1918 United States Senate election in Massachusetts
Both Walsh and Weeks were unopposed after their respective opponents, former Boston mayor John F. Fitzgerald and Governor Samuel W. McCall, withdrew from the race.Senator John Wingate Weeks had been a leading conservative critic of the Wilson administration and a candidate for president in 1916, though his appeal was limited to New England.progressives hoped that Governor Samuel W. McCall would seek a rematch of the 1913 race, when he lost a protracted battle for the Republican nomination to Weeks on the thirty-first ballot.He promised "unwavering support to President Wilson and his world work" and vowed to leave "nothing undone to help lighten the burdens ... of him whom Providence has chosen to direct us in these momentous times.[1] Walsh's victory was credited to his progressive record as governor, his ability as an orator, and his Catholicism, as well as the personal support of President Wilson in contrast to Weeks's strident opposition.