Notwithstanding the City of Washington was still filled with people who had been waiting weary weeks and months for the deposition of Mr. Johnson and the accession of Mr. Wade to the Presidency, for the fulfillment of pledges of appointment based thereon, and who were still importunate for impeachment, the business element of the country at large was tiring of it and its depressing effect upon the commercial activities. Even Senators and Congressmen were being moved to a sense of the obstructive and somewhat ridiculous phases the impeachment movement was beginning to take on--and not a few of those who in its earlier stages had honestly favored the movement, inside as well as outside the membership of both Houses of Congress, had begun to realize the actual nature and purposes, as also the shallowness of the impeachment movement that from whatever motives it had originated, it had degenerated very much into a game of personal ambition--of vindictiveness--and office getting and spoils--and practically nothing higher.
While some of its supporters who had manifestly entered upon the trial with a determination to convict, were still insistent for further prosecution had there been a shadow of ultimate success, there were others who had begun to realize, weeks before the end came, the awkwardness of the predicament in which they had allowed themselves and their party to be placed, and desired to abandon the enterprise.
The strain was becoming too great--there was certain to be a recoil sooner or later. The foundations of the Impeachment were shown to be too slender. There was a future ahead that must be faced, but Senators must preserve their consistency. They could not go before their pro-impeachment constituencies with a record indicating any degree of weakening in the impeachment crusade.
They had insisted for months that Mr. Johnson must be removed, and it would be politically inexpedient to retract.
But they wanted somebody to "help them let go."So the plan of "desultory" procedure herein outlined seems to have "happened"--whether by design or otherwise, is immaterial--and that plan was made easy by the concerted abandonment of the head and front of the indictment--the First Article--which was side-tracked and logically carried with it all that followed, as would manifestly have been the result if the voting had begun on that Article.
While, to degree, the turmoils and bitterness of that time have passed out of public mind, there are still many living who retain a keen remembrance of the struggle and the enmities it produced.
There were during the trial many thousands of men in the City of Washington awaiting the Impeachment and removal of the President for the fulfillment of pledges of official appointment based thereon, and their numbers increased as the trial progressed.
These anticipated beneficiaries were naturally not idle in efforts to the stimulation of zeal in the cause of Impeachment, and Senators were importuned at all seasonable and unseasonable hours in behalf of immediate and positive action. The lively anxiety, even anxious haste, of these patriots for their earliest possible entry upon the service of the Government, was emphasized on every corner and at every place of gathering, day and night, and the lobbies of the Capitol were thronged by them during the sessions of the Senate. No opportunity for a word with a Senator in behalf of the immediate deposition of the President, nor any appliance that seemed to promise a successful overture, was overlooked or forgotten.
When these seemed to fail of the desired effect, more direct and, it was hoped, more effective methods were resorted to. The beleaguered Senator was reminded that the applicant represented the united sentiment of the people of the State from which he held his Senatorial seat--that they demanded Mr. Johnson's conviction and removal--that that demand could not be safely denied, trifled with, or delayed; and that if money was wanted, to use the language of a notorious inquisitor of the House, Mr.
Butler, speaking of the possibility of securing a designated vote for Impeachment "tell the d----d scoundrel that if he wants money, there is a bushel of it here to be had!" Mr. Butler's message was delivered.
So desperate were the inquisitors, and so close the certainty of the vote, that even a project of kidnapping a Senator under the pretense of taking a trip to Baltimore for much needed rest, where, if the terms to be there proffered were refused, a vacancy was to be created--by assassination, if necessary--then a recess of the Senate to afford time for the appointment by the Governor of that Senator's State of a successor who would vote for the Impeachment, of the President--was entered upon and its execution attempted. But the trip to Baltimore for "rest" was not taken.
These are not pleasant facts to contemplate, but they somewhat conspicuously characterized the conditions of that time, and illustrate the real nature of the impeachment scheme. They boded the control of the Government by the worst element of American politics. It is unnecessary to say here what that control would have involved. During all the previous history of the Government--its wars and political turmoils--the Democratic-Republican forms that characterize its administrations have never faced so insidious or threatening a danger as during that hour. It was a crucial test, and the result a magnificent vindication of the wisdom and patriotism of the founders of our composite form of Government. Its results have but strengthened those forms and broadened the scope of the beneficent political.
institutions that have grown up under and characterize its operation.
It was a test such as probably no other form of Government on earth could have successfully passed, and it is to be hoped that its like may never return.
