The American: A Middle Western Legend

by Howard Fast

  II

  Governor Pete Altgeld walked to his office with a slow, shuffling step. Sometimes, it was this way, sometimes less, sometimes more. Inside, a process was at work, the nerves were going, the fine connections were breaking down. He was like a man in a house going bad, the roof leaking, walls splitting, floors rotting; and like a man in such a house and unable to repair the damage done, he would sometimes vent his fury on himself. This was not the night-time fear, the fear that spread over his body so strangely, as if he were all a sponge and the fear water soaking through, creeping over his heart, paralyzing it almost with a significance of death and uselessness and finality, the utter ending of an ending; but this was impatience and anger in which he could curse God for giving him the body he had, malaria-wracked, disease-ridden; not fall into superstition and black magic, thinking of sin and payment of sin, but demand life and strength, harshly and imperiously—yet uselessly.

  Sitting down at his desk, he put his face in his hands, and then lowered the whole side of himself in the dark, until he lay with his shoulders and face and hands hunched upon the desk, inert and lost and angered and terrified, searching for himself and for something strong to put his two hands on, to hang onto and to hold himself up with.

  The thought of Parsons held out sustenance in the fact of Parsons’ lack of fear; Parsons had stood on the edge of death and had not been afraid, but Parsons was young and strong and smiling, and Parsons had faith, more faith than he, more direction and singleness of purpose. Parsons had starved and gone hungry and ridden the rods of freights from town to town, talking to ragged mobs of workers, and never known what it was to have a hundred dollars of cold cash in his pockets, and never known the taste of yellow wine after a fine, rich dinner—so why did he look to him for strength?

  Thoughts of Parsons revived him from his despair, and substituted anger for misery. He had enemies; they hated him; he hated them. Parsons was quiet in his grave, and he, Pete Altgeld, had nothing to be ashamed of. He had fought Pullman, the way he knew, going over his tax accounts, making the city bite into him, the way he had fought the Tribune—the way it sometimes seemed to him he was fighting the whole nation. He had fought the president too. They could do nothing to him that he wasn’t strong enough to take, say nothing about him. In New York, they said of him that he was a Burr without Burr’s brains, a Johann Most without Most’s decency, a Eugene Debs without Debs’ cour age—without Debs’ courage. He turned that over and over; Debs had courage, no doubt of that—the same kind of courage Parsons had; they were cut out of the same cloth, and that was why he had waited so anxiously during the big strike to meet Debs. They had an appointment, carefully arranged by Schilling, and then Debs never showed up. What sort of wild ideas lay in back of his head as he waited to meet Debs? The President of the United States was sending troops into the sovereign State of Illinois. He was defying the president. If his militia had turned their guns on the Federal troops, what would have happened? Could history hang on such thin threads, or was it part and parcel of the sudden, impossible world he created as he waited for Debs to come? It had seemed to him then, only months ago, that a whole era of history was coming to an end, and that out of chaos would come something new and possible; but Debs never came; the Federal police took him, and the half-formed dream dissolved without ever being. Now he had another way, a better way. He was not a Debs, a Parsons. He was a democratic politician, and, as some said, the best America had ever produced.…

  His wife’s voice broke through the darkness into his thoughts. “Pete?”

  “Yes.”

  “Sitting here in the dark?”

  “I must have dozed off.”

  “You’re feeling all right?”

  “Fine. Fine.”

  “Are you—”

  “As a matter of fact, I never felt better.”

  “They’re here. They’re all inside, waiting for you.”

  “Yes?”

  “I put out brandy and cigars. You’re sure you’re all right?”

  “Fine. Don’t wait up for me, Emma.”

  He always said that and she always waited, sitting and performing careful needlework on some useless piece of linen, sometimes until the gray light of dawn dissolved the shadows around her lamp.

  III

  By midnight, in the parlor, the cigar smoke lay like a blanket of dirty gauze, and the faces of the older men had that gray look which comes with weariness and age. Darrow was lost in some inner contemplation; Joe Martin sprawled low on the couch, his legs thrust out; Schilling was hunched up; and Hinrichsen enveloped the lady’s chair. McConnell, talking as he sipped brandy, was saying to the Governor:

  “Populism is a lost cause. No matter how I look at it, it’s a lost cause. The people’s party is going down, down, down, and in ten years it won’t exist.”

  “For the tenth time, I tell you this is not populism.”

  “It amounts to the same,” Joe Martin said.

  “Like hell it does! I’m not a socialist—you ought to know that is no one else in this fool country does. I’m the Democratic Governor of one on the biggest industrial states in the union. I’m no populist—I’m a Democrat! Do I have to drill that into your skulls?”

  “Pete—Pete, wait a minute,” Hinrichsen said. “You’re tired. We’re all tired. Let’s not get to calling names.” And to McConnell, “Sam, let me put it this way. The party is rotten. All right, I grant you, that’s a point of view. It’s Pete’s point of view, it’s mine. It’s rotten to a point where it doesn’t matter a damn whether you vote Democrat or Republican. Suppose the Republicans put up McKinley, as they’re very likely to do; suppose the Democrats put up Cleveland again? What’s the difference—you tell me?”

  “Don’t be an idiot!”

  “Yes, one’s a Democrat, one’s a Republican, but to the Morgans, the Vanderbilts, the Rockefellers, the Armours, the McCormicks, the Goulds—to them it’s no damn difference at all. They’d as soon have Grover as William or any other horse’s neck that suits them. There’s no more two-party system, there’s a one-party system. Just in the past twenty years we’ve seen monopoly grow until it’s like a fat, overstuffed hog, embalmed in gold—gold—gold!”

  “And I say that’s socialism!”

  Altgeld snapped, “Schilling, for Christ’s sake, will you tell him what socialism is!”

  Schilling bestirred himself; Darrow began to grin, and Joe Martin flipped a coin back and forth, from hand to hand. “The hell with it,” Hinrichsen sighed, spreading his hands wide, and Schilling said gently, “It’s not socialism, Sam, not at all, not at all. It isn’t socialism. No matter how you look at it, socialism does away with the private ownership of the means of production. We don’t propose that. So it’s not socialism.”

  “Don’t give me any damned schoolbook lectures,” McConnell growled.

  “Look, look,” Altgeld said pacifyingly. “Let’s understand each other. Our party, it’s the party of the little man, always was, always, ever since Tom Jefferson made it. Read him. He made a party for the little man. Now it belongs to monopoly, body and soul. Grover belongs to monopoly, the party does, body and soul. And the password is gold. Ask the little man, the farmer—all over the state they’re losing their farms—ask the small businessman how he’s going to pay his debts, and he pays or goes bankrupt. Ask the workingman; every months he gets a dollar less in his pay envelope. I mean, we got something in common, something to fight for, to give them. Give them silver, sixteen dollars of silver to a dollar of gold. Free silver coinage; that’s a beginning. Gives us the farmers, the worker, small business—and the silver states. Gives us something to stand on. Then we fight; then out goes Grover onto his fat behind. Sure I hate him; I hate his guts; I want to see him down and nothing and less than nothing, but I want to see the party back where it belongs, back with us, back with the people and not with monopoly. And if you think we’re alone, talk to anyone who’s been kicked out because he tried to buck the millionaires.”

&n
bsp; “And when you throw out the milllionaires,” Joe Martin said, “where do we find our money, Pete? I don’t have to itemize a campaign for you.”

  “From the people.”

  “A dollar Democrat to a thousand dollars Republican?”

  “At its worst, yes. But we won’t be alone. You and I aren’t paupers, Joe, but we’re sitting here and talking about this.”

  “We can’t do it,” from McConnell.

  “I tell you we can. We can will Illinois. We can bring a solid delegation to the convention. We can line up the silver states, the farm states, even most of the south. The hell we can’t do it!”

  “And a candidate?”

  “Dick Bland of Missouri.”

  “No!”

  “Why not?” Altgeld demanded.

  “Because he’s a roach! Because they’re all roaches! You’ve talked to me three hours, Pete. Sure this can be done. You’re right. It’s been done before, it can be done again. I like it. I like to think of myself down there in Washington, pulling reins. I like to think of Cleveland out on his ass. But there’s only one man in this country who could run on that sixteen-to-one nonsense and make it.”

  “And who’s that?”

  “Yourself.”

  There was a sudden quiet in the room. They looked at Sam McConnell, the Chicago judge who had suddenly became such a power in the city, as much perhaps as Mike McDonald, and then they looked at the Governor to see whether he was smiling or not. “You’re serious?” Altgeld asked.

  “I’m serious as hell.”

  “I won’t argue with you, Sam. I was born in Germany. I was three months old when they brought me here.”

  “No.”

  “That’s right. I’d like to be president. I’d like to roll that on my tongue. But let’s talk sense.”

  “I’m sorry, Pete.”

  “Never mind. Let’s get down to business, it’s late enough. I say it can be done, I swear it can be done. Will you come along with me?” He looked from face to face. “Sam?” A brief nod. “Buck!” “Sure as hell.” “Clarence!” A nod again. “George!” A slow smile. “Joe!” “Right to hell, Pete.”

  “Any doubts!”

  “I got doubts,” McConnell said. “I don’t think Bland can do it. I think we’ll split the party at best. I hate that thought like hell.”

  “We won’t split the party.”

  “What about your own health!” Darrow said. “You’re going to have to carry this.”

  “I feel good. I could say I never felt better.”

  “Have you any money promised!”

  “That’s a long way off. We’ll get the money. We start small, we start gently. We work in the state committee, slowly, gently, first a word here, then a word there. Talk to people alone, and don’t hit them over the head. Let it come from them. Get them thinking on how it would be to call a special party convention on silver. Don’t lay it down the line. Just talk silver. And don’t worry about the votes I control. Maybe there are enough of them to swing it, but I want it overwhelming. Every step of the way I want it overwhelming. We’re not going to split the party—we’re going to steer it, away from the east, away from Wall Street. Joe, I want you to work on Coughlin. Bathhouse John’s been an alderman so long he’s prepared to die that way. Well, start him thinking. Talk his own language. Maybe he can even be mayor some day. He’d like to think about that. Let him get out the torchlight parades and beer parties—that’ll be along about June. Clarence, feed publicity; never mind my name, I want to be out of this, but I want the country to start watching Illinois. And George, we’re going to need labor. My god, silver’s no utopia, but it can’t be worse, can it!”

  “I think it might be worse,” Schilling said slowly, more tired than the others, looking now, at this late hour, as if he had sold his soul. “But labor will support you, Pete. Who else has labor got to look to now!”

  “How’s that!”

  “I’m tired, Pete. Labor will support you.”

  “At least one big meeting on silver, George.”

  “I’ll promise ten thousand at a meeting.”

  “Fine. The convention should be called next month, for June, I think. We’ll be a year ahead of any other state.”

  But they went on talking, and it was three in the morning before they finally left.

  IV

  Emma sewed a pattern onto a piece of yellowed Irish linen. The needle went round and round, scooping and searching; when she heard her husband come in, she didn’t look up, but went on with her embroidery, isolated in the pool of lamplight. Watching her, Altgeld wondered what her reaction would have been had she remained downstairs with the cigars and the brandy and the talk, and he was suddenly sick and ashamed of himself, and knowing he had spoken too much, was puzzled to find sense in anything he had said. It was all muddled and disjointed now, and the grandiose concept of taking the government of a great nation away from those who owned it, seemed not only far-fetched but completely pathetic. His guilt magnified itself in relation to his wife, and the excitement with which he had finished the session evaporated. Watching Emma, he sat down in a chair. Finally, she put away her work and said, “It’s very late, Pete, and hadn’t we better go to bed!”

  “It was very successful, Emma.”

  “Yes, I’m sure.”

  “I mean, they listened to me. They didn’t think it was impossible. They didn’t think it was just a wild dream.”

  “I’m sure they didn’t, Pete.”

  “And I feel fine.” He accentuated that; he came into the light. “I feel fine—I never felt better, Emma.”

  “Yes.”

  “You’re angry with me, aren’t you!”

  “I’m not angry, Pete. I’m tired, that’s all. Two o’clock one night, three the next. How long can you keep that up, Pete?”

  “I feel good, I told you.”

  “Yes.” She rose and put her hands on his face. “Pete, Pete, why do you hate the way you do? Why must everything be twice as violent for you! Why can’t we be like other people?”

  “I’m not like anyone else. No one is like anyone else.”

  “I’m sure, I’m sure.”

  “And Sam McConnell is in it with us. Emma, I’m going to elect the next president. I’m going to sit in there as secretary of state. I’m going to say what and how and why—”

  “Pete!”

  “Emma, Emma, let me dream, it’s going to be so goddamned hard.”

  “Pete, sometimes you frighten me.” She took his arm. “Come to bed.”

  V

  As tired as he was, Schilling could not sleep. Blind paths hemmed him in; gates were closed. How many years now had he followed Altgeld, blindly, trustingly? When he put his finger here and there, to add up the figures, he was not without justification and confirmation The day after the three Haymarket prisoners were pardoned, he, Schilling, went out to the cemetery. At Waldheim, in Chicago, a monument had been erected over the graves of the five dead men. Parsons, Spies, Fischer, Engel, and Lingg lay quietly, and now men spoke words over their graves. By the hundreds, they shook Schilling’s hand, and there was one tall, knifelike man who was introduced to him as Eugene Debs. Debs—Debs—Schilling had heard the name. Yes, Gene Debs. He took Schilling’s hand in both of his, and his words didn’t come like the words of other men, but fell on each other, like a hammer driving home a spike. “When a new kind of history is written, a people’s history, they will not be forgotten, and not you, Schilling.” People wiped the tears out of their eyes. “Well, what I did was nothing,” Schilling said, “and who can make the dead alive?”

  There was standing next to Debs a little, withered Irishman, Brian Donahue, who had seen with his own eyes what had been done to workingmen called the Molly Maguires; he crossed himself now and shook his head, but Debs put a hand on his shoulder and said, “Sometimes the dead aren’t dead. When workingmen go on strike, then Parsons is with them and so is Spies, and who can kill them now? Ask Brian if the Molly Maguires are dead.”
Donahue said, “There are those walking and living and breathing and buying and selling, and sure as God was Jesus Christ whom they nailed to a cross with His hands outstretched because He wanted men to be free, then the five blessed martyrs who lie here are as alive as you are and I am. We will sing songs about them and make stories, and my grandchildren and yours will not be quickly forgetful.” “So it’s no small service,” Debs said. “No small service, Schilling.” “We all did what we could.” “But what you did—all right, but some time I want to meet this Governor of yours.” “Altgeld!” “Would he sit down and talk with me?” “We could meet again and go into it,” Schilling said.

  But it was more than a year before they met again, and then Debs was waging war, with the Pullman Company and Pullman’s warm ally, the government of Grover Cleveland, and Federal troops with fixed bayonets were bivouacked in the empty lots of Chicago, and three thousand thugs and desperadoes, wearing the badges of Federal marshals, were ranging the streets of Chicago, beating and killing workmen, and their wives and children, too, and many an innocent citizen who happened in their path.

  Schilling met Debs in his strike headquarters, a gloomy basement lit by one lantern; now the strikers were beleaguered; warrants were out for the leaders. They moved from place to place, like hunted men, and a handful were doing the work of a hundred. But for all of that, Debs was delighted to see him, shook his hand warmly, and said, almost pleadingly, “Will he act, Schilling? Will he act?”