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Six weeks before the Republican National Convention, this Harper’s Weekly cartoon attests that the party’s eventual nominee, William Howard Taft, will have difficulty capturing the black and labor vote. Here, Taft (right) and President Theodore Roosevelt (left) sit atop their steeds, looking worriedly at the angry bull with its “Negro Vote” and “Labor Vote” longhorns. Since first gaining voting rights during Reconstruction, most black men voted Republican, but were often keep from the polls throughout the South by intimidation, violence, and legal restrictions. While many workingmen traditionally voted Democratic, the Republican Party had gained an increasing share of the labor vote since the economic depression of the mid-1890s. |
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