A Secret Life_ The Lies and Scandals of President Grover Cleveland - Charles Lachman [76]
Right on cue, Hendricks stepped into convention hall from a side entrance. Even he looked confounded as he stood there and took a little bow. For eighteen minutes the applause kept coming.
Over at the Connecticut delegation, the state’s young governor, Thomas M. Waller, was swept up by the clamor. Waller called an urgent caucus of his state right there on the convention floor. As the delegates gathered around him, Waller said the convention was clearly turning to Hendricks. Connecticut should back a winner and go with Hendricks. A consensus was reached. Waller shouted for recognition from the podium.
“Mr. Chairman! Mr. Chairman!”
Manning could not believe it. Could it be that Waller was about to switch his state’s votes to the dark horse from Indiana? Manning instructed Edgar Apgar to put a stop to this nonsense. Apgar started clambering over chairs like an agile little monkey to get to Waller. At the same time, the national chairman of the Democratic Party, William Barnum, took hold of the governor’s coattails. Waller wheeled around and found himself face-to-face with Barnum’s wrath. Barnum had to inform the impressionable governor that he was being played for a sucker and that if he continued, he would be “making the great blunder of his life.” Waller sank in his chair. How fascinating to note that Governor Barnum’s cousin was the American showman P. T. Barnum, who is credited with the phrase “There’s a sucker born every minute.”
Cleveland pulled in 683 votes on the second ballot. Bayard was second with 81, followed by Hendricks with 45. So much for the stampede for Hendricks. Grover Cleveland was the nominee of the Democratic Party.
Word of his victory came to Cleveland in the form of a cannonball. His day had started in Albany with his usual half-mile walk from the mansion to the governor’s desk. He had arrived at his office at eight. Usually, he walked back home for lunch at one, but on this day he decided to sit tight. At 1:40 p.m., the telegraph announcing Cleveland as the standard-bearer of the Democratic Party came into the Western Union offices; and by prearranged signal, a cannon positioned on the dock was fired. It was said that the boom woke up every napping infant in Albany. Dan Lamont threw open the doors of the Executive Chamber, his face beaming with joy, and vigorously shook Cleveland’s outstretched hand. Cleveland stood there, steady and in control. Only the sparkle in his eyes betrayed his pleasure at the news. The telephone rang a moment later with confirmation of his nomination.
“Dan, telephone the mansion. Sister will want to hear it.”
Citizens started pouring in to wish Cleveland well. One laborer in short sleeves, grasping a tattered hat in his hand, came in with his clothes dusty from work. “God bless you!” he told Cleveland. The governor gave him a hearty handshake. Lamont couldn’t keep up with the volume of congratulatory telegrams—there were more than a thousand. He handed only the most significant ones to Cleveland to read. The first telegram came from the editor of the New York World.
“Congratulate you and the cause of good government. You are nominated.”
It was signed “Pulitzer.”
The only sour note for Cleveland came when party bosses arranged for the nomination of Thomas Hendricks as vice president—a bone to mollify Tammany Hall and the old guard. It was seen as a cunning play because it solidified Hendricks’s home state of Indiana for the Democrats. Hendricks returned to Indianapolis expressing support