Thomas Dixon - The Sins of the Father - A Romance of the South

He was elected Speaker of the House by his party without a dissenting voice, and the first words that fell from his lips as he ascended the dais, gazed over the cheering House, and rapped sharply for order, sounded the death knell to the hopes of the Governor for a compromise with his enemies. His voice rang clear and cold as the notes of a bugle:

"The first business before this House, gentlemen, is the impeachment and removal from office of the alleged Governor of this state!"

Again the long pent feelings of an outraged people passed all bounds. In vain the tall figure in the chair rapped for order. He had as well tried to call a cyclone to order by hammering at it with a gavel. Shout after shout, cheer after cheer, shout and cheer in apparently unending succession!

They had not only won a great victory and redeemed a state's honor, but they had found a leader who dared to lead in the work of cleansing and rebuilding the old commonwealth. It was ten minutes before order could be restored. And then with merciless precision the Speaker put in motion the legal machine that was to crush the life out of the little Scalawag who sat in his room below and listened to the roar of the storm over his head.

On the day the historic trial opened before the high tribunal of the Senate, sitting as judges, with the Chief Justice of the state as presiding officer, the Governor looked in vain for a friendly face among his accusers. Now that he was down, even the dogs in his own party whom he had reared and fed, men who had waxed fat on the spoils he had thrown them, were barking at his heels. They accused him of being the cause of the party's downfall.

The Governor had quickly made up his mind to ask no favors of these wretches. If the blow should fall, he knew to whom he would appeal that it might be tempered with mercy. The men of his discredited party were of his own type. His only chance lay in the generosity of a great foe.

It would be a bitter thing to beg a favor at the hands of the editor who had hounded him with his merciless pen from the day he had entered office, but it would be easier than an appeal to the ungrateful hounds of his own kennel who had deserted him in his hour of need.

The Bill of Impeachment which charged him with high crimes and misdemeanors against the people whose rights he had sworn to defend was drawn by the Speaker of the House, and it was a terrible document. It would not only deprive him of his great office, but strip him of citizenship, and send him from the Capitol a branded man for life.

The defense proved weak and the terrific assaults of the Impeachment managers under Norton's leadership resistless. Step by step the remorseless prosecutors closed in on the doomed culprit. Each day he sat in his place beside his counsel in the thronged Senate Chamber and heard his judges vote with practical unanimity "Guilty" on a new count in the Bill of Impeachment. The Chief Executive of a million people cowered in his seat while his accusers told and re-told the story of his crimes and the packed galleries cheered.

But one clause of the bill remained to be adjudged – the brand his accusers proposed to put upon his forehead. His final penalty should be the loss of citizenship. It was more than the Governor could bear. He begged an adjournment of the High Court for a conference with his attorneys and it was granted.

He immediately sought the Speaker, who made no effort to conceal the contempt in which he held the trembling petitioner.

"I've come to you, Major Norton," he began falteringly, "in the darkest hour of my life. I've come because I know that you are a brave and generous man. I appeal to your generosity. I've made mistakes in my administration. But I ask you to remember that few men in my place could have done better. I was set to make bricks without straw. I was told to make water run up hill and set at naught the law of gravitation.

"I struck at you personally – yes – but remember my provocation. You made me the target of your merciless ridicule, wit and invective for two years. It was more than flesh and blood could bear without a return blow. Put yourself in my place – "

"I've tried, Governor," Norton interrupted in kindly tones. "And it's inconceivable to me that any man born and bred as you have been, among the best people of the South, a man whose fiery speeches in the Secession Convention helped to plunge this state into civil war – how you could basely betray your own flesh and blood in the hour of their sorest need – it's beyond me! I can't understand it. I've tried to put myself in your place and I can't."

The little ferret eyes were dim as he edged toward the tall figure of his accuser:

"I'm not asking of you mercy, Major Norton, on the main issue. I understand the bitterness in the hearts of these men who sit as my judges to-day. I make no fight to retain the office of Governor, but – major" – his thin voice broke – "it's too hard to brand me a criminal by depriving me of my citizenship and the right to vote, and hurl me from the highest office within the gift of a great people a nameless thing, a man without a country! Come, sir, even if all you say is true, justice may be tempered with mercy. Great minds can understand this. You are the representative to-day of a brave and generous race of men. My life is in ruins – I am at your feet. I have pride. I had high ambitions – "

His voice broke, he paused, and then continued in strained tones:

"I have loved ones to whom this shame will come as a bolt from the clear sky. They know nothing of politics. They simply love me. This final ignominy you would heap on my head may be just from your point of view. But is it necessary? Can it serve any good purpose? Is it not mere wanton cruelty?

"Come now, man to man – our masks are off – my day is done. You are young. The world is yours. This last blow with which you would crush my spirit is too cruel! Can you afford an act of such wanton cruelty in the hour of your triumph? A small man could, yes – but you? I appeal to the best that's in you, to the spark of God that's in every human soul – "

Norton was deeply touched, far more than he dreamed any word from the man he hated could ever stir him. The Governor saw his hesitation and pressed his cause:

"I might say many things honestly in justification of my course in politics; but the time has not come. When passions have cooled and we can look the stirring events of these years squarely in the face – there'll be two sides to this question, major, as there are two sides to all questions. I might say to you that when I saw the frightful blunder I had made in helping to plunge our country into a fatal war, I tried to make good my mistake and went to the other extreme. I was ambitious, yes, but we are confronted with millions of ignorant negroes. What can we do with them? Slavery had an answer. Democracy now must give the true answer or perish – "

"That answer will never be to set these negroes up as rulers over white men!"

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