Spectators Desert
Both McAdoo and Cox gained ground and McAdoo supporters dug themselves in, grimly determined on a last ditch fight. The 42nd roll call was started. It showed new drifts to Cox as the votes were shouted back to the platform from the unsuppressible murmur among the delegates, now regardless of the fatigue of the prolonged fight, altho the great galleries above them were by then almost vacant. Great blocks of empty seats showed where worn-out spectators had given it up by midnight and gone home expecting another day.
When Georgia was reached the delegation chairman leaped to his chair and shouted that his state, formerly in McAdoo ranks, would join hands with Ohio “To name the next President.” He cast the solid Georgia vote for Cox, and the shout that followed seemed to rock the building. McAdoo followers were still holding grimly. Again the Texas block of 40 votes went in for him. The western states, which led the way in his drives, stuck hard, and even the fact that Cox had swept beyond the first majority vote recorded for any candidate did not shake them loose.
The 43rd roll call began in a riot of noise that made the poll audible only as the surges of sound paused to let the figures reach the clerks. Little by little the drift to the Cox column continued gaining momentum as it ran. “Get into the wagon!” roared a man in the galleries, and the Cox rooters took it up. Votes for other candidates than Cox or McAdoo brought yells of “Come out of it!” and “Wake up!” In the New York delegations a challenge for a poll sent a dozen men scurrying to argue with the challenger. He was the center of a fire of argument and objurgation he could not resist. Finally, after a new move by McAdoo supporters to adjourn in a last desperate effort to stave off defeat had been roared down, the last ballot—the 44th—began.