1912: Wilson, Roosevelt, Taft and Debs -The Election that Changed the Country (Hardcover)

by James Chace (Author) "AN ASTOUNDING AND dreadfully poignant letter from his successor, William Howard Taft, awaited Theodore Roosevelt a few days before he was to board an ocean..." (more)
Key Phrases: New York, United States, White House (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Some histories interpret new evidence and add to our store of knowledge. Some, relying on others' research, simply tell a known story. Chace's work is the best of the latter kind: a lively, balanced and accurate retelling of an important moment in American history. Even though the 1912 election wasn't the election that changed the country (there have been several), it was a critical one. It gave us Woodrow Wilson, though only by a plurality of the popular vote (albeit a huge electoral majority) and so gave us U.S. intervention in WWI and Wilsonian internationalism. Because of former president Theodore Roosevelt's rousing candidacy as nominee of the short-lived Bull Moose, or Progressive, Party, the campaign deepened the public's acceptance of the idea of a more modern and activist presidency. Because Eugene Debs, the great Socialist, gained more votes for that party (6% of the total) than ever before or since, the election marked American socialism's political peak. What of the ousted incumbent, William Howard Taft? Chace (Acheson, etc.) succeeds in making him a believable, sympathetic character, if a lackluster chief executive. What made the 1912 campaign unusual was that candidates of four, not just two, parties vied for the presidency. The race was also marked by a basic decency, honesty and quality of debate not often seen again. Chace brings sharply alive the distinctive characters in his fast-paced story. There won't soon be a better-told tale of one of the last century's major elections.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From School Library Journal
Adult/High School–According to Chace, the election of 1912 was "a defining moment in American history." When Theodore Roosevelt's choice for successor, William Howard Taft, failed to support his reforms, Roosevelt left the GOP convention to run against Taft on the Bull Moose Progressive ticket. This bitter split in the Republican party was ultimately responsible for Woodrow Wilson's unexpected victory. A fourth candidate, Eugene V. Debs, an experienced and influential orator who was later imprisoned for espionage, ran as a Socialist representing labor. Chace makes this election come alive through careful research and clear writing. Describing the primaries, the personalities, the conventions, the campaigns, the issues, the race, and the aftermath, the book often reads like a suspense novel. Readers will be able to make valid comparisons between the 2004 presidential race and the 1912 election. Illustrations include good-quality, black-and-white photos of the candidates, their wives, and their families; several political cartoons; and a campaign poster of Debs. This is a valuable resource for those interested in the American electoral process and for American history and government students.–Pat Bender, The Shipley School, Bryn Mawr, PA
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster (May 4, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0743203941
• ISBN-13: 978-0743203944
• Product Dimensions: 9.6 x 6.4 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (33 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #629,149 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

30 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Engaging but superficial history of the 1912 election, August 25, 2004

By	Mark Klobas (Tempe, AZ, USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)

Though ostensibly about the 1912 presidential election, James Chace's book is really about the contest between two of the candidates in that race - Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson - and the ideologies that they espoused. This focus is understandable, given how these two major figures dominate the political history of the period, but it stints the forces represented in the candidacies of William Howard Taft and Eugene Debs, both of whom (Taft especially) get short shrift by comparison.

This in itself may not have been a problem had Chace provided a thoughtful analysis of the campaign. Instead, he has written a familiar, if engaging, narrative of events. All of the standard anecdotes are here, with little explanation of what they might reveal about the people mentioned. Worse, there is no sense of the broader background beyond a few vague statements about the progressive movement. Nor has Chace undertaken any original research, preferring instead to rely on the many books that have already been written about this memorable cast of characters.

The result is disappointing. The author has done little to show how the 1912 election was, as the subtitle states, "the election that changed the country." While a readable account of the events of a remarkable campaign (one that saw the near-assassination of Roosevelt and the death of a vice president), it provides no deeper examination of the candidates or the nation and offers nothing that hasn't been written elsewhere already. In the end, while the book makes for entertaining reading it is not the thoughtful analysis this momentous contest deserves.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars If Teddy and Bill Had Stayed Friends, October 14, 2005

By	Thomas J. Burns (Apopka, Florida USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Despite the apocalyptic title, the fact is that for all of the candidates for the presidency the nominations and subsequent campaign of 1912 could not come fast enough. For everything claimed about the 1912 election being a benchmark of later twentieth century electoral trends, the candidates themselves were men running on empty or close to it. Where the four candidates themselves [three, realistically, at any rate] were concerned, the prize of the White House was a reprieve from decline, oblivion, or in Debs' case, jail.

One can argue whether Eugene Debs deserves the attention he commands in this work. On election day he tallied about what one would expect from the least known candidate in a four man race, and there is no reading of the results that suggests Debs' share of the vote seriously affected the outcome. But the Socialist candidate is a charming fellow in his own way, an Adlai Stevenson in coveralls or a cheap suit, and James Chace gives him extended exposure to a current generation that has forgotten the struggles of American Labor.

Debs was a combination of things: laborer, philosopher, public office holder, labor leader, and perennial presidential candidate. The 1912 election would be his fourth run for the White House, though even Debs realized that his presidential campaigns were more about exposure on the bully pulpit than the prize itself. Chace provides a biography that briefly chronicles not just the colorful career of Debs but a thumbnail sketch of the labor-management problems coming to a boil in mainstream electoral politics.

Unfortunately for Debs in 1912, the issue of populism was now becoming semi-respectable, and others with more name recognition were willing to take the banner that Debs had manfully carried alone in past elections. Robert LaFollette appeared to be the front-runner until a physical and mental breakdown led reform-minded Republican governors in the West to coax, if that be the right word, Theodore Roosevelt out of retirement. If the reader winces at the juxtaposition of "coax" and "Roosevelt," that is probably understandable. Yet Roosevelt's third party candidacy was not an inevitability.

The popular wisdom has held that Roosevelt was literally panting to get back into the limelight, that four years of retirement had been a torment. This is only partly true. Roosevelt, for all his faults, was no fool. He knew he would be running against an incumbent of his own party, albeit a weak one, a crossing of the Rubicon if ever there was one. Unfortunately for Roosevelt, this was also an incumbent he had hand picked and groomed, a man once seen by Roosevelt as something of a younger brother. The rupture of Roosevelt's relationship with William Howard Taft was tragic, public, and unbearably cruel, and its impact was that of a two-edged sword in this campaign. Moreover, Roosevelt's sense of two-party order was strong; his positioning as a potential third-party reformer would put him in close proximity with people and causes he considered dangerously close to anarchy.

But still he ran for president, in part to tackle the trusts and other reform causes he had espoused in the White House and which he accused Taft of ignoring. For all his popularity Roosevelt had never won over the Republican Party machinery, which of course defeated him at the Chicago nominating convention. Such things happen in politics, but rules committee chicanery would be taken very personally by Roosevelt, who in his momentary disgust uncharacteristically took up a third party progressive banner. Naturally, his rage became all the more personified against Taft and brought out the worst in the Rough Rider's last presidential campaign.

The great mystery not unraveled in this study is why Taft felt compelled to run for reelection at all. By all accounts he was an unhappy president, possibly best remembered for his weight problem. He was self-effacing and rather atypical for a politician. It is not at all certain that Roosevelt's philosophy unduly concerned him. In fact, Taft's own trust-busting cost him much support within his own party. One can imagine him declining to run in 1912 and returning to the practice of law. All things considered, personal liabilities and the like, his might have been the most respectable third place finish in the history of presidential elections, though one wonders why he went to all the trouble.

Woodrow Wilson may have been a fresh face in the presidential arena, but in fact he had barely survived two major political upheavals, mostly of his own making, in smaller arenas prior to the campaign of 1912. As President of Princeton University his radical reform of traditional campus life, not to mention his style of implementation, made a run for the New Jersey state house a graceful escape. His tenure as chief executive of the Garden State was a stormy one; attacks on both sides-from machine Democrats and Republicans alike-brought out the intractability of the former college professor. From a distance, however, Wilson was a refreshing new reform face, particularly when the national Democratic Convention bogged down to a slugfest between career politicians long in the tooth. Wilson, who could be as priestly as the pope when the occasion arose, was the one contender who could wear William Jennings Bryan's vestments of reform and progressivism in a manner that Democratic pols did not mind going to church.

How much the election of 1912 changed the country is still an open question. In truth, the more pertinent question is how this election impacted World War I. Only Roosevelt, of the four candidates, seemed to have an inkling of a possible world war, though even his admiring biographers have reservations about Roosevelt as a wartime president. What can be safely said is this: a united Republican Party, i.e., with both Roosevelt and the bosses under the tent, would have probably defeated Wilson. The reader can make of that as he wishes.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Rise of Wilson and the Fall of Roosevelt., January 26, 2005

By	Kevin M Quigg (Carol Stream, Illinois United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)

Chace does a good job of detailing why the election of 1912 was so important to the United States. He describes the four participants in the election of 1912: Wilson, Taft, Roosevelt, and Debs. Bryan was also a factor in the Democratic nomination of Wilson. The main focus of this book is how these leaders would affect change in America. Taft was the conservative and Debs was the radical. Roosevelt and Wilson were the candidates for the Progressive faction of the country. Chace describes each candidate and all his positives and negatives. I didn't know Wilson was such a reactionary on race and immigrant relations, while Roosevelt was generally very liberal on these issues. All in all a good book about the campaign and why the Republican Party veered to the right.
For those interested in the politics of America, this is a good read. The reader would be surprised to find that the red and blue states have actually changed over the years. In the past, the South was reactionary and the West was Progressive while the East and Midwest favored the conservative (Republican) issues. Not so today. Hats off to Chace for writing a good read.