masters had in mind. As I look back upon the great event of this
convention, the nomination of Woodrow Wilson for the governorship of New
Jersey, I feel that destiny was inscrutably engaged there, working in
mysterious ways its wonders to perform, working perhaps through strange,
incongruous instrumentalities to bring the man of destiny into action, led
by those who were opposed to everything Woodrow Wilson stood for, opposed
by those who were yearning for and striving for just the dawn of political
liberalism that his advent in politics heralded. The conflict of the
Trenton Convention about to be enacted was an illustration of the poet's
line, "Where ignorant armies clash by night." The successful side of the
Convention was fighting for what they least wanted; the defeated against
what they most wanted. Here in this convention, in truth, were in
aggressive action the incongruities of politics and in full display were
witnessed the sardonic contrasts between the visible and the invisible
situations in politics. All the Old Guard moving with Prussian precision
to the nomination of the man who was to destroy for a time the machine
rule in New Jersey and inaugurate a new national era in political
liberalism while all the liberal elements of the state, including fine old
Judge Westcott of Camden and young men like myself were sullen, helpless.
Every progressive Democrat in the Convention was opposed to the nomination
of the Princetonian, and every standpatter and Old Guardsman was in favour
of Woodrow Wilson. On the convention floor, dominating the whole affair,
stood ex-Senator James Smith, Jr., of New Jersey, the spokesman of the
"highbrow" candidate for governor, controlling the delegates from south
and west Jersey. Handsome, cool, dignified, he rose from the floor of the
convention hall, and in rich, low tones, seconded the nomination of the
man "he had never met," the man he would not "presume" to claim
acquaintance with, the man whose life had lain in other fields than his.
Very close to him, "taking his orders," and acting upon every suggestion
that came to him, sat Jim Nugent, grim, big-jawed, the giant full-back of