Today -100: June 13, 1912: Of saturnalias of fraud and larceny

The RNC gives another 40 contested seats to Taft and none to Roosevelt, including 2 in California, simply disregarding the California primary law, because RNC rules are “supreme.” (This was the first ever presidential primary in California. When the Progressives came to power, they decided to go with principle over party machinery and enacted a primary law that awarded delegates based on the proportion of votes in the state as a whole. The Taft side accepted this, because it would give them some power, and Taft himself gave written approval to his list of delegates, as required by the law. But when he lost badly, his side claimed that party rules required that delegates be awarded by district, then claimed to have won two districts by a small margin, which is literally impossible to determine, since some precincts crossed district lines. Got it?) Gov. Hiram Johnson refuses to go before the committee to argue against the decision, saying it would be “an insult to the people of California were I to appear in a trial of the title to stolen property, with the thief who stole it sitting as Judge.” Sen. Dixon of Montana says the RNC is presiding over a “Saturnalia of fraud and larceny”. The Arizona primaries were also basically ignored in awarding that state’s delegates.

In a statement denouncing the RNC, Roosevelt says that the opponents of the Republican bosses are not the “irregulars” and would not be “bolting” the party, as the common usage would have it, but vice versa. He points out that the Taft majority on the RNC comes from territories (Alaska, the Philippines, etc) which don’t have a vote, states with very few actual Republicans, and states where Taft was rejected in the primaries.

Roosevelt finally comes out unequivocally in favor of a women’s suffrage plank in the party platform.

175 Mexican federales and rebels are killed in a battle in the Mormon colony – the battle that caused the Romneys to flee back to the US.

Striking Hungarian and Slav workers take over Perth Amboy, NJ after the companies bring in strikebreakers and guards, who shoot at the strikers.