The United States President Election of 1912 was fought between 3 of the major candidates. President William Howard Taft was renominated by the Republican Party. President Theodore Roosevelt, however did not get renominated even though he was the former president. President Roosevelt created his own party and named it the Progressive Party which was nicknamed "Bull Moose Party." This later nominated Roosevelt and let other candidates run for major offices in other states. Democrat-Woodrow Wilson was nominated on the 46th ballot. Thanks to the support of William Jennings Bryan, the three time Democratic Presidential candidate (Wilson) had a large number of voters in 1912.
The socialist candidate that I did my research on was Eugene V. Debs. His platform consisted of woman's suffrage, public ownership of utilities, and a shortened work day. He also believed in Tax Reform—The adoption of a graduated income tax, the increase of the rates of the present corporation tax and the extension of inheritance taxes…… Minimum Wage—establishing minimum wage scales.
Direct Election of President—The Election of the President and Vice-President by people.
Social Insurance— system of insurance by the State of all its members against unemployment and invalidism.
President Taft was expected to be Roosevelt's man in the white house if Roosevelt were to win the election and Taft vowed to follow Roosevelt's progressive policies. People later found out that TAFT stood for Take Advice From Theodore. I think this was pretty creative, but I feel like Taft should have stood up for himself a little more than he does. His "handlers" tried saying that he was this way because he refused to say anything rude or negative about his opponent. President Taft won the Election of 1908 and decided to run for his second term in 1912. Roosevelt considered Taft a traitor and thought that he was going against Roosevelt's plan for the economy. Theodore was very bitter over Taft's antitrust policy, which had targeted one of Roosevelt's personally sanctioned "Good Trusts," U.S. Steel. I can understand why Roosevelt thought that Taft was betraying him and thought that he was going against him, because I think I would think the same thing. I don't think Taft was trying to make Roosevelt feel this way, it's just kind of the way it looked.
President Roosevelt didn't always agree with the Republicans thoughts, but he decided that he needed their help and support if he wanted to win this election. He worked out an understanding with the legislators which gave him a free hand in foreign affairs in return, holding back the more progressive items of his domestic plan. Roosevelt didn't stop from using the executive office to help break up monopolies. He gave many lectures to the nation about how he thought the government should regulate big businesses. I agree with him on this because I can see how big of a problem monopolies were to the economy back then. I also disagree because I don't think the government should be able to decide what the big businesses do just because they're bigger than the smaller ones. Roosevelt had sort of an advantage because he had many wealthy capitalist who gave him up to 2 million dollars in his campaign. They supported Roosevelt because they preferred an "unpredictable head of a predictable party" in power than the "predictable head of an unpredictable party."
Wilson defeated the two other candidates (Taft and Roosevelt) in the election which lead him to have many of the electoral college and won 42% of the popular vote and his closest rival won 27%. Wilson was the only elected President of the Democratic Party between 1892 and 1932. He was also the 2nd of ONLY 2 Democrats to become president between 1860 and 1932. This was also the last election in which a candidate who wasn't either a Republican or Democrat came second in either the popular vote or the Electoral College and the first election where the 48 states of the United States participated.
Sources: "Woodrow Wilson." The White House. The White House Washington, 2006. Web. 24 Sept. 2013. <http://www.whitehouse.gov/about/presidents/woodrowwilson>;.
"Miller Center." American President: Theodore Roosevelt: Campaigns and Elections. N.p., 2013. Web. 24 Sept. 2013. <http://millercenter.org/president/roosevelt/essays/biography/3>;.
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Well done Sara!