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[[Image:Taft40.jpg|thumb|260px|''Time'' Jan. 29, 1940]]'''Robert A. Taft''' (1889-19531889–1953), son of President [[William Howard Taft]], was a leading Republican Senator, 1938–53, and was known as "Mr. Republican". He was a leader of the [[Conservative Coalition]], working with southern Democrats to control Congress. Little major legislation passed the Senate against his objections. His crowning achievement was writing and passing, over President [[Harry Truman|Truman]]'s veto, the [[Taft-Hartley Act]] of 1947. It balanced the interests of unions, management and the public. [[Image:Taft40.jpg|thumb|260px|''Time'' Jan. 29, 1940]]
==Private life==
Taft was the scion of a powerful Republican family based in Cincinnati Ohio. His father was elected president in 1908, and in 1921 became Chief Justice of the United States. Taft's sister Helen Taft Manning was a professor, and his brother Charles Taft was a leading reformer in Cincinnati. As a boy he spent three years in the Philippines, where his father was governor.
==Public offices==
Rejected by the army for poor eyesight, in 1917 he joined the legal staff of the [[Food and Drug Administration]] where he met [[Herbert Hoover]] who became his idol. In 1918-19 1918–19 he was in Paris as legal adviser for the [[American Relief Administration]], Hoover's agency which distributed food to war-torn Europe. He learned to distrust governmental bureaucracy as inefficient and detrimental to the rights of the individual, principles he promoted throughout his career. He distrusted the League of Nations, and European politicians generally. He strongly endorsed the idea of a powerful World Court that would enforce international law, but no such idealized court ever existed. He returned to Ohio in late 1919, promoted Hoover for president, and opened a law firm with his brother [[Charles Phelps Taft II]].
In 1920 he was elected to the [[Ohio House of Representatives]], where he served as Speaker of the House in 1926. In 1930 he was elected to the state senate, but was defeated for reelection in 1932. As an efficiency-oriented progressive, he worked to modernize the state's antiquated tax laws and supported mildly progressive legislation, such as limitations on child labor. He was an outspoken opponent of the Ku Klux Klan. Throughout the 1920s and 1930s he was a powerful figure in local and state political and legal circles, and was known as a loyal Republican who never threatened to bolt the party.
==Labor issues==
The [[Taft-Hartley Act]] single-handedly ended a growing problem of strikes after [[World War II]], and preserved [[capitalism]] in the United States. Ever since, [[Democrats]] have sought unsuccessfully for its repeal. It bans "unfair" union practices, outlaws [[closed shops]], and authorizes the President to seek federal court injunctions to impose an eighty-day cooling-off period if a strike threatened the national interest.
==Foreign policy==
In 1945 Taft found the new United Nations Charter sacrificed "law and justice" to "force and expediency." he lost some popularity when he stated that the Nuremberg trials were based on faulty ex post facto statutes; that position earned him a chapter in Senator John F. Kennedy's famous book, ''Profiles in Courage'' (1958).
In the late 1940s , Taft did not view Stalin's [[Soviet Union]] as a major threat. Nor did he pay much attention to internal Communism. The true danger he said was big government and runaway spending. He supported the [[Truman Doctrine]], reluctantly approved the [[Marshall Plan]] but tried to cut its budget, and opposed [[NATO]] as unnecessary and provocative. In 1950-52 he took the lead condemning President [[Harry S. Truman]]'s handling of the [[Korean War]]. Taft tolerated Senator [[Joseph McCarthy]]'s attacks on Democrats, claimed President Truman was fostering a "police state," and blamed General [[George C. Marshall]] for the loss of China and the subsequent Korean War.
Berger (1967) rejected the [[liberal]] criticism of Taft as an "isolationist", which is a pejorative term used by the [[Left]] to smear opponents of [[globalism]]. Berger says Taft was rather a "conservative nationalist at odds with the struggling attempts of liberal American policy-makers to fashion a program in the postwar years." Taft profoundly believed in the exceptionalism of America and its people, and argued the "principal purpose of the foreign policy of the United States is to maintain the liberty of our people." Taft identified three fundamental requirements for the maintenance of American liberty-an economic system based on free enterprise, a political system based on democracy, and national independence and sovereignty. All three, he feared, might be destroyed in a war, or even by extensive preparations for war, so he did not see Stalin's [[Soviet Union]] as a major threat to American values. Nor did he pay much attention to internal Communism. The true danger he said was big government and runaway spending. He supported the [[Truman Doctrine]], reluctantly approved the [[Marshall Plan]], and opposed [[NATO]] as unnecessary and provocative. He consistently opposed the draft and took the lead condemning President [[Harry S. Truman]]'s handling of the [[Korean War]].<ref>See John Moser, "Principles Without Program: Senator Robert A. Taft and American Foreign Policy," ''Ohio History,'' (1999) 108#2 pp. 177-192.</ref>
* Kirk, Russell and James McClellan, eds. ''The Political Principles of Robert A. Taft'' (1967).
* Wunderlin, Clarence E. Jr., et al. eds. ''The Papers of Robert A. Taft'' vol 1, 1889-1939 (1998); vol 2; 1940-1944 (2001); [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=102745451 vol 3 1945-1948 (2003) online edition]; vol 4, 1949-1953 (2006).
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[[Category:New Deal]]
[[Category:Conservatives]]
[[Category:Patriots]]
[[Category:Ohio]]
