Volume 14 , Issue 38

1912 - Laughter Shakes Moose Hopes

In a San Francisco, California, newspaper, Tuesday, 17 September 1912, The Call, the frontpage headlines read: "Laughter Shakes Moose Hopes, New Don Quixote Is Manhandled, Third Party Is Shown In True Light."

The sledge hammer blows delivered by John Maynard Harlan and impaled on the shafts of J. Adam Bede's ridicule, the Bull Moose was manhandled last night for the edification and intense amusement of a crowd that filled the National theater to overflowing.

The oldest of San Francisco's campaigners could recall no meeting like that assembled that night to listen to the republican orators who were following the trail of Theodore Roosevelt.

During the first hour the crowd conclusively proved its catholic partisan proclivities by cheering in sections for Taft, Roosevelt, Johnson, Debs, Wilson and Bryan. By far the most vigorous cheer elicited by Harlan was that which greeted his prophecy that Hiram W. Johnson would not be re-elected governor of California.

Harlan from his first hand knowledge discussed Roosevelt's record as a trust buster and the milking of the western railroads for campaign funds. He outlined the chronology of the Standard Oil campaign contribution controversy to show, as he said, conclusively that Roosevelt did know about the contribution of $100,000; knew that it had been spent, and prepared his letters, as related by Secretary of State Knox, to make the record good.

Bede, who swayed the crowd from convulsive laughter to storms of serious enthusiasm, contrasted President Taft's record of accomplishment with that of Roosevelt's eight years of conversational progress.

A String of Bede's

• The democrats look good to me this year because I'm an optimist. A barber told me the other day that it isn't half as hard to shave a democrat this year as it used to be.
• I believe in two strong parties, one in power and the other watching it; and the reason I've always been a republican is because I think the democrats make the best watchers.
• I've nothing particularly against the bull moose party, but we have a dehorning committee just the same, and it's open season for bull moose, particularly along in November.
• Theodore Roosevelt wasn't within gunshot of San Juan hill when the battle was on, and he hasn't been that near to a fact since. We've been electing him on things that didn't happen.
• Talk about the high cost of living: I saw a sign in the New York subway calling attention to a fine of $500 for spitting on streetcars, and we used to spit nothing.
• Most Americans today think that if they buy an automobile the government ought to make the repairs. There's many an American pays more for gasoline than his grandfather did for groceries.
• Don't ask for civilization on the half shell and then complain of the cost. If we find there is high cost for living, just remember we are living high.
• I organized a company of boy scouts back in Minnesota, and the first thing I did was to provide them with a gymnasium with wrestling mats and boxing gloves and everything that goes with the presidency.
• Theodore yells for us to have big families, and then the first thing he does is to bring on a panic so they can't be loathed or fed.
• news these days consists of things that never ought to happen -- the unusual things such as wrecks, divorces, scandals, mine disasters, murders and democratic victories.
• I've always thought of the Philippines as I do of triplets -- they are something you can't advocate and can't give away.

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