Does It Mean War?

New York Times 100 years ago today, December 27, 1912:
    We take it that Mr. Bryan is not going to be a member of President Wilson's Cabinet. The evidence is inferential, but it cannot be disregarded. It is to be found in an editorial article which appeared yesterday in Mr. Bryan's Commoner, published at Lincoln, Neb., here reprinted:
    The Democratic Party is going to have another struggle in both Senate and House over committee assignments and is again threatened with the blight of seniority, that is, it will be asked to put the ambitions and interests of individuals above the welfare of the party.
    The progressive Democrats will now be in the majority in the Senate caucus. Will they allow a reactionary minority to man the ship? Will they allow length of service to outweigh sympathy with the progressive cause? * * * The Democrats of the Senate owe it to the party to make the Senate organization represent the prevailing sentiment of the party, and thus enable it to work in harmony with the Administration. To do this the rule of seniority should be ignored. Assignments to committee should be made upon the basis of fitness and with a view to giving faithful expression to the will of the majority.
    At the most critical moment in the discussion of the Alabama affair between Charles Francis Adams, our Minister to England, and Lord Palmerston, Mr. Adams said: "I need not say to your Lordship that this means war." It is very evident that Mr. Bryan's Commoner article means war, it is war. His advice that the Senate and House committee assignments be made in disregard of seniority, and with a deliberate purpose of putting the committees and the control over the business of the Senate and House into the hands of "progressive Democrats," and that unmistakably means Bryan Democrats, would rob the Democracy of the fruits of the victory which give it control of the two branches of Congress. It would consign to inaction and to sulking and sullenness some of the ablest and most experienced men in the House and in the Senate. It would be a deadly affront to Democrats of prominence and of leadership, it would violate all usage and tradition, it would set up from the start a factional division in the majority party in and out of Congress.
    Mr. Bryan's advice, if taken as he plainly intends it to be taken, would deprive Mr. Underwood of his Chairmanship of the Ways and Means Committee. Manifestly, it would put Champ Clark out of the Speakership, which is more important than any committee. Representative Henry of Texas, a progressive and a near friend of Mr. Bryan, was spoken of not long ago as a possible contestant for the Speakership of the next Congress. Mr. Henry had good sense enough and loyalty enough to say at once that he must decline altogether to be considered a candidate for Champ Clark's place. A contest between himself and the Speaker, he said, would mean a certain split in the Democratic Party in the House, it would wreck the House Democratic majority at the beginning of the Wilson Administration. Leaving aside the question of the Speakership, the adoption of the course urged by Mr. Bryan would be equally effective in wrecking the Democratic majority. It would practically wreck the Administration, for a President who cannot count upon the support of Congress is robbed of much of his power, and a President with a Congressional majority that is at war with itself would hardly hope to make headway with his measures and his policies, or to retain the confidence of the people. The adoption of Mr. Bryan's policy would foredoom the Wilson Administration to failure.
    It was on Saturday. Dec. 21, that Mr. Bryan visited Gov. Wilson at the State House in Trenton and conferred with him for two or three hours. A day or two later, the story was published that Speaker Clark was going to serve notice on the President-elect that if Mr. Bryan was made a member of the Cabinet, he, the Speaker, would have nothing to do with him. The story was without authentication, and, we assume, was wholly baseless, as baseless as the Omaha newspaper report which Mr. Bryan used as a text for his attack upon Mr. Underwood. Mr. Bryan's declaration of war follows swiftly upon the heels of his visit to Triton, and of the publication, of the story about Speaker Clark. It is impossible to affirm upon information that The Commoner article is the fruit of anything said or not said at the Trenton interview, or that it was provoked by the report of the Speaker's attitude. But if Mr. Bryan had been invited into the Cabinet, or if he still entertained the hope that he would be a member of the Cabinet, it is not conceivable that he would now try to set the Democrats by the ears in both houses of Congress, substitute factional discord for union and harmony, and to the extent of his influence try to ruin the Administration of which he was to be a part.