Bull Moose Party Useless, Says Wilson.

New York Times 100 years ago today, August 20, 1912:
Whatever Need There Was for It Was Met, He Says, by the Baltimore Convention.
TALKS TO 10,000 GERMANS
Visits Headquarters Here and Spends the Night at a Club — Two Narrow Escapes In His Auto.
    Supplementing his declaration of Saturday that the Bull Moose Party was born of a feeling that the people had gone into blind alleys often enough in following the old political leadership and were determined to open a new road for themselves, Gov. Woodrow Wilson declared yesterday before 5,000 German picnickers at Schuetzen Park, near Hoboken, that a battle was fought at Baltimore which left the Democratic Party free from the bosses and made it an organized force capable of carrying out every just demand of the people.
    Gov. Wilson held that the Bull Moose Party, while it might have been considered to be necessary before the Baltimore Convention, was rendered useless and unnecessary by that convention, and was not likely, for that very reason, to menace his own party's success at the polls in November.
    "Nobody owns me and the men on the ticket with me," said Gov. Wilson. "I not only have not made a promise to any man, but no man has dared to ask me to mike a promise. My ears are free, therefore, to hear the counsels of my fellow-citizens. I am entering upon this campaign not only with hope of victory, but with an absolute confidence. I know that the people of this country have determined to take possession of their own affairs, in order that their own thoughts may be translated into the affairs of government."
    Gov. Wilson had a chat yesterday morning with Charles F. Grasty. publisher of The Baltimore Sun, who brought him enthusiastic assurances of a clean sweep in Maryland. In the afternoon he went to Schuetzen Park, at Union Hill, as the guest of the Plattdeutsch Volksfest Vereen, a charitable organization of 10,000 members, which was holding its thirty-eighth annual outing, and in the evening he came to New York to look over for the first time since he became a candidate the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee and the Campaign Committee.
    In the private office of Henry Morgenthau, Chairman of the Campaign Commitee's Finance Committee, Gov. Wilson spent the evening in conference with Mr. Morgenthau and the Treasurer, Rolla Wells. The three went over, in detail the plans that have been devised to obtain the necessary funds in such a way as to leave no strings attached to any portion of them and still to provide adequately for all necessary expenses.
    "I was greatly pleased," said Gov. Wilson, after the conference had concluded, "at the fine shape in which I found everything at headquarters. I particularly enjoyed my visit with the men who are preparing the campaign textbook. I found they were sending out the very last shoots of the proof, and that indicated fine progress."

Governor, in Auto, Has Two Escapes.
    Gov. Wilson left the National Head-quarters at 9:30 o'clock, his intention being to sleep at one of the city's clubs and to leave on an 8 o'clock train this morning for Trenton, where he is to be the guest of the Mercer County Wilson and Marshall Club at an outing at the State Fair Grounds.
    In his entrance into New York by automobile yesterday Gov. Wilson had two thrilling moments, occasioned by a taxicab in front of the Hotel Knickerbocker and a street car at the corner of Forty-second Street and Fifth Avenue. The taxicab darted out in front of the Governor's automobile while it was east-bound on Forty-second Street from the Weehawken ferry at 6 o'clock P.M. The Governor's chauffeur jammed on the emergency brake just in time to avoid a collision, and as it was he jolted his passengers out of their seats.
    In turning north into Fifth Avenue a westbound street car disputed the Governor's right of way, and the motorman drove the street car within eighteen inches of the automobile before clamping on the brakes. Men in autos following the Governor arose and tried to shout a warning, as they thought for an instant a collision would be inevitable.
    Gov. Wilson's appearance at Union Hill before the German picnickers was the signal for an outburst of applause that lasted half an hour and afterward broke loose at such frequent intervals that the Governor was unable to go ahead with the speech he had intended to make. Four German bands intervened so often that the Governor was finally driven in defeat from the platform. He arrived at Schutzen Park at 4:30 P.M.
    For the three-mile automobile ride from the nearest railroad station to Schutzen Park Mayor Wittpenn of Jersey City and Sheriff Wedin of Hudson County, rival and always militant leaders, were on hand with separate groups of enthusiasts and strings of automobiles.
    Sheriff Wedin was first to grasp the Governor's hand, and so he shoved him into his own automobile. His followers crowded close, and it was not until ten automobiles got under way that the Jersey City Mayor was able to gain a place in line.
    "I have sometimes protested against speaking of German-Americans and Irish-Americans," commenced Gov, Wilson, "Because" — but at that point a German band in a far distant corner of the grounds began its blare, and the Governor simply had to wait.
    "It seems to me we might as well have no hyphenated Americans," the Governor explained between cheers and interruptions, "because after you have gone, through the catalogue those of us who are left constitute a comparatively small number, and if you are going to give special labels to the majority of Americans, how are you going to label the minority.
    "It is merely a question of a comparative length of time when any of us came from the older countries to this side of the water, and I want to say that it seems to me America has been peculiarly enriched by the admixture of blood, which has constituted her the country that she is.

America Must Be Kept Free.
    "America has never grown old. America is for the world in 1912 just exactly what she was in the days of her settlement. I have great admiration for your distinguished German Emperor, and yet at the same time I know why you came to these shores. You came to seek a free field for your energies that you realized could be obtained nowhere where government is bound by the restrictions of classes. It is that America stands for in the view of the world just as she did at her beginning.
    "Our responsibility is to see that America is the country she is supposed to be by those who have not yet come to it. We have to ask ourselves, Is this a country where every man may become anything his gifts and energies make possible? If this is a free field are we keeping it free? If this is the home of political liberty are we seeing to it that political liberty is unspoiled? If we are not we are not true Americans.
    "It is just about two years since I began my campaign for Governor in New Jersey, and I remember that my first audiences looked at me with a very critical eye and seemed to say: 'Does this academic person know what he is talking about?' By degrees, I am proud to say, it began to dawn upon them that perhaps he did know what he was talking about and that perhaps if he were given a chance he had just so little experience in politics that he would actually undertake to do what he said he would undertake to do.
    "These men who knew the inside of politics said 'it is not possible.' It seemed to me at that time, and it seems to me now, that the inside of politics is so much smaller than the outside that all that is required is for the people outside to storm the inside and they will get what they want.
    "I am not use to competing with a band," Gov Wilson said when the music became intolerably loud, "but the band quite fully expresses my own feeling of affairs. A band is, not intellectual, but it is very spiriting. It affects the emotions, and I am ready to follow a band — after the fifth of November."
    In leaving Schuetzen Park a squad of motor-cycle policemen cleared a way for Gov. Wilson and incidentally identified him to the multitudes along the street, so that his progress toward the Weehawken Ferry was on triumphal march. But once Manhattan Isle was reached all this changed. A traffic policeman at Broadway and Forty-second Street waved the Governor's car a signal to stop, and then he sent a furniture van across its pathway on Seventh Avenue and directed a milk wagon to go northward on Broadway before the car could proceed. Gov. Wilson said he would not try to see National Chairman McCombs while here, as McCombs had been forbidden by his physician to talk politics, and it was hard enough to make him restrain himself without having political visitors to further incite him.