Grafton D. Cushing

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Grafton Dulany Cushing
Cushing c. 1915
45th Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts
In office
1915–1916
GovernorDavid I. Walsh
Preceded byEdward P. Barry
Succeeded byCalvin Coolidge
Speaker of the
Massachusetts House of Representatives[1]
In office
1912[1]–1914[1]
Preceded byJoseph H. Walker
Succeeded byJoseph E. Warner
Member of the
Massachusetts House of Representatives[1]
In office
1906[1]–1914[1]
Personal details
BornAugust 4, 1864[2][1]
Boston, Massachusetts[2]
DiedMay 31, 1939(1939-05-31) (aged 74)
New Bedford, Massachusetts
Political partyRepublican[2][1]
ProfessionLawyer[1]

Grafton Dulany Cushing (August 4, 1864 – May 31, 1939) was an American teacher, lawyer, and politician who served as the 45th lieutenant governor of Massachusetts from 1915 to 1916. A Progressive Republican, his unsuccessful decision to contest the 1915 Republican gubernatorial primary against Samuel W. McCall opened the door for conservative Republican Calvin Coolidge's rise to lieutenant governor, and eventually state governor and president of the United States.

Biography[edit]

Early life and career[edit]

Cushing was born on August 4, 1864 to a prominent New England family that had produced several generations of Massachusetts politicians.[3] His father Robert headed the mercantile house Russell & Company.[3] His uncle was New York socialite Thomas Forbes Cushing.[4]

Cushing studied at Noble's Classical School. He then graduated from Harvard College in 1885[1] and Harvard Law School in 1888.[2] At Harvard, he was a member of the Hasty Pudding Club.[5]

After graduating from law school, Cushing spent a year teaching at Groton School.[6] He left Groton for three years to enter private practice at Shattuck & Munroe, a Boston law firm,[7] and contributed two articles to the Harvard Law Review.[8][9] He returned to Groton in 1892, teaching in various capacities until 1906.[6] He served on the Boston school board from 1900 to 1906, and was president of the board from 1902 to 1903.[7]

In 1903, Cushing became the president of the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. According to the Society's website, he changed the Society's philosophy from taking children away from at-risk families to helping those at-risk families provide better conditions for their children.[10][11] He also chaired the Massachusetts Child Labor Committee.[7]

Political career[edit]

During Cushing's time as a teacher, he served as the president of the Massachusetts Republican Club in 1905 and 1906.[3] Cushing's liberal views caught the attention of Theodore Roosevelt, the leader of the progressive faction in the Republican Party, and whose sons attended Cushing's school. As summarized by Roosevelt, Cushing believed that "our aim must be the supremacy of justice, a more satisfactory distribution of wealth - so far as this is attainable - with a view to a more real equality of opportunity, and in sum a higher social system."[12] Roosevelt encouraged Cushing to expand his political career.[12]

Cushing was elected to the Massachusetts House of Representatives in 1905 and became Speaker of the House in 1912. In 1914, he successfully ran for Lieutenant Governor.[3] At the time, the custom of the Massachusetts Republican Party was that the lieutenant governor ordinarily went on to become governor.[13] However, Cushing served under a Democratic governor, David Walsh, disrupting the usual course of events. (Until 1966, candidates for Massachusetts governor and lieutenant governor were separately elected, which facilitated split-ticket voting.[14])

Ahead of the 1915 election, Cushing was faced with a choice: running for re-election as lieutenant governor, or competing with Samuel W. McCall for the Republican gubernatorial nomination. Although McCall had never served as lieutenant governor, he was a political veteran, having represented Massachusetts in the U.S. House of Representatives for twenty years.[15] Cushing decided to run for governor, which opened the door for Massachusetts Senate president Calvin Coolidge, also a Republican, to run for lieutenant governor. One of Coolidge's biographers said that if Cushing had deferred to McCall and ran for a second term as lieutenant governor, Coolidge would not have run against him.[16] Cushing's gamble failed: although he outpolled McCall in Boston,[17] McCall narrowly defeated him by just 6,143 votes (48.66% to 44.13%).[18] Coolidge went on to become Lieutenant Governor, Governor, Vice President, and finally President of the United States.

Cushing's political fortunes waned with those of the Republican Party's progressive wing. When Theodore Roosevelt returned to the GOP following the defeat of the Bull Moose Party, Cushing supported his unsuccessful campaign for the 1916 Republican presidential nomination.[19] In 1917, Cushing launched a primary challenge to unseat now-Governor McCall, but lost handily.[3][20] Following these setbacks, Cushing exited electoral politics.

Post-political career[edit]

After leaving electoral politics, Cushing entered the banking business.[21] During World War I, he headed a "semi-official commission of nine American business men" invited to the United Kingdom to inspect British military facilities. He encouraged the American government to provide additional Liberty Loan support to the British government.[21]

Personal life[edit]

Cushing was a lifelong bachelor, although it was once reported that he was engaged to Alice Roosevelt, the future wife of Nicholas Longworth.[3] During his years at Groton, Cushing cohabited with William Amory Gardner, the school's co-founder.[22] He was one of the founding trustees of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, which was established by Amory Gardner's aunt.[3][23]

A socialite and a dandy, Cushing was a member of the Knickerbocker Club of New York and the Somerset Club of Boston.[3] The Washington Post described him as a "Back Bay social dictator."[24] When an overdressed Loring Young visited then-Vice President Calvin Coolidge in Washington, D.C., Coolidge joked, "Hello, Loring, seen Grafton Cushing lately?"[25]

In 1911, the New York Times reported on Cushing's attempt to build a stone wall separating his family's Newport beach house from that of Henry Clews.[26] Cushing and his brother were reportedly irritated by the frequent screaming of Clews' toddler grandson.[27]

In 1929, Cushing moved to New York City. He died on May 31, 1939.[3]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Bridgman, Arthur Milnor (1915), A Souvenir of Massachusetts Legislators 1915 Vol. XXIV, Stoughton, Ma: A. M. Bridgman, p. 91
  2. ^ a b c d Who's Who in State Politics, 1911, Boston, MA: Practical Politics, 1915, p. 39
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i "GRAFTON CUSHING, LAWYER, DEAD, 74". The New York Times. 1939-06-01. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-05-27.
  4. ^ "WHAT IS DOING IN SOCIETY". The New York Times. 1902-06-07. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-05-27.
  5. ^ "Grafton Cushing as Joan of Arc 1885 - Hasty Pudding / Pach Bro's Cambridge, Mass". Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. 20540 USA. Retrieved 2024-05-27.
  6. ^ a b Ashburn, Frank D. (1934). Fifty Years On: Groton School, 1884-1934. New York: Sign of the Gosden Head. p. 194.
  7. ^ a b c Williams, Henry Morland (1910). Twenty-Fifth Anniversary Report (Report VII) of the Secretary of the Class of 1885 of Harvard College. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. p. 58.
  8. ^ Cushing, Grafton Dulany (1891). "On Certain Cases Analogous to Trade-Marks". Harvard Law Review. 4 (7): 321–332. doi:10.2307/1322303. ISSN 0017-811X.
  9. ^ Cushing, Grafton (1900). "Concentration and International Law". Harvard Law Review. 13 (7): 589–592. doi:10.2307/1323815. ISSN 0017-811X.
  10. ^ "Grafton D. Cushing, MSPCC Board President". MSPCC. Retrieved 2024-05-27.
  11. ^ "Child Welfare League of America". Child Welfare League of America. Retrieved 2024-05-27.
  12. ^ a b Roosevelt, Theodore (1908-02-27). "Letter from Theodore Roosevelt to Grafton D. Cushing". Theodore Roosevelt Center. Retrieved 2024-05-27.
  13. ^ Green, Horace (1924). The Life of Calvin Coolidge. Duffield. p. 99.
  14. ^ "Massachusetts Governor and Lieutenant Governor on Same Ticket, Question 1 (1966)". Ballotpedia. Retrieved 2024-05-28.
  15. ^ "McCALL, Samuel Walker". Biographical Directory of the United States Congress. Retrieved 2024-05-27.
  16. ^ Sobel, Robert (2012-04-01). Coolidge: An American Enigma. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 978-1-59698-737-1.
  17. ^ "The Sacred Heart Review, Volume 54, Number 15 — 25 September 1915 — Boston College Newspapers". newspapers.bc.edu. Retrieved 2024-05-27.
  18. ^ "Our Campaigns - MA Governor - R Primary Race - Sep 21, 1915". www.ourcampaigns.com. Retrieved 2024-05-27.
  19. ^ "STILL STAND BY ROOSEVELT.; Massachusetts Partisans to Continue Primary Fight". The New York Times. 1916-03-10. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-05-27.
  20. ^ Massachusetts. Office of the Secretary of State (1917). Number of assessed polls, registered voters and persons who voted in each voting precinct in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts at the state, city and town elections. Boston Public Library. [S.l. : s.n.] p. 169.
  21. ^ a b "SAYS OUR SAVINGS MUST WIN VICTORY". The New York Times. 1918-03-10. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-05-27.
  22. ^ Richards, Henry Howe (1960). "My First Year at Groton". Views from the Circle: Seventy-Five Years of Groton School. Groton School. p. 62.
  23. ^ Van N. Hadley, Rollin, ed. (1987). The Letters of Bernard Berenson and Isabella Stewart Gardner: 1887-1924. Boston, MA: Northeastern University Press. p. 417.
  24. ^ Wolanin, Tyler L. (2024-06-15). The Political Life of Reverend Roland D. Sawyer. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 54. ISBN 978-1-6669-4551-5.
  25. ^ Fuess, Claude M. (2013-04-16). Calvin Coolidge - The Man from Vermont. Read Books Ltd. p. 81. ISBN 978-1-4465-4904-9.
  26. ^ "NEWS OF NEWPORT.; Henry Clews Stops G.D. Cushing Building Fence Between Estates". The New York Times. 1911-05-13. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-05-27.
  27. ^ Davis, Deborah (2009-09-25). Gilded: How Newport Became America's Richest Resort. Turner Publishing Company. ISBN 978-0-470-73024-9.
Massachusetts House of Representatives
Preceded by Speaker of the Massachusetts House of Representatives
1912 — 1914 		Succeeded by
Political offices
Preceded by Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts
1915 – 1916 		Succeeded by


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