Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1912-06-19
|EVEN UP ON H|SSES|0F SOPRANO TYPE
But Roosevelt Forces Lead in Voice of Woman Delegates
Yelling and Threats Chicago Convention.
TAFTlTES BEST GROANERS TWO VOTES FOR McGOVERN
Dead Heat for Speakers Greeted With
| Each Side plause From Thousands of Threats
AUDIENCE GRAND TIME LARGE FEMININE CONTINGENT
| Attend Lookon shouters
| Worth.
But Roosevelt Forces Lead in
Yelling and Threats.
TAFTITES BEST GROANERS
Dead Heat for Speakers Mussed Up;
Three on Each Side.
AUDIENCE HAS GRAND TIME
Eager Citizens Who Put Up $50 to
Attend Convention Got Their
Moneys Worth.
BY GEORGE FITCH.

BY GEORGE FITCH.
Copyright 1912, by the Associated Newsnapers
! CHICAGO. June 1o.-Gray-haired con.
noisseurs In staple and fancy trouble
who have witnessed and abetted republi-
! can conventions since 1880 united in de-
clarfng that the reunion of fellow-work-
ers in the grand. but slightly ripped. old
party. exceeded in loudness, violence and
extreme candor any opening session that
has yet been pulled off.
| For once those eager citizens who put
up $50 for a ticket of admission to a
national convention got their money!
| worth. OF course. there were no deci-
| sions and comparatively little fighting.
Neither was 1t necessary to put sawdust
| in the arena. But for all that, Henry
Allen Of Kansas was right when after
Senator Bradley had yelled majestically,
Liar. liar. har.' with the opposition
chanting, 'Lorimer." he congratulated
Chicago on the show which it had
brought us.
Yesterdays chaos may have been a
national convention. but 1t looked and
sounded more like a county convention
magnified loo diameters. 1t was a mad
house Of opposing patriots egged on by
the whooping galleries.
Listed Results of Battle.
The result OF the first days battle, as
nearly as can be judged, was as follows:
For chairman-Root.
Aggregate duration Of yelling-Roose-
welt side, by three minutes.
Groans-Taft side. by about LOO.
Hisses-Dead heat
~ I'm nd
blown off stage-Three on each side.
Epithefs-Roosevelt side, by 7S9.
Observation-Disclosures side. by 35.
Threats-Roosevelt side, by 16.
Water consumed in effort to keep COOL
Senator Bradley, nine glasses; Gov. Fort,
three glasses; scattering, one barrel.
1t was a grand time for the audience.
Never has any audience been so busy
running a convention. 1t elbowed right
in both sides compelling the painting Of
ficials to conduct business in the middle
Of two opposing political rallies. There
was no doubt that the galleries had been
packed. but they were packed equally.
and they smothered each others speakers
with great skill and enthusiasm. Here Is
a partial list Of the victims:
Ex-Gov. Fort of New Jersey, driven of
indignant by a wild burst of enthusiasm
when his remark that IF we don't settle
the delegate question now, it will be too
Chairman Rosewater was alluded to as
little boy by leather-lunged spectator.
in a moment Of calm to the cruel delight
Of all.
How Payne Was Slowed Up.
Serene E. Payne, who began a speech
like an ocean liner letting off steam, but
ran into the inquiry. Tell US about the
Payne BILL" and became inaudfble from
that time on.
Gov Johnson Of California, who waved
an incendiary forefnger at the jeering OPP
position for Ave minutes and retired with
CALIFORNIA; blood-curdling threat still
unheard.
Francis j. Heney. who deposited few
remarks about Ruef in the bossism of a
wildly hooting mob Of Ruef admirers and
who announced he would finish his speech
If he had to stay there all summer.
Senator Bradley of Kentucky. who got
madden and madden as the crowd chant
ed who voted for Lorimer?'' until he
announced with a superhuman roar that
he would wait two minutes to allow every
fool in the audience to ask him the
questions he wanted.
AS a sublime gathering Of able and dis
tinguished patriots charged with the duty
of selecting for the people their candi-
dates for the presidency yesterdays meet
ing was no unanswerable argument
against the primary. But 1t intrencned
the convention system still more deeply
IN the hearts OF every AIutIlCdH SiliLCl
who loves a good fight, but whose wife
will not not allow him to go and see the
Johnson-F1ynn exhibition.
AS for the hall ITSELF picture voting
precinct rooted over with vast steel arches
and draped scantily about the middle like
a Salome dancer with sparse decorations
in the national colorS. A huge wall, yell
lowed by the sunlight streaming through
half an acre of windows, band percned
perilously in a flying gallery just below
/ Geph hTidDa
nervous admirals and warriors, back or
this bridge a deep layer OF delegates
wives and those solemn and thoughtfui
ladies who have been stepped on from
Army of Newspaper Men.
Surrounding the fighting platform. 400
newspaper men, with unfurled ears and
poised pencils. in front Of 1t 1,O76 dele
gates, an army with banners composed
OF state names on long poles, wild and
tempestucus army with constant erup-
tions in California, Pennsylvania, Okla
homa and other aggrieved states. and
all around, above, below, a pink and red
carpetfng, composed Of the wide-open
| faces of $4,000 plain people-that was the
convention when at noon Victor Rose
water. a little man with chinchilla hair.
| who looked far too small to referee an
elephant fight, began to pound the meet
| ing to order with slow measured whacks
which sounded as one Of the opening guns
| from the light artillery.
Ordinarily IL takes an hour to put down
| the 10000 casual conversations in a great
convention by means of one puny gavel.
Prominent statesmen have to be
cheered and candidates marching clubs
have to parade the aisles and two
| mammoth elephants and other junk
through the convention. but this was
no ordinary convention. 1t was a duel
| to the death. and in less than ten min
| the meeting to order In his cambria
voice. Herbert Hadley of Missouri was
on the platform with signed protest
| from fifteen national committeeman
and inviting the Taft side in sledge-
hammer arguments to give back eighty
| filched, stolen. appropriated. unjustly
gained and ruthlessly ravished dele
/ gates.
All Talk as They Please.
From that time on every delegate
/ abandoned himself to pleasure and
said just what he thought without
waiting for several hundred others to
finish talking.
| Hadley was one Of the few men, by
| the way. who deposited their remarks In
| every ear uninterrupted and unhooted
/ Eddie Cochems of Wisconsin. an old
4 foot ball player. with a voice made on,
| Of second calliope. was another. job
80 hn rn~