![Democratic National Convention Ticket](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d4/Democratic_National_Convention_Ticket.jpg)
The 1924 Democratic National Convention, held at the
Madison Square Garden
Madison Square Garden, colloquially known as The Garden or by its initials MSG, is a multi-purpose indoor arena in New York City. It is located in Midtown Manhattan between Seventh and Eighth avenues from 31st to 33rd Street, above Pennsylva ...
in
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
from June 24 to July 9, 1924, was the longest continuously running convention in
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
political history. It took a record 103 ballots to nominate a presidential candidate. It was the first major party national convention that saw the name of a woman,
Lena Springs
Lena Jones Wade Springs (March 22, 1883 - May 17, 1942) was the first woman placed in nomination for Vice President of the United States at a political convention. She was nominated at the 1924 Democratic National Convention.
A native of Pulask ...
, placed in nomination for the vice president.
John W. Davis
John William Davis (April 13, 1873 – March 24, 1955) was an American politician, diplomat and lawyer. He served under President Woodrow Wilson as the Solicitor General of the United States and the United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom ...
, a
dark horse
A dark horse is a previously lesser-known person or thing that emerges to prominence in a situation, especially in a competition involving multiple rivals, or a contestant that on paper should be unlikely to succeed but yet still might.
Origin
Th ...
, eventually won the presidential nomination on the 103rd ballot, a compromise candidate following a protracted convention fight between distant front-runners
William Gibbs McAdoo
William Gibbs McAdoo Jr.McAdoo is variously differentiated from family members of the same name:
* Dr. William Gibbs McAdoo (1820–1894) – sometimes called "I" or "Senior"
* William Gibbs McAdoo (1863–1941) – sometimes called "II" or "Ju ...
and
Al Smith
Alfred Emanuel Smith (December 30, 1873 – October 4, 1944) was an American politician who served four terms as Governor of New York and was the Democratic Party's candidate for president in 1928.
The son of an Irish-American mother and a C ...
.
Davis and his vice presidential running-mate,
Governor
A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political ...
Charles W. Bryan of
Nebraska
Nebraska () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by South Dakota to the north; Iowa to the east and Missouri to the southeast, both across the Missouri River; Kansas to the south; Colorado to the southwe ...
, went on to be defeated by the Republican ticket of President
Calvin Coolidge
Calvin Coolidge (born John Calvin Coolidge Jr.; ; July 4, 1872January 5, 1933) was the 30th president of the United States from 1923 to 1929. Born in Vermont, Coolidge was a History of the Republican Party (United States), Republican lawyer ...
and
Charles G. Dawes
Charles Gates Dawes (August 27, 1865 – April 23, 1951) was an American banker, general, diplomat, composer, and Republican politician who was the 30th vice president of the United States from 1925 to 1929 under Calvin Coolidge. He was a co-reci ...
in the
1924 presidential election.
Site selection
The selection of New York as the site for the 1924 convention was based in part on the recent success of the party in that state. Two years earlier, in 1922, thirteen Republican congressmen had lost their seats to Democrats. New York had not been chosen for a convention since 1868. Wealthy New Yorkers, who had outbid other cities, declared their purpose "to convince the rest of the country that the town was not the red-light menace generally conceived by the sticks". Though "dry" organizations that supported continuing the
prohibition of alcohol
Prohibition is the act or practice of forbidding something by law; more particularly the term refers to the banning of the manufacture, storage (whether in barrels or in bottles), transportation, sale, possession, and consumption of alcoholic be ...
opposed the choice of New York, it won McAdoo's grudging consent in the fall of 1923, before the oil scandals made Smith a serious threat to him. (McAdoo's candidacy was hurt by the revelation that he had accepted money from
Edward L. Doheny
Edward Laurence Doheny (; August 10, 1856 – September 8, 1935) was an American oil tycoon who, in 1892, drilled the first successful oil well in the Los Angeles City Oil Field. His success set off a petroleum boom in Southern California, a ...
, an oil tycoon implicated in the
Teapot Dome scandal
The Teapot Dome scandal was a bribery scandal involving the administration of United States President Warren G. Harding from 1921 to 1923. Secretary of the Interior Albert Bacon Fall had leased Navy petroleum reserves at Teapot Dome in Wyomi ...
.) McAdoo's own adopted state, California, had played host to the Democrats in 1920.
The primaries
McAdoo swept the primaries in the first real race in the history of the party, although most states chose delegates through party organizations and conventions, giving most of their projected votes to local or hometown candidates, referred to as "
favorite son
Favorite son (or favorite daughter) is a political term.
* At the quadrennial American national political party conventions, a state delegation sometimes nominates a candidate from the state, or less often from the state's region, who is not a ...
s".
Ku Klux Klan presence
The
Ku Klux Klan
The Ku Klux Klan (), commonly shortened to the KKK or the Klan, is an American white supremacist, right-wing terrorist, and hate group whose primary targets are African Americans, Jews, Latinos, Asian Americans, Native Americans, and ...
had surged in popularity after
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
, due to its leadership's connections to passage of the successful Prohibition Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. This made the Klan a political power throughout many regions of the United States, and it reached the apex of its power in the mid-1920s, when it exerted deep cultural and political influence on both Republicans and Democrats.
Its supporters had successfully quashed an anti-Klan resolution before it ever went to a floor vote at the
1924 Republican National Convention earlier in June, and proponents expected to exert the same influence at the Democratic convention. Instead, tension between pro- and anti-Klan delegates produced an intense and sometimes violent showdown between convention attendees from the states of Colorado and Missouri.
Klan delegates opposed the nomination of
New York Governor
The governor of New York is the head of government of the U.S. state of New York. The governor is the head of the executive branch of New York's state government and the commander-in-chief of the state's military forces. The governor ha ...
Al Smith
Alfred Emanuel Smith (December 30, 1873 – October 4, 1944) was an American politician who served four terms as Governor of New York and was the Democratic Party's candidate for president in 1928.
The son of an Irish-American mother and a C ...
because Smith was a
Roman Catholic
Roman or Romans most often refers to:
*Rome, the capital city of Italy
*Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD
*Roman people, the people of ancient Rome
*'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...
and an opponent of Prohibition, and most supported
William Gibbs McAdoo
William Gibbs McAdoo Jr.McAdoo is variously differentiated from family members of the same name:
* Dr. William Gibbs McAdoo (1820–1894) – sometimes called "I" or "Senior"
* William Gibbs McAdoo (1863–1941) – sometimes called "II" or "Ju ...
. Non-Klan delegates, led by Sen.
Oscar Underwood
Oscar Wilder Underwood (May 6, 1862 – January 25, 1929) was an American lawyer and politician from Alabama, and also a candidate for President of the United States in 1912 and 1924. He was the first formally designated floor leader in the Unit ...
of
Alabama
(We dare defend our rights)
, anthem = "Alabama (state song), Alabama"
, image_map = Alabama in United States.svg
, seat = Montgomery, Alabama, Montgomery
, LargestCity = Huntsville, Alabama, Huntsville
, LargestCounty = Baldwin County, Al ...
, attempted to add condemnation of the organization for its violence to the Democratic Party's platform. The measure was narrowly defeated, and the anti-KKK plank was not included in the platform.
Roosevelt comeback
Smith's name was placed into nomination by
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (; ; January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), often referred to by his initials FDR, was an American politician and attorney who served as the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945. As the ...
, in a speech in which Roosevelt dubbed Smith "
The Happy Warrior". Roosevelt's speech, which has since become a well-studied example of political oratory, was his first major political appearance since the
paralytic illness he had contracted in 1921. The success of this speech and his other convention efforts in support of Smith signaled that he was still a viable figure in politics, and he nominated Smith again in 1928. Roosevelt succeeded Smith as governor in 1929, and went on to win election as president in 1932.
Results
Presidential candidates
Image:James M. Cox 1920.jpg,
Image:William Gibbs McAdoo, formal photo portrait, 1914.jpg,
Image:AlfredSmith.png,
Image:John William Davis.jpg,
Image:Charles_Wayland_Bryan.jpg,
Image:Oscar W. Underwood.jpg,
File:E.T. Meredith, ggbain.16011u.jpg,
File:Senator Carter Glass of Virginia.jpg,
File:Homer Cummings, Harris & Ewing photo portrait, 1920.jpg,
![FDR-Nominating-Smith-June-26-1924 (cropped1)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/05/FDR-Nominating-Smith-June-26-1924_%28cropped1%29.jpg)
The first day of balloting (June 30) brought the predicted deadlock between the leading aspirants for the nomination, William G. McAdoo of California and Gov. Alfred E. Smith of New York, with the remainder divided mainly between local "favorite sons". McAdoo was the leader from the outset, and both he and Smith made small gains in the day's fifteen ballots, but the prevailing belief among the delegates was that the impasse could only be broken by the elimination of both McAdoo and Smith and the selection of one of the other contenders; much interest centred about the candidacy of John W. Davis, who also increased his vote during the day from 31 to 61 (with a peak of 64.5 votes on the 13th and 14th ballots). Most of the favorite son delegations refused to be stampeded to either of the leading candidates and were in no hurry to retire from the contest.
In the early balloting many delegations appeared to be jockeying for position, and some of the original votes were purely complimentary and seemed to conceal the real sentiments of the delegates. Louisiana, for example, which was bound by the "unit rule" (all the state's delegate votes would be cast in favor of the candidate favored by a majority of them), first complimented its neighbor Arkansas by casting its 20 votes for Sen.
Joseph T. Robinson, then it switched to Sen.
Carter Glass
Carter Glass (January 4, 1858 – May 28, 1946) was an American newspaper publisher and Democratic politician from Lynchburg, Virginia. He represented Virginia in both houses of Congress and served as the United States Secretary of the Treasu ...
, and on another ballot Maryland Gov.
Albert C. Ritchie got the twenty, before the delegation finally settled on John W. Davis.
There was some excitement on the tenth ballot, when Kansas abandoned Gov.
Jonathan M. Davis
Jonathan McMillan Davis (April 27, 1871 – June 27, 1943) was an American politician and the List of Governors of Kansas, 22nd Governor of Kansas.
Biography
Davis was born in Bronson, Kansas, to Jonathan McMillan and Eve (Holeman) Davis. H ...
and threw its votes to McAdoo. There was an instant uproar among McAdoo delegates and supporters, and a parade was started around the hall, the Kansas standard leading, with those of all the other McAdoo states coming along behind, and pictures of "McAdoo, Democracy's Hope", being lifted up. After six minutes the chairman's gavel brought order and the roll call resumed, and soon the other side had something to cheer, when New Jersey made its favorite son, Gov.
George S. Silzer, walk the plank and threw its votes into the Smith column. This started another parade, the New York and New Jersey standards leading those of the other Smith delegations around the hall while the band played "Tramp, Tramp, Tramp, the Boys are Marching".
First ballot
Fifteenth ballot
Twentieth ballot
McAdoo and Smith each evolved a strategy to build up his own total slowly. Smith's trick was to plant his extra votes for his opponent, so that McAdoo's strength might later appear to be waning; the Californian countered by holding back his full force, though he had been planning a strong early show. But by no sleight of hand could the convention have been swung around to either contestant. With the party split into two assertive parts, the rule requiring a two-thirds majority for nomination crippled the chances of both candidates by giving a veto each could—and did—use. McAdoo himself wanted to drop the two-thirds rule, but his Protestant supporters preferred to keep their veto over a Catholic candidate, and the South regarded the rule as protection against a northern nominee unfavorable to southern interests. At no point in the balloting did Smith receive more than a single vote from the South and scarcely more than 20 votes from the states west of the Mississippi; he never won more than 368 of the 729 votes needed for nomination, though even this performance was impressive for a Roman Catholic. McAdoo's strength fluctuated more widely, reaching its highest point of 528 on the seventieth ballot. Since both candidates occasionally received purely strategic aid, the nucleus of their support was probably even less. The remainder of the votes were divided among dark horses and favorite sons who had spun high hopes since the
Doheny testimony; understandably, they hesitated to withdraw their own candidacies as long as the convention was so clearly divided.
Thirtieth ballot
As time passed, the maneuvers of the two factions took on the character of desperation.
Daniel C. Roper
Daniel Calhoun Roper (April 1, 1867April 11, 1943) was an American politician and lawyer who served as the 7th United States Secretary of Commerce under President Franklin D. Roosevelt, and was the 5th United States Ambassador to Canada from Ma ...
even went to Franklin Roosevelt, reportedly to offer Smith second place on a McAdoo ticket. For their part, the
Tammany men tried to prolong the convention until the hotel bills were beyond the means of the delegates who had traveled to the convention. The Smith backers also attempted to stampede the delegates by packing the galleries with noisy rooters. Senator
James Phelan of California, among others, complained of "New York rowdyism". But the rudeness of Tammany, particularly their delegates' booing of William Jennings Bryan when he spoke to the convention, only steeled the resolution of the country delegates. McAdoo and Bryan both tried unsuccessfully to adjourn and then reconvene in another city, perhaps
Washington, D.C.
)
, image_skyline =
, image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...
or
St. Louis
St. Louis () is the second-largest city in Missouri, United States. It sits near the confluence of the Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a population of 301,578, while the bi-state metropolitan area, which e ...
.
Forty-second ballot
Sixty-first ballot
As a last resort, McAdoo supporters introduced a motion to eliminate one candidate on each ballot until only five remained, but Smith delegates and those supporting favorite sons managed to defeat the McAdoo strategy. Smith countered by suggesting that all delegates be released from their pledges—to which McAdoo agreed on condition that the two-thirds rule be eliminated—although Smith fully expected that loyalty would prevent the disaffection of Indiana and Illinois votes, both controlled by political bosses friendly to him. Indeed, Senator
David Walsh of Massachusetts expressed the sentiment that moved Smith backers: "We must continue to do all that we can to nominate Smith. If it should develop that he cannot be nominated, then McAdoo cannot have it either." For his part, McAdoo would angrily quit the convention once he lost: but the sixty-first inconclusive round—when the convention set a record for length of balloting—was no time to admit defeat.
Seventieth ballot
![Samuel Moffett Ralston](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8a/Samuel_Moffett_Ralston.jpg)
It had seemed for a time that the nomination could go to Senator
Samuel Ralston of Indiana.
Advanced by Indiana party boss
Thomas Taggart
Thomas Taggart (November 17, 1856March 6, 1929) was an Irish-American politician who was the political boss of the Democratic Party in Indiana for the first quarter of the twentieth century and remained an influential political figure in loca ...
, Ralston's candidacy might attract support from the Bryans, given that Charles Bryan had written, "Ralston is the most promising of the compromise candidates."
Ralston was also a favorite of the Klan and a second choice of many McAdoo delegates.
In 1922, he had launched an attack on parochial schools that the Klan saw as an endorsement of its own views, and he won several normally Republican counties dominated by the Klan.
Commenting on the Klan issue, Ralston said that it would create a bad precedent to denounce any organization by name in the platform.
Much of Ralston's support came from the South and West—states including Oklahoma, Missouri, and Nevada that had strong Klan elements. According to
Claude Bowers
Claude Gernade Bowers (November 20, 1878 – January 21, 1958) was a newspaper columnist and editor, author of best-selling books on American history, Democratic Party politician, and President Franklin D. Roosevelt's ambassador to Spain (1933 ...
, McAdoo said: "I like the old Senator, like his simplicity, honesty, record"; and it was reported that he told Smith supporters he would withdraw only in favor of Ralston. As with
John W. Davis
John William Davis (April 13, 1873 – March 24, 1955) was an American politician, diplomat and lawyer. He served under President Woodrow Wilson as the Solicitor General of the United States and the United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom ...
, Ralston had few enemies, and his support from men as divergent as the Bryans and Taggart cast him as a viable compromise choice. He passed Davis, the almost consistent third choice, on the fifty-second ballot; but Taggart then discouraged the boom for the time being because the McAdoo and Smith phalanxes showed no signs of weakening. On July 8, the eighty-seventh ballot showed a total for Ralston of 93 votes, chiefly from Indiana and Missouri; before the day was over, the Ralston total had risen to almost 200, a larger tally than Davis had ever received. Most of these votes were drawn from McAdoo, to whom they later returned.
Numerous sources indicate that Taggart was not exaggerating when he later said: "We would have nominated Senator Ralston if he had not withdrawn his name at the last minute. It was a near certainty as anything in politics could be. We had pledges of enough delegates that would shift to Ralston on a certain ballot to have nominated him." Ralston wavered on whether to make the race; despite his doctor's stern recommendation not to run and the illness of his wife and son, Ralston had told Taggart that he would be a candidate, albeit a reluctant one.
But the 300-pound Ralston finally telegraphed his refusal to go on; sixty-six years old at the time of the convention, he died the following year.
Seventy-seventh ballot
Eighty-seventh ballot
One hundredth ballot
One hundred third ballot
![CharlesBryan](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a7/CharlesBryan.png)
The nomination was finally awarded to
John W. Davis
John William Davis (April 13, 1873 – March 24, 1955) was an American politician, diplomat and lawyer. He served under President Woodrow Wilson as the Solicitor General of the United States and the United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom ...
, a compromise candidate, on the one hundred third ballot, after the withdrawal of Smith and McAdoo.
[ Davis had never been a genuine dark horse candidate; he had almost always been third in the balloting, and by the end of the 29th round he was the betting favorite of New York gamblers. There had been a Davis movement of considerable size at the 1920 San Francisco convention; however, Charles Hamlin wrote in his diary, Davis "frankly said ... that he was not seeking ]he nomination
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...
and that if nominated he would accept only as a matter of public duty". For Vice President, the Democrats nominated Charles W. Bryan, the governor of Nebraska and the brother of William Jennings Bryan
William Jennings Bryan (March 19, 1860 – July 26, 1925) was an American lawyer, orator and politician. Beginning in 1896, he emerged as a dominant force in the History of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, running ...
, and for many years editor of ''The Commoner''.
Full Balloting
A total of 58 candidates received votes over the 103 ballots, and the second ballot was the one where most candidates were voted for (20 in total).
The alphabetically sorted list of all 58 candidates:
* Henry Tureman Allen
Major General Henry Tureman Allen (April 13, 1859 – August 29, 1930) was a senior United States Army officer known for exploring the Copper River in Alaska in 1885 along with the Tanana and Koyukuk rivers by transversing of wilderness. His t ...
* Newton D. Baker
Newton Diehl Baker Jr. (December 3, 1871 – December 25, 1937) was an American lawyer, Georgist,Noble, Ransom E. "Henry George and the Progressive Movement." The American Journal of Economics and Sociology, vol. 8, no. 3, 1949, pp. 259–269. w ...
* John T. Barnett
* George G. Battle
* Martin Behrman
Martin Behrman (October 14, 1864 – January 12, 1926), an American Democratic politician, was the longest-serving mayor in New Orleans history.
Life and career
Behrman was born in New York City, the son of Frederica and Henry Behrman. His par ...
* George L. Berry
* Fred H. Brown
* Charles W. Bryan
* William Jennings Bryan
William Jennings Bryan (March 19, 1860 – July 26, 1925) was an American lawyer, orator and politician. Beginning in 1896, he emerged as a dominant force in the History of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, running ...
* John M. Callahan
* Marcus A. Coolidge
Marcus Allen Coolidge (October 6, 1865January 23, 1947) was a Democratic United States Senator representing Massachusetts from March 4, 1931, to January 3, 1937.
Biography
Coolidge was born in Westminster, Massachusetts, son of Frederick Spau ...
* Royal S. Copeland
Royal Samuel Copeland (November 7, 1868June 17, 1938), a United States Senator from New York from 1923 until 1938, was an academic, homeopathic physician, and politician. He held elected offices in both Michigan (as a Republican) and New York ...
* James M. Cox
James Middleton Cox (March 31, 1870 July 15, 1957) was an American businessman and politician who served as the 46th and 48th governor of Ohio, and a two-term U.S. Representative from Ohio. As the Democratic nominee for President of the United S ...
* William Coyne
* Homer Stille Cummings
Homer Stille Cummings (April 30, 1870 – September 10, 1956) was an American lawyer and politician who was the United States Attorney General from 1933 to 1939. He also was elected mayor of Stamford, Connecticut, three times before founding the ...
* Josephus Daniels
* Jonathan M. Davis
Jonathan McMillan Davis (April 27, 1871 – June 27, 1943) was an American politician and the List of Governors of Kansas, 22nd Governor of Kansas.
Biography
Davis was born in Bronson, Kansas, to Jonathan McMillan and Eve (Holeman) Davis. H ...
* John W. Davis
John William Davis (April 13, 1873 – March 24, 1955) was an American politician, diplomat and lawyer. He served under President Woodrow Wilson as the Solicitor General of the United States and the United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom ...
* William Emmett Dever
William Emmett Dever (March 13, 1862 – September 3, 1929) was the mayor of Chicago from 1923 to 1927. He had previously served as a judge and before that an alderman. As an alderman and judge he would work to become the Democratic candida ...
* Edward L. Doheny
Edward Laurence Doheny (; August 10, 1856 – September 8, 1935) was an American oil tycoon who, in 1892, drilled the first successful oil well in the Los Angeles City Oil Field. His success set off a petroleum boom in Southern California, a ...
* Edward I. Edwards
Edward Irving Edwards (December 1, 1863 – January 26, 1931) was an American Democratic Party politician who served as the 37th governor of New Jersey from 1920 to 1923 and in the United States Senate from 1923 to 1929.
Life and career
Edwards ...
* Woodbridge N. Ferris
* William Alexander Gaston
* James W. Gerard
James Watson Gerard III (August 25, 1867 – September 6, 1951) was a United States lawyer, diplomat, and justice of the New York Supreme Court.
Early life
Gerard was born in Geneseo, New York. His father, James Watson Gerard Jr., was a lawy ...
* Carter Glass
Carter Glass (January 4, 1858 – May 28, 1946) was an American newspaper publisher and Democratic politician from Lynchburg, Virginia. He represented Virginia in both houses of Congress and served as the United States Secretary of the Treasu ...
* Pat Harrison
Byron Patton "Pat" Harrison (August 29, 1881June 22, 1941) was a Mississippi politician who served as a Democrat in the United States House of Representatives from 1911 to 1919 and in the United States Senate from 1919 until his death.
Early li ...
* Gilbert Hitchcock
Gilbert Monell Hitchcock (September 18, 1859February 3, 1934) was an American congressman and U.S. Senator from Nebraska, and the founder of the ''Omaha World-Herald'' newspaper.
Life and career
Born in Omaha, Nebraska, Hitchcock was the son ...
* David F. Houston
* Cordell Hull
Cordell Hull (October 2, 1871July 23, 1955) was an American politician from Tennessee and the longest-serving U.S. Secretary of State, holding the position for 11 years (1933–1944) in the administration of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt ...
* J. Holmes Jackson
* John B. Kendrick
John Benjamin Kendrick (September 6, 1857 – November 3, 1933) was an American politician and cattleman who served as a United States senator from Wyoming and as the ninth Governor of Wyoming as a member of the Democratic Party.
Early life
...
* J. Richard Kevin
* Roland Krebs
* William Maloney
* Thomas R. Marshall
Thomas Riley Marshall (March 14, 1854 – June 1, 1925) was an American politician who served as the 28th vice president of the United States from 1913 to 1921 under President Woodrow Wilson. A prominent lawyer in Indiana, he became an acti ...
* Fred C. Martin
* William G. McAdoo
William Gibbs McAdoo Jr.McAdoo is variously differentiated from family members of the same name:
* Dr. William Gibbs McAdoo (1820–1894) – sometimes called "I" or "Senior"
* William Gibbs McAdoo (1863–1941) – sometimes called "II" or "Ju ...
* Edwin T. Meredith
* Emma Guffey "Belle" Miller
* Albert A. Murphree
* Robert Latham Owen
Robert Latham Owen Jr. (February 2, 1856July 19, 1947) was one of the first two U.S. senators from Oklahoma. He served in the Senate between 1907 and 1925.
Born into affluent circumstances in antebellum Lynchburg, Virginia, the son of a railroa ...
* Atlee Pomerene
Atlee Pomerene (December 6, 1863November 12, 1937) was an American Democratic Party politician from Ohio. He represented Ohio in the United States Senate from 1911 until 1923.
Biography
Pomerene was born on December 6, 1863, in Berlin, Holmes C ...
* Samuel M. Ralston
* Albert Ritchie
Albert Cabell Ritchie (August 29, 1876 – February 24, 1936) was an American lawyer and politician. A Democrat, he was the 49th governor of Maryland from 1920 to 1935. Ritchie was a conservative who campaigned for, but did not win, the presid ...
* Joseph Taylor Robinson
Joseph Taylor Robinson (August 26, 1872 – July 14, 1937), also known as Joe T. Robinson, was an American politician from Arkansas. A member of the Democratic Party, he represented Arkansas in the United States Senate from 1913 to 1937, servin ...
* Will Rogers
William Penn Adair Rogers (November 4, 1879 – August 15, 1935) was an American vaudeville performer, actor, and humorous social commentator. He was born as a citizen of the Cherokee Nation, in the Indian Territory (now part of Oklahoma ...
* Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (; ; January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), often referred to by his initials FDR, was an American politician and attorney who served as the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945. As the ...
* Willard Saulsbury Jr.
* George Sebastian Silzer
George Sebastian Silzer (April 14, 1870October 16, 1940) served as the 38th governor of New Jersey from 1923 to 1926.
Biography
He was born on April 14, 1870, in New Brunswick, New Jersey.[Al Smith
Alfred Emanuel Smith (December 30, 1873 – October 4, 1944) was an American politician who served four terms as Governor of New York and was the Democratic Party's candidate for president in 1928.
The son of an Irish-American mother and a C ...]
* Thomas J. Spellacy
* Cora Wilson Stewart
Cora Wilson Stewart (January 17, 1875 – December 2, 1958) was an American progressive era social reformer and educator who is well known for her work to eliminate adult illiteracy
Literacy in its broadest sense describes "particular ways ...
* William Ellery Sweet
William Ellery Sweet (January 27, 1869 – May 9, 1942) was an American banker and politician who served as the 23rd Governor of Colorado from 1923 to 1925.
Early life and career
William was born in Chicago, Illinois, on January 27, 186 ...
* Samuel Huston Thompson
Samuel Huston "Shy" Thompson Jr. (November 1, 1875 – February 17, 1966)"Former Chairman Of FTC, Roosevelt Aide Dies At 90", ''The York Gazette and Daily'' (February 19, 1966), p. 2, 15. was an American lawyer and college football coach. The Pr ...
* Oscar Underwood
Oscar Wilder Underwood (May 6, 1862 – January 25, 1929) was an American lawyer and politician from Alabama, and also a candidate for President of the United States in 1912 and 1924. He was the first formally designated floor leader in the Unit ...
* David I. Walsh
* Thomas J. Walsh
* Burton K. Wheeler
Burton Kendall Wheeler (February 27, 1882January 6, 1975) was an attorney and an American politician of the Democratic Party in Montana, which he represented as a United States senator from 1923 until 1947.
Born in Massachusetts, Wheeler began ...
Vice Presidential nomination
13 names were placed into nomination for Davis' vice-presidential running mate, and early in the process, the permitted length of speeches was limited to five minutes each.
Despite this, the only ballot was chaotic, with thirty people, including three women, getting at least one vote for the nomination.
George Berry, a labor union leader from Tennessee, trailed Charles W. Bryan, Governor of Nebraska
The governor of Nebraska is the head of government of the U.S. state of Nebraska as provided by the fourth article of the Constitution of Nebraska. The officeholder is elected to a four-year term, with elections held two years after presidential e ...
, by a vote of 332 to 270.5. Bryan had been chosen by a group of party leaders, including Davis and Al Smith.[ The party leaders first asked Montana Senator Thomas J. Walsh to run for vice president, but Walsh refused. New Jersey Governor ]George Sebastian Silzer
George Sebastian Silzer (April 14, 1870October 16, 1940) served as the 38th governor of New Jersey from 1923 to 1926.
Biography
He was born on April 14, 1870, in New Brunswick, New Jersey.[Newton D. Baker
Newton Diehl Baker Jr. (December 3, 1871 – December 25, 1937) was an American lawyer, Georgist,Noble, Ransom E. "Henry George and the Progressive Movement." The American Journal of Economics and Sociology, vol. 8, no. 3, 1949, pp. 259–269. w ...]
, and Maryland Governor Albert Ritchie
Albert Cabell Ritchie (August 29, 1876 – February 24, 1936) was an American lawyer and politician. A Democrat, he was the 49th governor of Maryland from 1920 to 1935. Ritchie was a conservative who campaigned for, but did not win, the presid ...
were also considered, but Bryan was proposed as a candidate who could unite the Smith and McAdoo factions. After the end of the first ballot, a cascade of switches from various candidates to Bryan took place, and Bryan was nominated with 739 votes. Notably, he remains, as of 2020, the only brother of a previous nominee (William Jennings Bryan
William Jennings Bryan (March 19, 1860 – July 26, 1925) was an American lawyer, orator and politician. Beginning in 1896, he emerged as a dominant force in the History of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, running ...
) to be nominated by a major party.
The official tally was:
Prayers
Each of the convention's 23 sessions was opened with an invocation
An invocation (from the Latin verb ''invocare'' "to call on, invoke, to give") may take the form of:
*Supplication, prayer or spell.
*A form of possession.
*Command or conjuration.
*Self-identification with certain spirits.
These forms are ...
by a different nationally prominent clergyman. The choices represented the party's coalition at the time: there were five Episcopalian ministers; three Presbyterians; three Lutherans; two Roman Catholics; two Baptists; two Methodists; one each from the Congregationalists, Disciples of Christ, Unitarians, and Christian Scientists; and two Jewish rabbis. All of the clergy were white men; African-American denominations were not represented.
With the convention deadlocked over the choice of a nominee, some of the invocations became calls for the delegates and candidates to put aside sectionalism and ambition in favor of party unity.[''Official Report of the Proceedings of the Democratic National Convention'', published by the Democratic National Committee (1924), p. 886]
Among the clergy who spoke to the convention:
* Catholics included Patrick Joseph Hayes
Patrick Joseph Hayes (November 20, 1867 – September 4, 1938) was an American cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church. He served as Archbishop of New York from 1919 until his death, and was elevated to the cardinalate in 1924.
Early life and ...
, Archbishop of New York, and Francis Patrick Duffy, Chaplain of the New York National Guard.
* Episcopalians, such as Thomas F. Gailor
Thomas Frank Gailor (September 17, 1856 – October 3, 1935) was the third bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Tennessee in the Episcopal Church and served from 1898 to 1935.
Career
Gailor was enrolled in the preparatory department of, then grad ...
, Bishop of Tennessee, and Wythe Leigh Kinsolving
Wythe Leigh Kinsolving (November 14, 1878 – December 21, 1964) was an American Episcopal Church in the United States of America, Episcopal priest, writer, poet, Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party political advocate, sometime pacif ...
, Chaplain of the Virginian Society of New York.
* The roster included, on different days, two fierce antagonists and frequent debaters on the theory of evolution and Biblical inerrancy, John Roach Straton
John Roach Straton (surname rhymes with "Dayton"); born April 6, 1875, in Evansville, Indiana; died October 29, 1929, in Clifton Springs, New York) was a Baptist pastor. Straton was the son of the Reverend Henry Dundas Douglas Straton and the f ...
, a Baptist conservative, and Charles Francis Potter
Charles Francis Potter (October 28, 1885 – October 4, 1962) was an American Unitarian minister, theologian, and author.
In 1923 and 1924, he became nationally known through a series of debates with John Roach Straton, a fundamentalist Chris ...
, a Unitarian Modernist.
* Rabbi Stephen Samuel Wise
Stephen Samuel Wise (March 17, 1874 – April 19, 1949) was an early 20th-century American Reform rabbi and Zionist leader in the Progressive Era. Born in Budapest, he was an infant when his family immigrated to New York. He followed his fath ...
, founder of the Free Synagogue, who was also a delegate from New York.
* Dr. Frederick Hermann Knubel, president of the United Lutheran Churches in America.
Legacy
In his acceptance speech, Davis made the perfunctory statement that he would enforce the prohibition
Prohibition is the act or practice of forbidding something by law; more particularly the term refers to the banning of the manufacture, storage (whether in barrels or in bottles), transportation, sale, possession, and consumption of alcoholic ...
law, but his conservatism prejudiced him in favor of personal liberty and home rule and he was frequently denounced as a wet. The dry leader Wayne Wheeler
Wayne Bidwell Wheeler (November 10, 1869 – September 5, 1927) was an American attorney and longtime leader of the Anti-Saloon League. The leading advocate of the prohibitionist movement in the late 1800s and early 1900s, he played a major ...
complained of Davis's "constant repetition of wet catch phrases like 'personal liberty', 'illegal search and seizure', and 'home rule'". After the convention Davis tried to satisfy both factions of his party, but his support came principally from the same city elements that had backed Cox in 1920. The last surviving participant from the convention was Diana Serra Cary
Diana Serra Cary (born Peggy-Jean Montgomery; October 29, 1918 – February 24, 2020), known as Baby Peggy, was an American child film actress, vaudevillian, author and silent film historian. She was the last living person with a substantial car ...
who as a five-year-old child film star was the convention's Official Mascot; she died on February 24, 2020 at the age of 101.
* This was the first Democratic National Convention broadcast on radio.
* The first seconding address by a woman in either national political parties was given by Izetta Jewel at this convention, seconding John Davis, and Abby Crawford Milton
Abby Crawford Milton (6 February 1881 – 2 May 1991) was an American suffragist and supercentenarian.
She was the last president of the Tennessee Equal Suffrage Association. She traveled throughout Tennessee making speeches and organizing suffrag ...
, seconding McAdoo.
* During his 1960 campaign, John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK and the nickname Jack, was an American politician who served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 until his assassination ...
cited the dilemma of the Massachusetts delegation at the 1924 Democratic National Convention when making light of his own campaign problems: "Either we must switch to a more liberal candidate or move to a cheaper hotel."
* Both Franklin D. Roosevelt and Al Smith were filmed during the convention by Lee de Forest
Lee de Forest (August 26, 1873 – June 30, 1961) was an American inventor and a fundamentally important early pioneer in electronics. He invented the first electronic device for controlling current flow; the three-element "Audion" triode va ...
using his Phonofilm
Phonofilm is an optical sound-on-film system developed by inventors Lee de Forest and Theodore Case in the early 1920s.
Introduction
In 1919 and 1920, Lee De Forest, inventor of the audion tube, filed his first patents on a sound-on-film process, ...
sound-on-film
Sound-on-film is a class of sound film processes where the sound accompanying a picture is recorded on photographic film, usually, but not always, the same strip of film carrying the picture. Sound-on-film processes can either record an analog ...
process. These films are in the Maurice Zouary collection at the Library of Congress
The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library is ...
.
"Klanbake" meme
In 2015, conservative blogs and Facebook pages started circulating a photo of hooded Klansmen supposedly marching at the 1924 DNC. In early 2017, a pro-Donald Trump
Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021.
Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of Pe ...
Facebook
Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin M ...
group called "ElectTrump2020" turned the photo into a meme which was shared more than 18,000 times on Facebook alone. Author Dinesh D'Souza
Dinesh Joseph D'Souza (; born April 25, 1961) is an Indian-American right-wing political commentator, author, filmmaker, and conspiracy theorist. He has written over a dozen books, several of them ''New York Times'' best-sellers.
In 2012, D' ...
shared the photo and the meme on Twitter in September 2017. In fact, the widely circulated photo depicted a December 1924 march by Klansmen in Madison, Wisconsin
Madison is the county seat of Dane County and the capital city of the U.S. state of Wisconsin. As of the 2020 census the population was 269,840, making it the second-largest city in Wisconsin by population, after Milwaukee, and the 80th-lar ...
and had no connection to any political convention. The term "Klanbake" appears to have been coined by ''New York Daily News
The New York ''Daily News'', officially titled the ''Daily News'', is an American newspaper based in Jersey City, NJ. It was founded in 1919 by Joseph Medill Patterson as the ''Illustrated Daily News''. It was the first U.S. daily printed in ta ...
'' columnist Joseph A. Cowan, in a satirical column reporting on the Convention at the time. Cowan also used the derisive terms "klanvention" and "klandidate." In 2000, a ''Daily News'' reporter included the term in an historical article about the 1924 convention, stating erroneously that "newspapers" referred to the convention as the Klanbake, when in fact Cowan was the only writer to use the term.
See also
* History of the United States Democratic Party
The Democratic Party is one of the two major political parties of the United States political system and the oldest existing political party in that country founded in the 1830s and 1840s.
It is also the oldest voter-based political party in t ...
* Democratic Party presidential primaries, 1924
From March 12 to June 7, 1924, voters of the Democratic Party chose its nominee for president in the 1924 United States presidential election. The concept of a primary election, where any registered party member would vote for a candidate, was ...
* List of Democratic National Conventions
This is a list of Democratic National Conventions. These conventions are the presidential nominating conventions of the Democratic Party of the United States.
List of Democratic National Conventions
* Conventions whose nominees won the subseq ...
* U.S. presidential nomination convention
A United States presidential nominating convention is a political convention held every four years in the United States by most of the political parties who will be fielding nominees in the upcoming U.S. presidential election. The formal purpo ...
* 1924 Republican National Convention
* 1924 United States presidential election
References
Further reading
* Burner, David. ''The Politics of Provincialism: The Democratic Party in Transition, 1918-1932'' (1968)
* Chalmers, David. "The Ku Klux Klan in politics in the 1920's." ''Mississippi Quarterly'' 18.4 (1965): 234-24
online
* Goldberg, David J. "Unmasking the Ku Klux Klan: The northern movement against the KKK, 1920-1925." ''Journal of American Ethnic History'' (1996): 32-4
online
*
* McVeigh, Rory. "Power Devaluation, the Ku Klux Klan, and the Democratic National Convention of 1924." ''Sociological Forum'' 16#1 (2001
abstract
* Martinson, David L. "Coverage of La Follette Offers Insights for 1972 Campaign." ''Journalism Quarterly'' 52.3 (1975): 539–542.
* Prude, James C. "William Gibbs McAdoo and the Democratic National Convention of 1924." ''Journal of Southern History'' 38.4 (1972): 621-62
online
External links
Democratic Party Platform of 1924
at ''The American Presidency Project''
{{Authority control
Democratic National Convention
The Democratic National Convention (DNC) is a series of presidential nominating conventions held every four years since 1832 by the United States Democratic Party. They have been administered by the Democratic National Committee since the 1852 ...
Democratic National Convention
The Democratic National Convention (DNC) is a series of presidential nominating conventions held every four years since 1832 by the United States Democratic Party. They have been administered by the Democratic National Committee since the 1852 ...
Democratic National Convention
The Democratic National Convention (DNC) is a series of presidential nominating conventions held every four years since 1832 by the United States Democratic Party. They have been administered by the Democratic National Committee since the 1852 ...
Political conventions in New York City
New York State Democratic Committee
Democratic National Conventions
Democratic National Convention
The Democratic National Convention (DNC) is a series of presidential nominating conventions held every four years since 1832 by the United States Democratic Party. They have been administered by the Democratic National Committee since the 1852 ...
Democratic National Convention
The Democratic National Convention (DNC) is a series of presidential nominating conventions held every four years since 1832 by the United States Democratic Party. They have been administered by the Democratic National Committee since the 1852 ...
1920s in Manhattan
Madison Square Garden