William Howard Taft rose in the political arena rather quickly. After graduating from Yale, he attended law school. After law school he immediately began practicing law for various companies, including his own, until he was appointed to fill a vacancy on the Ohio superior court. Later Taft moved to Washington and became the Solicitor General for the Harrison Administration. Eventually, Taft became friends with Teddy Roosevelt, a civil service commissioner at the time, and was eventually appointed to the United States Circuit Court; eventually making his way to Presidency.
Taft won the presidency and is famous for facing the humiliation of getting stuck in the bath tub of the White House and eventually having it removed, while installing a wider model. Although there was more to Taft than his weight; he implemented many different policies into the United States of America during his presidency; some of which, were not well received.
Use your promo and get a custom paper on
"Taft".
Taft primarily focused on trust-busting, while trying to strengthen the Interstate Commerce Commission. Taft also believed in the idea of using money as a way of leveraging other countries into partaking in the American Economy. Taft tried his Dollar Diplomacy in Manchuria. Taft told the local officials that he wanted to develop the railway system in the country. Taft requested this act to not only build solid ties to America’s economy; but, also so that Russia and Japan could not beat him to it and take the railway system for themselves. After several attempts of negotiations, Taft was unable to get the deal to go through. The idea was ultimately dropped and was considered a failure.
With Taft’s new policy the United States of America poured millions of dollars of investments into economies that were ultimately unstable. These economies were in Latin American Countries, mostly the Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, Cuba, and Honduras. Money was continuously poured into these countries and troops were even sent to these countries in order to protect their investments. All in all, Taft’s idea of Dollar Diplomacy was ultimately a failure.
Taft later went on to alienate himself from his supporters, including Theodore Roosevelt. He fired many of his cabinet members and secluded himself from the Republican Party. He did this because he stood up for what he believed in; but, this secluded himself and didn’t leave him with many supporters. His image was muddied and had given him several enemies in his own party.
Later on in his presidential career, Taft started an even bigger feud with Teddy Roosevelt. Roosevelt even went on to start his own political party and tried to run against his former friend Taft. The two argued back and forth in their campaigns and did little to actually inform voters on what each candidate brought to the table. All the while, Woodrow Wilson had been nominated by the Democratic Party and was able to easily able to win the presidency.
Taft had an esteemed career and an established one at that. However, his failures in the White House, along with his bath tub debacle, left him with an overall botched reputation. Taft had victories and failures in the White House. His biggest ideas; however, were his biggest failures. The Dollar Diplomacy was not a concept that seemed to not really be thought out. The old adage “give a man a fish and he will feast for a day, teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime” held true in this scenario. Throwing money at a problem won’t solve it.
