In 1912, the country was in turmoil. The fat cats on Wall Street had a stranglehold on the wealth of the country, and many progressive individuals felt that the rich had to put in a higher stake to take care of the poor. Tempers were flaring with our neighboring country of Mexico, and military forces were massing in the Middle East.
Any of this sound familiar?
Tonight, me and my fiance went up to the Greensboro Historical Museum to attend a talk on the Presidential election of 1912. I've seen these types of events listed on community calendars and bulletin boards before, but I've never gone to one. I've also never dropped by the Greensboro Historical Museum, which is a shame because it's not even a 5 minute walk from my new house. So, two birds with one stone!
Because of the recent election, I was particularly interested in this topic. The parallels between the political and social landscape of that time and our own were very striking, and the presenter, Matthew Young, did a great job of illustrating how these issues impacted the voters' view of the various candidates. And what crop of candidates it was...
The incumbent was William Howard Taft. A rotund man with an apparently great sense of humor, he once telegraphed a friend that he had just completed a 25 mile horse ride and felt great. His friend responded "How's the horse?" (I chuckled out loud at that one). He had been Secretary of War for the former president, Theodore Roosevelt, but this experience did not seem to serve him well. He did not carry through with many of the policies and ideals of his predecessor, and was supported by the corrupt party bosses that Roosevelt had actively tried to take down.
Taft's opponent for the Republican nomination was none other than Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt himself, who returned from an African safari after his first two terms, saw that the country was worse than when he left, and decided to run again. I was most impressed by what Young had to say about Roosevelt. The man did not shy away from life, and I can only hope to accomplish 1/4 of what he was able to in his life time. Most of it sounded like a Hemingway story, with a lot of political life thrown in. Did you know that he is the only person to receive both the Congressional Medal of Honor, our highest military award, and the Nobel Peace Prize?
Their opponent was the Democrat, Woodrow Wilson. A former President of Princeton with a Ph.D in History (Wilson is the only president in history with a doctoral degree), Wilson was a one term governor from New Jersey before he entered the race for President.
This election had significane to Greensboro itself because it was the first time that all three major candidates for President came to the Gate City. The Greensboro Historical Museum currently has an exhibit showcasing Greensboro's role in Presidential campaign history, including pictures of the 1912 candidates.
Wilson ended up winning the election because Roosevelt and Taft split the Republican vote. What I found to be most interesting of the whole talk were the differences between the 1912 election and our most recent election. Wilson, the Democratic candidate, won the South handily. If anyone saw election night coverage this year, the South was decidedly against the Democratic candidate. Theodore Roosevelt, first a Republican candidate, was for environmental conservation. He wanted strict regulations on food and medicine, and was a champion for anti-trust legislation. He seemed very unlinke the Tea-Party/Far right conservatives that flood the airwaves of talk radio today.
Going to this lecture tonight was great because it was a topic that I knew nothing about. I knew that Wilson was the President during WWI, but I didn't know how he got there. It was sad that Elizabeth and I were two out of the seven total people there, and that included the presenter and the guy at the front desk of the museum. But it was an intersting way to spend an hour, and I feel like I have a lot of trivia to drop the next time I'm at a party. And isn't that why we learn? So we can show off what we learn to our friends.
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