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Who Was the Real William Howard Taft? w/ Walter Stahr
Description
William Howard Taft is the only person who has been both president and chief justice, and he is still usually filed under mediocre. He called his own administration humdrum. Theodore Roosevelt made him president, then ran against him and helped drive him from office.
Walter Stahr thinks that verdict is too small. The New York Times bestselling biographer of Seward, Stanton, and John Jay joins the show to talk about William Howard Taft: A Great American Life (Simon & Schuster). Five decades of public service: judge, governor of the Philippines, Roosevelt's secretary of war, president from 1909 to 1913, and then chief justice from 1921 to 1930, when Taft helped give the Supreme Court the power to choose its own cases.
We get into the charge that Taft had no political skill, the 1904 campaign speeches Roosevelt asked him to give, the 1912 split and a two-state defeat, Payne-Aldrich and the tariff, the Philippines, and the White House bathtub that was never the stuck-president story the children's books tell.
William Howard Taft: A Great American Life is out November 10, 2026.
Walter Stahr: https://walterstahr.com
🎙️ History Shorts is a daily history podcast hosted by historian, author, and Smithsonian Magazine contributor Peter Zablocki. New episodes every day.
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