In New Jersey, Maryland, Oregon and Ohio, Roosevelt won
decisively; in Pennsylvania by a tremendous majority.
Massachusetts, the only remaining State which held a direct
primary, where both men were in the field, split nearly even,
giving Mr. Taft a small lead.
In the face of this clear indication of what the voters wished,
for the Republican leaders to go ahead and nominate Mr. Taft was
sheer suicide from a political point of view. It was also
something much worse: the few denying the will of the many. This,
of course, is tyranny,--what our ancestors revolted against when
they founded the nation. But go ahead they did. It is probable
that even as early as this they had no idea of winning the
election; they merely intended to keep the party machinery in
their own hands. Gravely talking about law and the Constitution
they proceeded to defy the first principles of popular government.
By use of the Southern delegates, from States where the Republican
Party exists mostly in theory, by contesting almost every
delegation, and always ruling against Roosevelt, by every
manipulation which the "Old Guard" of the party could employ, Mr.
Taft was nominated. In at least one important and crucial case,
delegates were seized for Mr. Taft by shameless theft. The phrase
is that used by Mr. Thayer,--a historian, accustomed to weigh his
words, and a non-partisan in this contest, since he favored
neither Mr.
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