The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-06-12


 I the First district convention if the R2ose- | welt men had been able to send the dele- gation. After being questioned regarding l this convention, Judge ORear said:
 'If you insist in pinning me down, I'll admit that we have a mighty slim case here, but slim cases are sometimes won.
 F. Brown for the Taft delegates declared Judge O'Rear was right when he said he had slim case. The Taft delegates from the First Kentucky district were seated by tho unanimous vote of the committee. The Second district case was then called. Judge ORear said that Taft had 6l and Roosevelt 57 votes in the convention which represented the whole. Union county had two delegates In Davis county. where the convention was held in the courthouse yard only part of the Roosevelt men were counted on a test vote. He declared the Roosevelt forces had 150 majority.
 Tellers Quit Counting
 The telers, he said, "quit counting and went back to the rear, and the Taft men retired.
 The case of Davies and Henderson coun- ties, the Second district convention, seat ed the Taft delegates. Judge ORear in- sisted that the national committee had the right to take up the cases Of those counties without regard to what the dis trict convention did,
 R. W. Slack for the Taft contestants de- clared the case in the Second district of Kentucky was similar to that of the case of the delegates at large. MT. Slack oe- clared that in Davies county, where the tellers were alleged to have quit counting the Roosevelt teller refused to complete the count.
 The Taft delegates from the Second l Kentucky district were unanimously or dered seated by the committee.
 MT. Heney and Governor Hadley did not vote. In the case of the Fourth Kentucky district, next called, Judge O'Rear an- nounced the contest would be withdrawn as it was similar to those in the First and Second districts already disposed of.
 The committee ordered the two Taft | delegates seated. The Seventh Kentucky 1 district was then taken up. Henry T. Duncan, Jr., a Roosevelt contestant de- 1 clared the legal boundaries of the Sev- enth congressional district had been changed by state reapportionment between | the time of the district convention and | the time when 1t was held. The Taft men represented the eight counties in the dis | trict when the official call was issued, he said. The Roosevelt forces insisted that all 12 counties In the newly drawn district should be taken in, and they withdrew from the convention and reor- ganized.'
 MT. Duncan charged that in Scott coun- ty there was conspiracy engineered by the postmaster and his brother with the evident purpose to defraud. He declared a Taft man, a negro, appointed to count the Taft supporters, counted single men as five and 10. Other counties represented brought out questionable methods, he said.
 Negro convicts, he declared. had been active in the Taft forces in one of the meetings.
 Vote Counted Fairly
 In behalf of the Taft contestants in the Seventh Kentucky district. R. C.. Stoll of Lexington denied charge of the Roosevelt attorneys that the vote In Fayette county convention was not counted fairly.
 The committee asked him to take up the matter of the Seventh districts re- arrangement by which four counties were added to it. He said the republic an state central committee met Feb ruary IT, when no districting bill had lyet been passed by the state legisla- ture. To cover the situation it issued a call for conventions in districts as now constituted" Later the Seventh and Tenth districts were changed by the legislature, but it was then too late to change the plans for the con ventions. The state central committee later reaffirmed the authority of the old districts to proceed to the selection of national and state convention delegates.
 MT Stoll said the counties had all participated in the old districts. Judge O'Rear, he declared, personally had pro- tested against his county participating s in the Tenth district convention.
 The district conventions, MT. Stoll continued, had been called about March 1 and the redistricting bill was passed March 12
 |
 When roll call on the Seventh dis trict was asked for the Taft delegates, won by a vote of 3S to 13. the Roose- welt men all voting in the negative.
 MT. Kellogg of Minnesota said he voted mo" because the district lines had been changed before the delegates were elected Mir. Heney dclared he voted. no because he believed the evil dence showed there was a mass of cor ruption" throughout the state of Ken lucky in the republican activities.
 In the Fifth Kentucky district, where two Taft and two Roosevelt delegates were selected with half a vote each, instead of the two delegates specified, the committee was asked to let all four enter the national convention with half a vote each. These delegates were not kcontested.
 Kellogg Advocates Seating
 Mir. Kellogg advocated their seating, put StCTeldiy nay Woou Stu thS Cohi- mittee not to admit extra delegates. If the precedent were established he said, each state would soon elect double the number of delegates and there would be no room in the convention to seat them. I MT. Heney again broke into the de- | bate.
 I'm satisfied that If the people of the United States should know what has hap pered in Kentucky alone,' he said, they would never submit to being robbed of self government as they have been"
 Secretary Hayward called Mr. Heney' s attention to the fact that no contest was involved in this Kentucky case, and that the two delegates seats in the Fifth dis triot had been divided by agreement be- tween Taft and Roosevelt.
 Mr. Kelloggs amendment to seat all four men with half vote each was lost. The delegates will settle who shall sit in the convention.
 The Eighth Kentucky district contest was next called.
 Judge O'Rear said in this district also the convention was held in the courthouse yard The two sides lined up for tempo rary chairman, and. he said, the chairman refused to count the delegates. More than Go witnesses had sworn, said Judge O Rear that the Roosevelt crowd was larger than the Taft crowd, but the chair man finally declared the Taft chairman elected. Less than 400 Taft men went into the courthouse to hold convention, while 46S Roosevelt men stayed on the out side he averred and organized another convention, claiming a majority of the regular delegates.