In the 1912 general election, held in the midst of the Cabin and Paint Creek strikes, the West Virginia Socialists scored over 5.5.% or over 15,000 votes, a five fold increase, for Debs and their gubernatorial Walter Hilton. Below a breakdown of votes around the state.

‘Great Socialist Gains in West Virginia’ from The Wheeling Majority. Vol. 6 No. 34. November 7, 1912.

15,000 Gain In West Virginia.

This paper’s estimate of 15,000 Socialist votes for West Virginia seems to have been realized by the election. Hatfield was elected governor by about majority, so this would mean that the Socialists have stepped into the arena as a real political party, casting enough votes to prevent a candidate from securing a plurality of the votes.

The highest Socialist vote was in Kanawha county, naturally, where the coal mine strike is raging. There the candidate for sheriff, Tincher, led the ticket with over 5,000 votes, but a few votes behind the Democrat and about 1,000 behind the Republican. Charge of wholesale corruption of the ballot are being freely made.

Ohio county came next with a grand growth which is solid Socialist, as shown by the fact that practically all the votes cast were straight votes there being but a slight difference between the lowest and the highest totals of the candidates.

The West Virginia vote is practically a 500 per cent increase over four years ago, and is decidedly cheering to the faithful workers who are trying to educate the working class to vote for themselves.

Marshall County.

Complete returns so far secured indicate a Socialist vote in Marshall county of 530. This is a gain of 200 over two years ago.

In McMechen the Socialists polled 81 votes, as against 51 two years ago and 31 four years ago.

Wetzel County.

New Martinsville, Nov. 7. (Special.) Debs has 154, with Smithfield yet to be heard from, Smithfield will add 25, which will make the vote of the c county double the highest previous vote.

Brooke County.

The Brooke county Socialist showing was remarkable. In the town of Follansbee the Socialists ran ahead of the two Democrats in some instances and ahead of the Republicans in others. The vote in detail by precincts was as follows:

1st, Debs 15, Hilton 13; second, Debs 7, Hilton 5; third, Debs 16, Hilton 13; fourth, Debs 39, Hilton 34; West Hill, Debs 4, Hilton 5; Bethany, Debs 16, Hilton 16; Lewis school house Debs 12, Hilton 11; Fowlers, Debs 17, Hilton 17; Coxels, Debs 14, Hilton 13; F. Glen, Debs 2; Hilton 2; Colliers, Debs 3, Hilton 1; Folansbee, fist, Debs 39, Hilton 33; Follansbee, second, Debs 60, Hilton 45; total, Debs, 244; Hilton, 208.

Kanawha County.

In Kanawha county the Republicans won, the Socialists putting up a wonderful battle. Tincher, the Socialist candidate for sheriff, is leading the ticket and will have over 4,000 votes. The Republicans will win with about 16,000, and the Democrats will have about 5,000. The Socialists are convinced that many of their votes were stolen or not counted.

Marion County.

Debs received 768 votes in this county, getting them principally in Fairmont, the stronghold of the Watson interests. The comrades are elated over the gain.

Morgan County.

A report from Berkely Springs, the county seat, states that the Socialist vote complete in the county is 75. This is a backward county and the total vote is little more than 1,000.

Logan County.

Logan City reports the total vote in but five precincts and gives the Debs vote as 227. This is a large gain over two years ago.

Wood County.

Parkersburg reports Wood county complete with 427 votes for the Socialist ticket.

Brooke County.

Brooke county complete gives Debs 160 and Hilton 155.

Wayne County.

Twenty-one precincts are reported as showing 23 Socialist votes. There are 34 precincts in the county.

Jefferson County.

At the Charles Town court house the returns given out were Debs 55 Hilton 54.

Ohio County Gains Large

The Socialist vote in Ohio county, as given in precinct detail in another column, shows an encouraging increase.

Four years ago the vote in the county for Debs was a little over 400; last Tuesday the vote for Debs 1,573, nearly 300 per cent of an increase.

The vote is higher even than the vote of two years ago, which, in many respects, was the result of unusual conditions. The highest vote then was Hilton with 1,543 for state senate and this time Corcoran led the ticket with 1,782 for. House Delegates.

Two years ago the average Socialist vote in the county was about 1,200; this year the average is over 1,500.

And it is a straight, clear, class conscious vote Roosevelt took all the discontented, although even Wilson and Taft proclaimed to be Progressive candidates. All the parties, even the Prohibitionists, claimed to be “progressive,” and offered many of the things for which the Socialists have been agitating.

In the fact of these facts it would not have been surprising if the Socialist vote had gone below the protest vote of two years ago in this county. That it has gained instead, and gained so handsomely, is remarkable, and most encouraging to those who are battling for working class solidarity. Charles Weiskirchner, Socialist candidate for sheriff, was cut by hundreds who imagined mistakenly that it made a difference as to which old party candidate for sheriff was elected. Knowing that Weiskirchner had no chance, they chose what they considered to be the lesser of two evils. Hilton’s vote was held down to some small extent, because of the bitterness of the fight for the governorship. The liquor interests supported Hatfield strongly.

The great showing makes the Socialists confident of winning next campaign, and the sentiment among them is overwhelming for starting immediately an educational movement that will add thousands to the roll of class Conscious workingmen within the next two years in Ohio county.

The Wheeling Majority of West Virginia began in 1907 as a project of several of the region’s unions and labor federations including the Ohio Valley Trades and Labor Association, the Belmont County Trades and Labor Association, the Tin Plate Workers International Protective Association of America, and the West Virginia State Federation of Labor. Socialist Party member Walter B. Hilton edited and managed the paper eventually bringing the weekly firmly into the Party’s orbit. One of three well-established local Socialist papers in West Virginia during the 1910s, the Majority’s motto, “For Those Who Plod With Plow or Pick or Pen.” Allied with the Party’s electoralist center, the paper like so many was a victim of the Red Scare after World War One and folded on April 29, 1920.

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