Colonel Roosevelt - Edmund Morris [123]
At the end of the day, it was obvious that the Taft forces were still playing for time, dragging out roll calls in order to exhaust whatever energy was left in the progressive opposition. By now, in any ordinary convention, the candidates should have been nominated. Root remarked, “Evidently there are delegates here who do not wish to go home for Sunday.” During the umpteenth procedural intermission, the band played “You’ll Do the Same Thing Over and Over and Over Again.”
THE ATMOSPHERE on Saturday, 22 June, was different and dangerous from the start. Root gaveled the convention to order early, at 10:43 A.M., and at once the fake steamroller whistles shrilled, accompanied by accelerating, chugging puffs and a mocking cry of “all aboard.” The Roosevelt family box was noticeably empty, with only Alice sitting like Cassandra, sure of coming catas trophe.
She joined in, however, when a group of delegates started chanting, “We want Teddy!” and “Roosevelt, first, last and all the time!” There was no fear of her father storming the hall and imperiling what was left of his presidential dignity. He had simply sent a message expressing the “hope” that his delegates would take no part in the nomination of a tainted candidate.
Since Hadley (secretly racked with tuberculosis, and running a 103°F fever) had joined Borah in declining to bolt, the Colonel authorized Henry J. Allen of Kansas to read this message aloud. But to general frustration, there were four further hours of roll calls to endure before Root announced that the convention was ready to hear any statement the Roosevelt forces wished to make. Allen rose at 2:54 P.M. He said that all he needed was “ten minutes of quiet attention.”
What he got was forty-four minutes of such bedlam that for much of the time he could not be heard. But the pertinent phrases of Roosevelt’s message sounded clear, and were telegraphed simultaneously to ten thousand newspapers across the country: The convention [is] in no proper sense any longer a Republican convention representing the real Republican Party. Therefore, I hope the men elected as Roosevelt delegates will now decline to vote on any matter before the convention.
From then until shortly before six, when 343 of Allen’s fellow progressives boycotted the adoption of the platform, mutual hatreds seethed. At last Root ordered each state that had a presidential candidate to present its nomination, in alphabetical order. Iowa, home of Albert B. Cummins, was called first. There was no response, signaling that the governor would join the progressive bolt. An even more deathly silence followed the call for New York. The progressive delegate who would have risen to name Theodore Roosevelt remained in his seat. At four minutes past the hour, Warren Harding of Ohio spoke for President Taft, and delivered an attack on the Colonel that had clearly cost him many hours with a dictionary:
Sirs, I have heard men arrogate to themselves the title of “progressive Republicans.” … Progression is not proclamation or palaver. It is not pretense nor play on prejudice. It is not of personal pronouns, nor perennial pronouncement. It is not the perturbation of a people passion-wrought, nor a promise proposed. Progression is—
Harding ran out of plosives at this point, to the relief of the megaphone men, and went on to other alliterations. But in conclusion, he reverted to his favorite consonant, accusing Roosevelt of “pap rather than patriotism,” and elevating Taft to the “party pantheon.” His speech touched off a wild demonstration. Yet there was something fatalistic about the chants and portrait-waving. Everyone knew that the RNC had decided to field a losing candidate in November, rather than gamble on one who would radicalize its traditional platform.
After a last-minute attempt to swing the convention for Robert M. La Follette had been laughed down, Root asked the states to vote. The only disturbance to a droning succession of calls came when Massachusetts