HIRAM JOHNSON, POLITICAL OVER the heads of the two candidates ROOSEVELT AND JOHNSON Also the verse from Kipling: For there is neither East nor West, When two strong men stand face to face, Theodore Roosevelt and his strength we know. Of Hiram W. Johnson, Governor of California and Vice-Presidential nominee of the Progressive party, the country has only begun to hear. Ever since the beginning of the Presidential primary campaign in California, the finger of destiny seemed to point to Governor Johnson, calling upon him to take second place with Theodore Roosevelt and to spread his presence and his great voice all over the country. Hiram Johnson is a simon-pure product of the Golden West, square-jawed, rough and ready, a political fighting man who burst above the horizon of 1910, when he made his campaign for Governor of California against the political machine of the Southern Pacific Railroad. He won by a majority of more than 22,000 votes. Out in California they say that he has Johnsonized the State and they like him immensely. He knows well, better than any other living man perhaps, the old order of things that has ruled the West politically. candi Before the Taft convention at Chicago, the California Outlook, a Progressive weekly of Los Angeles and San Francisco, in a number booming Johnson for the VicePresidential dacy, published an article by Francis J. Heney, graft - hunter of California, setting forth Johnson's qualifications. For the first time in the history of the nation, Mr. Heney pointed out, the Atlantic coast would be joining hands across the continent with the Pacific coast. Furthermore, the Progressive movement, so called, was born in the West, and it would be meet that a Western man should back up Roosevelt. Johnson, continued Mr. Heney, "possesses a clear conception of the causes which lie back of the defects of the old machinery of government, and of the modern remedies which he, more than any other man, caused to be adopted in California for the removal of the causes of such defects. No speaker whom I have heard can make these things plainer to an audience. Moreover, he understands the social and economic problems which are most urgent, GOVERNOR HIRAM JOHNSON, OF CALIFORNIA, CANDIDATE OF THE PROGRESSIVE PARTY FOR THE VICE-PRESIDENCY, ADDRESSING A POLITICAL MEETING Southern Pacific Railroad. Early in his life Hiram learned all about the science of wire-pulling. Later, as a lawyer, he understood what made the inside wheels of the political machine go round. It was only slowly that public attention was drawn to this man, who was to so upset California politics. He had held some small municipal position in Sacramento, but his public career may be said to have begun at the time his friend Heney began the graft prosecutions in San Francisco. After some work with Heney, Johnson dropped out. Friends endeavored to win him back, but he refused. It was the attempt upon Heney's life that made him change his mind. One day, while a lawyer acquaintance was arguing the case with him, the door of the office opened and, according to P. C. Macfarland, writing in the Metropolitan Magazine, the following dramatic scene ensued: While the two men gazed at each other in a sort of stubborn silence the tinkle of a telephone bell sounded faintly in the adjoining room, followed and has already done much, in California, by a muffled exclamation. The door opened to relieve the pressure of them upon the poor softly a moment later. Johnson's private and weak. No speaker can give a clearer secretary, Dennis Duffy, pale and disturbed, exposition of them." stood before them. All of Johnson's education and environment tended to keep him in the old régime. His father, Grove L. Johnson, was one of the most adroit members of the California bar, Heney has been shot down in open court," he gasped. Sullivan glanced at the pale-faced secretary and then looked at the face of Johnson "Are you sure?" Johnson inquired anxiously. "The report has been confirmed," said the secretary. Sullivan is a man who knows how to keep silent. He had not uttered a word. Only he looked questioningly at Johnson. "That settles it!" exclaimed Johnson, with a gesture of finality. "I don't want any fee. I'll take up the case with you, Sullivan. We will finish Heney's work for him. We will send Abe Ruef to jail." As the whole country knows, Johnson was as good as his word. The direct State primary law of 1909 was passed by the Legislature, although at that time of reactionary tendencies, by the force of public opinion, engineered by Governor Johnson. In accordance with this law the people of the State voted upon the question of sending delegates to the national nominating convention of 1912, and at the same time the Progressives found themselves in possession of the government of the State. Governor Johnson controlled the situation in his State; but believing, as he always has, in the will of the people, in the latter part of 1911 he called an extra session of the Legislature As a result of the graft prosecutions, the and brought about the enactment of a PresiState League of Justice unanimously selected dential preference primary law (a law, by him as its candidate for Governor. He did the way, which was clearly to the advantage not want to accept. In fact, the Progressives of the stand-pat Republicans, since it gave all over the State were stirring before he them an opportunity to stand up and be agreed to lead them. It was Heney who counted). It was under this law that the finally persuaded him. He made a seven voters of the State expressed their opinion months' campaign of the State, going to every upon the candidacies of Theodore Roosevelt hamlet and village in his automobile. The and President Taft. On May 14 the result campaign was unprecedented in the history was a majority of 77,000 votes for Colonel of California. His one issue was the grasp of Roosevelt. The story of the California conthe Southern Pacific machine on the State. His task was to convince the people that he could break it; to convince them he had to see them. California is more than 800 miles long and 300 miles wide. But Johnson took his automobile and went the rounds. The first inkling that the villagers and farmers would have of his approach would be the sound of the cowbells he had strung to his motor car. He hammered away on the one issue, and closed nearly every speech by saying: "And remember this, my friends: I am going to be the next Governor of California; and when I am, I am going to kick out of this government William F. Herrin and the Southern Pacific Railroad. Good night!" At first the opposition did not notice that the big man in the little automobile was making converts rapidly. When they did wake up, there was no stopping him. The votes were counted, and Johnson's majority was more than 22,000. In his inaugural address he told the legislators that if they did not fulfill to the letter all the promises of their platform, he would personally go into every district and hold each member up to the fire of his constituents. He put out of office every official suspected of an alliance with the big corporate interests. He got through the Legislature twenty-three amendments to the State constitution, and had nearly all of them approved by the people in the election that test at the Chicago convention of June 18, of how the delegation of 26 elected at large by the decisive majority for Roosevelt was changed into 24 for Roosevelt and 2 for Taft by the National Committee, on alleged evidence repudiated by California, has been set forth in the daily press. It was vigorously told to the people of California by Governor Johnson himself. "I object," he shouted at Chicago, "to having California's title to rightful goods stolen from her, determined by those who stole the goods." It was in June, at Chicago, that Johnson first secured widespread recognition for his fighting voice. Those who attended that convention can never forget that voice. They agree that, in the words of an editorial in Current Literature, The first notes of his voice keyed up your nerves to a fighting pitch. We can't imagine anyone's listening to Johnson for five minutes without wanting to fight-either to fight with him or to fight against him. His voice sounds just as an east wind feels. It grates and snarls and pierces, and puts you all on edge. The whole man goes with the voice. Every posture and gesture is one of intensity. His hands are nearly always clenched. His jaw, a good strong fighting jaw, is set. His muscles are tense. He talks rapidly and with no gradations of volume or tone, without any embellishments of rhetoric, without any appearance of self-consciousness. He gives you the impression of a man carried away entirely on the flood of his own feelings. Johnson in action has been called (by a writer in McClure's) "a political revivalist, a moral fervor fusing his audience into an al when speaking, we find this characterization by Edmund Norton, in La Follette's: He stands there, flat-foundationed on the platform, squareshouldered, short-necked, deepchested, and slightly rotundvery much like a boxer ready for the bout. Johnson gesticulates very little, but when he does, "Every little movement has a meaning of its own." Sometimes he shoves a thought out with a closed left fist; then with a clenched right fist; now with both hands he shoves it into place where he means it tostay. He is a mechanic, a constructor; and-is he an idealist? Wait and we shall see. Then he hammers the thing down, as on an anvil; fashioning it; first one fist, then the other, and finally both, as if tamping the roadbed solid for the coming of the freight. Johnson is elemental. He gives immediate opinions and calls for immediate action. Despite his legal training and attainments, says Congressman William Kent, of California, writing in the Outlook, "he has much more the attitude of an Arab sheik rendering justice offhand from under a palmtree than of a conventional 'civilized' judge scraping dust and cobwebs from musty precedent before expressing an opinion." A SNAPSHOT OF GOVERNOR JOHNSON AT CHICAGO IN AUGUST Johnson is a Progressive who believes in all the things that Colonel Roosevelt believes in. He is of the Roosevelt stripe. In the course of his speech accepting the nomination of the Progressive party for President, on August 7, Colonel Roosevelt said: people of that State the principles which we intend to apply throughout the Union as a whole. We ought to be nominated for the Vice Presidency; have nominated the only type of man who ever we have nominated a man fit at the moment to be President of the United States. No man throughout the entire western land, says the Los Angeles Express, editorially, has achieved such tremendous results for all the people as has Governor Johnson of California. His leadership "redeemed the State from machine government and railroad oligarchy. He literally freed the people from a tyranny of misrule unequaled in the annals of State history and gave back to California government of the people, by the people, and for the people." 66 wrote it; a letter of trust and belief, a letter of ardent championship from the soldier who was at the moment victorious, toward his comrade who at the moment had been struck down. In Governor Johnson we have a man whose every word is made good by the deeds that he had done. The man who as the head of a great State has practi He is a strong man, a full-sized man, fit to stand beside Colonel Roosevelt in his task of winning the government of America back to COLONEL ROOSEVELT ADDRESSING THE PEOPLE IN FRONT OF THE CONGRESS HOTEL ON HIS ARRIVAL AT CHICAGO ON AUGUST 5 THE PROGRESSIVES AT CHICAGO CHIC BY WILLIAM MENKEL The HICAGO has been the scene of many fication of a prearranged program of party political gatherings, but never of one like bosses, with the object of winning a purely that of August 5, 6, and 7 last. The nearest partisan victory; but the aroused determinaapproach to it was probably the convention tion of earnest, God-fearing citizens to make that nominated Lincoln in 1860. Some two their government truly the servant of the thousand men and women, moved by the people and their country a better place in new "progressive" spirit, came together in which to live. that city from all parts of the country, constituting what might well be called a committee on the State of the Union." occasion was, of course, a political convention, and the members of the gathering had been duly elected delegates; but how different this from the ordinary political convention. "A family reunion," some called it; "a prayer meeting," said others. It really was much like a gigantic revival meeting, with its old-fashioned enthusiasm, its prayers, hymn-singing, patriotic songs, and all the inspiration and fervor of a great body of earnest people moved by a common cause. And such a cause-not the perfunctory rati "GOVERNOR BEVERIDGE TO THE FRONT SEN JOSEPH THE OPTIMISTIC COMMITTEE And how different these delegates from those ordinarily assembled at political conventions. "Not a saloon-keeper in the crowd" commented a newspaper man. Here indeed was a far truer and broader representation of |