The Brattleboro daily reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1913-1955, 1920-07-29
HARDING VIEWS
ON NOMINATION
----- sstss
ttg I'll IL -.
Does Not Credit His Choice
to Senatorial Group or al
Other Leaders
HIS OWN MIDDLE
OF-ROAD POLICY WON
Some Erroneous Reports Concerning
Con yention Conferences Corrected -
Harding Personally Appealed to
Johnson for Party Harmony.

r.
Especial Despatch to The. Reformer
Copyright I92Oa
MARION, o.. JUL 90 Many are the
versions of the way in which Senator
Harding's nomination for the presidency
at Chicago was accomplished. Politicians
have retold their own part in the affair
with proud boast. Col. George Harvey
has been credited with influencing the
choice The writer has gathered and
written many a version of the tale as he
has interviewed returning delegates and
Republican leaders in different parts of
the country.
But here at last where resides the man
himself and his most intimate friends the
true story must be and. if the details
which one gets here are not conclusive,
certainly the most important thing is
that Senator Harding has the impressions
which he does have and not the impress
sions which have hitherto been printed
or been current.
For Senator Harding told me he was
honestly convinced that he did not owe
his nomination to any one man or group
of men. He said that he recognized that
three or four of his friends were perhaps
more influential than others and he feels
deeply grateful to all. but he is abso-
lutely fixed in his conviction that certain
people, including his much discussed coll
leagues, did not dictate the result.
The Republican candidate for the
10 a1fx mo mr. hn iuFeft
the kind. who would dampen the enthu-
siasm or ardor of any party worker by
denying or refuting impressions of their
work at Chicago. Moreover, he is the
last man in the party to assume he did
it all himself. But what Senator Hard
| ing modestly refrains from saying there
are others in his headquarters here who
do not hesitate to say. And they insist
that several men conspicuously men
| toned and a good many others in the
| senatorial group We're seriously advanc-
ing the candidacy of win Hays, the Re
/ publican national chairman, in the hours
/ between the morning and afternoon SEES
/ sion of the Saturday on which Mr.. Hard
I ing was nominated.
| There was not one conference but a
| series of conferences during the small
hours of Saturday morning. Senator
/ Harding himself went to see Senator
/ Johnson at ! o'clock in the morning to
| enlist the latter's aid i'm a movement to
/ preserve party harmony and keep the
i Johnson strength intact. As he left the
/ conferences he met others in the same
hotel, and fell into friendly and unex
Il pected meetings. In a previous article
the writer enormously mentioned the
name of Thomas w. Lamont of J. p Nor
i gan & Co. as present in one of these
conferences. Mr.. Lamont was in the
hotel, but the writer is assured he had
absolutely nothing TO do with the choice
of Mr.. Harding and much general interest
as he manifested in the doings of the
i convention was not unlike that of scores
of other observers who came to Chicago
ito see the show"
Even at the very hours of the morning
when it was supposed to have been
agreed to make drive for Harding. the
senator himself gives the Lowden men
credit for still clinging to the belief that
they might possibly put Lowden over
the majority mark when the balloting
was resumed. Senator Harding's friends
point out quite convincingly that in the
morning session he got only a relatively
small number of votes and BY no means
what had been anticipated There was a
ticklish moment in the balloting Satur-
lay morning when defections to Wood
in the Ohio delegation might have been
fatal to his chances if help had not come
at the some moment from the New York
delegation so that Harding gains were
consistently maintained
But the interesting fact on which
Senator Harding's friends speak frankly
is that the recess on Saturday was not
asked for by his own managers but was
really sought by the Wood and Lowden
generals They say there was no obiec-
ton to it, but in the interval there devel-
oped dangerous opposition to Hardings
Il candidacy which for the moment seemed
TO threaten its success. Talk was heard
about certain editorials which appeared
1 in Senator Harding's newspaper attack
ing Theodore Roosevelt. in 1912 But the
Idrift toward Harding was too strong to
obe counteracted. The delegates had been
impressed with the fact that the three
1 leaders We're deadlocked and that a new
man must be chosen, They had watched
Harding perform as permanent chairman
IN the 1915 convention and liked his fair
ness. Many of them had heard him on
4 the stump in the Hughes campaign. "a
| he spoke in nearly every northern state
/ from coast to coast. and most of them
1 We're impressed with the chance of carry
ing Ohio as argued by Frank Willis in his
speech for Harding earlier in the conven-
stion.