Joseph B. Foraker

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Joseph B. Foraker : biography

July 5, 1846 – May 10, 1917

1908 race; defeat for re-election

In the aftermath of the Gridiron Dinner, Foraker was increasingly ostracized, both politically and socially. Unwelcome at the White House, he was excluded from patronage. Nevertheless, the Committee on Military Affairs, on which Foraker sat, went ahead and held hearings into the Brownsville matter between February and June 1907. Author John Weaver, in his 1997 book on the Brownsville case, takes note of "Foraker’s masterful presentation of fact and law", including his cross-examination of witnesses who sought to convince the committee of the soldiers’ guilt. In March 1908, the committee issued its report, by a vote of 9–4 endorsing the President’s action. While the official minority report found the evidence inconclusive, Foraker and Connecticut Senator Morgan Bulkeley signed a separate report stating that "the weight of the testimony shows that none of the soldiers of the Twenty-fifth U.S. Infantry participated in the shooting affray".

Although he knew he had little chance of winning, Foraker challenged Taft, his fellow Cincinnatian, for the Republican nomination for president. He hoped to secure a deal whereby he would endorse Taft in exchange for support in the senatorial election to be held in January 1909. Roosevelt was determined to drive Foraker from politics, and Taft refused to deal. Taft won at each stage of the delegate-selection process, gaining all but two delegates from Ohio. At the 1908 Republican National Convention, Taft received 702 votes and was nominated; Foraker received 16, of which 11 came from African Americans.

After Foraker’s defeat for the presidential nomination, he began work to gain re-election to the Senate. His vote on the Hepburn Act and his opposition to Roosevelt had provoked opposition to him within the Ohio Republican Party; in addition, both he and Dick were seen by some as the face of the old guard of the party, out of place in the Progressive Era. Many of those who opposed him proposed Congressman Theodore E. Burton for the Senate seat; Foraker stated that the first thing to do was secure a Republican legislature, with the question of who should be senator left until victory was obtained. Amid speculation as to Taft’s position on Foraker, the two men met, to all appearances cordially, on September 2 at the Grand Army of the Republic encampment at Toledo, and later that day, the two men appeared on the same platform. Taft spoke in appreciation of Foraker, who, as governor, had appointed him as a judge, giving him his start in public life. Foraker, for his part, stated that Taft would be his party leader during the campaign, and called on the presidential candidate at his headquarters in Cincinnati a week later. The Taft campaign asked Foraker to preside, and to introduce Taft, at a rally to be held at the Cincinnati Music Hall on September 22. In a letter to a newspaper publisher, Taft pointed out that Foraker "can be useful with the colored vote and the Grand Army vote".

The seeming rapprochement was shattered when publisher William Randolph Hearst, giving a speech in Columbus, read from letters to Foraker by Standard Oil Company vice president John D. Archbold. During Foraker’s first term in the Senate, he had done legal work for Standard Oil; in the letters, Archbold made reference to legislation he considered objectionable, and also made references to substantial fees to Foraker. However, the publisher read them in such a way as to suggest a causal relationship between the killing of the legislation and the fees. Foraker quickly denied any impropriety, stating that the relationship was not secret and the excerpts had been read out of context. Foraker noted that when he was retained by the corporation in December 1898, it had not yet come under federal scrutiny, and when Archbold had sought to retain him in 1906, he had declined. Standard Oil was wildly unpopular, and the controversy put Taft in a difficult position. Foraker sent a letter to Taft, hand-delivered by Senator Dick, expressing his willingness to avoid the Music Hall meeting. Taft said only that he hoped Foraker would meet with the organizers of the event and follow their recommendation, which Foraker took to mean that Taft was giving credence to Hearst’s charges and did not want him there. Foraker cancelled all remaining campaign speeches. Ohio helped elect Taft and elected a Democratic governor, but returned a Republican legislature, which would elect a senator in January 1909.