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Part One Hundred Forty-One: The 1912 Democratic Nomination

The Democratic Nomination:
The Democrats had been smarting after going from electing President McKinley in 1900 to receiving fewer than 100 electoral votes in the 1908 election. President McKinley had remained an elder statesman of sorts, despite the failure of fellow Ohioan Calvin Brice to win any states outside the ex-Confederacy in the 1908 election. McKinley and a large "Eagle" wing of the Democratic Party, had supported American intervention in the Great War and many even supported the annexation of California. However, some opposed the annexation based on seeing it as merely an aggrandizement of Roosevelt's presidency and a drain on the United States' resources compared to leaving it a puppet reliant on American trade.

Since the Progressives had adopted presidential primaries in several states, the idea had caught on among the other parties as a way to gauge popular support for a candidate. This was aided by Progressive legislatures in Champoeg and Itasca, which passed laws in 1910 to require major parties to hold presidential primaries and bound convention delegates to the results of the primary. The Democrats were by far the most reluctant party in the move toward presidential primaries. Even so, by 1912 presidential primaries were established by the state Democratic Party in not only Itasca and Champoeg, but also in Michigan. The two binding primaries were held in states that had been heavily impacted by the Great War. Champoeg and Itasca had both saw their economies suffer during the war. Champoeg could be argued to have fared worse in the war. Champoeg was a major front in the early stages of the American invasion of California and the Modoc attack on the southern forts only stoked anger even further. The war stoked nativist sentiment in much of Champoeg outside of the Columbia River area, and among the already more conservative Democrats this sentiment only gained further appeal. It is not hard to see, then, why the Champoeg primary went to North Carolina Senator Furnifold McLendel Simmons. Simmons, a white supremacist who frequently used racial tactics to win elections and had built a strong Democratic machine as chair of the Democratic Party of North Carolina[1], proclaimed this victory as his ability to win votes outside of the ex-Confederacy. With the Champoeg primary as the first of the three Democratic primaries, it propelled Simmons to one of the top candidates among conservative Democrats.

Along with Champoeg, whose delegates were now bound for Furnifold Simmons at the convention, Simmons had the assured support of the North Carolina, South Carolina, Mississippi, and Chickasaw delegations simply by the nature of those states at the time. However, almost as soon as the result of the Champoeg primary hit the country east of the Rockies, a movement among more centrist Democrats, especially in the Northeast, to oppose Simmons' bid for the nomination. Former Vice President George Oliver, who had run in 1908, was urged to run again by McKinley and a week after the Champoeg primary threw his hat in the ring. Fellow Pennsylvanian Alexander Mitchell Palmer also jumped into the race for the nomination. Palmer was an odd member of the Democratic Party. In the House, he frequently joined more with the Republicans or the Progressives on matters such as tariffs, war preparedness, and even on business regulations. However, Palmer's district in northeastern Pennsylvania was dominated by the Democratic machine of Frederick W. Taylor[2] and Palmer likely would have never won his seat if he had run with another party. In a national run for the nomination, though, Palmer did not gain much traction among the Democrats outside his district, but he did manage to raise his profile nationally as a critic of many of his fellow candidates from within the Democratic Party.

While Furnifold Simmons won the Champoeg primary, as the anti-Simmons campaigns gained steam the other primaries were much more contentious. Itasca's primary, which like Champoeg's was binding for the delegates to the national convention, saw a close race between Maryland governor Edwin Warfield, former Vice President George Oliver, and Saint Louis mayor Rolla Wells. Wells was a dark horse figure, and much of his support came on the back of endorsement by Pulitzer's news empire. However, even the support of Joseph Pulitzer was not enough to place Wells more than a close third place with just over 20% of the vote. Edwin Warfield won the Itasca primary narrowly over Oliver The Itasca win gained Warfield some momentum among moderate Democrats, but it was dented by George Oliver's victory in the non-binding Michigan primary. Through the summer, Edwin Warfield and George Oliver jockeyed for position to be the anti-Simmons while other candidates faded away as the convention drew near.

As the delegates gathered at the Democratic National Convention in Saint Louis, the general expectation was that Warfield and Oliver were roughly equal in support but fairly behind Simmons, and that either could become the main candidate to raise a challenge to Furnifold Simmons as a compromise was reached. However, the result of the first ballot shocked many observers. Furnifold Simmons came ahead with strong support from Southern states as expected. But Edwin Warfield turned out to be significantly ahead of George Oliver, drawing support from not just Itasca and the mid-Atlantic but also from many states in the Upper South. It turned out that Edwin Warfield's reputation as a viable national candidate had spread. For one, Warfield was nearing the end of his term as governor of Maryland, a rare Democratic governor of the traditionally Republican state since the National War. Additionally, Warfield and Maryland was seen as a way to connect the Democrats of the Northeast with the Democrats of the South once again. Favorite sons still found their way into the first ballot, such as the Missouri delegates still voting for Rolla Wells and Cuba putting forward governor Mario Garcia Menocal[3]. Meoncal is notable here as the first Catholic and the first Ibero ever placed into nomination for president from a major party. These candidates and Oliver's support were slow to dissipate in the face of the Simmons-Warfield race, but by the fifth ballot delegates were moving behind Edwin Warfield as the clear opposition to Furnifold Simmons. Both candidates remained unable to reach a majority on the next few ballots, but on the ninth ballot Warfield gained enough support to push him over the top. Next came the Vice Presidential nomination. This was also assumed at first to be a tumultuous contest among many candidates, but a statement from Edwin Warfield quickly smoothed the waters. Warfield made a speech to the convention shortly before voting began for the Vice Presidential nomination endorsing George Oliver as his preferred choice, stressing the need to put a unified voice to the less nationalist factions of the Democratic Party if the party was to gain the votes outside the South needed to regain the presidency. George Oliver was nominated for Vice President on the second ballot, making his second nonconsecutive appearance on the bottom of a Democratic ticket. George Oliver was also selected in particular for his association with McKinley and the two men's ability to gain Democratic support in Ohio and Pennsylvania, bound to be two crucial states that year.

[1] Furnifold Simmons was in OTL ran the North Carolina Democratic Party in the early 20th century and was key in disenfranchising blacks in the state. He also ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1920.
[2] Frederick Winslow Taylor, of The Principles of Scientific Management OTL, got his start at Bethlehem Steel. Here he remains influential in Bethlehem and becomes the boss of the Pennsylvania Democrats after Matthew Quay's death, adapting his ideas on efficient management from the factory machine to the political machine.
[3] While Mario Garcia Menocal is a member of the Partido Conservador in state and congressional elections, he caucuses with the Democrats and affiliates with the Democrats for nationwide electoral purposes.