Presidential Election of 1912

THE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION of 1912 was crucial in American political history. It temporarily reversed the Republican dominance in presidential elections since to 1896. In the 1912 election, Democratic nominee Woodrow Wilson, governor of New Jersey and former college president of Princeton, won the election due to a split in the Republican vote after former President Theodore Roosevelt defected from the Republican Party to form the Progressive Party (Bull Moose Party) after losing the Republican nomination to President William Howard Taft.

The results of the 1912 election had their roots in the results of the 1908 election. In 1908, President Theodore Roosevelt was at the height of his popularity. Four years earlier, he had won the largest landslide in American political history over Democratic opponent Alton B. Parker. However, after winning the 1904 election, Roosevelt announced that he would not run for president again in 1908 because he respected the two-term tradition of George Washington.

In 1908, Roosevelt could have easily received his party's nomination and been elected. However, Roosevelt declined to run and selected his Secretary of War William Howard Taft of Ohio as his successor. In retrospect, Roosevelt overlooked the fundamental differences between his own activist tendencies as president and Taft's very judicial and conservative temperament. Perhaps this was due to Taft's amiable and easygoing nature. Taft's background was primarily judicial; he had served for a number of years as a circuit court judge. He had also served as a solicitor general and governor general of the Philippines. Taft's dream was to serve as chief justice of the Supreme Court. However, Taft's ambitious wife Helen dreamed of being first lady and [Page 612]pushed him in the direction of a political career. Taft received the Republican nomination in 1908 as a result of Roosevelt's influence, and easily defeated perennial Democratic presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan of Nebraska. In November, Taft easily defeated Bryan to become president.

After the 1908 election, Theodore Roosevelt traveled to Africa, content that his successor had been elected president. Unfortunately, while Taft was an honest and amiable man, he lacked Roosevelt's charisma and popularity. As a result, he was unable to hold together the conservative and progressive wings of the Republican Party. During Taft's presidency, a group of insurgent Republicans, including Congressman George Norris of Nebraska, stripped the conservative Republican House Speaker Joseph Cannon from control of the House Rules Committee.

In another instance, Taft, as head of the forest service, fired Roosevelt's primary conservation advisor, Gifford Pinchot. To his critics, Taft appeared to be a fat and lazy man who loved to eat immense amounts of food. Taft was criticized for signing the Payne-Aldrich Tariff bill, which increased duties on imported goods. There were stories of Taft falling asleep at public events. In fairness to Taft, his administration busted more trusts than Roosevelt had, he admitted Arizona and New Mexico into the Union, enacted the eight-hour day for federal employees, and supported making the income tax a constitutional amendment.

Yet for many Republicans, Taft was a step backward from Roosevelt's administration. A break between Roosevelt and Taft was increasingly evident after Roosevelt's return from Africa and Europe in 1910. In the 1910 midterm elections, Roosevelt campaigned for progressive Republican candidates and advocated measures such as inheritance and estate taxes and the recall of judges. These positions clashed with Taft's more conservative positions.

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