To the Fenton faction this severe criticism of a presumably fair man seemed justified after his jug-handle committee had made its jug-handle report. It favoured seating all contesting delegates outside of the City, admitted the Greeley delegates and their opponents with the right to cast half of one vote, and recognised the organisation established by the State committee as the regular and the only one. By this time the dullest delegate understood the trend of affairs. Indeed, dismissals and appointments in the civil service had preceded the assembling of the convention until politicians understood that the way to preferment opened only to those obedient to the new dictator. Accordingly, on the next roll-call, the weak-kneed took flight, the vote standing 202 to 116. Upon hearing the astounding result a Fenton delegate exclaimed, "Blessed are they that expect nothing, for they shall not be disappointed."[557]
In discussing the resolution to abolish the Greeley committee the question narrowed itself to members holding office under Tammany, the Greeley organisation maintaining that it had simply inherited the custom, not created it, while Cornell and his associates, having "Hank" Smith in mind, declared it impossible to avoid the custom without destroying the committee. To some of the Conkling leaders this seemed unnecessarily severe. Having showed their teeth they hesitated to lacerate the party, especially after the mad rush to the winning side had given them an overwhelming majority. At last, it fell to Hamilton Ward, a friend of the Senator, for six years a member of Congress, a forcible speaker, and still a young man of nerve, who was to become attorney-general and a judge of the Supreme Court, to propose as a substitute that the State committee be directed to consolidate and perfect the two city organisations. The Fenton people promptly acquiesced, and their opponents, after eliminating Smith by disallowing a member of the organisation to hold office under Tammany, cheerfully accepted it.
This compromise, thus harmoniously perfected in the presence and hearing of the convention, was loudly applauded, and the chairman had risen to put the motion when Conkling interrupted, "Not yet the question, Mr. President!" Until then the Senator had been a silent spectator. Indeed, not until the previous roll-call did he become a member of the convention. But he was now to become its master. His slow, measured utterances and deep chest-tones commanded instant attention. If for a moment, as he calmly declared opposition to the substitute, he seemed to stand alone, his declaration that a horde of Tammany ballot-box stuffers, pirates, and robbers had controlled and debauched the Republican organisation in the city of New York called forth the loudest applause of the evening. His next statement, that the time had come when such encroachments must cease, renewed the cheering. Having thus paid his respects to the Greeley committee, Conkling argued that a new State committee could not do in the four weeks preceding election what it had taken the old committee months to accomplish. The campaign must be made not with a divided organisation, but with ranks closed up. Reading from an editorial in the Tribune, he claimed that it approved the committee's report, and he begged the convention to take the editor at his word, shake hands, bury animosities and disappointments, make up a ticket equally of both factions, and accept the reorganisation of the city committee, so that double delegations might not appear at the next national convention to parade their dissensions. He disclaimed any unkind feeling, and in favouring the admission of both city delegations, he said, he supposed he had worked in the interest of harmony.
This appeal has been called one of Conkling's "most remarkable speeches."[558] Unlike the Senator's usual efforts laboured preparation did not precede it. The striking passage and the impressive phrase are entirely wanting. Epigrammatic utterances are the supreme test of a great orator or poet, but Conkling's speech of September 27 added nothing to that vocabulary. It may be said to lack every element of a well-ordered oration. As preserved in the newspapers of the day[559] it is hard, if not impossible, to find sufficient rhetorical merit to entitle it to a place in any volume of ordinary addresses. It wanted the persuasive power that allures by an exquisite choice of words, or charms by noble and sympathetic elocution. Even the style of his appeal for harmony was too self-assured and his faith in his own superiority too evident. Nevertheless, of the living who heard his explosive exclamation, "Not yet the question, Mr. President," and the flaming sentences arraigning the Greeley Republicans as partners of Tammany, it lingers in the memory as a forceful philippic, full of pose and gesture and dramatic action. Its influence, however, is not so clear. The power of patronage had already twice carried the convention, and that this incentive would have done so again had Conkling simply whispered to his lieutenants, must be evident to all who read the story. Ward's motion was lost by 154 to 194, the Conkling vote being eight less than on the preceding roll-call.[560]
Conkling desired a solid delegation at the next Republican National Convention, and the recognition of the organisation established by the State committee assured it, whereas the Ward amendment, by including the Greeley constituency, inspired the fear of a divided one.[561] Perhaps the failure of his friends to appreciate this fear justified Conkling's interference, but a single word of dissent was sufficient to alarm them, while a less arrogant and dominating spirit might easily have avoided making the bitter assault which provoked a storm of hostile criticism. Greeley's stinging retort illuminated the Senator's insincerity. "Conkling declared it right," said the editor, "to abolish the regular organisation because corrupted and controlled by Tammany money, and then invited its delegates to an equal share in making the platform and selecting a ticket. If he believed what he said, he was guilty of party treason in the offer; if he did not, he added the folly of insult to the crime of foul slander."[562] This was the view of the Greeley delegates, and refusing to accept the offered terms, Moses H. Grinnell, Marshall O. Roberts, and their associates, amid ironical cheers, withdrew from the convention.
After this business progressed smoothly and easily. There were no divisions, no debates, and no questions of importance. Nominations aroused little enthusiasm,[563] and the platform which Greeley called "the miracle of clumsiness,"[564] indorsed the administration of President Grant, denounced the crimes of the Tweed ring, and recommended local option. Meanwhile the seceders, assembled in Wild's Opera House, gave vent to bitter criticism and the whispered scandal of hotel lobbies.[565] When this proceeding finally ended they separated with the consciousness that their last performance, at least, had made them ridiculous.