The White House Week

THE PRESIDENCY

The White House Week

P: The President broke his rule against the acceptance of invitations to address public gatherings. He will speak at the annual meeting of the Ohio State Society in Washington on Jan. 29, the birthday of William McKinley. President Harding had agreed to address the Society two years ago on Jan. 29, but cancelled the engagement because it came at the time that the Knickerbocker Theatre collapsed in the Capital. Last year he again broke the engagement on account of Mrs. Harding's illness. This year the late President had again promised to speak. Chief Justice Taft called to ask President Coolidge to fulfill President Harding's promise, to which Mr. Coolidge agreed as a matter of sentiment.

P: On the anniversary of the Battle of New Orleans, President Coolidge placed a wreath at the base of the statue of the Democrat, Andrew Jackson, close to the White House. No previous Republican President is known to have done so.

P: From the Arctic, by radio, the President received the following message: "Members of MacMillan expedition in northern Greenland deeply appreciative of your holiday greetings and wishes for New Year. All's well on the Bowdoin in the middle of the long Arctic night."

P: The Tariff Commission (TIME, April 28), as a whole and in divisions, visited the White House a number of times in an attempt to solve, with the President's aid, various dissensions which had arisen with-in the Commission. The chief disagreement is understood to be whether a member may take part in disposing of any case concerning any commodity in which he is or has been financially interested, a point on which there was a three-three division. President Coolidge apparently did not secure a settlement.

P: The President and Mrs. Coolidge held the annual reception for the Judiciary; Mr. Coolidge invited Herr Anton Lang, Passion Play Christus, to be a guest at the White House when the Players are in Baltimore next March; the Coolidges attended a performance of Hamlet, by John Barrymore; over 100 women of the Directorate of the General Federation of Women's Clubs called on Mrs. Coolidge in a body; Mr. and Mrs. Coolidge were guests of the Secretary of the Treasury and Miss Ailsa Mellon at an entertainment with the Senators from Pennsylvania, and a group of Philadelphia and Manhattan politicians, financiers, and "Society."

P: After going to church on Sunday morning, President and Mrs. Coolidge drove in their car to the residence of Arthur Brooks, Negro valet of all the Presidents since Taft, who had been confined to his home by illness.