Teapot Dome Scandal
The "Ohio Gang" refers to President Warren Harding's cabinet members and there close ties to the state of Ohio. This cabinet is rifled with corruption. This was no ordinary gang of crooks. It was a complex criminal enterprise that was run like a well-organized, well-coordinated business.1
The leader of the "Ohio Gang" was not Harding, it was actually Harry Daugherty who was Attorney General later tried on conspiracy and acquitted but forced to resign. Albert Fall, Sec. of Interior would be the first cabinet member in history to go to jail, and Charles Forbes head of the FBI and verterans bureau was later convicted on bribery, fraud, and conspiracy charges.2
Everything about Warren G. Harding’s presidency stinks of corruption. From the way he was elected to how several of his cabinet members ended up in prison, his administration is looked down upon in American History. Going into the 1920 RNC, Harding was looked at as an outsider and a "dark horse" candidate to win the nomination. Many oil tycoons put large sums of money into Harding's campaign, like Henry Sinclair putting around $1 million in campaign contributions.3 Harding would put Albert Fall, notorious for his policies against conservationism, as Sec. Of Interior. A year into Harding’s term, Fall got Harding to sign a contract granting use of oil fields to private businesses under Fall as Secretary of Interior.4 The Wall Street Journal would later publish how this was done reporting Fall took a bribe and without competitive bidding leased the U.S. petroleum reserve at Wyoming’s Teapot Dome to a private oil company.5 What was illegal was not allowing other bids to take place on this oil field which would be one reason Fall would end up serving time in prison. It had been uncovered Fall had been receiving bribes from private companies in exchange for contracts to mine Oil Fields throughout the country.6 As Secretary of Interior Fall had total control of certain Oil Fields that beforehand belonged to the U.S. Navy. Massive sums of money followed Harding from the RNC to the Oval Office.
This scandal has been called “the Watergate before Watergate” and a certain parallel that represents the connection is Richard Nixons famous words “I am not a crook.” Everything about the Harding administration should serve as an example of how business and politics are intertwined and if not there is no proper oversight, politicians will use their office to make money.
From everything presented in this exhibit whether it is Boss Tweed and the influential political machines that took control in major cities to the corruption and graft that takes place in presidential elections. Coming out of the Gilded Age, politicians of this era heading to the turn of the 20th century were not beneath taking a little extra off the top to bolster their own pockets. Repeatedly we see politicians from both party's disregard ethics rules and their constituents to boost their own self-interests.
Footnotes
- Laton McCartney, The Teapot Dome Scandal: How Big Oil Bought the Harding White House and Tried to Steal the Country (New York: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2009). P. 69
- Britannica, T. Editors of Encyclopaedia. "Ohio Gang." Encyclopedia Britannica, May 3, 2017. https://www.britannica.com/topic/Ohio-Gang.
- “Bria 24 4 the Teapot Dome Scandal,” Constitutional Rights Foundation, 2009, https://www.crf-usa.org/bill-of-rights-in-action/bria-24-4-the-teapot-dome-scandal.html.
- “Sinclair Consolidated in Big Oil Deal with U.S. ,” Wall Street Journal , April 14, 1922, pp. 1-8.
- “Senate Investigates the ‘Teapot Dome’ Scandal,” U.S. Senate: Senate Investigates the "Teapot Dome" Scandal, February 26, 2021, https://www.senate.gov/about/powers-procedures/investigations/senate-investigates-the-teapot-dome-scandal.htm.
- Laton McCartney, The Teapot Dome Scandal: How Big Oil Bought the Harding White House and Tried to Steal the Country (New York: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2009). P. 312