1912 Presidential Primaries Results

23 thoughts on “1912 Presidential Primaries Results”

1. Sounds pretty awesome.

2. I’d say 1920 would be another one to look at for the near-future, with the convention resulting in about ten rounds of voting before Warren G. Harding finally won the nomination. I think he had about 6% or so of the delegates going into the convention as well.

   Pretty fascinating race, really.

3. NY Pres Primary was on 3-26-1912
   http://www.thegreenpapers.com/Hx/PresidentialPrimariesDates.phtml

4. Here is everything that I can find in regards to the primaries.

   The totals: Senator LaFollette won a total of 36 delegates; President Taft won 48 delegates; and Roosevelt won 278 delegates. However 36 states did not hold primaries. (source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1912_Republican_National_Convention)

   This is an extremely helpful website for 1912: http://presidentialcampaignselectionsreference.wordpress.com/overviews/20th-century/1912-overview/

   Additionally, this is also helpful:
   The Primary Season of 1912

   The jockeying by Taft, Roosevelt, and LaFollette began in state conventions and continued through the primary season. By the time of the first presidential preference primary, held in North Dakota on 3/19/1912, Taft was leading in the delegate count with 127 to 10 for his challengers. These delegates had been chosen in conventions. NYT 3/14/1912

   Voters who braved the cold rain in North Dakota on primary day (3/19/1912) handed the first official presidential primary to LaFollette. The campaign there was almost exclusively a TR vs. LaFollette race; LaFollette ended up with 57% to 40% for TR and 3% for Taft. Roosevelt explained the loss was due to Democrats who voted for LaFollette to embarrass his candidacy. [NYT 3/20/1912]

   Pres. Taft’s first major victory came in New York’s primary on 3/26/1912. Just before the vote, the New York Times reported that Taft had won 134 out of the 170 delegates chosen nationwide [NYT 3/24/1912]. New York Republicans voted overwhelmingly for Taft, by roughly a 2:1 margin. New York City gave Taft nearly 70% of the vote there. It was a stunning repudiation of Roosevelt in his home state and his second loss in the first two presidential primaries.

   Roosevelt changed his strategy following his New York debacle. He issued an ultimatum to Republicans on 3/28/1912 to nominate him; otherwise, he would run as an independent [NYT 3/28/1912]. With local conventions being held nearly on a daily basis, Roosevelt was falling further behind in the delegate counts.

   LaFollette scored another major victory on 4/2/1912 when he won his home state of Wisconsin. He defeated Taft by a 73-26% margin; Roosevelt missed the filing deadline but received some write-in votes.

   Roosevelt’s fortunes began to change with the Illinois primary on 4/9/1912. In his first primary victory, TR won 61% of the vote to Taft 29% and LaFollette 10%. Roosevelt won every county, though Taft won some Congressional Districts in Chicago. Including NYS, the count of delegates chosen in primaries was Taft-84, TR-68, and LaFollette-36.

   In the two weeks following the Illinois primary, Roosevelt won three states. He defeated Taft by a 60-40% margin in PA on 4/13/1912. Nebraska and Oregon voted on 4/19/1912. Roosevelt won NE with 59% (Taft placed behind LaFollette) and OR with 40% to LaFollette 31% and Taft 29%. Taft ended the month with a 50-48% win in Massachusetts. Due to the MA ballot offering a presidential preference separate from the delegate vote, TR won more delegates even though he placed second. At the end of the month, Roosevelt was leading in delegates chosen in primaries with 179 to 108 for Taft and 36 for LaFollette. The nationwide delegate count, however, was Taft 428, TR 204, and LaFollette 36. [NYT 4/28/1912]

   Five states voted in the final four weeks of the primary season, and Roosevelt won all five states. He won Maryland 53-47 over Taft. In California, Roosevelt received 55% to Taft 27% and LaFollette 18%. The major shock of the primary season was TR’s 55-40% defeat of Taft in his home state of Ohio on 5/21/1912. One week later, TR won New Jersey, 56-41%. The primary season ended in South Dakota, where TR won 55% to Taft 29% and LaFollette 16%.

   Altogether, TR won 284 delegates in the primaries to 125 for Taft and 36 for LaFollette. Including delegates chosen in party conventions, Taft had a 571-439 margin, placing Taft over the 540 needed for nomination. [NYT 5/29/1912]
   (source: http://www.ourcampaigns.com/RaceDetail.html?RaceID=55164)

   Overall, I’m surprised it is so difficult to find good info on this. I’m at work, but I’ll check the national archives website when I’m at home. Anyway, these three links should help.

5. @DJP,

   Ya, we’ll be looking at which scenario to add next after 1912 is done – suggestion noted.

6. @Matt,

   Thanks – date added and Green Papers resource link added.

7. @Jonathan,

   Thanks for this – added the 1912 Republican National Convention link as a resource.

8. Actually, Burke was not a candidate for the Democratic nomination. He supported Wilson and was pushed by William Jennings Bryan to be their vice presidential candidate, but he declined. Perhaps he could be included as a VP choice for Democrats.

   Also, will you include possible candidates who didn’t actually run like you did in 2012 with Clinton and Christie? And how will you implement Roosevelt into the Republican and Progressive parties? It would be strange if a Republican Roosevelt is running against a Progressive Roosevelt in the general election.

   And will Eugene Debs,the Socialist nominee, be included as a minor candidate? The 1912 election was his best showing, having six percent of the popular vote.

9. I forgot to mention that the information on Burke came from his page on wikipedia.

10. @Peterson,

    In the game currently, Burke is a VP nominee (as you suggested), and not a Presidential candidate. However, it appears that he won the ND Democratic primary. See here:

    http://www.ourcampaigns.com/RaceDetail.html?RaceID=34647

11. @Peterson,

    No hypothetical candidates for 1912 at this point.

    Roosevelt will probably be dealt with by not allowing him to start in the primaries for the Bull Moose party, and then allowing a jump if he loses the Republican primary. We’ll see.

    Debs is currently included.

12. I think 1880 would be a really cool next election. Grant’s attempt at a non-consecutive 3rd term.

    As for 1912, I think you can find some primary data here, if you scroll down to 1912:
    http://www.uselectionatlas.org/WIKI/index.php/Pre-1976_Primaries

13. @Jonathan,

    Thanks for this – I’ve added the relevant info and the link to the resources.

14. 1876 would be an interesting one as well. Tilden wins the popular vote by about 4%, but Hayes the Electoral College vote by 1 single vote.

    GOP Convention had 7 rounds of voting before settling on Hayes. Blaine was the “front-runner” the whole way until round 7.

    Democrat nomination was more uneventful. Tilden almost won it round one, and clinched the second round.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1876

    1848 was relatively close. Third party pulled 10% of the popular vote.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1848

    1836 had a fractured Whig Party, with two nominees. Maybe have a scenario where they join forces at the Whig convention, and see if a unified Whig Party can beat Martin Van Buren?

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1836

    1824 was an interesting race as well.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1824

    Just a few ideas. Take any, all, none, whatever you think best. 🙂

15. Yes, I agree all of those are interesting. However, anything before 1828 is very difficult, because most of the states didn’t have a popular vote.

16. Here is tactic you can use to get information if it proves elusive: send an email to a professor who has written a book on an election. Generally, the author, if still living, will have an email address at the university where he/she teaches at. You could ask an expert on the 1912 (or any election) where you could find state-by-state primary results for the election.

    I’ve done this before when working on projects. Sometimes I’ve received very long and detailed information. Generally, they’re passionate about the subject and happy to respond.

17. @Jonathan,

    Thanks for the suggestion – I’ll use that as a resort if the other sources don’t have it.

18. I’ve added more details about the primaries, as well as the delegate totals per state and votes on the first ballot at the party conventions. Source is the Congressional Quarterly’s Guide to U.S. Elections.

19. Awesome. What else do you need now for the 1912 scenario?

20. Sounds awesome! More historical elections are always a good thing!

    Any idea when we’ll see a candidate editor? I’m looking forward to playing as myself.

21. Hi there

    i understand that the 1912 scenario that p4e12 was shipped was a beta, so thought i might drop some info in from when i am playing. i started as debs during the primaries, and as of monday 22nd july, i have 44.2% of the vote!!!!!, beating the dems who have 30.5 and reps with 19.5%!!!!!!!

    basically, the newspaper adverts are far to powerful and or far far too cheap. the entire country only costs me $304!!!!! to run an advert and with a bank balance of over $14m, that is not a problem. I have been rather restrained and only run 3 for me so far every 5 turns and 3 attacking the reps, however this leads to momentum for me of over 15 every turn and constant republican ‘campaign collapse’.

    the only limit if i chose to go full time on adverts, is how quickly i could produce them and i have little difficulty in believing that if i attack the dems as well, i could end up with 60% of the vote and all 48 states.(currently i hold 417 / 531 electoral college votes)

    i was wondering if this could be addressed for a future version. Also, though i saw it mentioned, i have seem no indication that roosevelt will join race, Taft won rep primaries.

    one last point. on game i have played, 2016 and 1912 with primaries active, candidates defeated in the primaries are not deleted from the game. This causes a major problem in the general, as the momentum for a candidate does not replace the party value. Not sure if this was caused by it, but in 2016, i reduced rubio to 19% just before election day (with me at 55% and rest undecided), and ec dominance, though on polling day, most votes went to rubio, even tho i had massive +ve momentum and he had massive -ve momentum.

    hope this helps tweak the scenarios. thanks for the great game.

    Alex, United Kingdom

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