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Chapter four explores Harry Sinclair's involvement in the notorious Teapot Dome oil scandal. Republican Warren G. Harding's landslide victory in the 1920 presidential election marked a new direction in American politics, ending the Progressive Era and ushering in a pro-business climate that would further enrich men like Sinclair and facilitate the return of American horseracing to national prominence. New secretary of the interior Albert B. Fall transferred oil reserves held by the US Navy in Wyoming to Sinclair. As news of the shady deal spread, Sinclair debuted his colt Zev, named after the oilman's attorney, William Zevely, who was a facilitator of the corrupt bargain. Zev would surpass Man o' War's all-time American earnings record, and his twenty-three career wins would include scores in the Kentucky Derby, Belmont Stakes, and the Race of the Century against English champion Papyrus.

Barkley attended the 1920 Democratic national convention and became acquainted with and campaigned for the party’s vice presidential candidate, Franklin D. Roosevelt. Warren G. Harding and the GOP won the White House, and thus began the era of “normalcy.” The Great War helped turn Barkley into a moderate internationalist who belonged to the Inter-Parliamentary Union and supported the Washington Naval Disarmament Conference. Barkley continued to be a progressive politician, but congenial programs were rare except for the Sheppard-Towner Maternity Act. Barkley was a sometime member of the farm bloc but fought the GOP higher tariff, which promised high rates against foreign agricultural imports. He lost his only election when he ran unsuccessfully against J. Campbell Cantrill in the 1923 Democratic primary for the Kentucky governor’s post. In the process, however, he built a statewide organization that enabled him to win the Senate seat from Richard P. Ernst in 1926.

This chapter details the history of the Republican Party from 1921–1933. Topics covered include the revelations of corruption under Warren G. Harding's presidency, for which he was vilified after his death; the election of Calvin Coolidge as president; and the disastrous performance of Herbert Hoover's administration during Great Depression of the 1930s.

This chapter describes how fear of radicalism defined the post-Great War Red Scare. Announcement on November 11, 1919, of an armistice ending the fighting in Europe had given Americans hope of a return to what future president Warren G. Harding would call normalcy, a renewed opportunity for the nation to enjoy its myriad benefits. Yet at least immediately this was not to be the case. Multiple manifestations of class-based dissent, in the form of strikes, protests, and horrific acts of violence, put the nation on edge. Much of the fervor focused on immigrants, as it had since the onset of industrialization, and Americans again turned their attention to the eradication of immigrant-engendered subversion. Ultimately, reaction to this Red Scare would set the stage for the implementation of new and more severe immigration policies.

This chapter discusses that on June 7, 1916, Senator Warren G. Harding of Ohio delivered the keynote address at the Republican National Convention in Chicago. This 1916 speech is the first recorded appearance of the phrase “founding fathers”. This chapter further relates that over the next years, Harding occasionally revived the phrase “founding fathers”, such as his speech on the commemoration of George Washington's birthday on February 22, 1918. He mentioned that it is good to meet and drink at the fountain of wisdom inherited from the “founding fathers of the Republic”. In 1920, after the party leaders at the deadlocked Republican convention in Chicago fixed on the Ohio senator as their presidential nominee, Harding twice quoted the “founding fathers” in his acceptance speech.

Harding administration scandals and the president’s death did not prevent Coolidge from winning election as president in 1924 by a huge popular vote. Barkley characterized the new administration as a period of calm but of little accomplishment. The focus of his attention was on the economic depression suffered by his farmer constituents. Much congressional attention centered on the McNary-Haugen farm bill, which Coolidge vetoed twice. During the 1928 Democratic national convention, Barkley was a failed candidate for the vice presidential nomination. He seconded the presidential nomination of Al Smith and served as Smith’s campaign manager in Kentucky. Hoover won the White House. The new president signed the Agricultural Marketing Act into law, but it proved to be a failure largely because of the Great Depression. Barkley strongly opposed the Hoover-signed Hawley-Smoot Tariff. He correctly predicted that the high protective rates would shrink foreign markets for US products and thus expand rather than reduce the Depression.

This chapter discusses Vandenberg’s formative years. It details his childhood in Grand Rapids, Michigan, his time working at the Grand Rapids Herald, and his beginning in politics. His editorials at the Herald and his oratory ability propelled him into the political arena, as did his relationship with congressman and Herald majority owner William Alden Smith. This chapter further outlines Vandenberg’s changing and evolving political stances, from supporting Roosevelt and the Progressive movement, to allying with William Howard Taft and the Republicans, and even to his ambivalent views on Woodrow Wilson. Vandenberg also had reservations about the United States joining the League of Nations. After the war and Red Scare, he developed a visceral fear of the Bolshevik threat to capitalism and American values, but continued to defend labor’s right to collective bargaining and encouraged the recognition of labor unions. Moreover, this chapter describes how Vandenberg found a hero in Alexander Hamilton, who embodied the best qualities of conservatism and progressivism, walking a middle path between isolationism and internationalism—characteristics Vandenberg strove to emulate.