A livelier and more variegated omnium-gatherum was never assembled. They
had already begun to straggle in when I arrived. There were long-haired
and spectacled doctrinaires from New England, spliced by short-haired and
stumpy emissaries from New York--mostly friends of Horace Greeley, as it
turned out. There were brisk Westerners from Chicago and St. Louis. If
Whitelaw Reid, who had come as Greeley's personal representative, had his
retinue, so had Horace White and Carl Schurz. There were a few rather
overdressed persons from New Orleans brought up by Governor Warmouth, and a
motely array of Southerners of every sort, who were ready to clutch at any
straw that promised relief to intolerable conditions. The full contingent
of Washington correspondents was there, of course, with sharpened eyes and
pens to make the most of what they had already begun to christen a conclave
of cranks.
Bowles and Halstead met me at the station, and we drove to the St. Nicholas
Hotel, where Schurz and White were awaiting us. Then and there was
organized a fellowship which in the succeeding campaign cut a considerable
figure and went by the name of the Quadrilateral. We resolved to limit
the Presidential nominations of the convention to Charles Francis Adams,
Bowles' candidate, and Lyman Trumbull, White's candidate, omitting
altogether, because of specific reasons urged by White, the candidacy of B.
Gratz Brown, who because of his Kentucky connections had better suited my
purpose.
The very next day the secret was abroad, and Whitelaw Reid came to me to
ask why in a newspaper combine of this sort the New York Tribune had been
left out.
To my mind it seemed preposterous that it had been or should be, and I
stated as much to my new colleagues. They offered objection which to me
appeared perverse if not childish. They did not like Reid, to begin with.
He was not a principal like the rest of us, but a subordinate. Greeley was
this, that and the other. He could never be relied upon in any coherent
practical plan of campaign. To talk about him as a candidate was
ridiculous.
I listened rather impatiently and finally I said: "Now, gentlemen, in this
movement we shall need the New York Tribune. If we admit Reid we clinch it.
You will all agree that Greeley has no chance of a nomination, and so by
taking him in we both eat our cake and have it."
On this view of the case Reid was invited to join us, and that very night
he sat with us at the St. Nicholas, where from night to night until the end
we convened and went over the performances and developments of the day and
concerted plans for the morrow.
As I recall these symposiums some amusing and some plaintive memories rise
before me.
The first serious business that engaged us was the killing of the boom for
Judge David Davis, of the Supreme Court, which was assuming definite and
formidable proportions. The preceding winter it had been incubating at
Washington under the ministration of some of the most astute politicians of
the time, mainly, however, Democratic members of Congress.
A party of these had brought it to Cincinnati, opening headquarters well
provided with the requisite commissaries. Every delegate who came in that
could be reached was laid hold of and conducted to Davis' headquarters.
We considered it flat burglary. It was a gross infringement upon our
copyrights. What business had the professional politicians with a great
reform movement? The influence and dignity of journalism were at stake. The
press was imperilled. We, its custodians, could brook no such deflection,
not to say defiance, from intermeddling office seekers, especially from
broken-down Democratic office seekers.
The inner sanctuary of our proceedings was a common drawing-room between
two bedchambers, occupied by Schurz and myself. Here we repaired after
supper to smoke the pipe of fraternity and reform, and to save the country.
What might be done to kill off "D. Davis," as we irreverently called the
eminent and learned jurist, the friend of Lincoln and the only aspirant
having a "bar'l"? That was the question. We addressed ourselves to the task
with earnest purpose, but characteristically. The power of the press must
be invoked. It was our chief if not our only weapon. Seated at the same
table each of us indited a leading editorial for his paper, to be wired
to its destination and printed next morning, striking D. Davis at a
prearranged and varying angle. Copies of these were made for Halstead, who
having with the rest of us read and compared the different scrolls
indited one of his own in general commentation and review for Cincinnati
consumption. In next day's Commercial, blazing under vivid headlines, these
leading editorials, dated "Chicago" and "New York," "Springfield, Mass.,"
and "Louisville, Ky.," appeared with the explaining line "The Tribune
of to-morrow morning will say--" "The Courier-Journal--and the
Republican--will say to-morrow morning--"
Wondrous consensus of public opinion! The Davis boom went down before it.
The Davis boomers were paralyzed. The earth seemed to have risen and hit
them midships. The incoming delegates were arrested and forewarned. Six
months of adroit scheming was set at naught, and little more was heard of
"D. Davis."
We were, like the Mousquetaires, equally in for fighting and foot-racing,
the point with us being to get there, no matter how; the end--the defeat
of the rascally machine politicians and the reform of the public
service--justifying the means. I am writing this nearly fifty years after
the event and must be forgiven the fling of my wisdom at my own expense and
that of my associates in harmless crime.
Some ten years ago I wrote: "Reid and White and I the sole survivors; Reid
a great Ambassador, White and I the virtuous ones, still able to sit up and
take notice, with three meals a day for which we are thankful and able to
pay; no one of us recalcitrant. We were wholly serious--maybe a trifle
visionary, but as upright and patriotic in our intentions and as loyal to
our engagements as it was possible for older and maybe better men to be.
For my part I must say that if I have never anything on my conscience worse
than the massacre of that not very edifying yet promising combine I shall
be troubled by no remorse, but to the end shall sleep soundly and well."
Alas, I am not the sole survivor. In this connection an amusing incident
throwing some light upon the period thrusts itself upon my memory. The
Quadrilateral, including Reid, had just finished its consolidation of
public opinion before related, when the cards of Judge Craddock, chairman
of the Kentucky Democratic Committee, and of Col. Stoddard Johnston, editor
of the Frankfort Yeoman, the organ of the Kentucky Democracy, were brought
from below. They had come to look after me--that was evident. By no chance
could they find me in more equivocal company. In addition to ourselves--bad
enough, from the Kentucky point of view--Theodore Tilton, Donn Piatt and
David A. Wells were in the room.
When the Kentuckians crossed the threshold and were presented seriatim the
face of each was a study. Even a proper and immediate application of whisky
and water did not suffice to restore their lost equilibrium and bring them
to their usual state of convivial self-possession. Colonel Johnston told me
years after that when they went away they walked in silence a block or two,
when the old judge, a model of the learned and sedate school of Kentucky
politicians and jurists, turned to him and said: "It is no use, Stoddart,
we cannot keep up with that young man or with these times. 'Lord, now
lettest thou thy servant depart in peace!'"