decade. also, he moves on to other treaties in the far east. he gets japan to give the province of shantung back to china, which was a major accomplishment. and it's a thing which people really wouldn't believe. but going into that decade, the united kingdom, britain, was united in treaty, that is, if they were attacked or the other party was attacked, they would go to war, and the other party was with japan. and there was a fear of the united states

kennedy and obama, of course and warren harding.ate to the white house. do you have a political trivia question that you think should be on the show, e-mail us to dailyrundown@msnbc.com. oh, that's helpful! well, our company does that, too. actually, we invented that. it's like a sauna in here. helping you save, even if it's not with us -- now, that's progressive! call or click today. no mas pantalones! the wife. hey, babe. got the jetta. i wiped the floor with the guy! not really. i would've been fine with 0% for 36 months, but i demanded 60. no...i didn't do that. it was like taking candy from a baby. you're a grown man. alright, see you at home. [ male announcer ] the volkswagen autobahn for all event. we good? we're good. [ male announcer ] at 0% apr for 60 months, no one needs to know how easy it was to get your new volkswagen. that's the power of german engineering. to get your new volkswagen. ♪ hello...rings ♪ what the... what the... what the... ♪ are you seein' this? ♪ ♪ uh-huh... uh-huh... uh-huh... ♪ ♪ it kinda makes me mi

warren g. harding and then, of course, senses departure from the white house, richard nixon, who raises a very interesting point which i not going to get into here. maybe in a q&a about all we do about a president who is so ignominiously humiliated and yet accomplished some very significant things before all that happened. another guy in that category, with to a lesser extent is london johnson who have massive accomplishments and and then basically brought himself down through his vietnam. so let's talk about grants. they seem to have lost my place to. all of these guys that are the so-called villiers are 1-termers except for nixon. and except for the one a liar. ulysses s. grant. grant is considered a failure although he is rising in the estimation of history. it gets a little complicated. he was succeeded by his own party in 1876. only as a result of corrupt manipulation. the republicans are able to do that because they had occupied the south. grant's first term was a clear success, not a huge succes

abolition of congress' prerogative of declaring war was rebuked by the record majority cast for warren g. harding's return to normalcy in 1920. franklin roosevelt's plan to pack the supreme court, new deals governor refusal to enforce the law against the sit-down strikes was rebuked in 1938 and subsequent years. which produced anti-congress during the years. lyndon johnson, great society was rebuked in the elections of 1966 and '68 and the stagflation that prevailed during jimmy carter's presidency produced a 44 state landslide for ronald reagan in 1980. two the most recent democratic presidents after raising taxes and advancing a national health care plan were rebuked sharply by record republican victories in the off-year elections of 1994 and 2010. now, many conservative thinkers, the pessimists would reply that these victories do not change the trajectory of public policy. the creeping socialism kept creeping. there's something to this. but i think the argument is overstated. tax rates were vastly cut, in wartime nationalization of railroads and shipyards was ended after 1920. by the way the lat

. >> warren g. harding says he can return america to normalcy. horse feathers.hat's all a bunch of copper-plated hog wash. fact is, he's a goof. he's all wet. this fellow likes to beat his gum. ach apple sauce. he's so screwy, he even put his pooch on top of his gel apy. time for him to dry up. telegram him and tell him to scram! vote for james m. cox, a ducky fellow. he really knows his onion. this november, hot socks, it's cox! paid for by a young rupert murdoch. [ cheers and applause ] >> jimmy: thank you. alec baldwin ran into some trouble this morning. he and his fiance were getting their marriage license and there were photographers outside taking their picture and this happened. you can see alec either push or punch the guy. the photographer claims he was attacked unprovoked. alec baldwin has a different story. either way, no way to treat your wedding photographer. i have to say, he looks particularly handsome when he's beating someone up. rage really suits him. meanwhile lindsay lohan had a bad weekend. producers of a movie she's shooting became concerne

let's talk about warren g harding, a total failure by historians. now we all recall elected in 1920, died in office, was a passive chief executive and the view generally as a kind of vacuous pseudo-close to his career was filled primarily by the fact that he looked precisely, what people thought a president should look like. so people of course had been in his time and later when they've read about them shake their head at the 15 year affair he had with kerry phillips who have been to be his closest friends wife and they would snicker at this sort of vision of the tryst he had with the starry eyed women who is 31 years his junior and congress at the national agenda, all true. and finally interrupted after he died in office, but nevertheless harmed his reputation because they were of those trials of the century and it really just eroded his standing. arthur/jerry junior said he was more careless. he was overly protective of people he should have been her carefully. and always knew how to just capture these things is that hurting is bad man. he was ju

please welcome my fellow board member, the tireless and hard-working esteemed chair of the luncheon committee, the very honorable james l. warren. [applause] >> i'm the guy that sends you all those emails saying thank you. and i mean it. i am jim warren, the chair of the committee, and it's my pleasure to welcome all of you here with everybody else. we have more than 900 people in this room, law firms, corporations, public interest groups, judges, we have over 28 judges. i understand we have virtually every court, the superior court, the court of appeals the supreme court, the district court, the ninth circuit, but justice roberts had another conflict and couldn't make it. but i'd like to echo what lisa just said about the people who have committed so much money to making this organization functional. and i'd like to honor specifically certain of our donors who have contributed way above and beyond the call of duty. i'd like to honor odett and partners. [applause] >> lef cabraser. [applause] >> latham and watkins. [applause] >> scad and arps. [applause] >> cooley. [applause] >> morrison and forester. pillsbury. and simpson that

warren already on the case. sewing american flags on their singer. they say it's hardup with orders, but when they ship them out, they are full of american heart. and then, this image from boston common. a spectacular site. 300 volunteers, 33,000 flags. she told us late today, every flag, made in america. they paid a little more, but she says, home grown for their hometown heroes. and it got us wondering about the friends we melt when "world news" took you to ohio, population, 11,000. the colors everywhere, flags on mailbox, even the silos in the middle of the field. and this -- >> made byamericans, for americans. >> reporter: all the way back to the civil wars, world wars i and ii. and that moment on the moon? >> one small step for man. >> reporter: saluting that flag on the moon. >> that was ours. yes, sir. >> reporter: proud of it? >> very proud. >> reporter: tonight, we learn that sales at annin are up nearly 20% over last year. so, americans are now looking at those labels, just like that family in utah today. changing one flag at a time, three worlds at a time. m

. >> coming up next, you heard elizabeth warren talk about the controversial dodd-frank act. i'm going to hit that hardit is one of the president's landmark pieces of legislation designed to protect you and your finances. it is two years old now, but depending on the political wins, it could be watered down or washed out all together. i'll speak to the new head of the consumer financial protection bureau. package... oahhh! [ male announcer ] it made a big splash with the employees. [ duck yelling ] [ male announcer ] find out more at... [ duck ] aflac! [ male announcer ] ...forbusiness.com. ♪ ha ha! i bo because of its efficiency. i bought the car because i could eliminate gas from my budget. i don't spend money on gasoline. it's been 4,000 miles since my last trip to the gas station. it's pretty great. i get a bunch of kids waving at me... giving me the thumbs up. it's always a gratifying experience. it makes me feel good about my car. i absolutely love my chevy volt. ♪ jonathan horton climbed all the way to the ceiling... in the middle of a department store. some parents might have scolded him. ♪ jon

. >> coming up next, you heard elizabeth warren talk about the controversial dodd/frank act. i'm going to hit that hardn we come back. it's one of the frez's landmark pieces of legislation designed to protect you and your finances. it's two years old now. depending on the political wins, it could be watered down or washed out altogether. i'll speak to the new head of the consumer financial protection bureau. . >>> hello. i want to take you straight to aurora, colorado, you're looking at live pictures by way of our affiliate kcnc. we understand from authorities there that they may soon be ready to try to detonate this booby trapped apartment, that apartment that of the suspect and that movie massacre just yesterday early morning. james holmes. you can see them in some of the bomb experts in a so-called bucket that they have ascended to the third floor level of this apartment complex. they pull out a little bit more. you see them of course handling wiring. i don't have the intricacies of what they're doing. but our security analyst mike brooks is on phone and has a much better understanding of this kind

warren pierce never expected he would need. >> even if we had flood insurance it doesn't cover basements and that's what's going to flood. so kind of between a rock and a hard spot. >> reporter: and the threat can last years. this is where california's station fire burned back in 2009. these hills were first ravaged by flames then after it rained came the floods. this area today is still a danger zone. seven months after the fire a river of knee deep mud washed down from the barren foothills. the cleanup topped $30 million. in colorado the river went from this to this. the fire then the runoff turned once calm water into a raging river of black sludge. now in colorado springs an urgency to protect what survived. >> the disaster after the fire is something almost to be on par with what the fire is itself. >> reporter: one threat gone, another still looming. miguel almaguer, nbc news, los angeles. >>> from our natural world to the political world now where the president and his campaign continue to bore in on mitt romney's private sector career, which romney has been running on as a high point in a down economy. our report tonight from nbc's peter alexander.

resources it's an extremely hard to find them and unpredictable if you find them you have no idea if they're going to be economic this is why you. benjamin graham for that matter warren buffet wouldn't dream of investing in a mining stock it should inherently speculative it's not a predictable growth business and mining is becoming much much harder and much less profitable in recent years primarily because of regulations. and also because as with oil all of the easy to find deposits low hanging fruit all over the world has been found so really places where you can go or politically dangerous and unstable countries war or exotic deposits that are deep or very low grade it's a tough tough business that's the problem partly it will and partly just technical geologically and the other thing is is we shouldn't refer to the gold as an investment it's an asset and investment is theoretically something that produces new wealth and. in the climate of fear that we have in a world where people don't want to take risks they want to have an asset and not simultaneously somebody else's liability and that means go right right along those lines though you do predict a bubble i'm cur

warren say it. megyn: you're rile upset. >> i am upset. i know how hardorking, ten years without a vacation around-the-clock. i've sacrificed relationships with spouses, kids, everything, i speak for all small business people, it's crap, it's the ultimate insult that the president has to dig this low, and it's ridiculous. it's so infuriating because it also gives credence to people who don't work hard. in other words, see, here is the thing, if you can't take credit for your success because of society then you can't be credited for your failure because of so saoeufplt not only is he hurting people that are trying hard but he's giving a free pass to people who aren't. megyn: you're a democrat, why are you shaking your head yes. >> this is the defining moment. what is being told to people particularly in the midsection of this country is that their efforts aren't significant enough, and the problem here is that the democrats in the house and senate ought to be telling the president of the united states to stop saying these things, because he's cutting them