The Memoirs of an American Citizen Part 42

Of late years, especially since the boy's death, Sarah seemed to have lost her interest in things pretty much.

The trip might do her good.

CHAPTER XXIX

THE SENATORSHIP

_The people's choice--What the legislature of a great state represents--The Strauss lobby--Public opinion, pro and con--An unflattering description of myself--Carb.o.n.e.r's confidences--On the bill-boards--Popular oratory--I discover my brother in strange company--I do some talking on my own account--An organ of kick and criticism--Turned crank_

Jane Dround was right about old Senator Parkinson. He came home to die early in the fall, and faded away in a couple of months afterward. The political pot at the capital of the state then began to hum in a lively fashion. It was suspected that the Governor himself wanted to succeed the late Senator, and there were one or two Congressmen and a judge whose friends thought they were of senatorial size. That was the talk on the surface and in the papers. But the situation was very different underneath.

The legislature might be said, in a general way, to represent the people of the state of Illinois, but it represented also the railroad interests, the traction and gas interests, and the packers, and when it came to a matter of importance it pretty generally did what it was told by its real bosses. This time it was told to put me in the Senate in place of the late Senator, and it obeyed orders after a time.

Carmichael was honest with me, and stuck to his agreement to use the Strauss lobby in the legislature in my behalf.

Of course the papers in Chicago howled, all those that hadn't their mouths stopped with the right cake. The three largest papers couldn't be reached by our friends in any way, but their scoring did little harm.

They had up again the story of Judge Garretson and the bonds of the London and Chicago concern. But the story was getting a little hazy in men's memories, and that kind of talk is pa.s.sed around so often when a man runs for office in our country that it hasn't much significance. We did not even think it worth while to answer it. Besides, to tell the truth, we had nothing much to say. Our policy was, of necessity, what Sloc.u.m sarcastically described as "dignified silence." When my name began to be heard at Springfield more and more insistently, the Chicago _Thunderer_ came out with a terrific roast editorially:--

"Who is this fellow, E.V. Harrington, who has the presumption to look l.u.s.tfully on the chair of our late honorable Senator? Eighteen years ago Harrington was driving a delivery wagon for a packing firm, and there are to-day on the West Side retail marketmen who remember his calls at their places. We believe that his first rise in fortune came when, in some tricky way, he got hold of a broken-down sausage plant, which he sold later to the redoubtable Strauss. But it was not until the year '95, when the notorious American Meat Products Company was launched, that Harrington emerged from the obscurity of the Stock Yards. That corporation, conceived in fraud, promoted by bribery, was the child of his fertile brain. Not content with this enterprise, he became involved in railroad promotion in the Southwest, and he and his man Friday, Sloc.u.m, were celebrated as the most skilful manipulators of legislative lobbies ever seen in the experienced state of Texas.

"What will Harrington represent in the Senate, a.s.suming that he will be able to buy his way there? Will he represent the great state of Illinois,--the state of Lincoln, of Douglas, of Oglesby? He will represent the corrupt Vitzer and the traction interests of Chicago, the infamous Dosserand and the gas gang--above all, he will represent the packers' combine,--Joe Strauss, Jenks, 'big John'

Carmichael. These citizens, who are secretly preparing to perpetrate the greatest piece of robbery this country has ever witnessed, propose to seat Harrington in the United States Senate as their personal representative. Can the degradation of that once honorable body be carried to a greater depth?"

It was not a flattering description of myself, but Tom Stevens, the proprietor of the _Thunderer_, always hated Strauss and his crowd, and the papers had to say something. To offset that dose, the _Vermilion County Herald_ printed a pleasant eulogy describing me as a type of the energy and ability of our country,--"the young man of farmer stock who had entered the great city without a dollar and had fought his way up to leadership in the financial world by his will and genius for commerce.

Such practical men, who have had training and experience in large affairs, are the suitable representatives of a great commercial people.

The nation is to be congratulated on securing the services of men of Mr.

Harrington's ability, who could with so much more profit to themselves continue in the career of high finance."

The only trouble with this puff was that it was composed in the office of my lawyers and paid for at high rates. But, so far as affecting the result, the _Thunderer_ and the _Vermilion County Herald_ were about on a par. The order had gone out from headquarters that I was to be sent to the Senate to take Parkinson's vacant seat, and, unless a cyclone swept the country members off their feet, to the Senate I should go. All that I had to do was to wait the final roll-call and pay the bills.

My old, tried counsellor, Jaffrey Sloc.u.m, was managing this campaign for me. We could not use him at Springfield, however; for by this time he was too well known as one of the shrewdest corporation lawyers in the West. He represented the United Metals Trust, among other corporations, and had done some lively lobbying for them of late. He was a rich man now, and weighed several stone more than he did when he and I were living at Ma Pierson's joint. He was married, and had a nice wife, an ambitious woman, who knew what her husband was worth. She might push him to New York or Washington before she was done. Meantime, it was settled that he should take care of the packers' merger, when that came off, and that business would mean another fortune for him.

One day, while the election was still pending, I went over to see Jules Carb.o.n.e.r. The old fellow was cheery as ever, and as pleased to see me as if I had been a good boy just home from school. We had some of his strong coffee and talked things over.

"By the way," he said, as I was leaving, "let me tell you now how we happened to get hold of that block of Products' stock."

And he explained to me the mystery of that stock, which had saved my life, so to speak, at a critical time. It seems that about three months before the war scare, when there were bad rumors about Meat Products all over the city, Dround had placed his stock in the hands of a New York firm of bankers. I suppose he was ashamed to let me know that he was going to break his last promise to me. For if he didn't tell those bankers to offer Strauss his stock, he knew that was just what they would do. So much for the scrupulous Henry I! The bankers felt around and tried to strike a bargain with the great packer, and negotiations were under way for some time about the stock. That gave our enemies the confidence to sell us short. They thought that, in case the market went wrong, they could put their hand on Dround's stock. Just at this point Carb.o.n.e.r received word where the stock was and orders to buy it. He went to New York the next day and bought it outright, paying all it was worth, naturally....

I came back from Carb.o.n.e.r's place through Newspaper Row. On the boards in front of the offices one could read in large red and blue letters:--

HARRINGTON SAID TO BE SLATED FOR THE SENATE FINAL BALLOT TO-DAY

Men pa.s.sing on their way home from their work paused to read the bulletin, and I stopped, too. A group of laboring men were gathered about the door of a building near by, and from the numbers entering and leaving the place I judged that some kind of meeting was in progress within. As I stood there my attention was caught by a man who went in with several others. Something about the man's back reminded me of my brother Will, and I followed into the building and upstairs to a smoky room, where the men were standing about in groups, talking together, only now and then paying any attention to the speaker on the platform.

He was a fat, round little fellow, and he was shouting himself out of breath:--

"Yes! I tell you right here, you and your children are sold like so many hogs over at the Yards. Don't you believe it? What do you pay for meat?

What do you pay for every basket of coal you put in your stoves? The millionnaires there at Washington make the laws of this free country, and who do they make them for? Don't you know? Do they make 'em for you, or for Joe Strauss? They are putting one of their kind in the Senate from this state right now!"...

So he rambled on, and having sampled his goods, and not seeing the face I was looking for, I was moving toward the door, when I was arrested by the voice of a man who began to speak over in one corner.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Men paused to read the bulletin, and I stopped, too._]

"That's so. I know him!" he shouted, and the attention of the room was his. The men around him moved back, and I could see that the speaker was Will. He was dressed in a long waterproof coat, and his hat was tipped back on his head. An untrimmed black beard covered the lower half of his face. "I can tell you all about him," he continued in a thin, high voice. "He's the man who got a bill through Congress giving himself and his partners a slice of land out of the Indian Territory. He's the man who kept the Texas legislature in his hire the same as a servant."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "_He's the man who sold sc.r.a.ps and offal to the Government for canned beef_--"]

Generally when I hear this kind of sawing-air I go about my business.

The discontented always growl at the other fellow's bone. Give them a chance at the meat, and see how many bites they would make! It's hopeless to try and winnow out the truth from the ma.s.s of lies they talk about the trusts, capital, the tariff, corruption, and the rest of it.

But it hurt all the same to have Will say such things about me....

"He's the man who sold sc.r.a.ps and offal to the Government for canned beef--"

"That's a lie!" I spoke out promptly.

"Don't I know what I am saying? Didn't I try to live on the rancid, rotten stuff? My G.o.d, I've got some home now I could show you!"

Will turned to see who had contradicted him, and recognized me.

"You ought to know better than that," I replied, directly to him. "Some of it was rotten, but not the Meat Products' goods. We lost on our contract, too, what's more."

Will was a little startled, but he steadied himself soon and said again:--

"That's the same thing. You were all the same crowd."

"No; that wasn't so," I remonstrated, "and you ought to know it."

The men in the room had stopped their talking and were craning their heads to look at us. Will and I eyed each other for a time; then I turned to the crowd and made the first and last real public speech of my life.

"That's all a d----d lie about the beef _we_ sold the Government. I know it because I inspected it myself. And I gave my own money, too, to support men at the front, and that is more than any of you fellows ever did. And the rest of the talk these gentlemen have been giving you is just about as wrong, too. Let me tell you one thing: if you folks were honest, if you didn't send rascals to Springfield and to Congress, if you weren't ready to take a dollar and club a man if he didn't hand it over, there wouldn't be this bribery business. I know it, because I've got the club over and over again. And one thing more, it's no more use for you and I to kick about the men who put their money into trusts than it would be to try to swallow all the water in the lake. That's the way business has got to be done nowadays, and if it weren't done you folks would starve, and your wives and children would starve--"

"Who are you?" some began to shout, interrupting me.

"I am E.V. Harrington!" I called back.

Then they hooted: "h.e.l.lo, Senator. Put him out!"

I turned toward Will, and called to him:--

"Come on! I want to have a word with you, Will."

He followed me downstairs into a saloon. Some of the loafers who had heard our talk upstairs came in and crowded up to the bar, and I set up the drinks all around several times. Will wouldn't take any whiskey.

Then the bartender let us into a little room at the end of the bar, where we could be by ourselves.

"Will!" I exclaimed, "whatever has happened to you?"