aid in overthrowing an obnoxious policy. Premeditated
suicide was shown by the purchase, while on his way to the ferry, of a
bag of shot which sank the body quickly and beyond immediate recovery.

[Footnote 1034: _Autobiography of Thurlow Weed_, p. 475.]

Every delegate in the Syracuse convention knew that Weed's cordial
relations with Johnson, established through Preston King, made him the
undisputed dispenser of patronage. Nevertheless, the failure of
Pennsylvania and Massachusetts to endorse the President's policy,
supplemented by Mississippi's action, made a deep impression upon
radical delegates. Besides, it had already been noised abroad that
Johnson could not be influenced. Senator Wade of Ohio discovered it
early in July, and in August, after two attempts, Stevens gave him up
as inexorable.[1035] "If something is not done," wrote the
Pennsylvanian, "the President will be crowned King before Congress
meets."[1036] Under these circumstances the leading Radicals desired to
vote for a resolution affirming the right of all loyal people of the
South to a voice in reorganising and controlling their respective
State governments, and Greeley believed it would have secured a large
majority on a yea and nay vote.[1037] But Raymond resisted. His
friendship for Johnson exhibited at the Baltimore convention had
suddenly made him an acknowledged power with the new Administration
which he was soon to represent in Congress, and he did not propose
allowing the _Tribune's_ editor to force New York into the list of
States that refused to endorse the President.

[Footnote 1035: _Sumner's Works_, Vol. 9, p. 480.]

[Footnote 1036: Edward L. Pierce, _Life of Sumner_, Vol. 4, p. 480.]

[Footnote 1037: New York _Tribune_, September 21, 1865.]

Such a course, he believed, would give the State to the Democrats,
whose prompt and intrepid confidence in the President had plainly
disconcerted the Republicans. Besides, Raymond disbelieved in the
views of the extreme Radicals, who held that States lately in
rebellion must be treated as conquered provinces and brought back into
the Union as new States, subject to conditions prescribed by their
conquerors. As chairman of the committee on resolutions, therefore,
the editor of the _Times_ bore down heavily on the Radical dissenters,
and in the absence of a decided leader they allowed their devotion to
men to overbear attachment to principles. As finally adopted the
platform recognised Johnson'