A Warren/Lodge ticket dis-Lodges Democrats
Dude, Nixon was a 41-years old freshman Senator. He was already an unconventional VP pick and there's no way he could be a contended in 1952.
Bryan was contender for less in all ways, also Kefauver was running as a freshie Senator too.
Nixon's strengths as a Vice Presidential pick in 1952 would have been his weaknesses as the leader of any ticket. With youth, you got inexperience; with anti-communism, you got attachment to the McCarthies of the world; with his attack dog status, you got "unpresidential".
[EDIT: It should also be stated that the Republican Party in 1952 was in a profoundly different, and probably incomparable, position than the Democrats found themselves in 1896. Beyond ideology, demography, and recent winning record (or lackthereof), the country as a whole was in a very different spot.]
In any case, I had forgotten MacArthur. With no Eisenhower, he might have been The One. Without his presence, I see Taft taking the nomination over Warren, Dewey, or Lodge. As I recall, he may have had some deal with MacArthur to select him for Vice President. As for those afraid of what a MacArthur presidency might look like, recall that aside from his vainglorious qualities and saber-rattling language, he actually did run a country for some years, and in an interesting and innovative, if flawed, fashion. Of course, we cannot take how he would run the reconstruction of a former enemy state as an example for how he would run America, but I think it speaks to a certain level of "enlightenment"--if we could still call it that--which can be seen in his desire for universal suffrage, an industrial base, recognition of labor, etc. And as for foreign policy, we had Dulles as Secretary of State for over six years and somehow avoided nuclear catastrophe. If we eliminate MacArthur from contention entirely, either as President or Vice President, I can see Taft being forced to select someone like Lodge--relatively well-known, fresh enough in that he has never been on a Presidential ticket before, obviously moderate, service in the war, relatively young, and very well-positioned to balance Taft overall in terms of demeanor, appearance, region, and stance on the issues. Dewey and Warren, in my mind the two other obvious possibilities from the moderate wing, had been used before.
