Part 27 (1/2)

They laughed at him. Roar after roar was the answer. The Chief Justice in loud angry tones ordered the Sergeant-at-Arms to clear the galleries.

Men leaned over the rail and shouted in his face:

”He can't do it!”

”He hasn't got men enough!”

”Let him try if he dares!”

The doorkeepers attempted to enforce order by announcing it in the name of the peace and dignity and sovereign power of the Senate over its sacred chamber. The crowd had now become a howling mob which jeered them.

Senator Grimes, of Iowa, rose and demanded the reason why the Senate was thus insulted and the order had not been enforced.

A volley of hisses greeted his question.

The Chief Justice, evidently quite nervous, declared the order would be enforced.

Senator Trumbull, of Illinois, moved that the offenders be arrested.

In reply the crowd yelled:

”We'd like to see you do it!”

At length the mob began to slowly leave the galleries under the impression that the High Court had adjourned.

Suddenly a man cried out:

”Hold on! They ain't going to adjourn. Let's see it out!”

Hundreds took their seats again. In the corridors a crowd began to sing in wild chorus:

”Old Grimes is dead, that poor old man.” The women joined with glee.

Between the verses the leader would curse the Iowa Senator as a traitor and copperhead. The singing could be distinctly heard by the Court as its roar floated through the open doors.

When the Senate Chamber had been cleared and the most disgraceful scene that ever occurred within its portals had closed, the High Court Impeachment went into secret session to consider the evidence and its verdict.

Within an hour from its adjournment it was known to the Managers that seven Republican Senators were doubtful, and that they formed a group under the leaders.h.i.+p of two great const.i.tutional lawyers who still believed in the sanct.i.ty of a judge's oath--Lyman Trumbull, of Illinois, and William Pitt Fessenden, of Maine. Around them had gathered Senators Grimes, of Iowa, Van Winkle, of West Virginia, Fowler, of Tennessee, Henderson, of Missouri, and Ross, of Kansas. The Managers were in a panic.

If these men dared to hold together with the twelve Democrats, the President would be acquitted by one vote--they could count thirty-four certain for conviction.

The Revolutionists threw to the winds the last scruple of decency, went into caucus and organized a conspiracy for forcing, within the few days which must pa.s.s before the verdict, these judges to submit to their decree.

Fessenden and Trumbull were threatened with impeachment and expulsion from the Senate and bombarded by the most furious a.s.saults from the press, which denounced them as infamous traitors, ”as mean, repulsive, and noxious as hedgehogs in the cages of a travelling menagerie.”

A ma.s.s meeting was held in Was.h.i.+ngton which said:

”Resolved, that we impeach Fessenden, Trumbull, and Grimes at the bar of justice and humanity, as traitors before whose guilt the infamy of Benedict Arnold becomes respectability and decency.”

The Managers sent out a circular telegram to every State from which came a doubtful judge: