The Salt Lake tribune. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1890-current, 1912-04-09
THE PREFERENCE PRIMARY,

lu the discussion of the Presidential
primaries that we see in the Eastern
newspapers, the surprising fact is de
veloped that all concerned appear TO b,
dlsmsyed at what they find to be tht
practical working of the primaries. Tb,
Keen contest heretofore has been be
tween Taft and Roosevelt 1t would moi
be possible for the managers of eithe,
candidacy in any Presidential primary
district or State, to allow the vote tc
scatter all over the field in the seec
tion of delegates. If, for instance
President Taft S men had allowed the
Taft vote 10 scatter on five or six times
as many men as could be sent as dele.
gates, the Roosevelt men, by concen-
| tratlDg their votes, even though they
were not more than one. third of the
whole, wonid get the delegates by plui-
| rality vote IT was necessary, there.
| fore, on both sides, for the vote to con.
centrate on certain names for delegates
How should those names be selected ?
Clearly not by the primary, because
they were the names TO 20 before the
primary. and the delegates must first be
agreed on so the respective votes could
concentrate. II was necessary, there
fore. for the party bosses to get to-
gether, select their lists of delegates,
and present them to the Republican vot-
ers at the primaries. This was done nee.
essarily, both by the Taft and the
Roosevelt managers: in fact it had to
be done. There was no other possible
way in which the vote could be concen-
trated, except to select beforehand GER
tain candidates for delegates and have
the Taft or the Roosevelt vote, as the
case might be, concentrated upon those
names
But this was, in effect allowing the
delegates to be selected by few men
~ secret meeting in the interests Of the
candidacy for which they stood. 1t was
seen at once that the vote must be con.
centrated in this manner. but il does
not seem TO have occurred to any of the
party men that the selection OF the
delegates would be made practically
matter of secret caucus in which but
few men participated The Roosevelt
managers met secretly and selected
their list Of delegates The Taft men
did the same. And now. all AT once,
IL is found that the primary is sim
ply a ratification Of the secret selec-
tions made by party managers. Thus
the primary. which was supposed to
be a splendid device TO get the true
voice of the people. turns out to be
mere ratification Of the choice of the
managers OF the different sides in this
contest-it could not be otherwise.
The same condition confronted the
people of this State on the passage of
the bill establishing municipal com
missions. and providing for primaries
The question immediately arose. who
were 20 be the candidates at those pri-
marics! II was impossible to 90 20
the primaries without some prelimin-
arv selection of candidates here. The
American party openly and fairly held
Its caucuses and convention. and made
ITS nominations. The other two parties
made up their tickets, on the one hand,
oy voluntary meeting of business
men interested in getting up a citi-
zens ticket, and on the part OF the
Federal bunch by the usual way. The
point here insisted upon is not that
there was anything wrong IN the par.
ties doing this, because II was neces.
sary for them TO dc something Of the
kind. but the point is that the prinIa.
Ties wer9 not the agencies through
which the candidates were selected at