New Party Hears Negro Contests.

New York Times 100 years ago today, August 4, 1912:
Committee Seats One White Delegation — Then Adjourns Till Monday.
NO VOTES FOR TERRITORIES
Hotel Crowds Small and No Great Stir Made in the Convention City.
DIXON ON PARTY GROWTH
Says Country's Response to Bull Moose Call Has Been a Marvel to All.
Special to The New York Times.
    CHICAGO, Aug. 3.— The city to-day has been the scene of one convention in full swing, and of the preparations for another. Col. Roosevelt's third party Illinois State Convention adjourned at a late hour this evening after putting in effect a long programme dictated in advance by the Colonel and his lieutenants. While this gathering was in progress the preliminary activities of the National Progressive Convention, which is scheduled to meet here on Monday, were being pushed by the Colonel's campaign managers.
    All this would indicate cheering multitudes, crowded hotel lobbies, bands of music playing patriotic airs, and the hustle and activity usually attendant upon the gathering of the clans from all parts of the country in the convention city. To-night Chicago is on the eve of a convention for which all the historic interest and importance attendant upon the birth of a new party is claimed. And yet one might look about in the corridors of hotels, which are the centre for the ante-convention activities, and find little to suggest that anything out of tho ordinary is afoot. Certainly none of the outward manifestations suggest any of the keen interest that the Colonel's followers assert has been aroused throughout the length and breadth of this land by his call for the formation of a new party.

Committee Strikes a Snag.
    The Provisional National Committee of the Colonel's third party, after having been in session for many hours hearing contests brought by colored Roosevelt enthusiasts from the South who desire a vote and voice in this first National Convention of the new Progressive Party, at a late hour to-night stands in recess with its work uncompleted. It seated the twelve white delegates from Alabama, and then adjourned until 9 o'clock Monday morning.
    The committee was nearly unanimously in favor of carrying out to the letter the Colonel's policy of keeping negro delegates from the South out of the Progressive National Convention. All its activities so far have indicated that the steam roller would be put into commission to achieve that purpose whenever that would be found necessary.
    But the committee woke with a jar when, after the colored contestants from Florida had presented an unusually strong case in the face of unkind heckling by several members, E. F. Tuttle, proxy for Henry J. Doughty, the provisional National committeeman from Rhode Island, arose and entered a vigorous protest against any attempts at discrimination against the negro.
    "In New England," said Mr. Tuttle, "we have long ago passed the stage where we would stand for discrimination against anybody on account of race, religion, or color of his skin. I would not dare to return to my people were I to become a party to any such discrimination."
    The purpose of the committee has been sufficiently revealed in its handling of the contests to make it certain that every negro delegate from a Southern State would be thrown out by the time the Rhode Islander arose in protest.
    Senator Dixon, Provisional Chairman of the National Committee and the Colonel's National campaign manager, then declared a hurried recess and started working the wires to Oyster Bay with a view of obtaining some concessions from the Colonel to make the word of the committee less harsh and disagreeable, less open to unfavorable comment and dire consequences such as the loss of the votes of negroes and negro sympathizers in the North, where such votes count in a National campaign.
    The committee met shortly after noon to-day at the headquarters of the Progressives in the Congress Hotel. About forty of the fifty-seven members attended, either in person or by proxy.
    Routine business and a speech by United States Senator Joseph M. Dixon of Montana, Provisional Chairman, consumed the first two hours of the meeting.
    Senator Dixon in his speech explained his wonder at the rapid growth of the National Progressive Party, and at what had been accomplished by Col. Roosevelt and his lieutenants in the weeks that have intervened since the Colonel's defeat in the Republican National Convention here in Chicago.

Dixon Reviews Party's Progress.
    Senator Dixon said in part:
    "The call for this convention was signed on July 8. This is the third day of August, twenty-nine days later. I doubt if in the history of the Anglo-Saxon race there has ever been such a development, such an evolution politically among 90,000,000 of people as you have witnessed during the last twenty-nine days.
    "During that time forty-seven of the forty-eight States of the Union through their representatives in mass meetings have come together, and a National Convention has developed. We purposely limited our call to one man from each State equaling the number of representatives and Senators in Congress. Some faint hearts doubted whether we would have delegations enough to fill up. As it stands, more than two-thirds of the States, in the enthusiasm of the local situations, have sent delegations double and treble and quadruple and in the case of Connecticut seven times the number of delegates demanded to answer the call."
    "The Progressive Party has been organized now," shouted a member.
    "It was pure spontaneous combustion in the State of Utah; there was not a telegram sent or a letter written. Utah is organized, and here with how many, please?" continued Senator Dixon.
    "Eight delegates and eight alternates," came the response.
    "Double the number called for in the call," said the Senator. "They told me that my distinguished colleague Reed Smoot would merely blow his breath on the suggestion and you would never near a wiggle.
    "The Californians are back here in full strength. They really were the heroes and the veterans of the tenth legion on the 22d of July, and I know of no delegation on earth to which there is a warmer hand extended than to the men of California.
    "Lots of men got it into their heads that this was a bolt from the Republican Party. It was hard to make some men understand that it was the evolution of democracy; that the new National Party, knowing no north and south and no east and no west, invited to its ranks the real thinking men of this Nation, who really foresaw real meat and food and drink in this movement of the people.
    "Gentlemen, this is a positive demonstration, and when 1,100 men meet on Monday down in the Coliseum, and the story goes to the country that it is no longer an academic discussion, but that a new nation-wide movement in American politics has become an actual reality you are going to see the line stiffened in every State of the Union, and you are going to see the politician who has been a doubting Thomas up to this time reach the point where it is demonstrated to him that this is not a flash in the pan.
    "I went down to Washington — I haven't worked very much on that job since the first of March — but I have had different work. I had to go down there three weeks ago — Senator Bailey with whom I was paired said he wanted to vote on a certain matter. I stayed there a week. Positively it was like an old-time country funeral, if any of you folk were raised in the country — down South especially.
    "Of all the heart-breaking things on earth I think is a funeral in the country. I will say to you the atmosphere under the dome of the Capitol as compared to an old-time country funeral would be like an Irish wake in comparison. I do not quite yet understand what has happened. .
    "For the psychology of men's minds we can remember the election returns of two and four years ago. We can't get it out of our brains. I think the atmosphere at the capital is the worst of any place in the union, but they are beginning to hear from home. Men in these Northern States, in these States which have been progressive already, and have nominated members for Congress — one man came to me and said: 'You don't intend to have a candidate from my district?.' I said: 'I am not going to have a candidate, but a regiment of infantry can't stop a new candidate for your district unless you declare where you are in this fight.' He said: "We will all be defeated.' I said: 'Of course you are going to be defeated.' "

State Committeemen Report.
    O. K. Davis, who has been appointed Secretary of the National Convention, read the call to the convention, and afterward called the roll of States. As each State was called the National Committeeman gave a brief account of the situation in his State and what number of delegates could be expected.
    William Flinn, the Colonel's Pennsylvania boss, said that nearly all the delegates who were sent from the Keystone State to the Republican Convention would be back again to help nominate the Colonel at the National Convention of the Progressives.
    "We had 64 delegates and 64 alternates to the Republican National Convention," said " Boss Flinn. "Nearly all will be back again on Monday. I asked all of them to come, and only 16 sent replies declining the honor. So, out of the 128 delegates and alternates who were here in June and stood by the Colonel then, you will be in a position to renew your pleasant acquaintance with about 90."
    It was said that the convention would have more than 1,000 delegates despite the fact that under the call only one delegate was allowed for each Congress District and two delegates at large from each State, just half of the number in the Republican National Convention. Under a resolution, adopted during the early hours of the meeting the padded delegations that will come from a great number of States are to be seated entire, but with fractional votes to square with the basis of representation provided for in the call for the convention.

No Vote for Territories.
    There was a long-drawn-out debate over the question of whether the Territories and foreign possessions of the United States should have representation in the Colonel's convention. No such representation had been provided for in the call for the convention. When the Colonel met his Waterloo at the Republican National Convention in June the delegates from the Territories and the colonial possessions in the main voted with his old guard foes on all questions. At that time the Colonel was quoted as saying that it was improper to give votes in a convention to the Territories which could not vote in elections. Both the old parties permit representatives for the Territories.
    The suggestion came before the committee in a motion made by Col. Cecil Lyon of Texas that Hawaii, the District of Columbia, and Alaska have representation in the convention on the temporary roll, and that the representatives be permitted to participate in debates but not in voting. No request for representation had come from Porto Rico or the Philippine Islands.
    Mr. Flinn moved as a substitute that the territories have a representation of one delegate each with a vote on the temporary roll, and that the question afterward be referred to the Committee on Rules. After a debate, in which Oscar R. Hundley of Alabama, John M. Parker of Louisiana, Mr. Atkinson of Hawaii, Gov. J. M. Carey of Wyoming, Medill McCormick of Illinois, William Savacool of New Hampshire, C. H. Thompson of Vermont, Francis J. Heney of California, John L. Stevens of Iowa, and Col. Lyon of Texas participated. The Flinn motion was voted down. Col. Lyon's original motion was then adopted by unanimous vote.
    For hours before the National Committee sat down to hear contests the corridors of the Congress Hotel were ringing with denunciation of the Roosevelt policy of keeping negro delegates from the South out of the convention. Angry words were exchanged between white and black followers of the Colonel's cause, and in one instance the controversy almost led to blows. Some of the negro contestants even threatened a widespread bolt to Wilson, in case the National Committee should carry out the Colonel's policy and the contesting delegates from the South be ousted by steam-roller tactics.
    A group of colored contestants from the State of Mississippi, of which Perry W. Howard, a negro lawyer from Jackson was the centre, clustered just outside the door of the committee room all afternoon. Howard, who was a Republican, organized the contesting delegation from Mississippi.
    All the while there hovered on the outskirts of this group a few white Bull Moosers, who used all their powers of persuasion to Induce the Mississippi contestants not to carry the fight into the National Committee room, but in vain. Howard, who lacks neither intelligence nor force, invariably came back, with this reply:
    "We represent 90 per cent. of the Republican Party in Mississippi."
    Howard was giving that.answer when T. F. B. Sotham, one of the Colonel's admirers from Michigan, who has a powerful voice, a quick temper, and a ferocious bunch of bristling black whiskers, came within earshot. Mr. Sotham rushed in to the colored group and made for Howard. The latter, however, stood his ground, and Mr. Sotham halted in the middle of his rush.
    "If you are Republicans and Democrats to hell with you. We don't want any of you. Before you come here you had better go home and renounce your old party affiliations and write yourselves down Progressives. This is the National Progressive Party," he said.
    "That's exactly what we are trying to do, but you won't let us," came the ready retort from Howard.
    The first contest taken up by the committee after the recess was in the Alabama delegation. Twelve negroes led by Dr. Joseph T. Thomas contested the delegates elected by the Progressive Convention held at Birmingham from the Fourth, Sixth, and Ninth Districts of the State. Oscar R. Hundley, member of the National Committee, appeared for the regular delegates and Dr. Thomas for the negroes. It appeared that some thirty-one negroes who attended the convention elected the twelve contestants after the regular convention had named its delegates.
    The committee did not vote on the Alabama contest when the argument was concluded, but proceeded to hear the Florida contests.

Committee Hears Contests.
    It was late in the afternoon before the National Committee began hearing contests, There were only a few of these, and it is needless to say that both the regulars and contestants involved in each were Roosevelt enthusiasts. The regular delegations were composed entirely of white men. The contesting delegations were composed either entirely of negroes or in some instances negroes and whites.
    In Alabama, Florida, Georgia, and Mississippi contests were filed covering the entire State delegations with the negro question the issue. In Ohio contests have been filed from the first two Congressional districts.
    The Alabama contest was taken up first. Here Dr. Joe T. Thomas, a negro physician of Birmingham. Ala., and E. W. Simmons of the same city, appeared as representatives of the contestants. Both come from the Fourth Congressional District in Alabama, which is in the "black belt." They made out a very poor case. It was shown by former United States Judge, Oscar R. Hundley of Birmingham, who appeared for the white regulars, that the call of the county convention where the delegates were chosen, was signed by 116 followers of the Progressive Party, and that in the Convention itself there never, on the admission of the contestants, were more than thirty-one negro delegates.
    "We had been told to leave our folks at home and not bring them on in any great numbers," Dr. Thomas explained. "The man I went to for advice when the convention was called was E. H. Thompson, Collector of Internal Revenue. He is looked upon as the leader of the new party in Alabama, and I felt that if I could not take his word I could not take anybody's. The result was that when the convention got under way we were outvoted."

Negroes Ignored in Florida.
    The situation in Florida was different. Here it was shown that a deliberate attempt had been made by L. H. Anderson, the Colonel's National Committeeman from that State, to keep the negroes out of the convention where delegates to the National Convention were elected.
    The call for the regular Progressive State Convention was Issued bv the National committeeman for July 27. It was held in the Temple Theatre at Ocala, Fla. At the same time it appeared the National committeeman sent letters to several negro leaders in the State who favored the Colonel, telling them that it was very desirable that they should meet in St. Augustine on the same day in mass convention to indorse the Colonel's candidacy.
    Many negroes took this bait and went to St. Augustine. But a hundred or more made a determined effort to break into the convention at Ocala; and when this failed they organized a convention of their own in that city, keeping in touch and contriving to bring about community of action between their convention and the mass convention in St. Augustine by the novel and original operations of a Committee on Telegrams.
    The result of this co-operation between the two conventions was the election of a full delegation to contest the seats with the regular delegation chosen at the meeting in the opera house.
    Dr. C. H. Groves of Ocala, a white man, and C. H. Alston, a negro lawyer of Tampa, Fla., appeared for the contestants, while National Committeeman Anderson presented the argument for the regular delegation. Alston told the story of his efforts to get into the convention in the opera house at Ocala:
    "Mr. Anderson met me at the door and said:
    " 'There is not going to be a nigger in this convention.' "
    "I challenge that statement,' exclaimed Mr. Anderson. "Confine yourself to facts, Alston."
    "I will try to do as much as I can," replied the negro lawyer urbanely. "If I depart I beg your pardon and the forgiveness of my God."
    Alston then told the committee that he had not seen National Committeeman Anderson at a National convention for sixteen years, while he and his friends had been on the firing line always. There were over one hundred delegates in their convention, and only seventeen of the Lily White regulars, he declared.
    "I want nothing," said the negro lawyer. "I work for Roosevelt because I love and admire the man. l showed my devotion to him as early as last February, when I walked out of the regular Republican convention which indorsed Taft, and organized another convention which indorsed Col. Roosevelt.

Thanked by Roosevelt.
    "We were the first to indorse his candidacy. I sent him a telegram telling of our action, and got a reply from Oyster Bay thanking me for what I had done. If I was good enough in February, why are we not good enough in August?"
    Mr. Alston said that there were not 200 white Republican votes in all of Florida.
    "Why is that?" asked Chairman Dixon.
    "Well, first of all the old Republican machine was too corrupt, and did too many evil things. And in the second place the leader, Internal Revenue Collector Lee, who is a colored man, never wanted any more Republicans than enough to hold the Federal offices."
    "Is it not a fact," asked Senator Dixon, "that there are so few white Republicans because the white men will not follow the leadership of the negroes?"
    "We are not looking for leadership, we only want to follow," said Alston. "We are not ward politicians. We came up here in a chartered Pullman and we won't have to walk back; We are all men of means, one of our colored delegates is worth $250,000, and there is hardly one among us who is not worth $50,000."
    National Committeeman Anderson did not dispute the fact that as a matter of political necessity he was seeking to organize his party in Florida without the negroes' aid, but declared that he was utterly opposed to any attempt to disfranchise them.
    " The Colonel will get nearly every colored vote in Florida." he declared.
    When Anderson concluded the committee called for an expected Georgia contest. The contestant failed to appear, but the committee was loath to seat the delegates without giving all an opportunity for argument. Finally, on suggestion of Cecil Lyon, the committee voted to place the delegation on the temporary roll, expressly providing that any contestants might appear without prejudice before the Credentials Committee of the convention.
    Committeeman Lyon, in making the motion, expressed his anxiety lest there appear any suggestion of "steam roller" tactics about the work of the committee. This sentiment was echoed by all present with eager emphasis.

Mississippi Contest.
    A contest from the State of Mississippi followed, and in presenting the claims of the negroes from that State Perry. B. Howard, a negro, of Jackson, appealed to the Provisional Committee not to discourage the 900,000 negro voters of that State by refusing them recognition.
    Howard, who was a delegate to the regular Republican convention, took up the campaign for Roosevelt after the first call sent out by Senator Dixon late in July. In this he met opposition from B. F. Fridge, who was picked out by Senator Dixon to take up the fight for Roosevelt in Mississippi.
    Howard contended eloquently before the committee that he should lead the colored vote for Roosevelt to the polls in November, and vehemently declared:
    "'Would you have Roosevelt the cause of taking from us the liberty that Abraham Lincoln gave us?"
    Senator Dixon asked Howard if he did not think it would be wise to have the negroes in Mississippi who favored Theodore Roosevelt led by white men."
    "Why would you not experiment with white leadership this time?" asked the Senator.
    "That would be all right," said Howard. "But the majority of the negroes who are Democrats will not follow white leaders. We must be recognized. We do not want to lead, but we must have recognition in his Progressive Party if we are to do any effective work."
    Then the committee went back to the Alabama contest and seated the twelve white delegates. When Florida was taken up for settlement the clash came and adjournment to Monday was taken.
    The Republican National Convention last June opened on a Tuesday. The National Progressive Convention is scheduled to open on Monday. Under the circumstances one might have expected that by this time a big crowd would already be on hand in the convention city, but there isn't.
    The lobbies of Congress Hotel, which is the centre of the ante-convention activities, undoubtedly are somewhat more populous than they would be if the Colonel's convention was not scheduled for next week, but the overflow is largely represented by the newspaper correspondents, who always come some time in advance.

California Comes Singing.
    On the Saturday preceding the Republican National Convention the hotel lobbies were crowded and dozens of delegates were already on hand. The New York delegation came in late to-night, but prior to its arrival here the only delegation on hand was that from California. They are always the early birds at National Conventions. The men from California came in this morning and marched from the station headed by a. band, and a majority of the delegates singing out of full lungs.

          I like to be a Dull Moose
              And with the Bull Moose stand,
          With antlers on my forehead
              And a big stick in my hand.

    The delegation is headed by Gov. Hiram W. Johnson, one of the seven little Governors who first hitched up to the Roosevelt band wagon. Of the seven a majority are missing at this convention, notably Govs. Stubbs of Kansas, Hadley of Missouri, and Osborne of Michigan.
    In the California delegation was Francis J. Heney, the San Francisco vice hunter, who was one of the storm centres in the Roosevelt camp at the Republican National Convention. It is understood that he has been requested to keep out of the limelight to some extent at the present gathering. A majority of the Republican delegates to the Republican National Convention from California returned for the Progressive National Convention, among the latter Mrs. Isabella Blaney, the woman delegate who appeared with the Californians when the Republicans met.
    "There is nothing to it but Roosevelt in the West," said Gov. Johnson when he reached his hotel. "It is the protest of the Westerners against the most humiliating affair in American politics — I refer to the manner in which President Taft got his nomination here in June."
    Gov. Johnson is the man most prominently mentioned for second place on the National Progressive ticket. He declined to be drawn into any discussion of his Vice Presidential boom, but did say that he doubted whether he could accept the nomination if it should come to him. Gov. Johnson said he was more interested in the platform than in the Vice Presidency.
    "Boss" Flinn came alone from Pennsylvania to attend the meeting of the provisional National Committee of which he is a member. His delegation will follow to-morrow. He said the Roosevelt cohorts in Pennsylvania would be known as the Washington Party. Boss Flinn is harboring the novel plan of holding the Pennsylvania convention for the purpose of electing delegates at large here in Chicago on Monday. He does not think there is anything in the law against holding it out of the State.
    "Do you still call yourself a Republican?" Mr. Flinn was asked.
    "Why, certainly," he replied. "We won in the Republican primaries in Pennsylvania, I guess."
    "But hasn't the Colonel said that this must be a new party?" some one suggested.
    "This is a protest against a dastardly outrage, that is what it is," said "Boss" Flinn.
    Among other notables who appeared on the scene to-day were James R. Garfield of Ohio, who was Secretary of the Interior when Col. Roosevelt was in the White House, and Gifford Pinchot.