Woodrow Wilson as I Know HimTumulty, Joseph P. (Joseph Patrick)
History
Woodrow Wilson as I Know Him
Tumulty, Joseph P. (Joseph Patrick)
Presidents -- United States -- Biography; Wilson, Woodrow, 1856-1924
consideration for the United States senatorship in New Jersey.
To me was given the honour of nominating at a joint session of the Senate
and House Assembly the candidate opposed to Woodrow Wilson for the Senate,
the Honourable Edwin E. Stevens. I recall the comparison I made between
the claims of Colonel Stevens, the strict party man, and those of Woodrow
Wilson, the Princeton professor. The speech nominating Woodrow Wilson at
the joint session of the Legislature was the shortest on record. It was
delivered by a big generous fellow, John Baader, one of the Smith-Nugent
men from Essex County. When Essex County was called, he slowly rose to his
feet and almost shamefacedly addressing the Speaker of the House, said,
tremulously: "I nominate for the United States Senate Woodrow Wilson, of
Princeton," and then, amid silence, sat down. No applause greeted the name
of the man he nominated. It seemed as if the college professor had no
friends in the Legislature except the man who had put his name forward for
the nomination.
Colonel Stevens won the honorary nomination and Woodrow Wilson was
defeated. Colonel Harvey, disgruntled but not discouraged, packed up his
kit and left on the next train for New York.
CHAPTER IV
COLONEL HARVEY ON THE SCENE
Although the intrepid Colonel Harvey was defeated in the first skirmish to
advance the cause of Woodrow Wilson, he continued to pursue his purpose to
force his personal choice upon the New Jersey Democracy. The approaching
gubernatorial election in 1910 gave the Colonel his opportunity and he
took full advantage of it.
Rumours began to circulate that the machine run by Davis, Smith, and Ross,
the great Democratic triumvirate of the state, was determined to nominate
the Princeton president at any cost. Young men like Mark Sullivan, John
Treacy, and myself, all of Hudson County, representing the liberal wing of
our party, were bitterly opposed to this effort. We suspected that the
"Old Gang" was up to its old trick of foisting upon the Democrats of the
state a tool which they could use for their own advantage, who, under the
name of the Democratic party, would do the bidding of the corporate
interests which had, under both the "regular" organizations, Democratic
and Republican, found in New Jersey their most nutritious pastures. At a
meeting held at the Lawyers' Club in New York, younger Democrats, like
Judge Silzer of Middlesex and myself, "plighted our political troth" and
pledged our undying opposition to the candidacy of the Princeton
president. As a result of our conferences we set in motion the progressive
machinery of the state in an intensive effort to force the nomination of
Judge Silzer in opposition to that of Woodrow Wilson.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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