Theodore Roosevelt [121]
a sense of fairness would return and rule the Regulars, now realized that Fraud would concede nothing and that their Cause was lost. And they felt a great load lifted. No obligation bound them any longer to the Republican Party which had renounced honesty in its principles and fair play in its practice. Henceforth they could go out and take any step they chose to promote their Progressive doctrines. *
* Lewis, 363.
Shortly after the Convention adjourned, having, by these methods, nominated Mr. Taft and James S. Sherman for President and Vice-President, the Rooseveltians held a great meeting in Orchestra Hall. Governor Johnson presided and apparently a majority of the Rooseveltians wished, then and there, to organize a new party and to nominate Roosevelt as its candidate. Several men made brief but earnest addresses. Then Roosevelt himself spoke, and although he lacked nothing of his usual vehemence, he seemed to be controlled by a sense of the solemnity of their purpose. He told them that it was no more a question of Progressivism, which he ardently believed in, but a question of fundamental honesty and right, which everybody ought to believe in and uphold. He advised them to go to their homes, to discuss the crisis with their friends; to gain what adherence and support they could, and to return in two months and formally organize their party and nominate their candidate for President. And he added: "If you wish me to make the fight, I will make it, even if only one State should support me. The only condition I impose is that you shall feel entirely free, when you come together, to substitute any other man in my place, if you deem it better for the movement, and in such case, I will give him my heartiest support."
And so the defeated majority of the Republicans at Chicago, Republicans no longer, broke up. There were many earnest hand-shakings, many pledges to meet again in August, and to take up the great work. Those who intended to stay by the Republican Party, not less than those who cast their lot with the Progressives, bade farewell, with deep emotion, to the Leader whom they had wished to see at the head of the Republican Party. Chief among these was Governor Hadley, of Missouri, who at one moment, during the Convention, seemed likely to be brought forward by the Regulars as a compromise candidate. Some of the Progressives resented his defection from them; not so Roosevelt, who said: "He will not be with us, but we must not blame him."
Six weeks later, the Progressives returned to Chicago. Again, Roosevelt had his headquarters at the Congress Hotel. Again, the delegates, among whom were several women, met at the Coliseum. Crowds of enthusiastic supporters and larger crowds of curiosity- seekers swarmed into the vast building. On Monday, August 5, the first session of the Progressive Party's Convention was held. Senator Albert J. Beveridge, of Indiana, made the opening address, in which he defined the principles of their party and the objects it hoped to obtain. Throughout the proceedings there was much enthusiasm, but no battle. It was rather the gathering of several thousand very earnest men and women bent on consecrating themselves to a new Cause, which they believed to be the paramount Cause for the political, economic, and social welfare of. their country. Nearly all of them were Idealists, eager to secure the victory of some special reform. And, no doubt, an impartial observer might have detected among them traces of that "lunatic fringe," which Roosevelt himself had long ago humorously remarked clung to the skirts of every reform. But the whole body, judged without prejudice, probably contained the largest number of disinterested, public-spirited, and devoted persons, who had ever met for a national and political object since the group which formed the Republican Party in 1854.
The professional politician who usually preponderates in such Conventions, and, in the last, had usurped control both of the proceedings and decisions, had little place here. The chief topic of discussion turned on the
* Lewis, 363.
Shortly after the Convention adjourned, having, by these methods, nominated Mr. Taft and James S. Sherman for President and Vice-President, the Rooseveltians held a great meeting in Orchestra Hall. Governor Johnson presided and apparently a majority of the Rooseveltians wished, then and there, to organize a new party and to nominate Roosevelt as its candidate. Several men made brief but earnest addresses. Then Roosevelt himself spoke, and although he lacked nothing of his usual vehemence, he seemed to be controlled by a sense of the solemnity of their purpose. He told them that it was no more a question of Progressivism, which he ardently believed in, but a question of fundamental honesty and right, which everybody ought to believe in and uphold. He advised them to go to their homes, to discuss the crisis with their friends; to gain what adherence and support they could, and to return in two months and formally organize their party and nominate their candidate for President. And he added: "If you wish me to make the fight, I will make it, even if only one State should support me. The only condition I impose is that you shall feel entirely free, when you come together, to substitute any other man in my place, if you deem it better for the movement, and in such case, I will give him my heartiest support."
And so the defeated majority of the Republicans at Chicago, Republicans no longer, broke up. There were many earnest hand-shakings, many pledges to meet again in August, and to take up the great work. Those who intended to stay by the Republican Party, not less than those who cast their lot with the Progressives, bade farewell, with deep emotion, to the Leader whom they had wished to see at the head of the Republican Party. Chief among these was Governor Hadley, of Missouri, who at one moment, during the Convention, seemed likely to be brought forward by the Regulars as a compromise candidate. Some of the Progressives resented his defection from them; not so Roosevelt, who said: "He will not be with us, but we must not blame him."
Six weeks later, the Progressives returned to Chicago. Again, Roosevelt had his headquarters at the Congress Hotel. Again, the delegates, among whom were several women, met at the Coliseum. Crowds of enthusiastic supporters and larger crowds of curiosity- seekers swarmed into the vast building. On Monday, August 5, the first session of the Progressive Party's Convention was held. Senator Albert J. Beveridge, of Indiana, made the opening address, in which he defined the principles of their party and the objects it hoped to obtain. Throughout the proceedings there was much enthusiasm, but no battle. It was rather the gathering of several thousand very earnest men and women bent on consecrating themselves to a new Cause, which they believed to be the paramount Cause for the political, economic, and social welfare of. their country. Nearly all of them were Idealists, eager to secure the victory of some special reform. And, no doubt, an impartial observer might have detected among them traces of that "lunatic fringe," which Roosevelt himself had long ago humorously remarked clung to the skirts of every reform. But the whole body, judged without prejudice, probably contained the largest number of disinterested, public-spirited, and devoted persons, who had ever met for a national and political object since the group which formed the Republican Party in 1854.
The professional politician who usually preponderates in such Conventions, and, in the last, had usurped control both of the proceedings and decisions, had little place here. The chief topic of discussion turned on the