Deficit Spending

It isn’t very well known, but America went through a Depression for 20 months beginning in January 1920. Unemployment went from 1.9% at the end of 1919 to 11.7% in August of 1921. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 47% in the same period. Presidential candidate and soon to be President, Warren Harding, offered and executed a financial plan that would have economist of today howling. His plan was the polar opposite of what we have done in any economic challenge since that time. The difference is, his plan worked. What was this plan?