Plain Speaker
Gould was noted for speaking his mind plainly and frankly. In a 1929 newspaper interview, he described Sen. George W. Norris of Nebraska as a "bitter, sour old man with not a good word for anybody" and said Sen. Thomas J. Walsh of Montana "hasn't got a kindly thought in his system". Both men were famous progressives, and such statements perhaps reveal Gould's instinctive conservatism as much as their clashing temperaments. Gould was particularly suspicious of the Midwest and West for wanting to wrest too much power from the Eastern states, and from New England in particular. But he also derided his own political skills, saying "the fact of the matter is that I'm not cut out for politics, I want to get back to my railroad and the pine forests of Maine." His favorite politician was Calvin Coolidge and one of his best friend in the Senate was a Democrat, Senator Joseph E. Ransdell of Louisiana.
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