As the Democratic nominee for President of the United States at the 1920 presidential election, he lost in a landslide to fellow Ohioan Warren G. Harding.

Born and raised in Ohio, Cox began his career as a newspaper copy reader before becoming an assistant to Congressman Paul J. Sorg.

As owner of the Dayton Daily News, Cox introduced several innovations and crusaded against the local Republican Party boss.

As governor, Cox introduced a series of progressive reforms and supported Woodrow Wilson's handling of World War I and its aftermath.

Cox retired from public office after the 1920 presidential election to focus on his media conglomerate, which expanded into several cities.

Cox started a crusade against Dayton's Republican boss, Joseph E. Lowes, who used his political clout to profit from government deals.

He also confronted John H. Patterson, president of Dayton's National Cash Register Co., revealing facts of antitrust violations and bribery.

[8] He introduced direct primaries and municipal home rule, started educational and prison reforms, and streamlined the budget and tax processes.

[14] Cox conducted an activist campaign visiting 36 states and delivering 394 speeches mainly focusing on domestic issues, to the displeasure of the Wilsonians, who pictured the election "as a referendum on the League of Nations.

The public had grown weary of the turmoil of the Wilson years and eagerly accepted Harding's call for a "return to normalcy."

Stone argued that there was never a stronger case in the history of American presidential elections for the proposition that the better man lost.

[15][16] Among them was the campaign speech now preserved at the Library of Congress that accused the Republicans of failing to acknowledge that Wilson's successful prosecution of the Great War had, according to Cox, "saved civilization.

[18]: 389  This deal included radio station WSB, which joined his previous holdings, WHIO in Dayton and WIOD in Miami, to give him, "'air' from the Great Lakes on the north to Latin America on the south.

It was constructed in the classical French-Renaissance style with six bedrooms, six bathrooms, two tennis courts, a billiards room and an in-ground swimming pool.

Cox practiced a variety of trades throughout his life, being a farmer, reporter, Congressional staff member, newspaper publisher and editor, politician, elected official and finally, a regional media magnate.

Cox is credited with words, "If there is anything in the theory of reincarnation of the soul then in my next assignment, if I be given the right of choice, I will ask for the aroma of printers ink.