that purpose it was proposed to establish a joint
committee of the two Houses having no function but to look into military
needs and report to Congress. The proposal was at once accepted and its
crafty backers secured a committee dominated entirely by themselves.
Chandler was a member; Wade became Chairman.(3) This Committee on the
Conduct of the War became at once an inquisition. Though armed with no
weapon but publicity, its close connection with congressional intrigue,
its hostility to the President, the dramatic effect of any revelations
it chose to make or any charges it chose to bring, clothed it indirectly
with immense power. Its inner purpose may be stated in the words of
one of its members, "A more vigorous prosecution of the war and less
tenderness toward slavery."(4) Its mode of procedure was in constant
interrogation of generals, in frequent advice to the President, and on
occasion in threatening to rouse Congress against him.(5) A session of
the Committee was likely to be followed by a call on the President of
either Chandler or Wade.

The Committee began immediately summoning generals before it to explain
what the army was doing. And every general was made to understand
that what the Committee wanted, what Congress wanted, what the country
wanted, was an advance--"something doing" as soon as possible.

And now appeared another characteristic of the mood of these
furious men. They had become suspicious, honestly suspicious. This
suspiciousness grew with their power and was rendered frantic by
being crossed. Whoever disagreed with them was instantly an object of
distrust; any plan that contradicted their views was at once an evidence
of treason.

The earliest display of this eagerness to see traitors in every bush
concerned a skirmish that took place at Ball's Bluff in Virginia. It
was badly managed and the Federal loss, proportionately, was large. The
officer held responsible was General Stone. Unfortunately for him,
he was particularly obnoxious to the Abolitionists; he had returned
fugitive slaves; and when objection was made by such powerful
Abolitionists as Governor Andrew of Massachusetts, Stone gave reign to a
sharp tongue. In the early days of the session, Roscoe Conkling told
the story of Ball's Bluff for the benefit of Congress in a brilliant,
harrowing speech. In a flash the rumor spread that the dead at
Ball's Bluff were killed by design, that Stone was a traitor,
that--perhaps!--who could say