Volume 14 , Issue 33

100 Years Ago Today - 13 August 1912

One hundred years ago today there was "another big split among republicans." On Tuesday, August 13, 1912, in The Democratic Banner, out of Mt. Vernon, Ohio, on the front page reported "Vacancy On the Ticket For Governor Is Filled" and "Resulting in Resignations of Eight Members of Committee."

Columbus, Ohio, Aug. 12, 1912 -- "At the meeting of the Republican state central committee to select a successor to Judge Dillon as gubernatorial candidate, the following program was carried out:

"General R. B. Brown of Zanesville was nominated for governor over U. G. Denman of Toledo by a vote of 11 to 8. Walter F. Brown of Toledo withdrew from the Republican National committee, also resigned as chairman and member of the Republican state central committee.

The following members of the central committee, all Roosevelt supporters, withdrew: William Kirtley, Jr., Fifth district; Sherman Eagle, tenth; Israel M. Foster, Eleventh; Malcom A. Karshner, twelfth; George S. Tinlin, Sixteenth; J. H. C. Lyon, Eighteenth; C. L. Knight, nineteenth. Withdrew from the Republican National ticket as nominee for presidential elector in nineteenth district, John E. Thomas, Niles.

The resignations were all accepted and a meeting was held the next day at which vacancies would be filled and a candidate for lieutenant governor named to take the place of General Brown, promoted to the head of the ticket. W. L. Parmenter of Lima was selected as temporary chairman and Sherman M. Granger of Zanesville as temporary secretary of the committee.

After they adjourned the meeting Walter F. Brown stated that the responsibility for the disruption of the committee must rest upon the personal representatives of President Taft, who favored the nomination of General Brown. The members who withdrew were willing to support any Republican of genuinely progressive ideals, who would appeal to all Republicans without regard to differences of opinion as to national politics. Also said was that the Roosevelt supporters had no political plans for the future.

W. L. Parmenter, temporary chairman of the committee, announced that the resignations would not affect the determined purpose of the Republican party to prosecute to success an aggressive campaign.

In Zanesville, Ohio, August 12, 1912, General R. B. Brown, Republican candidate for governor, appointed by the state central committee to fill the vacancy made by the resignation of Judge E. B. Dillon of Columbus, set forth his stand. He said he was going to make a straight-out Republican fight. He would support President Taft and stand squarely on the Chicago platform and the platform adopted by the state convention July 2 (1912) at Columbus. He did not know any other party to support other than the Republican.

Just What He Wanted

In the same Mt. Vernon newspaper, dated Tuesday, 13 August 1912, Colonel Roosevelt said he was pleased over Ohio situation. At Oyster Bay, NY, Aug. 12 (1912), Colonel Roosevelt was apprised of the fact that the Democratic campaign managers had altered their plans and that William J. Bryan would not be asked to trail him through the west and south, he was much amused.

Roosevelt, the ex-president was pluming himself over the action of the Progressives in Ohio. The Roosevelt men on the Republican state central committee, by resigning from that body, foreshadowed the putting up without delay of a third party ticket in that state. This is what the colonel had most desired.

Colonel Roosevelt's point of view showed that there was much significance attached to the turn affairs had taken in Ohio. In as much as his followers had lacked but two votes of controlling the Republican state committee, and after the resignation of Judge Dillon, the compromise candidate for governor, seemed to have a chance of controlling the state organization and naming a progressive candidate as the regular nominee, the indications had been that the third party would not be organized in President Taft's home state.

This was made to appear the more likely by the strong disinclination of Walter Brown and F. U. Wright of Cleveland and other Roosevelt leaders to break away from the Republican party. Their present willingness to cut loose conforms exactly what the colonel's wishes and is at the same time an agreeable surprise. It was with great satisfaction he added Ohio after Massachusetts to the long list of states in which a separate third party ticket was to be named and the foundations laid for a National Progressive "Bull Moose" party as distinct, on the one hand, from the Republican party, as from the Democratic on the other.

There was one phase of the Ohio situation about which the colonel was reticent. The third party managers had picked a progressive in the person of Dr. A. O. Sewick of Cincinnati, to run against his son-in-law, Nicholas Longworth.   |  View or Add Comments (0 Comments)   |   Receive updates ( subscribers)  |   Unsubscribe

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