Theodore Roosevelt
Republican primaries and convention

In November 1911, a group of Ohio Republicans endorsed Roosevelt for the party's nomination for president. Roosevelt conspicuously declined to refuse a nomination. Soon thereafter, Roosevelt said, "I am really sorry for Taft... I am sure he means well, but he means well feebly, and he does not know how! He is utterly unfit for leadership and this is a time when we need leadership." In January 1912, Roosevelt declared "if the people make a draft on me I shall not decline to serve". Roosevelt spoke before the Constitutional Convention in Ohio, identifying as a progressive and endorsing progressive reforms—even endorsing popular review of state judicial decisions. In reaction to Roosevelt's proposals Taft said, "Such extremists are not progressives—they are political emotionalists or neurotics".

Roosevelt began to envision himself as the savior of the party from defeat in the upcoming election. In February 1912 in Boston, Roosevelt said, "I will accept the nomination for president if it is tendered to me". Elihu Root and Henry Cabot Lodge thought division would lead to defeat in the election, while Taft believed he would be defeated either in the primary or general election.

The 1912 primaries represented the first extensive use of the presidential primary, a reform achievement of the progressive movement. The Republican primaries in the South, where party regulars dominated, went for Taft, as did New York, Indiana, Michigan, Kentucky, and Massachusetts. Meanwhile, Roosevelt won in Illinois, Minnesota, Nebraska, South Dakota, California, Maryland, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. At the 1912 Republican National Convention in Chicago, Taft won the nomination on the first ballot.

According to Lewis L. Gould, in 1912

Roosevelt saw Taft as the agent of "the forces of reaction and of political crookedness".... Roosevelt had become the most dangerous man in American history, said Taft, "because of his hold upon the less intelligent voters and the discontented." The Republican National Committee, dominated by the Taft forces, awarded 235 delegates to the president and 19 to Roosevelt...Roosevelt believed himself entitled to 72 delegates from Arizona, California, Texas and Washington that had been given to Taft. Firm in his conviction that the nomination was being stolen from him, Roosevelt....told cheering supporters that there was "a great moral issue" at stake and he should have "sixty to eighty lawfully elected delegates" added to his total....Roosevelt ended his speech declaring: "Fearless of the future; unheeding of our individual fates; with unflinching hearts and undimmed eyes; we stand at Armageddon, and we battle for the Lord!"
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