Imagine a presidential election with four well-qualified and
distinguished candidates and a serious debate over the future of
the nation Sound impossible in this era of attack ads and strident
partisanship? It happened nearly a century ago in 1912, when
incumbent Republican William Howard Taft, former president Theodore
Roosevelt running as the Progressive Party candidate, Democratic
nominee Woodrow Wilson, and Socialist candidate Eugene V. Debs all
spoke to major concerns of the American people and changed the
landscape of national politics in the bargain.
The presidential election of 1912 saw a third-party candidate
finish second in both popular and electoral votes. The Socialist
candidate received the highest percentage of the popular vote his
party ever attained. In addition to year-round campaigning in the
modern style, the 1912 contest featured a broader role for women,
two exciting national conventions, and an assassination attempt on
Roosevelt's life. The election defined the major parties for
generations to come as the Taft-Roosevelt split pushed the
Republicans to the right and the Democrats' agenda of reform set
them on the road to the New Deal.
Lewis L. Gould, one of America's preeminent political
historians, tells the story of this dramatic race and explains its
enduring significance. Basing his narrative on the original letters
and documents of the candidates themselves, he guides his readers
down the campaign trail through the factional splits, exciting
primaries, tumultuous conventions and the turbulent fall campaign
to Wilson's landslide electoral vote victory in November.
It's all here--Gene Debs's challenge to capitalism, the
progressive rivalry of Roosevelt and Robert La Follette, the debate
between the New Freedom of Wilson and the New Nationalism of
Roosevelt, and the resolve of Taft to defeat his one-time friend TR
and keep the Republican Party in conservative hands. Gould combines
lively anecdotes, the poetry and prose of the campaign, and
insights into the clash of ideology and personality to craft a
narrative that moves as fast as did the 1912 election itself.
Americans sensed in 1912 that they stood at a turning point in
the nation's history. Four Hats in the Ring demonstrates why the
people who lived and fought this significant election were more
right than they could ever have known.
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