“In the first place I want to thank you all for your good wishes and your efforts in my behalf. But my position and yours is the same that it has ever been since we came to Denver. I am not, and have not been a candidate for the vice-presidential nomination, and if there is to be any contest, any balloting at all, my name will not be presented. That is what I wish the position of the Indiana delegation to be, and if you agree with me that is what it will be. Let us forget about it and go home and carry Indiana. God bless you all.”
“In the first place I want to thank you all for your good wishes and your efforts in my behalf. But my position and yours is the same that it has ever been since we came to Denver. I am not, and have not been a candidate for the vice-presidential nomination, and if there is to be any contest, any balloting at all, my name will not be presented. That is what I wish the position of the Indiana delegation to be, and if you agree with me that is what it will be. Let us forget about it and go home and carry Indiana. God bless you all.”
About the time he was uttering these words the leaders from over the country were in conference canvassing the availability of the various men mentioned, and here the Indiana leaders’ claims were being urged by John E. Lamb and Thomas Taggart. The conference agreed that the best interest of the party would be served by the nomination of Mr. Kern.
It was a feverish group of Indianians that early sought their seats in the very front of the great convention hall at noon that day. When Alabama was called for nominations she yielded to Indiana, and thus for the first time Thomas Riley Marshall, then the nominee for governor in Indiana and destined to the rare distinction of two elections to the vice-presidency, appeared upon the platform and faced the Democracy of the nation. He had only had a few minutes for reflection, as it was the original intention that Mr. Lamb, whose voice was almost gone, to present the name of Mr. Kern. As the small, wirey figure of the now familiar national leader appeared, there seemed little probability that he could impress the convention in that vast auditorium. There was no doubt on the part of the Hoosiers. Nor was there any doubt on the part of the convention after he had uttered his first sentence. This speech pleased Kern.
In seconding the nomination of Kern, Governor Folk of Missouri described him as a man who was fit to represent the platform and fight beside Bryan. Martin J. Wade of Iowa described him as a “broad-gauged, energetic, faithful, loyal Democrat.” Ollie James, speaking for Kentucky, referred to him as “one of the gamest, knightliest and bravest Democrats in the Union.” George Fred Williams of Massachusetts spoke of him as “a man absolutely beyond any criticism, whose nomination will arouse the undivided enthusiasm of all the Democrats of the nation.” State after state rose to second the nomination of Kern as the enthusiasm of the convention intensified, the loyal Hoosier delegation voiceless from shouting long before the roll call was ended. The names of others were presented, among them the name of Charles A. Towne, who soon caught the drift of the convention and appeared upon the platform and withdrew his name to the end that an acclamation nomination might be made of “that able andworthy Democratic war horse of Indiana.” A motion was soon thereafter made to that effect and Mr. Kern was nominated without a ballot being taken.
While the convention was acting Mr. Kern sat alone in his room at the Albany smoking. His first act on learning of his nomination when enthusiastic Hoosier friends burst in upon him was to send a telegram to his family at Indianapolis—“Have just now been nominated. God bless you all.” Within a few minutes after the convention acted he began to pay the penalty of the celebrity thrust upon him. The crowds flocked to his room in such numbers that he was finally forced to make his escape to Mr. Taggart’s room in the Brown Palace, but almost immediately afterward his hiding place was discovered by Senator Gore and thereafter no further effort was made to find a place of retirement. Among the first telegrams that reached him was the one that meant more perhaps than any other—from Mr. Bryan:
“Lincoln, Neb., July 10.“Hon. John W. Kern, Denver, Colo.:“Accept my warmest congratulations. Your nomination gratifies me very much. We have a splendid platform and I am glad to have a running mate in such complete harmony with the platform. Stop off and see us on your way east.“William Jennings Bryan.”
“Lincoln, Neb., July 10.
“Hon. John W. Kern, Denver, Colo.:
“Accept my warmest congratulations. Your nomination gratifies me very much. We have a splendid platform and I am glad to have a running mate in such complete harmony with the platform. Stop off and see us on your way east.
“William Jennings Bryan.”
Addressing a delegation of returning Nebraskans soon afterwards, Mr. Bryan said:
“I am sure that when people come to know John W. Kern as I have known him for many years, they will believe, as I do, that he is in perfect harmony with the platform, and can be trusted to carry out that platform to the letter, if circumstances should place upon him the responsibility for its enforcement.”
“I am sure that when people come to know John W. Kern as I have known him for many years, they will believe, as I do, that he is in perfect harmony with the platform, and can be trusted to carry out that platform to the letter, if circumstances should place upon him the responsibility for its enforcement.”
Into his retreat at the Brown Palace the crowds thronged. The newspaper men with their cameras and note books appeared and the candidate, with his customary amiability, submitted to being cross-examined as to the most intimate details of his life. TheDenver Timeswas much impressed because Kern did not “talk in the Hoosier dialect”—a puzzle that was solved to its satisfaction by the discovery that his father was a Virginian and he, as a boy, had lived in Iowa. Other papers solemnly assured their readers that he was the original of “The Man From Home” of Booth Tarkington’s creation. The nomination of Bryan having been a foregone conclusion, the vice-presidential nominee became the chief topic of conversation, and that night Kern was being discussed almost exclusively by the politicians in hotel lobbies, cafés and upon the streets. An interview on the nomination by as astute an observer as Herbert Quick, of Iowa, gives as accurate an appraisement of the atmosphere in which it was made as can be found. “The nomination of Mr. Kern was widely favored,” he said, “in my section of the middle west long before the convention. He is regarded as a man whose high character and place of residence would add strength to the ticket. He will not be regarded as an unknown or an accident. I watched the convention as it nominated Kern and mingled in the groups engaged in the preliminary discussions. No one was ever nominated in an atmosphere freer from dickering and trading. The galleries were for Kern and the galleries have a curious faculty of feeling the national pulse.”
He remained in Denver for a time so as to reach Lincoln just in time for the meeting of the national committee at Fairview on July 14th, and during the interval was kept busy conferring with party leaders and with social engagements. I was with him on the train on the return trip as far as Lincoln and had an opportunity to note the effect the new celebrity had upon him. If anything, and if possible, he was even more democratic, genuinely democratic, in his manner, and a trifle subdued, as though he felt the responsibility that would fall to him in meeting his share of the burdens of the campaign. The night his party left Denver he stayed up late keeping his companions in mirthful mood with a seemingly interminable string of stories gleaned from his own experiences. It was on the train that he first had an opportunity to read the Indianapolis papers and learn of the joy and jubilation of his friends and neighbors of both parties and of the plans of his old Kokomo friends to tender him a great reception. These things seemed to touch him more than the honor of the nomination.
Again he reached Lincoln in the night, this time at three o’clock in the morning, but this time he was met by a delegation of citizens and taken to the hotel. Before he was up in the morning a large crowd was at the hotel to greet him, and for a time, as the press put it, “the town went Kern mad.”
About noon on the day of his arrival he went to Fairview on the car, receiving ovations along the way, and he remained at the home of Mr. Bryan through the afternoon meeting party leaders. During that afternoon, too, in a campaign conference with Mr. Bryan, a plan was determined upon that was destined to make the Bryan and Kern campaign of 1908 memorable and of vital importance to the nation regardless of the result of the election, for it was then decided to pledge the party to giving publicity to campaign contributions before the election, and to limit the amount that could be subscribed by any one party.
On the following day when the members of the national committee had been called to order at Fairview, Mr. Bryan, when called upon, referring to Mr. Kern in the course of his brief speech, said:
“I desire to express ... my gratitude that a candidate for vice-president has been selected who is not only a political friend and a personal friend, but one in whom I have entire confidence (applause). I do not know how I can better express my feeling on the subject than to say that if I am elected president and Mr. Kern is elected vice-president, I shall not be afraid to die, because I shall feel that the policies outlined in the platform, which I shall endeavor to put into operation, will be just as faithfully carried out by him as they would be by me.” (Applause.)
“I desire to express ... my gratitude that a candidate for vice-president has been selected who is not only a political friend and a personal friend, but one in whom I have entire confidence (applause). I do not know how I can better express my feeling on the subject than to say that if I am elected president and Mr. Kern is elected vice-president, I shall not be afraid to die, because I shall feel that the policies outlined in the platform, which I shall endeavor to put into operation, will be just as faithfully carried out by him as they would be by me.” (Applause.)
Mr. Bryan then presented his history-making proposal which had been discussed by him with Mr. Kern the previous afternoon:
“We suggest for your approval a maximum of $10,000 and a minimum of $100, no contribution to be received above $10,000 and all contributions above $100 to be made public before the election.“We suggest, also, that on or before the 15th day of October, publication shall be made of all contributions above $100 received up to that date; that after the 15th of October publication shall be made of such contributions on the day that the same are received, and that no contribution above $100 shall be accepted within three days of the election.“With the hope that these suggestions may be favorably acted upon, we are, with great respect, etc.,“Yours truly,“William Jennings Bryan,“John W. Kern.”
“We suggest for your approval a maximum of $10,000 and a minimum of $100, no contribution to be received above $10,000 and all contributions above $100 to be made public before the election.
“We suggest, also, that on or before the 15th day of October, publication shall be made of all contributions above $100 received up to that date; that after the 15th of October publication shall be made of such contributions on the day that the same are received, and that no contribution above $100 shall be accepted within three days of the election.
“With the hope that these suggestions may be favorably acted upon, we are, with great respect, etc.,
“Yours truly,“William Jennings Bryan,“John W. Kern.”
Thus the first act of Mr. Kern as a candidate was to affix his signature to a proposal destined, after much controversy and sophisticated efforts to escape, to be written into the law of the land. After Mr. Kern had spoken briefly, a resolution embodying the ideas of the proposal was submitted by Josephus Daniels of North Carolina and unanimously adopted. History was made at Fairview that afternoon. An issue of such vital moment was then made that it would not down. And the issue was all the more direct because a Republican congress had just refused to enact a publicity law, the Republican national convention had refused to incorporate in its platform a provision for one, and the announcement of the Fairview plan was at first ridiculed by the reactionary press of the country. But the issue was so clear that it could not be scoffed from the boards. Mr. Taft tried to meet it by reforming on his original selection of a treasurer of his campaign committee, and that, failing to satisfy the independent press, he tried to offset the Fairview program with a proposal of publicity of contributions after the election. Thiswas so manifestly absurd that it failed utterly to satisfy, notwithstanding President Roosevelt’s remarkable advocacy of the proposal of Taft to lock the stable after the horse was stolen. The impression made by the plan outlined at the conference between Bryan and Kern at Fairview that afternoon was so pronounced that the popular demand for a law of that character persisted, and finally under the administration of Mr. Taft, who had opposed it, it was written into law at the behest of an overwhelming public opinion. That incident alone, aside from the platform, makes the Bryan-Kern campaign of 1908 one of vital value to the institutions of America.
On the evening of the day of the adoption of this resolution, Mr. Kern and his party turned their faces toward home—and here he was to partake of the sweets of his triumph.
Mr. Kern knew, through the press, that his friends and neighbors were taking the keenest delight in the honor that had been shown him. On the night of the nomination great crowds of cheering men, headed by a band, waving flags, burning red fire, and singing patriotic songs, had been quickly improvised with the view to serenading the family of the candidate. Stopping on the way to cheer in front of the Columbia club, the Republican organization, and to
John H. Kern, Jr. Mrs. Kern William C. KernJohn H. Kern, Jr.Mrs. KernWilliam C. Kern
serenade the newspapers, it had gone rollicking to the Kern residence, where Mrs. Kern greeted the enthusiasts from the porch, and Judge Gavin had responded in her behalf. Returning it paused at the home of Vice-President Fairbanks, who appeared and briefly paid tribute to Kern the man and neighbor. “There is no better man in the city of Indianapolis or in the state of Indiana than John W. Kern,” he said, and the crowd, with “three cheers for Fairbanks,” passed on to pause again at the home of the venerable former Senator David Turpie, who was too feeble to appear but sent assurances of his participation in the common joy. The Indianapolis press, regardless of politics, editorially joined in the general jubilation. Four years before when a similar reception had been given Mr. Fairbanks, Mr. Kern had presided, and at that time the former had predicted that he would one day serve as chairman of such a meeting to greet Kern. The arrangements were made accordingly.
There was something in this reception so significant of the affection of his fellow citizens, and something in Mr. Kern’s attitude toward it so characteristic of the man that it deserves more than a mere reference. When the train stopped to permit his party to alight at Capitol avenue he was met by a delegation representing the civic bodies of the community, a large crowd of citizens, and a band playing “When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again,” Vice-President Fairbanks was the first to grasp his hand. He was followed by Mayor Bookwalter, also a Republican, and the two escorted the nominee to his carriage. The procession moved through cheering crowds to where Mrs. Kern and the family were waiting to receive him. As the home of the nominee was approached the streets were packed, and houses of Democrats and Republicans alike were hung with bunting and brightened with flags, while a streamer stretched across the street announced a “Welcome by Your Neighbors.” As Mr. Kern, bearing his two boys in his arms, ascended the steps of his home any one who knew the heart of the man could appreciate the emotions with which he faced his fellow citizens.
“Sometimes I can talk,” he said to the crowd, “but this is not one of the times. On some other occasion I shall tell you all how glad I am to see you, but for reasons that must be obvious to you all I can not speak now.”
“Sometimes I can talk,” he said to the crowd, “but this is not one of the times. On some other occasion I shall tell you all how glad I am to see you, but for reasons that must be obvious to you all I can not speak now.”
That evening it was the carriage of Vice-President Fairbanks that called to convey Mr. Kern to the court house yard, where a platform had been erected and where the formal home welcome was to be given. Here fully 15,000 people had assembled when Mr. Fairbanks assumed charge of the meeting. In the course of a generous address the vice-president referred to Kern’s “ability as a lawyer, eminence as an orator, integrity as a man, uprightness as a neighbor, and admirable life within the sacred circle of home.”
Seldom has a more remarkable ovation ever been accorded any man within the confines of Indiana than that which greeted Mr. Kern when he rose to speak. For eleven minutes the thousands cheered and shouted, and the efforts of the recipient of the honor to still the tumult only seemed to give it impetus. The speech of Mr. Kern on this occasion disclosed the inner man.
“I am tired and somewhat travel worn to-night and I don’t know that I can make myself heard to the uttermost limits of this vast audience. I am sure that I can find no words which will in any measure express the emotions of my heart upon this occasion.“It is true, as has been said, a mark of distinction has been given me by the national convention of my party, and to that convention and the men it represents I am deeply grateful, but I am more grateful to Almighty God for the friends He has given me in Indianapolis, regardless of political affiliation. I would be very much more or less than a man were I not deeply touched by this manifestation of your personal friendship and confidence which I have witnessed from the time I alighted at the station this afternoon until the present hour. I may be defeated at the polls, but if so that is not a killing matter, because I have become accustomed to that; but if I should go down in defeat in November, the memoryof what has occurred here to-night will amply repay me for whatever of toil may be my lot between now and then.“And the fact of this great assemblage attesting your loyalty and friendship to me I will bequeath to my children as a richer legacy than any on the face of the earth or all of the wealth of the world....“How small is the man who will stop in campaign time, or any other time, to quarrel with his neighbor, because that neighbor, in his right of citizenship, differs from him as to the best method of government. The true American feeling is manifest here to-night. Our children must play together in the years to come, whether they are Democrats or Republicans. They will inter-marry. They will rear families. Their lots will be cast together; they will all be interested alike in promoting the welfare, the honor and the glory of this mighty republic, and this being so, why will we quarrel because they can not agree?”
“I am tired and somewhat travel worn to-night and I don’t know that I can make myself heard to the uttermost limits of this vast audience. I am sure that I can find no words which will in any measure express the emotions of my heart upon this occasion.
“It is true, as has been said, a mark of distinction has been given me by the national convention of my party, and to that convention and the men it represents I am deeply grateful, but I am more grateful to Almighty God for the friends He has given me in Indianapolis, regardless of political affiliation. I would be very much more or less than a man were I not deeply touched by this manifestation of your personal friendship and confidence which I have witnessed from the time I alighted at the station this afternoon until the present hour. I may be defeated at the polls, but if so that is not a killing matter, because I have become accustomed to that; but if I should go down in defeat in November, the memoryof what has occurred here to-night will amply repay me for whatever of toil may be my lot between now and then.
“And the fact of this great assemblage attesting your loyalty and friendship to me I will bequeath to my children as a richer legacy than any on the face of the earth or all of the wealth of the world....
“How small is the man who will stop in campaign time, or any other time, to quarrel with his neighbor, because that neighbor, in his right of citizenship, differs from him as to the best method of government. The true American feeling is manifest here to-night. Our children must play together in the years to come, whether they are Democrats or Republicans. They will inter-marry. They will rear families. Their lots will be cast together; they will all be interested alike in promoting the welfare, the honor and the glory of this mighty republic, and this being so, why will we quarrel because they can not agree?”
TheIndianapolis News, politically antagonistic, editorially referred to “Mr. Kern’s unusual gift of felicitous extemporaneous speech” in commenting upon his “altogether admirable speech.” After a few days of much needed rest spent with his family at the home, the nominee turned to the preparation of briefs in supreme court cases during the next few weeks, with occasional political journeys, and some non-partisan addresses. Most enjoyable to him among the latter was his trip to Kokomo to receive the non-partisan homage of his “home folks.” Herehe was forced to address a great throng from the hotel balcony before the exercises in the evening at the theater, where Judge Harness, a Republican, presided. Here he was greatly affected as he stood waiting for the ovation to end while the band played “Auld Lang Syne.” And here, too, he made a heart speech, unmarred by a partisan note. In the latter part of July he attended a meeting of the national committee at Chicago when Norman Mack was chosen for the national chairmanship, and here he again conferred with Mr. Bryan. And on August 11 he was the guest of Mr. Bryan at Fairview on the occasion of the latter’s notification. Here he made a brief non-partisan address and conferred with the presidential nominee and Mr. Mack. Another non-partisan address at Indianola, Iowa, where he visited his mother’s grave, renewed boyhood friendships, and revisited the scenes of childhood, and a political speech at Milwaukee intervened before his formal notification at Indianapolis on August 25.
This was a great day in the history of the Hoosier Democracy. The faithful gathered from the four quarters, for not only was the Indiana leader, most beloved by the rank and file, to receive his formal notification, but Mr. Bryan, the idol of the same element, was to participate in the ceremonies. Indianapolis was thronged. The day was ideal. In the morning before the exercises Mr. Bryan and Kernreceived and conferred with party leaders from over the country, and met the members of the national committee and the notification committee, and all these sat down to a luncheon at the Denison hotel. The notification was made in the enormous coliseum at the state fair grounds, which seats 20,000 people. Hundreds of automobiles bearing the politicians dashed out Meridian street, and it required 500 street cars to carry the less favored. When Bryan and Kern entered the immense auditorium each was given an ovation from the vast audience. Theodore Bell, of California, chairman of the notification committee, charmed with his eloquent address of notification, and Mr. Kern, in accepting the nomination, took up the challenge thrown down by James S. Sherman, his Republican competitor, in his speech at Utica, N. Y., making a powerful presentation of the Democratic case on the tariff, the trusts, and popular government. That evening he and Mrs. Kern entertained the party celebrities at dinner at the Country club, and the great day was over. Mr. Kern was now the nominee for vice-president, and knew it.
By the middle of September Mr. Kern’s itinerary had been made out by the national committee and called for extensive campaigning, especially in the east and south. There had been rumblings throughthe press of some apathy in the southern states, and while there was no danger of losing the electoral votes of this section, it was thought but the part of deserved courtesy to send the vice-presidential nominee through the south. The middle of September found him addressing a great throng at the state fair at Louisville, where he carefully refrained from any expression of a partisan nature; two days later he was in Chicago with Mr. Bryan, and on the 19th he began his speaking tour of the south. This took him first into Maryland. It was while here that the unfortunate Haskell episode, which occasioned such concern and embarrassment to leading Democrats, occurred. The charge that the treasurer of the Democratic national committee had some sort of connections with the Standard Oil Company, had been taken up by President Roosevelt with the view to convincing the people of the insincerity, if not dishonesty, of the Democratic candidates in the matter of campaign contributions. There was enough fire to make much smoke with the careful handling of an astute politician like Mr. Roosevelt using his high office as a base of operations. The publicity-before-the-election policy of Bryan and Kern was causing Mr. Taft and Mr. Roosevelt no end of trouble, and the attempt of the former, strangely backed by the latter, to convince the people that a program of publicity-after-the-election would do quite as well wasnot making a favorable impression. Thus the Haskell incident was worked to the limit of its possibilities. At Elliott City, Md., Mr. Kern took notice of the president’s contribution to the campaign concerning the Haskell matter, charging him with using it in an effort to muddy the waters, and ridiculing his pretensions as a reformer. From Maryland he was forced to jump to Mansfield, Ohio, to formally open the campaign in that state with former Gov. James E. Campbell, where he discussed the tariff and trusts and facetiously referred to the Foraker-Taft-Roosevelt Kilkenny cat fight. Five days later he met his opponent for the first time at the Auditorium Annex in Chicago. Learning that Mr. Sherman was in the hotel, he expressed a desire to Senator Smith, of Michigan, to meet him. The senator called the Republican nominee from his room and the meeting took place in the lobby, to the delight of the newspaper men. This was the beginning of a warm personal friendship between two men whose political opinions were as divergent as it was possible for them to be.
From Chicago Mr. Kern plunged into the south, making his first speeches in Alabama. All the Kern meetings in the south were remarkable demonstrations. His meeting at Birmingham was a huge success. On his way from this industrial capital of Alabama to Atlanta he spoke for ten minutes to themill hands at Anniston. These were the men to whom he made a strong appeal.
At Macon, Ga., when his train drew into the station he found a cheering crowd to greet him and the meeting in the evening was one of the most rousing he addressed during the campaign. Here he took occasion to reply vigorously to the attacks of Mr. Bryan’s enemies on the ground that he was “unsafe.”
His meeting at Asheville, N. C., in early October, was one of the stirring old-fashioned sort, the greatest political meeting that had been held there since 1896. A picturesque touch was given to this demonstration by several hundred mountaineers riding into town from miles around on mules. Here he was introduced by former Governor Glenn and followed by the brilliant James Hamilton Lewis.
Having in two weeks spoken in Maryland, Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina, he closed this part of his canvass, hoarse from a cold and from over-use of the voice at a great meeting at Huntington, W. Va., on October 10, and on the following day he reached his home in Indianapolis.
Here a great trouble awaited him. John Kern, Jr., had been stricken with that most distressing of maladies, infantile paralysis. During the next three days the candidate spent every moment possible at the bedside of his stricken boy, but the 14th of October found him engaged in strenuous campaigning in New Jersey. In the afternoon he spoke to the business men in Elizabeth, and at night to two remarkable meetings at Newark and Jersey City. At the former meeting the meeting was preceded by an old-fashioned parade with marching clubs, and the faithful in automobiles, the streets aglare from the red lights carried by the marchers, and by occasional bonfires along the streets. From Newark he was hurried to Jersey City, where he was greeted with a great crowd at Phœnix hall. It was at this latter meeting that he attacked the source of some great fortunes. Referring to the comment of Judge Taft that one way to reduce swollen fortunes would be for the possessors to give generously, Kern said that “Judge Taft advocates the pillaging of the people and trusting to the generosity of the pillager to pay back some of the ill-gotten riches.”
On the following day the candidate spoke at Tammany Hall in New York city, where his entrance was the signal for an ovation which was repeated a moment later when Lieutenant-Governor Chandler, the nominee for governor, ascended the platform and clasped the hand of the vice-presidential nominee. Mr. Kern’s speech here in the great financial center of the country was significant of his unwillingness to in any way compromise on his progressive principles for the possible effect in New York city.
In all his speeches on his eastern tour Mr. Kernmade a special plea to the laboring classes, for upon these he predicated his sole hope of carrying New York, New Jersey or Connecticut. At Bridgeport, Conn., he addressed his remarks exclusively to these.
On the 19th of October he went to Utica, the home city of Mr. Sherman, his Republican opponent. Here, to his surprise, he was given one of the most remarkable welcomes of his tour. Knowing of Mr. Sherman’s wonderful hold on the affections of his fellow citizens he was startled at the warmth of the greeting until he learned that his opponent had wired a request to his own followers to join in the general welcome. As he stepped upon the platform to face a great audience he was handed a personal telegram of welcome from Sherman, then touring the west. This was a touch that Kern could appreciate, for it smacked of himself, and his opening remarks were in a happy vein as he referred to the incident. His speech here was an attack upon the great trusts and on swollen fortunes made possible by special legislation. It was here he said that “the spending on one dinner by the ultra-rich of sufficient to feed a million starving men is doing more to foster socialism and anarchism than all the socialistic and anarchistic propaganda.”
If Utica was to be remembered by him as the scene of a pleasing act of chivalric courtesy, it was also to be associated with the most painful shock of the campaign. It was here that a telegram reached him announcing the serious condition of young John and summoning him to the bedside. He immediately canceled all engagements and left for Indianapolis. Reaching home in the early morning, worn with fatigue of travel and speaking, he took up his vigil by the sick boy’s bed, scarcely leaving his side. The next few days found the vice-presidential nominee in the sick room. On October 26th he arranged to keep in constant touch with his home, and left for a week of strenuous campaigning in Indiana. By using steam train, interurbans and automobiles he was able to cover the state from the river to the lake making many speeches each day. On the Friday night before the election he spoke to the people of Indianapolis at a great meeting at Tomlinson hall. During the days immediately preceding Andrew Carnegie had gravely announced his adherence to the cause of Taft and Protection, and this announcement, which was unnecessary, was followed by one equally unnecessary from John D. Rockefeller to the same effect. These announcements appealed to Mr. Kern’s sense of humor, and he discussed them with biting sarcasm.
Mr. Kern’s close of his Indiana campaign at Evansville on Saturday night was not to mark the end of his labors. On the insistence of the national committee he was hurried into northern Ohio for anumber of speeches on the day before the election, and after a meteoric rush through numerous towns he spoke his last word at night at an important meeting at Toledo.
But as he turned toward home that night it was not of the battle of ballots on the morrow that he was thinking.
It was a sad group that gathered in the Kern library the night of the election. The returns were not the cause nor did they create much interest for the immediate family, which was alone; they were more intent on the news that the doctors and nurse were bringing from the room above where John, Jr., was fighting what then seemed to be a hopeless battle. He was not expected to live through the night. The fact that the little warrior’s mind was keen and alert that night only added a poignancy to the pathos. He won his battle; and on the morning after when Mrs. Kern entered the room the little fellow looked up anxiously:
“Mother, was father elected?”
Mrs. Kern hesitated a moment and then told the truth:
“No, John, your father was defeated.”
The boy closed his eyes tight and with the bitterness of childhood exclaimed:
“Uh! What fools the people of the United States are to turn down such a man as father.”
Later on, when the boy was on the road to ultimate recovery, this remark, rather pathetic at the time, took on a humorous side; and when two years later Vice-President Sherman was in Indianapolis and called at the Kern home the story was told for his amusement. To the surprise of every one the amusing feature of the story did not appeal to him. His eyes filled up, and tenderly placing his hand on the head of the boy, still crippled, he said gravely:
“My boy, the more I have seen of your father and the better I know him the more I am inclined to think you were right.”
This incident, so expressive of the sweetness and tenderness of Mr. Sherman, added to many other manifestations of his chivalry, endeared him to Mr. Kern. While no two men could possibly have differed more widely on almost every phase of public policy, a personal affection sprang up between them which lasted through the life of both. During the campaign the chivalry of Mr. Sherman was not confined to urging his supporters to give his opponent a royal welcome to Utica, nor to the personal telegram of greeting that was handed Mr. Kern that night on the platform. When the announcement went out from that city that the Democratic nominee had been summoned home by the serious illness of his boy, hehad scarcely turned homeward when another telegram reached him from Mr. Sherman expressing his sympathy in tenderest phrasing. And when during the last week of the campaign a vicious personal attack was made on Kern by a New York paper, even before he had heard of it, his Republican opponent wired him of his personal disgust. When two years later Mr. Kern entered the Senate and had been sworn in, before he could reach his seat a page overtook him with a request from the vice-president for him to take the chair. And these instances of the beautiful chivalry of “Jim” Sherman might be multiplied. When the vice-president died Mr. Kern was one of the senators chosen to pay tribute to his memory at the impressive services in the Senate chamber attended by the president and his cabinet, the justices of the supreme court, the members of the House, and the diplomatic corps. The address he made on this occasion is the only one he delivered during his senatorial career in which he took special pride. He put his heart into it, for, like so many others who differed with him radically in politics, he had learned to love the man who defeated him for the vice-presidency in 1908.
THE seventeen months following the election of 1908 were to bring to Mr. Kern the most bitter disappointment and the most gratifying triumph of his career. While Indiana had been lost to the national ticket by a comparatively small majority, local conditions, and the remarkably attractive campaign of Thomas R. Marshall, the gubernatorial nominee, had resulted in the election of a Democratic governor and legislature. And the majority in the legislature meant the election of a Democratic United States senator. As a result, the polls had scarcely closed in Indiana when the state found itself engaged in another spirited contest to determine which of the Democratic aspirants should be sent to Washington. In quick succession these men appeared upon the scene with their organizations and pretensions. It was the general assumption of the masses of the party that Mr. Kern, who had sacrificed himself to the party in 1900, in 1904 and again in 1908, and whose association upon the ticket with Mr. Bryan, the popular idol of the Indiana Democracy, carried with it that leader’s following, would enter upon his reward.
But this assumption was not to go unchallenged. To thoroughly understand the situation it is necessary to know something of the character of the campaign which had resulted in a Democratic triumph. It had hinged upon the periodic issue of liquor legislation forced upon the politicians by the action of Governor Hanly in compelling the Republican state convention to declare in favor of county option. This action had been met by the Democrats taking a stand in favor of ward and township option, and the issue had been accentuated by the move of Governor Hanly, in defiance of the appeals and threats of his fellow Republicans, in calling a special session of the legislature in the fall and forcing the county option law upon the statutes before the voters had an opportunity to register their verdict. The so-called liberal element lined up aggressively with the Democrats and with its powerful organization, with ramifications into every community, contributed much to the result. At any rate it took to itself the triumph. And this explains the element of uncertainty precipitated into the senatorial situation—the liberal element was opposed to Mr. Kern.
Among the men who offered themselves as candidates were several who had richly earned a reward from the party. Chief of these was Benjamin F. Shively, who had distinguished himself in early manhood by a brilliant career in the house of representatives, and had endeared himself to thousands by his gallant fight in 1896, when he led the party as its nominee for governor. A man of imposing presence, extraordinary intellectual equipment and impressive eloquence, he measured up to the high senatorial traditions of the party in the state of Hendricks, Voorhees, McDonald and Turpie. And in addition to that he was the favorite of the liberal element that claimed the credit for the victory.
Another aspirant was John E. Lamb, who had begun a career of exceptional promise as a member of the house of representatives before he was thirty, had maintained the reputation then made through years of brilliant service on the stump, and had, upon the personal request of Mr. Bryan, taken charge of the western headquarters in the campaign of 1908. Major G. V. Menzies, who had behind him a long career of effective party service, L. Ert Slack, about whom the radical temperance forces rallied, and E. G. Hoffman, a young man, then comparatively little known but backed with the prestige of the organization that had nominated Marshall for governor, completed the list.
While the various candidates and their organizations made the customary claims, it was generally thought throughout the state among party men of the rank and file that the recent nominee for vice-president would have an easy triumph, previous to theappearance of the politicians in Indianapolis. It was the contention of Mr. Shively’s supporters that since Kern had chosen the vice-presidency and their candidate had confined himself to the senatorial campaign the state victory warranted him in insisting upon the fruit of the triumph; and Mr. Lamb’s friends were equally insistent upon the claim that his management of the western campaign for the party gave him a clear right to the honor; while the others rested their cases upon the ground that any good party man had a right to aspire to the senatorship. Notwithstanding all these conflicting claims the prevalent impression over the state was that Kern would be selected. Until the politicians moved on Indianapolis, two weeks before the caucus, there was not the shadow of a doubt in the mind of Mr. Kern as to his election.
Seldom in the political history of Indiana have more animated scenes been witnessed than those that were staged about the Denison Hotel in Indianapolis during the two weeks preceding the contest in caucus. Headquarters were opened early by all but Kern, who persisted in the folly that his election was assured by popular mandate. Delegations of local admirers of candidates flocked from all sections. The café, in those days a place of frolic and folly, was packed until the small hours of the morning with wire-pulling politicians. All the candidates had perfected excellent organizations of practical political manipulators of men—all save Kern, who relied on popular opinion. The result was numerous interchanges of views between the various camps, attempts at bargaining, and all tending to the crystallization of one opinion—that Kern was the man to beat. Thus his advantage proved his weakness. He was not, however, to be permitted to drift without a warning. Within twenty-four hours after reaching the scene of battle Mr. Lamb, as perspicacious a politician as the state has produced, accurately sensed the situation and realized that the efforts of powerful elements were being directed primarily toward undermining the prospects of the Indianapolis candidate. He did not underestimate the resources of these elements and was convinced that the salvation of Kern depended upon an open ballot to the end that the force of opinion might be brought to bear upon the legislators. With this in view he early importuned Kern to take a determined stand against a secret caucus, and lead off himself with a declaration in favor of a vote in the open. On the following day Kern was said by the press to favor an open ballot—but he made no statement. And when, on the day following, the press reported “Kern stock booming,” with thirty-five votes certain on the first ballot, he permitted himself to be lulled into a sense of security. It was almost a week after Lamb had taken his standand but two days before the date for the caucus that Kern was forced by unmistakable developments to a realization of his danger, and he gave out a statement to the effect that the people had a right to know how their representatives voted.
It was on the day of the caucus that the trend of events began to develop into meaning to the spectator. Members of the legislature were actually quoted inThe Indianapolis Newsas saying that they “did not intend to tell any one how they voted.” And that same evening the common talk about the hotel lobby was of combinations against Kern, with all the other candidates posing as the logical beneficiary of the combine.
When, accompanied by Oscar Henderson and Michael A. Ryan, Mr. Kern reached the state house on the night of the caucus and took up his quarters in the rooms of the lieutenant governor it was with a full realization of his danger. He knew that the votes would be delivered in the dark, and he suspected that with the exception of Lamb the other candidates were in league against him. Almost exhausted, he lay down upon a couch for an hour, too tired to talk, merely nodding his head in reply to questions. During the balloting the scenes about the state house were exciting enough and not a little disgraceful. Members emerging from the room were followed like prisoners by attaches of the legislature in an effortto prevent them from conversing, and one of these narrowly escaped a caning at the hands of Lamb when he poked his head over the candidate’s shoulder in an effort to hear what he was saying to the senator from his own county, who was acting as his floor manager. It required twenty ballots to elect, but the first ballot sounded the knell of Kern’s hopes. Where he had hoped for more than thirty votes he received but twenty-five, although the combined strength of the two next highest, Shively and Lamb only surpassed it by one vote. The second ballot was significant with two desertions—at a time when there could be but one explanation for such desertions, and that plain treachery. On the third ballot, when Lamb went to him, he received thirty-four votes, but instead of starting a rush in his direction he fell to twenty-eight on the next ballot—showing that men playing the cat and mouse act with him had taken flight. At 10 o’clock Kern rose from the couch and paced the corridors smoking, his hands in his side pockets, and on the announcement of the fifth ballot he said “It’s all over.” From that time on it was a case of hoping against hope. As the contest narrowed to Kern and Shively efforts were made to persuade some of the losing candidates to throw their support to Kern, but their attitude clearly disclosed in the case of the men approached that he was the one man they would not benefit if they could help it. At2 A. M. the door to the caucus room flew open—Shively had been elected, the final vote giving him 42 to Kern’s 36.
That was the darkest night in Kern’s career.
Through years of sacrifice he had reached—this. He went home that night more completely crushed than he ever was before or after.
But over at the hotel a group of politicians celebrated throughout the night, not so much over Shively’s election as over Kern’s defeat. But the next morning threw a different light on things. A wave of bitter resentment against the secret caucus swept over the state and legislators were being called to an accounting. The roll call by the various constituencies of the state during the next few days disclosed that Kern still had the majority of eight he had figured on. It was a period of alibis. Irate members under suspicion of treachery furiously announced through the press that they were “ready to lick any man who says I did not vote for Kern.”The Indianapolis Newseditorially expressed the prevalent opinion when it said—“We think that Mr. Kern suffered from the secret ballot, for this deprived him of the weight of the popular indorsement which was clearly his, and which would have had full play had there been an open ballot.” The event attracted attention all over the country and within twenty-four hours Representative Charles B. Landis, from Washington, made the prophetic prediction that this particular secret caucus would result in a direct primary “or something of the sort.”
With Kern it was accepted as the end of a political career, and he turned again, now sixty years of age, to the practice of his profession. About this time he received a letter from James B. Morrow, the well-known Washington journalist, to the effect that he would soon be passing through Indianapolis and would stop over in the hope of having a talk with him concerning his early struggles, with the view to writing a special feature article. Mr. Kern replied that he would be glad to see him. It was several months before he appeared. The night he reached Indianapolis Kern received him in his office and after relating the story of his early struggles he sat until a late hour with the journalist exchanging stories and reminiscences of public men. During the whole of this time not a word was said about the senatorial election. At length as they were preparing to leave and Morrow was helping Kern on with his overcoat, the former remarked that in the east they had expected to see Kern in the senate. With a whimsical smile Kern replied that he too had expected it, but that “they got eight of them away from me.” On being asked who he meant by “they” he replied—“The brewery crowd.” It was not the understanding of Kern that this was part of the interview,but Morrow, with the keen nose for the important, incorporated it in his story. In doing so he did not employ the exact words used—but the sense was the same. The difference was due to the cold type. That interview was to pursue him as long as he lived. He might have escaped some embarrassment by giving the lie to the newspaper man—a favorite method of most politicians. But Kern knew that Morrow wrote sincerely and with no evil intentions and it was so nearly exact that he accepted it. Two years later, after his election to the senate, Morrow entered the office of Kern in Washington and asked to see him. “I want to thank him, congratulate him, and apologize to him. I wrote an interview with him once that must have caused him considerable annoyance. In years of experience as a newspaper man he is the first man, thus confronted with an interview that caused annoyance that did not repudiate the interview and put the lie on the correspondent. He did not—and he stood the gaff. I want to apologize for unintentionally causing him annoyance, thank him for not giving me the lie, and congratulate him on being a man.”
That interview was perhaps the most famous ever given by a public man in Indiana.
Kern quickly recovered from his disappointment and turned to his profession with the determinationto put politics behind him forever and devote the remainder of his life to making money for his family. He had sacrificed much to politics, and at the age of sixty was a poor man. But he had an excellent practice and could look forward with confidence to several years of active work. While too ardently attached to the principles of his party to fail in party service when occasion called he considered his office-seeking days as over and his family rejoiced in his retirement.
As the campaign of 1910 approached with another United States senator to be elected, Governor Marshall startled the stationary politicians with a statement in advocacy of the nomination of a senator in the state convention. This was one of the fruits of the secret caucus of the spring of 1909. At first there was a disposition to treat the suggestion with levity, but it appealed so strongly to the rank and file that the old-line politicians finally felt compelled to take an aggressive stand against it. And the fight was on. The governor merely stood firmly on his statement, taking the position that it would not be becoming in him to take the stump in its behalf, but his personal popularity carried it far. And when almost immediately many veteran politicians such as John E. Lamb put on the armor in its behalf the fight became picturesque and exciting. There has probably neverbeen a more dramatic political convention in Indiana than that which met in Tomlinson Hall in the spring of 1910. We need not go into details concerning the preliminary work of the convention culminating in the triumph of the “governor’s plan.” With this phase of the convention Mr. Kern had nothing to do. He occupied a seat with the Marion county delegation—one of the rank and file. After the vote on the plan he left the hall and was absent when the names of various candidates for the senatorial nomination were presented. He had a premonition that his name might be urged upon the delegates and had taken steps, as he thought, to prevent any such movement. Hearing that the delegations from Howard and Clinton counties had announced their intention of supporting him, he had personally protested and felt that he had accomplished his purpose. He did not know that a few farmer delegates from the Indianapolis delegation could start a storm. Returning to the convention while the first ballot was in progress he found that his name was before the convention. “When I entered the hall,” he said afterward, “several men yelled ‘Stand pat, John,’ and I didn’t know what to do for an instant. I thought, however that the manly thing to do was to make a statement to the convention and I stood on a chair and told them that my name had been presented without my knowledgeor consent, and that no man had any right or authority to present my name and that I was not in any sense a candidate.”
The moment he concluded Wabash county was called and cast 15 out of its 16 votes for him, and Wayne county followed with its 26 votes—the solid delegation.
When his name had been first presented there was a tremendous ovation and cries of “Kern,” “Kern” drowned all other noises. In a box in the balcony an interesting little drama was enacted. Mrs. Marshall, wife of the governor, was entertaining several ladies, including Mrs. Kern and Meredith Nicholson, the novelist. When Kern’s name was presented and the demonstration began, Mrs. Kern, frankly elated at the rare honor being shown her husband, insisted that he would not accept. This was received with incredulity by the others present. The subject had been thoroughly threshed out about the family hearth and she knew. Nicholson scouted the idea that he would decline—a preposterous idea! When Kern appeared, his coat almost torn from him by frantic friends trying to hold him back, and mounted the chair and rebuked his friends, the novelist, amazed, exclaimed—“That man’s not human.” But that was not to be his final effort. The first ballot ended with Kern far in the lead with 303 votes, only six of these from Marion county, the other 177 having been castfor Thomas Taggart. On the second ballot Taggart withdrew his name and cast the solid vote of the delegation for Kern, and the roll call ended found him with 647 votes.
It was then, with the nomination within his grasp, that Kern made his supreme effort to put aside the crown. This time he took the platform and the convention heard him with impatience, and with a considerable show of feeling he protested against the right of the delegates to force upon him something he had renounced. When he said that it had been intimated that he had been masquerading in the matter he was greeted with shouts of “No, no,” “Sit down” and “You can’t refuse.”
Leaving the hall on the conclusion of his speech he went to his law office and began work on a case. It was while thus engaged, and after Lamb had also withdrawn in his favor, that the stenographer, answering the telephone, turned to him in surprise with the exclamation—“Why, Mr. Kern, you have just been nominated for the senate.”
His first inclination was to refuse the nomination. But the fact that it was so manifestly the spontaneous will of the party and the urgent insistence of the avowed candidates that he face a duty finally persuaded him against his will. Almost in a flash all his plans for a peaceful life in the practice of his profession were ruins at his feet, and he again, as somany times before, put on the armor and prepared for battle.
The senatorial campaign in Indiana in 1910 was unique in the political history of the state. Senator Albert J. Beveridge was the nominee of the Republican party for re-election, although his position with his own party was precariously insecure. He had entered public life as an aggressive and brilliant exponent of the more pronounced Hamiltonian theories, and had been a consistent champion of Big Business, an audacious defender and eulogist of the trust, an eloquent advocate of the protective tariff, and in other ways, viewed from the Democratic viewpoint, a peculiarly advanced and defiant reactionary. But he had rebelled against the Aldrich senatorial machine when it threw even discretion in the winds in its arrogant determination to force the Payne-Aldrich tariff bill upon the country, and had joined Dolliver, Cummins, Bristow, Clapp and Lafollette in the fight against it. This he had done with his usual brilliancy and eloquence, and he had thus incurred the deadly enmity of the reactionary element of his party in the state. Unhappily for him this was the predominant element. His one hope under the circumstances was that his courageous act of rebellion would rally to his support the progressive element of the Democratic party and thus make up forany loss from the Republicans. This plan, however, contemplated the creation of the impression among the progressives that the election of a Democratic legislature would result in the election of a reactionary to the senate, and his supporters had two or three men in mind to hold forth to the people as likely beneficiaries of a Democratic victory. The action of the state convention in nominating a candidate overthrew all these well-laid plans. The nomination of Kern, nationally known as a progressive, was the last straw. Little wonder that Senator Beveridge, in writing to Governor Marshall after the adoption of “the governor’s plan,” said “You have broken my heart.” But thus handicapped he prepared to contest every inch of the ground, and no man has ever made a more thorough and brilliant campaign.
Kern opened the campaign in a strong speech at Evansville on October 1st. It was a powerful presentation of the issues involved in the unique campaign in which a Republican senator was appealing for support on the strength of his repudiation of the policies of his party while urging the retention of that party in power. The action of Beveridge in voting for the ship subsidy bill and against the income tax was used with deadly effect, as was the insistence of some of the senator’s friends, such as Charles G. Sefrit, ofThe Washington Herald, that had the vote of the senator been necessary to the passage of the Payne-Aldrich bill he would have supported it. All his references to his opponent were directed by Mr. Kern to an effort to compromise his position as a contender for the progressive vote, and the senator had been too intimately identified with Republican policies to make this difficult. The last half of his speech was consumed in a denunciation of the extravagant expenditures by Republican congresses and the misuse of the taxing power.
The speech was considered extraordinarily adroit and forceful.The Indianapolis News, a Republican paper, never friendly to the senator, in an editorial analysis of Mr. Kern’s discussion of the senator’s progressive pretentions, managed to insinuate an interrogation of its own and concluded by saying: “What Mr. Kern had to say of governmental extravagance was well said. He argued that extravagance and protection are related to each other, that protection is itself extravagance. On the whole Mr. Kern’s speech is a strong and fair statement of the Democratic position. This is manifestly a campaign in which the speakers on both sides are going to deal with real things and real issues. The truth is that the people are tired of the old buncombe, a fact which the campaigners evidently appreciate. The question in Indiana is whether the people will believe that the insurgents are strong enough to change the course of their party, which they admit to havebeen wrong, and to free it from influences that have long dominated it, which they confess to be abhorrent. And that is a question which each man must answer for himself, with the help of such information as he may be able to get. It gives us pleasure to commend the speech of Mr. Kern as a straightforward and manly presentation of the Democratic case.”
Mr. Bryan telegraphed: “Your speech was a powerful statement and much stronger both in substance and manner to that of your opponent.”
During the next month Mr. Kern was constantly on the stump, speaking afternoon and night, accompanied usually by correspondents of Indianapolis papers upon whom the personality of the candidate made an agreeable impression, if we are to judge by the tone of their articles. In this way his speeches were given the widest possible publicity. As the campaign progressed his reiterated questionings of Senator Beveridge’s position as a progressive led the latter to taking a more advanced position than in the beginning, and this served to further embitter the Republican reactionaries. In speech after speech Kern dwelt upon the senator’s vote in favor of a ship subsidy until toward the close of the campaign Mr. Beveridge was forced to pledge himself against a similar performance. Never, perhaps, has Senator Beveridge been more eloquent,more daring and dashing than in the campaign of 1910. He preferred to look upon his rôle as that of a crusader, and he did smite the reactionaries hip and thigh. As the heat of the battle increased this crusading feature was emphasized until the sentimental reached a climax in the declaration of Fred Landis, an orator noted for his quaint humor, that Beveridge, holding the plutocrats at bay, was standing for “Mary of the vine-clad cottage.” This symbolizing of the humble lot was instantly seized upon by the senator’s crusading friends, and even the senator adopted “Mary,” until Kern turned it into ridicule in a speech at Decatur which caused a roar of laughter from river to lake. In satire and ridicule Kern had no equal in the state, and he used his weapons on occasions with much effectiveness. His satire on Mary was copied inThe New York Sun, and as long as the present generation lingers on the stage “Mary of the vine-clad cottage” will bring a smile.
The two candidates, while strenuously engaged on the stump themselves, had some outside assistance. Mr. Roosevelt swept across northern Indiana in behalf of Beveridge, but some unpleasantness of a mysterious nature diverted popular discussion from what he said to the fact that he refused to leave his car to address a great throng at Richmond. The two former presidential nominees of the Democratic party, andboth personal friends, Alton B. Parker and Mr. Bryan entered the state in behalf of Mr. Kern. In his speech at Indianapolis the middle of October Judge Parker told his hearers that in the senate “we shall need the common sense, the sturdy honesty and eloquence of John W. Kern.” And about the same time Bryan was sweeping over the state in a characteristic whirlwind of oratory, addressing a dozen audiences a day and everywhere making a special plea for the election of Kern.
Thus in the struggle for the progressive vote the advantage was all with Kern. There was no possible reason why any progressive of the Democratic party should vote against Kern, and while the Republican progressives were intensely loyal to Beveridge they were in the minority, and the Republican reactionaries were bent upon the destruction of the man who had refused to bend beneath the Aldrich lash. It is doubtful if any man has ever been the victim of greater treachery than Beveridge in 1910. There was scarcely a community where the Republican politicians were not whetting their knives for his slaughter. The result was easily foreseen and the Democrats carried the legislature.
The peculiarly venomous and unscrupulous nature of Kern’s enemies was disclosed after the election by the suggestion that the legislature might not feel bound by the action of the state convention on thesenatorship. This, of course, did not get very far. The mere suggestion damned itself, and the leaders alarmed, denounced the idea of such treachery. Governor Marshall made it clear that he would not sign the commission of any man but that of the man for whom the majority of the people had voted. There was probably never the least danger from any such suggestion. Mr. Kern took no stock in the fears of many of his friends, and the event vindicated his confidence. When the legislature met he was promptly elected. Any other result would have wrecked the Democratic party for a generation.
Thus after thirty-eight years of service and sacrifice he entered into his reward in the realization of the ambition of his life.
SENATOR Kern entered the senate at a time when the dawn for the Democracy was breaking in the east; the long night of wandering in the wilderness was over and the day had come. In the opposite end of the capitol, the Democrats, with a triumphant majority, had made possible the election to the speakership of Champ Clark, one of the most uncompromising of Democrats and one of the most picturesque floor leaders that any party had ever had in the house. The Payne-Aldrich tariff bill had wrought such havoc that many of the old familiar figures of the congress had been swept into private life by the flood of popular indignation. The bitter fight that had been made by the Republican rebels in the senate against the iniquities of the tariff measure had left a once militant party in a state of demoralization, born of mutual distrust a desire for vengeance. There were no longer two parties in the senate—there were three, and the two of these counted as Republican were more bitter against each other than against the common enemy across the aisle. This was to be impressively disclosed early in the session, when the death of the venerable Fryof Maine necessitated the election of a president pro tempore and the Republicans with their numerical advantage were unable to muster a majority for Senator Gallenger, the caucus nominee, because the progressives, as they then termed themselves, insisted on voting for Senator Clapp. To intensify the Republican dissensions, the action of President Taft in calling an extraordinary session for the consideration of the Canadian Reciprocity bill was as gall and wormwood to the extreme exponents of a high protective tariff. The Republicans were surly, and hopeless, disorganized, distrustful, demoralized.
And into this new senate the elections of 1910 had injected new blood. Aldrich, for a generation the potential leader of triumphant reactionary principles, no longer answered to the roll call. Hale of Maine, the first lieutenant of Aldrich, had retired. So too had Burrows of Michigan, one of the little coterie that arbitrarily determined the course of legislation in “the good old days.” On the Democratic side of the chamber were many new faces, some young, some old, but all fresh from the people and militantly progressive in their tendencies—their faces to the east. From Maine the virile, forceful Johnson—the first Democrat in generations; from Missouri the eloquent, picturesque militant, James A. Reed, destined to claim and compel a hearing from the start; from Ohio, in the seat of the reactionary Foraker, Atlee Pomerene, a thinker and fighter with faith and vision; from Nebraska the brilliant and aggressive journalist, Gilbert Hitchcock; from New York James A. O’Gorman, than whom no stronger character has ever represented the Empire state, independent in thought and action; from Tennessee the youthful Luke Lea—“Young Thunderbolt,” they called him, because of his pugnacity in battling for whatever he considered right; from New Jersey, fresh from his triumph over Smith, the former senator who had helped to scuttle the Democratic ship in the emasculation of the Wilson bill seventeen years before; from Montana, Henry L. Myers, the soul of sincerity and political honor; from West Virginia, William E. Chilton, and from Mississippi the brilliant John Sharpe Williams. Thus of the thirty-nine Democratic senators ten were new men and every one progressive in his tendencies and determined upon an aggressive party policy.
In the days immediately preceding the opening of the session the new Democratic senators, fresh from the people, held numerous conferences, and into these conferences other senators holding similar views, such as Shively of Indiana and Stone of Missouri, were drawn. There was much to consult about. The rank and file of the party throughout the country had not been satisfied with the character of the Democratic opposition to the Payne-Aldrich tariff bill, which had been secondary to that of the Republican rebels. During the long years of Democratic defeat there had developed among the Democratic gray beards of the senate an exotic known as the “White House” senator—the man whose party militancy had been softened into mushiness through the influence of social and patronage favors. There were others thought to be on too intimate terms with the Republican oligarchy dominated by Aldrich. Flowers over the garden wall had become too common. In brief the masses of the Democratic party were demanding a far more aggressive and uncompromising party policy than had been in evidence in a number of years. And practically all of the new senators, fresh from the people, shared heartily in these views.
But the method of impressing their views upon the Democratic membership of the senate presented a problem. Under the antiquated rules and practices, sustained by the pernicious rule of seniority, which held that new senators should be seen and not heard for an indefinite period, the old regime would arbitrarily determine committee assignments and, largely, caucus action. And they were practical politicians—these new men. They were not in the least awed by the atmosphere of the capitol. And they understood perfectly that if they were to get a “place in the sun” for the policies they stood for theywould have to fight for it. This they determined to do.
From the beginning these new men gathered around Senator Kern, who was not only the oldest man among them, but the best known nationally. Day by day groups gathered in his offices, and without in any sense claiming it he found himself in the position of counselor of the militant progressives—the exponents of the new deal. His forty years of active participation in the hard-fought political battles of the doubtful state of Indiana gave assurance of a safe leadership; and his very name was a symbol of the policy these new men proclaimed.
The fight came in the election of the caucus leader, whose power to name the committee on committees made him in a large sense the determining factor in deciding the general tone of the Democratic side of the senate. Senator Martin of Virginia, who had been the leader and expected to retain the leadership, was generally looked upon as an ultra conservative, and at that very hour a fight was being made against him along progressive lines in the Old Dominion. A man of pleasing personality and unfailing courtesy, the decision to contest his re-election was not predicated upon personal dislike, but upon the fact that he at the time symbolized the old regime, which the new men proposed to pull down. For this purpose Senator Kern presented to the caucus, in opposition,the name of Senator Shively. The vote was a revelation to the “gray beards.” Notwithstanding the vigorous fight made in behalf of the Virginia senator, the peculiar sense of senatorial courtesy, the personal pleas that his defeat would be used unfairly against him in his fight in the primaries of the state, the accessions to the new senators from the old were so numerous that Martin’s majority was not at all gratifying.
This marked the beginning of the general reorganization of the Democrats of the senate. The representatives of the old regime readily recognized the necessity of making concessions, and in the selection of the steering committee, or committee on committees, the new senator from Indiana was included. This within itself was a distinction seldom, until then, accorded a new member.
It was in connection with his work on this committee that Senator Kern met the greatest embarrassment of his senatorial career, resulting in some unjust criticism on the part of his political enemies in Indiana. The determination of the personnel of the important Finance committee, it was his desire that his colleague, Senator Shively, should have a place on this committee. Not only did the senior senator desire the assignment, but he was peculiarly fitted for it by a lifetime of study of fiscal legislation. No man connected with the public life of Indiana for a generation had possessed such a mastery of the intricacies of tariff legislation. He had unhappily been deprived of the opportunity of participating actively in the discussions of the Payne-Aldrich bill by the physical breakdown which had followed almost immediately his entrance to the senate, and he had felt it keenly. But his special qualifications for service on this committee were well known by all his colleagues, and he had the further qualification of having served on the Ways and Means committee of the house. For some reason a stubborn opposition to the appointment of Senator Shively developed, and to make the situation more embarrassing it was proposed by Senator Kern’s colleagues on the committee that he should accept a place on the Finance committee. In the meanwhile some senators, understanding Kern’s position, called upon Shively with a frank statement of the situation, with the view to getting his indorsement of Kern’s acceptance, but the senior senator, not unnaturally miffed by the attitude of the steering committee, maintained silence. At this the senators who made the attempt returned to the meeting of the committee, and, in the absence of Kern, and knowing his position, placed him upon the Finance committee. These facts are set forth because of the disposition of Senator Kern’s enemies to create the impression that he had used his position on the steering committee to further his own interests at the expense of his colleague. Of interest in this connection is the fact that two years later when elected to the leadership of the senate and the chairmanship of the steering committee he voluntarily retired from the Finance committee in favor of his colleague, while permitting him to retain the equally important assignment as ranking member of the committee on Foreign Relations. Notwithstanding the persistent efforts of petty busy-bodies in Indiana to alienate the two senators, their relations warmed with their years of association in the senate and were never closer than when, on the solicitation of the dying Shively, Senator Kern called at the White House to urge the appointment as ambassador to Chili of Joseph H. Shea, who had managed Shively’s campaign for the senate against Kern in the legislature of 1909.