Thomas R. Marshall
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Vice President of the United States · United States
On the regime page: Wilson administration
4 quotes, oldest first. Filter with other speakers.
Content note: Dismissive remarks about the suffrage movement and women voters. The words are shown as they were said or written. Why
“One of the most annoying things was the everlasting clatter of the militant suffragettes. I think the adoption by the Senate of the Nineteenth Amendment was portrayed in the Scriptures by the unjust judge who got tired of hearing about it. The amendment really was submitted to the people in self-defense, to get rid of these women in order that some business might be transacted.”
Memoir passage about his years presiding over the Senate (1913-1921), on lobbying for the woman suffrage amendment that Congress sent to the states in 1919.
Thomas R. Marshall, Recollections of Thomas R. Marshall, Vice-President and Hoosier Philosopher: A Hoosier Salad (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1925), p. 233 Source
Content note: Joke about women's right to vote. The words are shown as they were said or written. Why
“I called her attention to the fact that I had announced that women had a right to shave and sing bass if they wanted to, but that I was not going to assist in the process.”
Marshall's account of an exchange with a woman who asked him to support the suffrage amendment, which he opposed.
Thomas R. Marshall, Recollections of Thomas R. Marshall, Vice-President and Hoosier Philosopher: A Hoosier Salad (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1925), p. 234 Source
“I was having some difficulty myself in remaining neutral. I had almost reached the conclusion that the only way to be strictly neutral was to be a congenital idiot.”
Memoir passage on Washington society during the period of American neutrality (1914-1917), which he recalls as strongly pro-Allied.
Thomas R. Marshall, Recollections of Thomas R. Marshall, Vice-President and Hoosier Philosopher: A Hoosier Salad (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1925), p. 263 Source
“The standing joke of the country is that the only business of the vice-president is to ring the White House bell every morning and ask what is the state of health of the president. If there were a soul so lost to humanity as to have desired his death, I was not that soul. I hoped that he might acquire his wonted health. I was afraid to ask about it, for fear some censorious soul would accuse me of a longing for his place. I never have wanted his shoes.”
Marshall on the months after President Wilson's stroke of 2 October 1919, when Wilson did not carry out the full duties of the office. The vice-president did not assume them.
Thomas R. Marshall, Recollections of Thomas R. Marshall, Vice-President and Hoosier Philosopher: A Hoosier Salad (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1925), p. 367 Source
Often attributed, not verified
These words circulate under Thomas R. Marshall’s name but could not be traced to a source. They are listed so readers can check them, not as Thomas R. Marshall’s words.
“What this country needs is a really good five-cent cigar.”
Not in Marshall's own Recollections (1925), where the phrase appears only in a photograph caption: "Mr. Marshall loved a pipe but made famous the saying, 'What the country needs is a good five-cent cigar.'" The Congressional Record for the 63rd Congress has no such sentence, according to Jeffrey Graf, "What This Country Needs is a Really Good Five-Cent Cigar" (Indiana University Libraries, 2018), which traces the earliest printed account to Fred C. Kelly's syndicated column of 6 February 1914 and a possible earlier origin with the humorist Kin Hubbard. No first-hand text found.