Second Term As Governor and Death
Despite Beckham's move to unseat McCreary in the Senate, the two were once again allies by 1911, when Beckham supported the aging McCreary for the party's gubernatorial nomination. It is unclear whether McCreary sought the reconciliation in order to secure the gubernatorial nomination or Beckham made amends with McCreary because he thought he could control McCreary's actions as governor. In the Democratic primary, McCreary defeated William Adams by a majority of 25,000 votes.
Republicans nominated Judge Edward C. O'Rear to oppose McCreary. There were few differences between the two men's stands on the issues. Both supported progressive reforms such as the direct election of senators, a non-partisan judiciary, and the creation of a public utilities commission. McCreary also changed his stance on the liquor question, now agreeing with Beckham's prohibitionist position; this also matched the Republican position. O'Rear claimed that Democrats should have already enacted the reforms their party platform advocated, but his only ready line of attack against McCreary himself was that he would be a pawn of Beckham and his allies.
McCreary pointed out that O'Rear had been nominated at a party nominating convention instead of winning a primary, though O'Rear claimed to support primary elections. He also criticized O'Rear for continuing to receive his salary as a judge while running for governor. McCreary cited what he called the Republicans' record of "assassination, bloodshed, and disregard of law", an allusion to the assassination of William Goebel in the aftermath of the 1899 gubernatorial contest. Caleb Powers, convicted three times of being an accessory to Goebel's murder, had been pardoned by Republican governor Augustus Willson and had recently been elected to Congress. He further attacked the tariff policies of Republican President William H. Taft. In the general election, McCreary won a decisive victory, garnering 226,771 votes to O'Rear's 195,435. Several other minor party candidates also received votes, including Socialist candidate Walter Lanfersiek, who claimed 8,718 votes (2 percent of the total).
Read more about this topic: James B. Mc Creary
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