Unwise zealots
wished to make the effort totally to abolish the appeal in connection
with the Hepburn Bill. Representatives of the special interests wished
to extend the appeal to include what it ought not to include. Between
stood a number of men whose votes would mean the passage of, or the
failure to pass, the bill, and who were not inclined towards either
side. Three or four substantially identical amendments were proposed,
and we then suddenly found ourselves face to face with an absurd
situation. The good men who were willing to go with us but had
conservative misgivings about the ultra-radicals would not accept a good
amendment if one of the latter proposed it; and the radicals would not
accept their own amendment if one of the conservatives proposed it.
Each side got so wrought up as to be utterly unable to get matters into
proper perspective; each prepared to stand on unimportant trifles; each
announced with hysterical emphasis--the reformers just as hysterically
as the reactionaries--that the decision as regards each unimportant
trifle determined the worth or worthlessness of the measure. Gradually
we secured a measurable return to sane appreciation of the essentials.
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