WHEN A BULL MOOSE CRASHED THE REPUBLICAN PARTY
By Cliff McCarthy
After the clamor and hyperbole of the 2012 presidential
election abates, we cannot help but be drawn to the past for comparison, or at
least perspective, on our quadrennial media orgy. What a difference a century
makes.
Campaigning was different in 1912, when the nation
experienced one of its wildest and most bizarre presidential elections. That was the year that former President Teddy
Roosevelt broke with the Republican Party, which he claimed had been taken over
by a conservative faction, and sought election under the new Progressive Party banner. Proclaiming himself as healthy as a
"bull moose," TR vigorously stumped around the country, giving
speeches from the caboose of a campaign train.
He called for stronger federal regulation of the economy and lambasted
irresponsible corporate greed. In
Milwaukee on October 14, he was shot by a local saloonkeeper, the bullet
lodging in his chest after penetrating his steel eyeglass case and a folded
copy of his speech. He gave the speech,
then went to the hospital.
His rival, the rotund William H. Taft, disdained
campaigning. His strategy was to rely on
the stature of his office and the Republican machine to deliver the necessary
votes, while leading from the White House -- the first "Rose Garden
campaign." It may have been an omen
when his running-mate, Vice-President James S. Sherman, died less than a week
before the election.
The beneficiary of the Republicans' turmoil was the Democratic
candidate Woodrow Wilson, whose "New Freedom" campaign highlighted
individualism and a less powerful federal government. At that time, only one Democrat had won the
presidency in the previous half-century.
Adding to the mix, Eugene V. Debs ran a credible fourth party campaign on the Socialist
Party ticket, winning nearly a million votes nationwide -- 6% of the popular
vote -- having spent a total of $66,000 on his campaign. And there was even a Prohibition Party
candidate.
However wild the campaign was, the result was
predictable. Roosevelt effectively split
the Republican vote, throwing the election to Woodrow Wilson in an electoral
college landslide. Roosevelt became the
only third-party candidate to beat a mainstream candidate, Taft, in the
electoral count.
Massachusetts went Democratic that year, supporting Wilson
and Eugene Foss as Governor. However, the
staunchly Republican counties of the Pioneer Valley bucked the trend: Franklin
and Hampshire went for Taft, while Wilson won Hampden by just thirty-five
votes.
