At first, the canvass was a mere personal contest, having little significance to any one except the Radical leaders. A Convention of the Union party was called to meet in Nashville on May 22d. Both candidates pledged themselves to abide by the decision of this Convention.
Ex-President Johnson’s return to Tennessee at this time added to the uncertainty of the contest. He was still a power in Tennessee politics, and it was rumored that he might enter the race as a Conservative Democrat. The Radical Convention assembled in Nashville on the day appointed. It was called to order by Thos. Cates, chairman of the Central Committee, who was a Stokes man. After the reading of the call, Judge Houck moved that Mr. Pearne, a friend of Governor Senter, be made temporary chairman of the Convention. His motion having failed to be recognized by Mr. Cates, he put it to the House himself and declared Mr. Pearne elected. Mr. Pearne attempted to reach the chair, but was forcibly prevented. This resulted in a hand-to-hand contest between the delegates. Failing to perfect a temporary organization, the Convention adjourned until the following day. But at the second meeting the disgraceful scenes of the first were repeated. It finally dissolved amid the utmost confusion.
The Union and American, a daily newspaper, published in Nashville, contained the following report of the Convention’s proceedings.
“The so-called Radical State Convention, the most disgraceful, profane, and vulgar assemblage of men ever congregated in the State to consider public affairs, came to an abrupt termination yesterday, after an ineffectual attempt of two days to organize. It simply dissolved. It could not even adjourn. It had no chairman, no secretary, and could not even transact any business. It met as if by chance, and dispersed from necessity. It was an agglomerate discord, an inflamed mob filled with mean whiskey and meaner passions. It was a meeting of mortal enemies under the guise of friendship to decide the spoils of misdeeds and crimes. They quarrelled and fought, and called each other liars and thieves, and all manner of epithets. Such a congregation of vulgar elements, so fierce, so bitter, and so reckless, was never seen before in this section of the Union.
“This assemblage of Radicals was called together to counsel for the good of the State, and present to the people a person of such fair name and true patriotism as to be worthy of them and the State for their chief executive!”
The above description was written by a “rebel” editor, but the following account, taken from the Knoxville Whig, is scarcely less severe: “We share in the regret of all good Republicans that the late Convention was so divided, boisterous, disrupted. We have attended many conventions, national and State. We never attended one in which such injustice, violence, and fraud were practised.”
These two pictures of the Convention, drawn from different standpoints, give us some idea of the kind of men that had ruled Tennessee for four years. At last the household was divided against itself; it was only a matter of a few weeks until it should fall.
The Senter faction attempted to throw the blame for the disrupted Convention upon Mr. Stokes and his friends. They denied the charge, and asserted that at least sixty-four counties had been instructed for Mr. Stokes, which would have insured him the nomination. The result of the discussion was that Governor Senter and Mr. Stokes declared their intentions to “fight it to a finish at the polls.” They began at Nashville, January 5th, a joint canvass of the State. A direct issue was soon made between them on the franchise question. Governor Senter declared “that the time has come, and is now, when the limitations and disabilities which have found their way into our statute-books, as the result of the war, should be abolished and removed, and the privilege of the elective franchise be restored, and extended so far as to embrace the mass of the adult population of the State.”
Mr. Stokes thus defined his position: “When the killing of Union men ceases, the hellish organization of Ku-Klux is abandoned, and the laws are observed, then I am willing to entertain a proposition to amend the State constitution so far as to allow the disfranchised to come in gradually, by providing that the Legislature may by a two thirds vote remove the disabilities for those who petition, and come well recommended by their loyal neighbors.”
After these declarations of principles the struggle became one of paramount importance to the whole people of the State.