“Perhaps once in a generation,” Roosevelt at last began, “there comes a chance for the people of a country to play their part wisely and fearlessly in some great battle of the age-long warfare for human rights.” Perhaps less dramatic than the struggles their fathers and forefathers had faced, the battle for social justice was “well-nigh as important.” If the problems created by the industrial age were left unattended, Roosevelt cautioned, America would eventually be “sundered by those dreadful lines of division” that set “the haves” and the “have-nots” against one another.
“We know that there are in life injustices which we are powerless to remedy,” Roosevelt acknowledged, “but we know also that there is much injustice which can be remedied.” The Progressive Party, he pledged, would harness the “collective power of the people through their governmental agencies” to move the country forward. “We propose to lift the burdens from the lowly and the weary, from the poor and the oppressed,” he asserted. “We propose to stand for the sacred rights of childhood and womanhood. Nay, more, we propose to see that manhood is not crushed out of the men who toil, by excessive hours of labor, by underpayment, by injustice and oppression. . . . Surely, there never was a fight better worth making than this.” And, finally, contemplating this cause so much larger than any individual, Roosevelt concluded: “Win or lose I am glad beyond measure that I am one of the many who in this fight have stood ready to spend and be spent.”
Throughout, his face and manner had revealed strain, but the voice was “as clear as a bell.” Those who had witnessed scores of earlier appearances felt they heard “a new Roosevelt” on this night, free from “the old violence and the old sarcasm.” He uttered not a single word against his opponents, focusing his remarks solely on the principles for which the Progressive Party stood. Even his nemesis, the New York Sun, praised his lyrical and passionate presentation, lauding the “good taste” he exhibited in avoiding the “temptation to misuse an unparalleled opportunity for self-exhibition.”
On the Friday before the election, President Taft sat down with New York World reporter Louis Seibold for an extended interview. Aware that his chance for outright victory was small, Taft nevertheless hoped to outpoll Roosevelt. A frank discussion of the circumstances surrounding his break with Roosevelt, the reporter suggested, might help to influence public opinion. Taft was “in excellent spirits,” Seibold later recalled. The lengthy conversation, transcribed by the president’s stenographer, was scheduled to run the following day—not only in the World but in newspapers across the country through release to the Associated Press.
When he entered the presidency, Taft explained, he had been “anxious to carry out the promises of the platform,” but he was hindered by long-developing factions within the Republican Party. Asked by Seibold if Roosevelt had “fomented” these factions, Taft cast no blame. “No,” he replied, “the party naturally divided itself.” The rupture was caused by a widening division between eastern manufacturing interests, desiring a high protective tariff, and western farmers, calling for serious tariff reductions. He had moved “in the right direction” when he signed the Payne Bill, but “the genius of publicity,” the president admitted, was an attribute he never possessed. “The training of a Judge is something that leads you to depend upon the opinion published and the decree entered as speaking for themselves,” he reflected, endeavoring to justify his lack of engagement with the press. As a result, he never properly educated the country about the benefits of the tariff bill, the corporation tax, or any of the other measures he was proud to have passed.
When the reporter sought Taft’s comment on anything “beyond the personal ambition of Mr. Roosevelt” that had propelled the former president into the race, Taft demurred. There had been “personalities enough in the preconvention campaign,” he cryptically remarked. Under Seibold’s persistent probing to explain the bitterness of Roosevelt’s commentary during the primary contest, Taft eventually offered a benign explanation: “Mr. Roosevelt is so constituted that it is impossible for him to go into a controversy without becoming personal.” Roosevelt had once told him that in every fight he strove to “get close up to a man,” attacking “not only the man’s argument but the man himself. He could not ascribe to the man differing from him radically any other than an improper motive.”
Would Roosevelt have entered the race if he had foreseen “the wrecking of the Republican party,” Seibold wondered. “I can not tell,” Taft replied, loath to publicly ascribe malicious motives to his adversary. “I don’t think he went deliberately into it that way,” noting that Roosevelt was not “a planner” but simply a man who “acts from day to day.” Taft himself remained “in a philosophical state” as he considered the upcoming election. “I have had to be. The experience I have had in the Presidency has made me so,” he explained, “and what I am very hopeful is that whatever happens, the country will go on to ultimate happiness.”
After the interview, Seibold was told he could have the transcript upon its completion, but later that afternoon he received word that the president wanted time to make “minor corrections.” Taft invited the reporter to join him on the evening train to New York, as the presidential party traveled to attend the funeral of Vice President James Sherman, who had died from heart disease two days earlier. Seibold agreed but emphasized the practical need to get the interview into production; “space was being saved in every newspaper.” Still Taft procrastinated, insisting that he needed time for edits, and furthermore wanted to consult Root and Wickersham when the train reached New York. “I’m afraid that’s too late,” Seibold warned. “But Roosevelt was my closest friend,” Taft objected.
The interview never ran.
ON ELECTION EVE, TAFT ARRIVED in his home city of Cincinnati following a twenty-eight-hour train ride from New York. He had chosen a “leisurely” route through Ohio, allowing him to greet and visit the friendly crowds gathered at train stations along the way. He refrained from mentioning politics, indulging instead in pleasantries about the prosperous economy and local events. Upon reaching Cincinnati, he went directly to his brother Charley’s mansion, where he would receive election returns among family and friends. Nellie had not made the trip, choosing instead to accompany Helen and young Charlie to New York, where the Republican National Committee chairman had arranged a small dinner party.
On election day, November 5, Taft reportedly “slept late, ate a good breakfast, smiled profusely and acted generally as though some sixteen million men were not voting on the subject of his political fate.” At noon, he motored to his regular polling place on Madison Road, stopping first to visit Nick Longworth, who was in a tight race to retain his congressional seat. The polling place was crowded, but the president “stood in line and waited his turn,” chatting with friends and posing for pictures. After casting his vote, he spent a quiet afternoon at his brother’s Pike Street house.
Roosevelt passed “a busy morning” catching up on his voluminous correspondence; at noon, he motored to the small firehouse in Oyster Bay where he traditionally cast his vote. Accompanied by his gardeners, coachman, and chauffeur, he was greeted with cheers from “a crowd of villagers.” After signing the register, he headed toward the booth. “Here goes another Bull Mooser vote,” a man shouted, eliciting a broad smile from the Colonel. That afternoon, Theodore and Edith took “a long ramble in the woods” before returning to dress for dinner and prepare for the election returns.
After a final campaigning push the night before the election, Woodrow Wilson returned home to Princeton, thrilled to be back with his family on election day. “He felt like a boy out of school on a lark,” he told reporters that morning, relieved that for once “he didn’t have to jump out and make a speech somewhere.” After breakfast, Wilson walked to his polling place at the Chambers Street fire station. Directly across the street stood the boardinghouse where he had lived more than three decades earlier when he came to Princeton as a college freshman. Wilson had spent the better part of his
life in Princeton, Ray Baker noted, and he knew “every nook and corner of the old town.” After casting his vote, the governor had lunch with his wife and daughters, answered letters, posed for press photographs, and took a walk through the countryside with his secretary and an old friend.
The small dinner party at Wilson’s home that night, the New York Times reported, “was much in the nature of a celebration, for every minute or two it was interrupted by messages from the telegraph room, every one of which brought news that the tide was running strongly in the Governor’s favor.” Before long, such bulletins made it clear to both the president and the former president that neither man could win the election. By the time Taft and Roosevelt each sat down for dinner, “an air of gloom and despondency” pervaded Pike Street and Sagamore Hill alike.
Official word of Governor Wilson’s victory was confirmed after 10 p.m. via telegraph. Ellen Wilson delivered the welcome news to her husband, who stood talking to friends before a bright fire in the parlor. “My dear,” she said, kissing him, “I want to be the first to congratulate you.” The bells atop historic Nassau Hall began to ring, and soon several thousand Princeton students arrived at Wilson’s house, waving flags and carrying torches. Speaking with “great emotion, even with tears in his eyes,” Wilson told the students that he understood the serious challenges he faced. “I look almost with pleading to you, the young men of America, to stand behind me, to support me in the new administration.”
Wilson had achieved an immense victory in the Electoral College. He captured forty of the forty-eight states, bringing him 435 electoral votes; Roosevelt took six states, producing 88 votes; Taft won only Vermont and Utah, for a total of 8 electoral votes. The popular vote was somewhat less emphatic. Wilson won nearly 6.3 million votes, compared to 4.1 million for Roosevelt, and a little short of 3.5 million for Taft. Eugene Debs secured over 900,000 votes, the highest total the Socialist Party had ever reached. The split between Taft and Roosevelt had clearly hurt both men: their combined vote exceeded Wilson’s by nearly 1.3 million. And together, they had captured over 50 percent of the electorate, leaving only 41.9 percent with the new president, Woodrow Wilson.
At 11:30 p.m., President Taft sent a warm congratulatory telegram to Governor Wilson, extending his “best wishes for a successful Administration.” By then, it was already clear that Taft had suffered an overwhelming defeat, coming in third. Four years earlier, he had celebrated victory with dozens of jubilant friends. On that auspicious night, “several thousand of his fellow townsmen with blatant horns and red fire thronged about the mansion.” On this night, “the streets were deserted and the only persons in the vicinity were the policemen on guard around the house.”
As news of Wilson’s victory came over the wires, Roosevelt sent word to the press that he would receive them at eleven o’clock. “They went in rather more subdued than usual,” the New York Times reported, “filled with a great curiosity to see just how he was taking the defeat.” He was seated at his desk, “with a log wood blaze shining softly from the big fireplace,” when the group of journalists arrived. “Now old friends,” Roosevelt remarked, “I’m really glad to see you.” He then proceeded to recite from memory the telegram he had sent to the president-elect: “ ‘The American people, by a great plurality, have conferred upon you the highest honor in their gift. I congratulate you thereon.’ ” After finishing, he laughed softly and said: “That’s all.”
NOT SURPRISINGLY, ROOSEVELT WAS HIT harder by the defeat than the president, who appeared to make a quick recovery. As Taft boarded the train for his return to Washington, he “chatted as gaily as he did before the election,” appearing to reporters as if “a great load had been taken from his shoulders.” He acknowledged that while he had been “hopeful” that he might secure victory in a close election, he had not been “so hopeful” that he had experienced “any shock of real disappointment.” To a lifelong friend he humbly explained his composure: “The people of the United States did not owe me another election. I hope that I am properly grateful for the one term of the Presidency which they gave me, and the fact that they withheld the second is no occasion for my resentment or feeling of injustice.” Most important, he reflected to another friend: “As I look back over the record of the administration, I feel very well satisfied that a great deal was accomplished which will be useful to the people in the future, and that, after all, is the only real satisfaction one gets out of any public service.”
Although Roosevelt had been realistic about his chances, he was deeply unsettled by the magnitude of the loss. In the two weeks following the attempt on his life, there had been such an outpouring of “popular feeling,” Edith explained to Kermit, that Progressive leaders felt victory might truly be possible—not only for Roosevelt but for the party. When the election returns were fully counted, the Progressives actually captured just a single governorship and a dozen congressional seats. The Democrats not only increased their majority in the House but also seized control of the Senate for the first time in nearly two decades. “There is no use disguising the fact that the defeat at the polls is overwhelming,” a disappointed Roosevelt wrote his British friend Arthur Hamilton Lee, allowing that he “had expected we would make a better showing.” Several days later, his assessment appeared darker as he told Gifford Pinchot: “We must face the fact that our cutting loose from the Republican Party was followed by disaster to the Progressive cause in most of the States where it won two years ago.”
Only in time would Roosevelt’s perspective on the defeat grow more sanguine. “It was a phenomenal thing to be able to bring the new party into second place and to beat out the Republicans,” he told Henry White that November, recognizing the remarkable achievement of an association that had, in a mere three months, managed to gather more support than a sitting president, and defeat a political party that had held sway over national politics for fifty years.
In the aftermath of the election, Roosevelt reiterated to reporters his view that “the leader for the time being is of little consequence, but the cause itself must triumph, for its triumph is essential to the wellbeing of the American people.” Rather than a rationalization to assuage the bitterness of his loss, his statement would prove remarkably prescient. Although the Progressive Party met defeat, the progressive causes would continue to influence American politics for years to come. Within the coming decade alone, three signal amendments would be added to the Constitution: the Sixteenth, giving the national government the power to levy a progressive income tax, without which many of the New Deal’s social programs might not have been possible; the Seventeenth, providing for the popular election of U.S. senators; and the Nineteenth, finally granting American women the right to vote.
While William Howard Taft had embraced the role of the conservative during the presidential race, he, too, had long since rejected the laissez-faire philosophy that had dominated politics since the Civil War, committing himself instead to the core progressive belief that government had a responsibility to remedy social problems, improve working conditions, safeguard public health, and protect our natural heritage. Though the two men had strikingly different temperaments—Roosevelt’s original and active nature at odds with Taft’s ruminative and judicial disposition—their opposing qualities actually proved complementary, allowing them to forge a powerful camaraderie and rare collaboration. There was a time, at the height of their careers, when Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft stood shoulder to shoulder as they charted a different role for the U.S. government that would fundamentally enlarge the bounds of economic opportunity and social justice.
EPILOGUE
ON MAY 26, 1918, SIX years after the election that ended his presidency and fractured his party, William Howard Taft arrived for a conference at Chicago’s Blackstone Hotel. As Taft was retiring to his room upstairs, the elevator operator informed him that Colonel Roosevelt was presently seated alone in the dining room. “I hear he’s leaving right away,” the young man remarked. Taft did n
ot hesitate. “Then I’ll ask you to take me back downstairs,” he responded.
After the White House, Taft had become the Kent Professor of Constitutional Law at Yale, a position that offered intellectual engagement, the camaraderie of a cherished college campus, and the freedom to lecture around the country. Roosevelt had found his own solace through a combination of writing, public speaking, and intense physical activity. The election no sooner behind him, he had begun work on his autobiography. Completing that project within ten months, he embarked on an expedition to explore the River of Doubt, an uncharted tributary of the mighty Amazon. Returning home, he occupied himself writing dozens of articles and delivering scores of speeches each year. He had stopped at the Blackstone Hotel on his way to Des Moines, where the following day he was scheduled to deliver three speeches.
Over the years since the contentious 1912 election, mutual friends and political allies had repeatedly tried to reunite Roosevelt and Taft, but their infrequent meetings had been neither “cordial” nor “intimate,” marked by what Taft deemed “armed neutrality.” In 1915, they had both served as honorary pallbearers at the funeral of Yale professor Thomas Lounsbury. Taft made the first overture, extending his hand to Roosevelt. “How are you, Theodore?” he asked. The Colonel merely “shook hands silently without smiling,” and “no further communication passed between them.” A year later, in early October 1916, Elihu Root had arranged for the two men to appear at a Union League Club reception for Republican presidential nominee Charles Evans Hughes. Organized with the goal of “cementing the union of Progressives and Republicans” against Woodrow Wilson, Republicans hailed the event as a “Big Love Feast.” Though Roosevelt’s presence was calculated to symbolize his return to “the Republican fold,” Taft told Nellie they simply “shook hands with a Howdy do and that was all.”