IX.
ATTEMPTS TO SAVE THE GOVERNMENT.
The alliance between the socialistic societies and the various Irish organizations had for some time been impossible of concealment. Still the Irish had taken a less active part in the bloody inauguration of the revolution than had the others. The Government at Washington found communication with the various State Governments practically shut off. It was helpless for offence or defence. With such troops as it had been able to collect from Fortress Monroe and a few other neighboring garrisons, it had barely kept down the revolutionists in Washington. A band of some ten thousand now set out from New York and Philadelphia to reinforce them and seize the capital. At a Cabinet meeting held to consider the situation it was decided to call on the Irish members of Congress to use their influence with Irish organizations throughout the country, either to detach them altogether from the revolutionists, or to bring about some understanding by which a peace might be patched up till the next national election should afford the people an opportunity to pass upon the whole matter.
These Irish members had distinguished themselves, during the long debates which had dragged through the early summer and the heated tirades which had succeeded the first outburst of the revolutionists, by sitting unmoved in their seats, taking no part in the proceedings except when some chance allusion by another speaker afforded them the pretext for uttering a fierce demand that the United States undertake “the cause of Ireland.” They seemed to have lost all sense of American citizenship, and to have become engrossed by the mania that their only duty was, fas aut nefas, to aid the rebellion which was smouldering in Ireland. This had been the general opinion regarding their motive. But now it was seen at last that they had been acting in accordance with a consistent plan to do nothing and say nothing which could be construed as unfriendly to the revolutionists. How much influence did they possess with their own compatriots and with the revolutionary leaders? That was the question which the Cabinet determined to settle. They were summoned to the White House, and their good offices besought by the President in person.
In other times, the spectacle of the President of the United States begging a dozen Irish politicians to intercede with a mob for the safety of the Republic would have been received with derision. But the people never heard of this last shame upon them. The newspapers, excepting those whose sympathies were with the revolutionists, had been among the first to go down in the general wreck. The ordinary means of spreading information among the people had ceased to exist, and whatever news was published was colored and distorted by the prejudices of the socialist and Irish editors, who alone were allowed to continue their business.
The Irish members thus appealed to asked time for consideration and for consultation with other Irish leaders; but they promised that there should be no disturbance of the Government in Washington till their answer was ready. Transportation was irregular and slow. The railroads had suffered not only in material and men, but in the practical annihilation of their business by the riots. The Irish members set out for New York by such routes as were most practicable, arriving there the second morning after leaving Washington. A hastily called meeting of Irish leaders in the metropolis heard their statements of the condition of affairs at the capital. The conference lasted all that day and far into the following night. Messengers were constantly hurrying around the city, summoning additional advisers from among the best known of the dynamiters. Several prominent socialists and a few not so well known at the time were seen to enter the hall where the conference was held.
On the fifth day after their first summons to the White House the ambassadors returned to Washington. They were tired out and travel stained, but they repaired at once to the executive mansion. The President met them with an anxious face. During their absence nothing had arrived from the States to give him encouragement. Instead of being able to offer the National Government any assistance, the State Governments, many of them in flight from their own capitals, were anxiously calling on it to extricate them from their own difficulties.
Without any attempt to smooth over or disguise the harshness of their message, the Irish members laid before the President the ultimatum of the Irish societies. They demanded the appointment of O’Halloran “Patsy,” of New York, as Secretary of State, and Cincinnatus Wagner, of Illinois, as Secretary of War, in place of the then incumbents. O’Halloran had for some time been known as the real executive head of the Irish societies. His appointment would conciliate them. The appointment of Mr. Wagner they believed would be received as an overture of peace by the socialistic organizations. They professed to have no authority to speak for these latter, but insisted upon Mr. Wagner’s appointment as strenuously as upon that of Mr. O’Halloran. With these two men in the Cabinet, they had no doubt the revolutionists would meet the Government half way in arranging at least a truce upon the basis of the statu quo. Anyhow, if the terms suggested were accepted, and the President agreed to be governed by the advice of the men named, they were willing to guarantee that in twenty days the Irish societies alone would furnish the Government with a force sufficient to protect itself and to begin the task of re-establishing order. If the terms proposed were not accepted, they felt bound to warn the Government that it must prepare to defend itself from immediate and powerful attack.
Astounded at the audacity of the demand thus made upon him, the President at first peremptorily refused to consider it. Congressman Hagarty, of Chicago, who acted as spokesman for the party, replied only by calling his attention to the hopeless situation the Government was in without the aid offered. The President sought to temporize. Was it not possible to modify the terms proposed? He was told that modification was out of the question; that the proposition made him was the result of a conference with nearly all the leaders of the various Irish societies; and that the men who had acted merely as messengers were powerless to alter it in any way. The President asked how it was possible to reach O’Halloran and Wagner and secure their presence in Washington in time to be of avail. He was informed that O’Halloran had returned from New York with the Irish members, and was at that moment waiting to know whether he should remain or return to New York, while Wagner had been telegraphed before they left New York to meet the President at Washington, and would arrive in the course of a few hours. The President still refused to accept the Irish proposition, but was persuaded to consult with the Cabinet before returning a definite answer.