Utah's Senatorial Election of 1899: The Election That Failed

Utah Historical Quarterly

Vol. 39, 1971, No. 1

Utah's Senatorial Election of 1899: The Election That Failed

BY STEWART L. GROW

SO ENDED THE STRUGGLE that has cost the Democratic party more heartburnings, more bitterness, and more unforgetable differences than any battle it has ever waged," wrote the Salt Lake Tribune at the close of Utah's senatorial election of 1899. The Tribune was commenting on the fact that the Democratically controlled 1899 Utah State Legislature, after a dramatic and bitter struggle, had failed to elect a United States senator to succeed Republican Frank J. Cannon. It was the election that failed.

The episode occurred at a time when the United States Constitution required that United States senators be elected by state legislatures, a practice which continued until after the adoption of the Seventeenth Amendment in 1913. Federal law also established the procedure to be followed by a state legislature when it had the responsibility to elect a senator. Specifically, the law required that on the second Tuesday after the organization of the legislature the two houses of that body were to meet separately and vote for senator. The following day, the two houses were to meet together, and if any person had received a majority in each house he was declared elected. If no person had such a majority, then the two houses of the legislature were to meet in joint session and take at least one ballot every day until a senator was elected by a majority of the joint assembly.

Utah's 1899 Legislature had the responsibility of choosing a senator to succeed Senator Frank J. Cannon, a Silver Republican. Inasmuch as the Democrats dominated both houses of the legislature, it was anticipated that a Democrat would be elected. The legislature was opened with an address by Republican Governor Heber M. Wells, in which he pointed out that one of the legislature's duties would be "the election of one of your fellow citizens to the exalted position of United States Senator from Utah." He then expressed the hope that this important duty might be performed "without entrenching unreasonably upon the time of the members and without bitterness or unnecessary strife." The governor's request that the election be swift, and without bitterness, probably was voiced in the hope that the legislature would avoid some of the delay and conflict which had developed during the previous senatorial election of 1897, in which Joseph L. Rawlins had defeated Moses Thatcher on the fifty-third ballot, after a bitter fight. If such was the governor's hope, he must have been severely disappointed in the legislature's subsequent actions, for although it labored long and hard, it became embroiled in bitter controversy and failed to elect a senator.

In accordance with proper procedure, the two houses met separately on January 17 and proceeded to vote for senator. The chambers were filled by people who were there to observe the process of "senator making," or to support one of the various candidates. The chaplain's prayer, in the senate, included a petition to the Almighty "that in the choice of a United States senator, such a man might be chosen as would suitably and honorably represent the State in the Halls of Congress." At 2:30 the balloting began, with the following results :*

No candidate had received a majority in either house. In accordance with the law, the legislature met in joint session the following day. The galleries were again packed and many people were turned away. Several classes of students, with their teachers, put in an early appearance and stayed throughout the session. The presiding officer called the session to order, the journals of the two houses were read and inasmuch as they showed that no candidate had been elected to the Senate, the joint assembly then proceeded to ballot by roll call. That first roll call was the beginning of what must have become a rather tiring routine during the subsequent 163 times that the clerk read the names of the legislators and recorded their votes. At that time, probably no one in the chamber would have predicted that the Democratic majority would remain so divided that during 164 ballots they could not agree on a senator. Even the newspapers were carrying articles indicating that an early election was expected.

Five ballots were taken the first day of the joint session. As shown in the following table, the voting throughout all five ballots held very rigid, with the 5th ballot being exactly the same as the 1st. *

On the 4th ballot, a complimentary vote was cast for Mr. E. H. Snow by one of King's supporters, Mr. McQuarrie. However, having paid honor to Mr. Snow, McQuarrie returned his support to King on the 5th ballot. The practice of giving complimentary votes was adopted by several legislators during the session. Analysis of the 164 votes taken by the legislature indicates that the rigid pattern of voting of the first day of the joint session largely set the pattern for voting throughout the session. Frank J. Cannon started with a block of seven votes, which remained loyally with him throughout the entire balloting process. He attracted a high of thirteen votes on the 110th ballot, but finished on the 164th ballot with the same seven votes he had on the first roll call. William H. King started with nineteen votes and reached a high of twenty votes on several ballots; however, he finished with only four votes. Aquilla Nebeker started with one vote and reached a high of ten votes on the 120th ballot, but ended with the one vote he had at first. George Sutherland received the support of the majority of the Republicans and started the race with fourteen votes. He held these solidly until the 6th ballot, when the Republicans shifted their votes to A. L. Thomas. This practice by the non-Cannon Republicans of shifting from one candidate to another, in an attempt to find one who would attract Democratic votes, continued throughout the contest. Such prominent names as C. C. Goodwin, Reed Smoot, and Charles Zane were nominated, but none of them drew more than the fourteen Republican votes. The one candidate who seemed to be able to influence a significant number of legislators to switch their support to him was A. W. McCune. He started the contest with eleven votes. On the 6th ballot, he gained three additional votes, which brought his total to fourteen. By the 20th ballot it had climbed to fifteen, by the 40th to twenty-two, and on the 80th ballot he received twenty-eight votes, just five short of the necessary majority of thirty-two. The McCune forces were working diligently; and although they did not receive any additional votes in the public polling, they seemed to be gathering pledges which would shift at the appropriate time when victory could be assured. By evening of February 17, they seemed confident that on the first roll call of February 18, the 121st ballot, they would win. However, before the clerk would call the roll that morning, tragedy struck their cause. Representative Albert A. Law, a Republican, secured the floor on a point of personal privilege and proceeded to charge that A. W. McCune had attempted to buy his vote for $ 1,500. His speech included a dramatic and detailed account of the alleged bribery attempt. Immediately upon conclusion of Law's speech, supporters of McCune vigorously denied Law's charges and later alleged that what actually happened was that Law had offered to sell his vote for $5,000 and that when his proposition was spurned he had laid a plot to entrap McCune. To dispel any ideas that because Representative Law was a nominal Republican that he was speaking for the Republican party, the Republican leader in the House gained the floor and proceeded to declare that Law had previously disassociated himself from the party and also that he had been disowned by it.

After the dramatic charges, denials, and disownings had concluded, the joint assembly proceeded to select a seven-man bipartisan committee to hear the charges and ascertain the facts. After three weeks of hearings, they submitted a divided report. Five members of the so-called Bribery Committee held that the charges had not been sustained and a minority of two members held that they had been proven.

Throughout the period of the committee's hearings, the joint assembly had continued to vote for senator each day as required by law. However, during much of that time, the voting was largely a formality as the legislators waited for the committee's report. When the report was received, there were only three days left in the constitutionally limited sixty day session. During those remaining three days, the activity and tension in the legislature were at a high pitch. Thirty ballots were taken, fourteen of them coming on the sixtieth legislative day. In a last minute effort to find an acceptable compromise candidate, President George Q. Cannon, a member of the First Presidency of the L. D. S. church and former delegate to Congress from Utah, was nominated. Immediately, he drew fourteen Republican votes. On the 160th ballot, he drew twentythree votes — nine short of the needed majority. However, that was the peak of his strength, and on the final ballot he received the same twentythree votes. During the closing hours, Mr. CO Richards was nominated in the hopes that the Democrats could be encouraged to give him a majority vote, but he attracted a maximum of fifteen votes. Democratic leaders tried desperately to get their party members to compromise, but their efforts were fruitless.

On the evening of the sixtieth and final legislative day, the joint assembly took a recess for dinner and reconvened at 8:00 P.M. An immense throng packed every available space in the legislative chamber and crowded the halls outside. In the next four hours, nine ballots were taken. They were interspersed with dramatic appeals for unity, hurried caucuses, and last minute negotiations — all to no avail. The final ballot, the 164th, was started at three minutes before midnight and was finished at five minutes after. By the start of that ballot, it had become evident to most of the legislators that the stalemate would not be broken and many of them returned to their first choice. The final totals stood as follows:*

Immediately following the announcement of the vote, President Nebeker declared that no senator had been elected, and the legislature adjourned. The crowd, which had been held in check during the long hours of the night session, surged onto the legislative floor. Some men shouted, while others threw their hats in the air. Many were sad faced and grim. Women waved their handkerchiefs or used them to wipe tears from their eyes. Some of the crowd seemed to find great pleasure in the outcome and others were equally dispirited.

The factors which produced such an electoral failure are difficult to identify and weigh. The newspaper reports of the time did not identify any specific forces and neither did the legislative record. The struggle did not seem to be between church and non-church forces, for candidates of both categories were included on both the Republican and Democratic sides. Nor did the contest seem to be based on sectional or economic factors. All of the strong candidates resided in the central Utah area and were from the upper-economic, well-educated level. Salt Lake had three major newspapers at the time, the Deseret News, the Salt Lake Tribune and the Salt Lake Herald. The Herald supported A. W. McCune, while the Tribune vigorously opposed him but did not promote the candidacy of any other aspirant. The Deseret News remained neutral. So it appears that the contest was not a struggle among these newspapers.

If any factors can be charged with bringing about the failure, they would seem to be the large number of candidates, the predeliction of legislators to stick with individual candidates, the inexperience of the legislators in senatorial elections, and the lack of party discipline, especially within the Democratic party. When the election started, there were six candidates and none of them seemed to be in a dominant position. The incumbent, Frank J. Cannon, might have been in favorable circumstances had it not been that he was a Silver Republican seeking re-election through a dominantly Democratic legislature. His candidacy had also been weakened by the development of a considerable amount of opposition within his own party, as evidenced by the fact that the majority of Republicans failed to support him. William H. King, a Democrat, started with the highest vote total of eighteen, but this was far from the thirtytwo required. However, inasmuch as he was the Democratic candidate with the most votes in a Democratic legislature, it might have been expected that he could win; but, the divisions within the Democratic party were such that King was only able to accumulate two additional votes for a high total of twenty, and never came close to election. Instead of consolidating behind King, the Democrats slowly developed a large enough coalition behind A. W. McCune that on the 121st ballot his election seemed certain until Representative Law accused him of bribery. That accusation, and the subsequent investigation, seemed to alienate some of McCune's support. Although the Bribery Investigation Committee exonerated him by a five to two vote, he was not able to bring together again the necessary majority. The Democrats then failed to agree on any other candidate. Their failure to compromise can, therefore, be charged as the cause of the electoral failure. Historian Orson F. Whitney, who was a member of the Senate during the 1899 election, also lays the blame for the failure on the "division among the Democrats." However, the Republicans also played a significant part in bringing about the failure, for at any time they could have shifted their votes to a Democratic candidate and brought about an election which would have assured Utah its full representation in the U.S. Senate. Evidently, they saw the possibility that a two-year vacancy in the Senate seat being contested would result in a Republican occupying that seat instead of a Democrat and so failed to swing over.

The reasons for the failure of the Democrats to compromise and the Republicans to swing over can be found largely in the depth of personal commitment to individual candidates, human stubborness, and party advantage. However, there were other factors existing on the Utah political scene at the time that may have had significant influence. These were inexperience in senatorial elections and underdevelopment of party discipline. At the time of the 1899 election, Utah had only been a state for three years, and was, therefore, quite inexperienced in senatorial elections. Her legislators, particularly the Democrats, had not yet developed adequate skills in organizing for an electoral battle of the type they faced in 1899. Furthermore, party discipline was still a developing commodity. National political parties, the Democrats and the Republicans, had only been functioning on the Utah scene for five or six years. Prior to that time, Utah politics had been operated through the People's party, which was dominantly Mormon, and the Liberal party, which was principally non-Mormon. When the religious basis of party division was abandoned, during the early 1890s, the population moved into the two national parties. This created a great upheaval in Utah's traditional political patterns and evidently new patterns had not yet developed sufficiently to produce the organization and party discipline, at least among the Democrats, necessary to effect a choice among a number of strong candidates. This weakness had also been demonstrated in the election of 1897 when the legislature went through fifty-three ballots before it finally elected Joseph L. Rawlins to the Senate. However, the struggle of 1897, and the failure of 1899, seemed to be a good teaching experience and Utah's legislature never again failed to elect a senator so long as it had that responsibility.

The sad sequel to the 1899 failure, so far as the Democrats were concerned, came in the state legislative elections of 1900 when the Republicans won a lopsided victory, due partially to the futile factionalization exhibited by the Democrats in the 1899 senatorial fight. When the 1901 Legislature met, the dominant Republican majority, no doubt having learned a lesson from their Democratic brethren, swiftly proceeded to elect Thomas Kearns on the first ballot of the joint session. The vote gave Kearns thirty-seven and McCune twenty-five. Senator Kearns, however, served only four years because two years of the term for which he was elected had already elapsed.

Such was Utah's senatorial election of 1899 — the election that failed.

STATEMENT OF OWNERSHIP, MANAGEMENT AND CIRCULATION

The Utah Historical Quarterly is published quarterly by the Utah State Historical Society, 603 East South Temple, Salt Lake City, Utah 84102. The editor is Charles S. Peterson and Margery W. Ward is associate editor with offices at the same address as the publisher. The magazine is owned by the Utah State Historical Society and no individual or company owns or holds any bonds, mortgages, or other securities of the Society or its magazine.

The purposes, function, and non-profit status of this organization and the exempt status for federal income tax purposes have not changed during the preceding twelve months.

The following figures are the average number of copies of each issue during the preceding twelve months: 2,500 copies printed; no paid circulation; 1,948 mail subscriptions; 1,838 total paid circulation; 110 free distribution (including samples) by mail, carrier, or other means; 1,948 total distribution; 552 inventory for office use, leftover, unaccounted, spoiled after printing; total 2,500. The following figures are the actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 2,500 copies printed; no paid circulation; 2,089 mail subscriptions; 1,979 total paid circulation; 110 free distribution (including samples) by mail, carrier, or other means; 2,089 total distribution; 411 inventory for office use, leftover, unaccounted, spoiled after printing; total 2,500.

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