The Republicans who followed President Taft, the “stand-patters,” believed in property rights first, and human rights second.  If any of them did not actually believe this, they joined people who did thoroughly believe it, and so their action counted toward putting that belief into practice.  The others, the “Insurgents” or Progressive Republicans, (later called the Bull Moose) believed in human rights first.  That is as near as the thing can be stated, remembering that it was a disputed point, with good men on both sides.  The stand-patters said the Progressives were cranks,—­ visionary and impractical; the Progressives replied that it was better to be both of these things than to be quite so near to the earth and selfish as Mr. Taft’s followers or managers.  The events of later years have not borne out the contention that Roosevelt was “rash” and “dangerous”; while the charge that Mr. Taft made a President more pleasing to the Bosses than to the people was amply proved, in the campaign of 1912.

CHAPTER XIII

THE BULL MOOSE

It was not personal ambition which made Roosevelt become the leader of the revolt in the Republican Party, and later head a new party.  The revolt had been growing while he was in Africa, and he was long besought to become its leader.  At first, Senator La Follette seemed a possible leader, but he broke down in a nervous attack, and the belief that he was not the man for the place has been justified by later events.

As President Taft’s administration drew to an end, in 1911 and 1912, it was clear that he was steadily losing the public confidence.  State elections, and other straws, showed how the wind was blowing.  The Progressive Republicans pointed out to their fellow-members of the party that only where a Progressive ran for office in a state election did the party win.  Otherwise the Democrats were victorious.  The lesson was plain; but the stand-patters did not care to see it.  By the beginning of 1912 it was freely predicted in print that the Democrats would nominate Governor Wilson of New Jersey, their strongest candidate, and that they would win if the Republicans insisted on naming Mr. Taft.  But the old-line Republicans were above taking advice.  The Democrats were naturally gleeful about the situation; they kept their faces straight and solemnly warned the Republicans, in the name of the safety of the country, not to listen to the “wild man,” Roosevelt, but to be sure to nominate Mr. Taft.  And the Republicans listened to the advice of their opponents.  “Whom the Gods would destroy they first make mad.”

Roosevelt had been telling his friends that he would not run again; that he did not wish to oppose Mr. Taft, who had been his close friend and associate.  But neither he, nor the Republicans who thought as he did, liked to see their party drift back and back to become the organization for plunder which the Bosses would have made it long before, if they had always had a “good-natured” man in the White House.  When the governors of seven States—­ Michigan, West Virginia, Wyoming, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Missouri and Kansas—­united in an appeal to Roosevelt for leadership, he began to change his mind.