During the whole of November things went from bad to worse. The all-important Ausgleich remained hard aground, and could not be sparred off.
Badeni's government could not withdraw the Language Ordinance and keep its majority, and the Opposition could not be placated on easier terms.
One night, while the customary pandemonium was crashing and thundering along at its best, a fight broke out. It was a surging, struggling, shoulder-to-shoulder scramble. A great many blows were struck. Twice Schonerer lifted one of the heavy ministerial fauteuils--some say with one hand--and threatened members of the Majority with it, but it was wrenched away from him; a member hammered Wolf over the head with the President's bell, and another member choked him; a professor was flung down and belaboured with fists and choked; he held up an open penknife as a defence against the blows; it was snatched from him and flung to a distance; it hit a peaceful Christian Socialist who wasn't doing anything, and brought blood from his hand. This was the only blood drawn. The men who got hammered and choked looked sound and well next day. The fists and the bell were not properly handled, or better results would have been apparent. I am quite sure that the fighters were not in earnest.
On Thanksgiving Day the sitting was a history-making one. On that day the harried, bedevilled, and despairing government went insane. In order to free itself from the thraldom of the Opposition it committed this curiously juvenile crime; it moved an important change of the Rules of the House, forbade debate upon the motion, put it to a stand-up vote instead of ayes and noes, and then gravely claimed that it had been adopted; whereas, to even the dullest witness--if I without immodesty may pretend to that place--it was plain that nothing legitimately to be called a vote had been taken at all.
I think that Saltpeter never uttered a truer thing than when he said, 'Whom the gods would destroy they first make mad.' Evidently the government's mind was tottering when this bald insults to the House was the best way it could contrive for getting out of the frying-pan.
The episode would have been funny if the matter at stake had been a trifle; but in the circumstances it was pathetic. The usual storm was raging in the House. As usual, many of the Majority and the most of the Minority were standing up--to have a better chance to exchange epithets and make other noises. Into this storm Count Falkenhayn entered, with his paper in his hand; and at once there was a rush to get near him and hear him read his motion. In a moment he was walled in by listeners.
The several clauses of his motion were loudly applauded by these allies, and as loudly disapplauded--if I may invent a word--by such of the Opposition as could hear his voice. When he took his seat the President promptly put the motion--persons desiring to vote in the affirmative, stand up! The House was already standing up; had been standing for an hour; and before a third of it had found out what the President had been saying, he had proclaimed the adoption of the motion! And only a few heard that. In fact, when that House is legislating you can't tell it from artillery practice.
You will realise what a happy idea it was to side-track the lawful ayes and noes and substitute a stand-up vote by this fact: that a little later, when a deputation of deputies waited upon the President and asked him if he was actually willing to claim that that measure had been passed, he answered, 'Yes--and unanimously.' It shows that in effect the whole House was on its feet when that trick was sprung.
The 'Lex Falkenhayn,' thus strangely born, gave the President power to suspend for three days any deputy who should continue to be disorderly after being called to order twice, and it also placed at his disposal such force as might be necessary to make the suspension effective. So the House had a sergeant-at-arms at last, and a more formidable one, as to power, than any other legislature in Christendom had ever possessed.
The Lex Falkenhayn also gave the House itself authority to suspend members for thirty days.
On these terms the Ausgleich could be put through in an hour--apparently.
The Opposition would have to sit meek and quiet, and stop obstructing, or be turned into the street, deputy after deputy, leaving the Majority an unvexed field for its work.
Certainly the thing looked well. The government was out of the frying-pan at last. It congratulated itself, and was almost girlishly happy.
Its stock rose suddenly from less than nothing to a premium. It confessed to itself, with pride, that its Lex Falkenhayn was a master-stroke--a work of genius.
However, there were doubters--men who were troubled, and believed that a grave mistake had been made. It might be that the Opposition was crushed, and profitably for the country, too; but the manner of it--the manner of it! That was the serious part. It could have far-reaching results; results whose gravity might transcend all guessing. It might be the initial step toward a return to government by force, a restoration of the irresponsible methods of obsolete times.
There were no vacant seats in the galleries next day. In fact, standing-room outside the building was at a premium. There were crowds there, and a glittering array of helmeted and brass-buttoned police, on foot and on horseback, to keep them from getting too much excited. No one could guess what was going to happen, but every one felt that something was going to happen, and hoped he might have a chance to see it, or at least get the news of it while it was fresh.
At noon the House was empty--for I do not count myself. Half an hour later the two galleries were solidly packed, the floor still empty.