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:
“Consider the vice president, George Bush, a man so bedeviled by bladder problems that he managed, for the last eight years, to be in the men’s room whenever an important illegal decision was made.”
—Barbara Ehrenreich (b. 1941)
“It is the vice of a vulgar mind to be thrilled by bigness.”
—E.M. (Edward Morgan)
“A President is best judged by the enemies he makes when he has really hit his stride.”
—Max Lerner (b. 1902)
“We shall have to begin all over again. [Taft hoped that] the Senators might change their minds, or that the people might change the Senate; instead of which they changed me.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)