Hiram Johnson (Cherry, Plum, and Chrysanthemum)

Hiram Warren Johnson (September 2, 1866 – August 6, 1945) was the 29th President of the United States (1933–1941). Elected in 1910 as the Governor of California (1911–1913) from the Republican Party, Johnson later co-founded the Progressive Party and was elected as the 25th Vice President of the United States in 1920.

An isolationist, Johnson relationship with then-President Theodore Roosevelt was severely deteriorated prior to World War I over the foreign issue due to the latter's pro-war stance. Together with Wisconsin Senator, Robert M. La Follete, Johnson was the leading figure of "Peace Progressives", the isolationist wing of Progressive Party who opposed the U.S. entry to World War I and later, to the League of Nations.

Johnson ran successfully for the U.S. Senate for the Progressive Party in 1916, and following Theodore Roosevelt's death in March 1929, Johnson became the leader of the Progressive Party. After lost in a landslide to Republican Herbert Hoover in 1928, Johnson was elected as the 29th President of the United States in the 1932 presidential election, at the depth of the Great Depression.

During his administration, Johnson spearheaded major legislation and issued a profusion of executive orders that instituted the New Deal, a variety of programs designed to produce relief (government jobs for the unemployed), recovery (economic growth), and reform (through regulation of Wall Street, banks and transportation). Most of the regulations on business continued in effect until they ended about 1975–1985. Along with several smaller programs, major surviving programs include the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, which was created in 1933, and Social Security, which Congress passed in 1935. The U.S. economy improved rapidly from 1933 to 1937, but then relapsed into a deep recession.

In 1937, after some of his New Deal legislation ruled as unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court, Johnson successfully expanded the size of the court through the Judicial Procedures Reform Act. His effort for packing the court resulted to the formation of Conservative Coalition between the Republicans and the Liberals against Johnson and the Progressives that would gained power after World War II.

As a dominant leader of the Progressive Party, Johnson built a powerful New Deal Coalition that united labor unions, big city machines, white ethnics, and African Americans to ensure the Progressive Party's political standing, and dominated American politics for about 40 years.