Teapot Dome Scandal: How Big Oil Bought the Harding White House and Tried to Steal the Country by Laton McCartney

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The Barnes & Noble Review

Americans have one vote apiece, but that equality doesn't extend to economics. Those with the most money have often paid for political access and influence -- as true in the 1920s as it is today. Financial journalist McCartney meticulously describes the systematic corruption of Warren Harding's White House in The Teapot Dome Scandal. Harding himself, McCartney notes, had won the 1920 presidential race by accepting millions of dollars in secret campaign contributions from oil companies. The author lays out a compelling case that Republican Harding had been truly "bought" by Big Oil -- and that he paid them back when elected. The poker-loving, skirt-chasing president proceeded to nominate his poker buddy Albert Fall for secretary of the interior: Fall's top priority was to "privatize" government land for commercial development. Fall would grant leases to Harding's biggest campaign contributors, allowing them to drill for oil on federally controlled lands. The richest prize was the now-infamous Teapot Dome in Wyoming, which Fall leased to oil baron Ed Doheny. Of course, Fall took his cut, receiving large bribes from oilmen like Doheny and Harry Sinclair, and McCartney doggedly follows the money trail. His thorough account of this massive scandal makes gripping reading -- and reminds us of the perpetually corrosive effects that money has on the political system. --Chuck Leddy

Synopsis

In this amazing and at times ribald story, Laton McCartney tells how Big Oil handpicked Warren G. Harding, an obscure Ohio senator, to serve as our twenty-third president. Harding and his “oil cabinet” made it possible for cronies to secure vast fuel reserves that had been set aside for use by the U.S. Navy. In exchange, the oilmen paid off senior government officials, bribed newspaper publishers, and covered the GOP campaign debt. When news of the scandal finally emerged, the consequences were disastrous. Drawing on contemporary records newly made available to McCartney, The Teapot Dome Scandal reveals a shocking, revelatory picture of just how far-reaching the affair was, how high the stakes, and how powerful the conspirators–all told in a dazzling narrative style.

Michael LaMagna - Library Journal

Journalist McCartney (Friends in High Places: The Bechtel Story) examines corruption and scandal at the highest levels of the federal government in his look at the scandal of Warren G. Harding's administration, Teapot Dome. The groundwork for the scandal was in fact in place even before Warren G. Harding had won the Republican nomination in his bid for the presidency. America's top oil companies had funneled money into the Harding campaign, providing the kind of monetary support needed for Harding to win the White House. In return, Harding appointed Albert Fall as his secretary of the interior, a position the oil interests believed would open up the Naval Oil Reserves in Wyoming (the teapot dome reserve) and California for their companies, something that Fall did accomplish. Once this quid pro quo became public, Congress pressed Harding to nullify the lease; the Supreme Court ruled that the authority Harding had given to Fall in the first place was illegal. McCartney's final section details what happened to the key individuals. The major conspirators received little or no jail time. The Teapot Dome scandal showed how monetary political contributions could lead to political corruption, something we now take for granted. Readers unfamiliar with this bit of history will find this work heavy in detail and light in general context. Recommended for informed readers in public and academic libraries.

Biography

Laton McCartney is the author of the national bestseller Friends in High Places: The Bechtel Story–The Most Secret Corporation and How It Engineered the World and Across the Great Divide: Robert Stuart and the Discovery of the Oregon Trail. McCartney has written extensively on business, finance, and politics for many national magazines. He and his wife, Nancy, divide their time between Wyoming and New York.


From the Hardcover edition.