Vice President Under Taft
In 1908, Sherman was nominated as the Republican candidate for Vice President on the ticket with William Howard Taft. Although not an obvious front-runner, he balanced Taft's profile, by being both an Easterner and a conservative (it was said that the two wings of the G.O.P. 'flapped together'), and the New York lobby pressed hard for his nomination. The Republicans won by a comfortable margin, though Sherman is not credited as a major vote-winner in this election.
At first, Sherman and Taft found themselves at odds over both tariff policy and the role of the Vice President. But Taft presently moved to the right, and the two of them worked together more harmoniously - a relationship eased further by the First Lady's enjoyment of the company of Sherman and his wife. The President declared that Sherman accomplished much on Capitol Hill by his "charm of speech and manner, and his spirit of conciliation and compromise", backed by a "stubborn adherence" to his principles.
Read more about this topic: James S. Sherman
Famous quotes containing the words vice president, vice, president and/or taft:
“The President has only 190 million bosses. The Vice President has 190 million and one.”
—Hubert H. Humphrey (1911–1978)
“Keep your hands clean and pure from the infamous vice of corruption, a vice so infamous that it degrades even the other vices that may accompany it. Accept no present whatever; let your character in that respect be transparent and without the least speck, for as avarice is the vilest and dirtiest vice in private, corruption is so in public life.”
—Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl Chesterfield (1694–1773)
“I tell you, you’re ruining that boy. You’re ruining him. Why can’t you do as much for me?”
—S.J. Perelman, U.S. screenwriter, Bert Kalmar, Harry Ruby, and Norman Z. McLeod. Groucho Marx, Horsefeathers, a wisecrack made as Huxley College president to Connie, the college widow (Thelma Todd)
“On the whole, yes, I would rather be the Chief Justice of the United States, and a quieter life than that which becomes at the White House is more in keeping with the temperament, but when taken into consideration that I go into history as President, and my children and my children’s children are the better placed on account of that fact, I am inclined to think that to be President well compensates one for all the trials and criticisms he has to bear and undergo.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)