Show mm RIENT FOR COL ROOSEVELT battling worrior of oyster bay becomes popular as campaign brows near never in the history of any living politician has the republican party entered the pi residential campaign so helplessly at sea as to candidate or platform as ill in this year with the republican national ri convention but i 1 few short weeks away politicians and soothsayers so 0 th bay ars confess their inability to pick the winner or to guess tile the outcome former leaders grope in a dense fog and throw up their hands and shiver when asked if the nor nominee ninee of the convention is going to be roosevelt or hughes A fight in the nominating convention is the very last thing that these leaders desire to see thoughts of a stearn steam roller give them symptoms of neurasthenia they aver that th there ere is to be no roughhousing rough housing no larceny of delegates and no sand begging of opinion or smothering of inchoate booms by preference the old guard would choose root mccall weeks or burton for the presidential nomination but they are wise enough to know that the selection of any of these men would drive thousands of progressives Progress ives to vote for wilson it is for this reason that they are permitting if not encouraging cod cou raging the remarkable growth crowth of roosevelt sentiment among regular republicans and are doing little or nothing to stop the movement for hughes it shows to what straits the republican organization is is reduced when it can with apparent calm ness and without more than a ami minimum of profanity contemplate the possibility of either roosevelt or hughes becoming the canidate for president three years ago the man who would have prophesied that theodore roosevelt would be the candidate of the regular republicans f joc or the highest office in the gift of the people would have been laughed at as being a simp from Simp ville I 1 and yet today there is a strong probability that the very men who kicked him at chicago in 1912 will shout themselves hoarse in acclaiming him is as the savior of the party in 1916 there are men like taft who will never forgive nor forget there are big mogul republicans in every state in tile the union who will not vote for roosevelt just how large this bunch of stalwarts stal warts sno body knows it will be one of the unknown factors of the campaign the growth the sentiment for roosevelt within the past two months dilong regular republicans and not a few democrats is a political marvel but there is a good and sufficient reason for the kaleidoscopic trend to the battling warrior of oyster bay he alone of all the republican and progressive leaders has had from the beginning a definite virile man size policy of antagonism and criticism of president wilsons Wil sons methods of handling our intricate and delicate foreign relations persistent patience is one of the dominating of mr wilson it may be the right way but e is thing spectacular about abou tit it nothing to thrill the jingo blood be that as it may it can not be denied that there has been a rapidly growing against president wilson burh g the last bax months on the ground ahat he has not handled our foreign relations with vigor col roosevelt kashammer ed d away at tile the president so long and 0 ho o vociferously ferou slY that he has been identified in the popular mind as practically ily the only virile defender of the national honor in public life abone As one of americas cleverest politicians he has taken advantage of this pounding home his criticisms of the president with passionate appeals to american pride the re that a great and 4 growing number of people believe that if roosevelt had been president germany german would not have jared dared to sink the lusitania nor villa to spit on the american fl flag ag this may all be botand i of and nonsense but many people believe it if not ot nominated for president roosevelt will be a dominant factor in the convention fight and will have a decisive voice in the selection election of a c candidate andi date all attempts to smoke out tile the boom hn hab so far failed 1 hughes hughes is ia the political sphinx of the 1 republican party he will vill not declare himself on any public policy arid and has said that under no chhum stalls will he accept a nomination ii nation for the im presidency si dency still he has a big following and there are many who believe that he is the only man who can unite the party with any chances of success against wilson they believe in his ability and integrity his political sanity and his judicial pose it gives him great strength among the rank and file and makes him Roosevel ts most formidable competitor in the coming convention ven tion his advocates are men who fear and dislike the roosevelt brand of politics and who find the old guard tactics and policies equally obnoxious to them there is a fairly good list of favo favorite sons who will present inte interesting 9 material for analysis before the holding of the national convention nearly every state in the union will have a candidate for the presidency plenty of good timber will vill be in evidence and considerable of it will be more or less green roosevelt roosevel t and hughes and a few other ermine minor lights flights will wil I 1 be the names to be juggled with and it seems at this date that col roosevelt isto is to be the chieftain who will lead the republican hordes to victory or defeat democrats are not indulging in pre convention worries worries all opposition to wilson has crumbled and his party is with hirn him to a man ile he is the only man mail is their ranks who is being considered and the st I 1 L luay pu is convention will be a one ring ci circus acus lacking g no noisy isy accod accompaniment banim ent and flee biorn jarring strife and light bight liere here is a strange anomaly |