Joseph B. Foraker - Assessment

Assessment

Historian Allen Nevins, in his foreword to Walters' biography of Foraker, suggested that Foraker did not attain the presidency, as he had hoped, because of the ambitions of other Ohio politicians. While Foraker might have secured the nomination in 1888 as a compromise candidate, had not his pledges to Sherman prevented it, having "stood aside for an older man year after year he was compelled to stand aside for younger leaders. First McKinley, with Hanna at his side, was given precedence; then Taft, whom Foraker had given a start in public life, scaled the peak. Foraker, for all his administrative capacity, his wide popular appeal, and his unflinching courage, had the tragic lot of seeing a succession of associates go above him." Even Foraker's final defeat, in 1914, proved to be part of the political rise of another president from Ohio, Harding. Nevins noted the aggressive nature of Foraker's political style, and commented, "How much of his failure to reach high office was attributable to ill fortune and how much to some of his traits, readers … may judge for themselves." Cincinnati editor Murat Halstead, a contemporary, attributed the fact that Foraker did not get nominated in 1888 to the surplus of ambitious Ohio men at the convention: in addition to Sherman, Foraker, and McKinley, even Harrison had been born in Ohio.

According to Nevins, "in the era which began after McKinley's assassination he did not show the progressive qualities which the electorate increasingly demanded; indeed, he seemed positively reactionary." Walters agreed, noting that Foraker's 1914 defeat was caused in part by fears that his "uncompromising Republicanism of an earlier era would injure the party. The stirring principles of the New Freedom called for new leaders." Historian Benjamin Kendrick noted that "Mr. Foraker was among the first of prominent politicians to be retired because of their too close connection with 'Big Business.'"

Historian Louis L. Gould, who wrote a study of the McKinley administration, stated that Foraker "may well have been too close to some large corporations, but he also retained some vestiges of the commitment of the Civil War generation in the North to the idea of human equality ... This prompted him to champion the cause of the Negro soldiers." According to historian Percy Murray in his journal article on the relationship between Foraker and black newspaper editor Harry Smith, Foraker's "political career ended partially because of his support for and espousal of black rights ... Perhaps Smith best summed up his alliance with Foraker when he stated that it was time for Afro-Americans to ... show full support for Foraker and men like him who supported the efforts of Afro-Americans." Walter Rucker and James Upton, in their Encyclopedia of American Race Riots, write favorably of Foraker:

Senator Foraker is acknowledged as the key person in Congress to keep the issue of the Brownsville soldiers alive. He made speeches about it and wrote about it. His statement in defense of the soldiers was summed up appropriately when he said that the soldiers "ask no favors because they are Negroes, but only justice because they are men".