FIGHT FOR THE PRESIDENCY.

West Coast Times, 13 June 1912, Page 1

FIGHT FOR THE PRESIDENCY.

NECK AND NECK,

Tho two candidates for tho Republican nomination for the American Presidency are running nock and nock. The election of the State delegations gave Mr Taft and Mr Roosevelt an equal number of supporters, so that a struggle of a sensational kind is now taking place at the Republican Convention at Chicago. The result may be expected to. remain in doubt until the very hour of decision. Each man professes to be confident and each is backed by a campaign'organisation which has command of much money and a wide experience of the political game as it is played in America. The great majority of the newspapers favour Mr. Taft, who hais also the advantage of being able to use tlie official Republican “machine.” On the other hand, Mr. Roosevelt has sncceeeded in stirring to enthusiasm the Radical sentiment of tho Western States, and he retains his peculiar faculty for appealing to the popular imagination, which may be a factor of importance with the delegates whose attitude is a little doubtful. Tho Republicans have realised that the breach in their ranks is offering the Democrat nominee a possible road to victory, and it has been urged in some quarters that both Mr Roosevelt and Mr. Taft had better be set aside in favour of some lesser light of the party. But the suggestion has come too late. The two big men have the field and they will fight their battle to a finish whatever may be the effect upon the fortunes of their party. Really it would be a matter for international regret if so Homeric a contest were not allowed to reach a conclusion.—“ Times.’ 1