The Progressive Nomination
Following Wallace's collapse in the polls, the Progressive nomination became wide open. Many expected Philip La Follette would win, given his brother's win in the nomination in 1944.
La Follette Biographer Nancy Hart: "I think the La Follette dynasty had been one of the strongest progressive forces since the founding of the party. The La Follette brothers were the last of the Founding Fathers of the Progressive-Farm-Labor party to really have a shot at the nomination. A lot of people remembered Fighting Bob."
Images of the original Robert La Follette "However, there was a lot of negative press regarding the idea of a 'dynasty'. Philip had been governor for eight years, and Senator for another eight years. His career was separate from his brother's, but many people believed nominating the same family twice in a row would seem dynastic."
Historian Kyle Anderson, PhD: "The La Follette machine was very powerful in Wisconsin and very influential and popular in the Midwest. I think he assumed that this popularity would carry into other urban areas, that other industrial unions would back their strong ally."
Brien McMahon's victory in New Jersey put an end to that idea. It became clear that La Follette would not be able to sweep the Northeast like his brother had achieved four years previously. McMahon went on to win New York, a huge prize that assured that he would compete nationwide.
Kyle Anderson: "McMahon focused on foreign policy and the need for the United States to invest in nuclear research. However, he'd spent his career working with unions in the Northeast while also amassing the reputation as a great reformer."
Law historian James R. Hill, J.D. PhD: "McMahon's main competition in the Northeast was Justice Douglas. However, the Supreme Court battle, rather than strengthening Douglas, hurt him, as he could not comment. In a field against numerous Senators, his poll numbers dropped to a negligible level. Douglas's campaign was already controversial among judicial circles; to campaign properly would require him to do the unthinkable."
Meanwhile, the plains states were not shaping up to be strong La Follette territory either.
Nancy Hart: "La Follette had hoped that as Wallace's support fell, he would regain rural voters who would be unwilling to vote for a radical without Wallace's long record supporting agriculture. He didn't anticipate that the charge of being part of an elite dynasty would not play well to many people in rural areas, especially poorer people."
The results of the North Dakota primary were unwelcome to LaFollette; Glen H. Taylor won the primary with the radical supporters of Wallace rallying around him and the moderates moving to Senator Joshua Lee.
Kyle Anderson: "Lee had support among moderate, rural Progressives. He hoped that as Senator from Oklahoma, he could sweep the South and would be in a good position going into a divided convention."
Historian Martin Luther King Jr., PhD: "Lee simply failed to anticipate the dramatic turnout of newly enfranchised Afro-American voters in the South. He assumed they would be in the minority, even with the southern Progressive parties always having been incredibly small. However, black voters turned out and voted for their greatest champion in the Senate, Glen H. Taylor."
Nancy Hart: "La Follette had anticipated that Elmer Benson would serve as a drag on Taylor in the midwest and Claude Pepper in the South. Taylor's huge lead among the Afro-American vote created a situation where he could not lose in the Deep South. Lee, Pepper, and La Follette split the white vote in the Upper South and let Taylor win Virginia, Tennessee, North Carolina, and Kentucky."
Kyle Anderson: "Taylor managed to gain some white support in the Upper South as well. His folksy rural charm played well among rural Progressives across the nation, and in parts of the South that were less racially polarized than the Deep South, he won over a few votes. Not many, but enough to win Kentucky."
With the Florida Primary too late to swing the election, Claude Pepper dropped out of the race and endorsed Taylor. The contest quickly became a "stop Taylor" strategy among the remaining candidates. However, Taylor's victories in Texas and Kansas knocked Joshua Lee out of the race.
Nancy Hart: "McMahon and La Follette both staying in the race trying to be the more industrial, union, urban candidate, each running a national, rather than regional, campaign, led to them splitting the vote in several states. Losing North Dakota was annoying. Losing California was concerning. Losing Missouri was very alarming and losing Illinois was simply cataclysmic for the La Follette campaign."
The predicted split of the radicals simply never materialized. Elmer Benson's campaign, for all the media coverage it attracted, never managed to actually attain substantial electoral support.
Kyle Anderson: "Benson was not too radical for the Progressive base. However, even Progressives who liked him admitted that he was simply unelectable."
Footage of Benson giving aggressive speeches. "They knew that he would not only fail to win the election, but that if he was nominated, it would lead to a split in the Progressive party.
"
A photograph of Senator Benson meeting Grand Marshal Tukhachevsky in early 1947, shaking his hand in front of the giant, ornate Palace of the Soviets.
Historian Marsha Spielberg, PhD: "Benson was seen as a dangerous radical, while paradoxically Floyd Olson was seen as a popular hero. Benson was not particularly more radical on policy than his mentor, other than being much more openly pro-Soviet. And Olson had run a very aggressive campaign full of alarming rhetoric in 1932 as well. The difference was that during the Depression, anger was much more widespread, nearly universal in the electorate."
Footage of hundreds of thousands gathering for Floyd Olson rallies plays. People can be seen carrying huge banners, defiantly holding their fists in the air, and burning and/or beheading effigies of President Mellon and General Douglas MacArthur One sign holds a checklist, with Morrow and Coolidge's names checked off and Mellon's name below, with writing saying "One more to go". "By 1948, that anger simply was not present. The small post-war recession of 1946 and 1947 was over, the country was at peace again, and the Olson legacy was intact. There was a lot of frustration and concerns about the debt and inflation. But there simply was no appetite for Benson's destructive, revolutionary rhetoric."
Kyle Anderson: "Taylor swept the west, and he swept the South, and while he lost almost every contest in the Midwest and Northeast, he managed strong second and third place finishes with his coalition of Afro-American and rural voters, demonstrating that he had a true nationwide appeal - the only Progressive candidate to do so."
Glen H. Taylor failed to win an outright majority of delegates, but he was so close that it was clear no one could possibly beat him. He was nominated on the second ballot, and chose Pennsylvania Governor Francis J. Myers as his running mate.
Glen Taylor, receiving Henry Wallace's endorsement in a rally before the convention after reconciling from Wallace's attacks earlier in the primary.
