Finally, the General went over to the rooms of the Secretary of War. There he found some six or eight members of Congress with Mr. Stanton, evidently awaiting the _dénouement_. He demanded the office. Stanton ordered him to his room as Adjutant-General. He refused to obey. He demanded the office of the Secretary of War a second and a third time, and a second and a third time Stanton refused to yield it to him and ordered him to his room as Adjutant-General. The General then left the room of the Secretary of War, and went across the hall into General Schriver's room. Stanton followed him and asked him if he insisted on acting as Secretary of War. The General replied that he did, and would demand the mails of the War Office. The two then fell into a friendly chat, General Thomas saying that he had had nothing to eat or drink that day and requesting Mr. Stanton the next time he might have him arrested not to do it before {173} breakfast, and Stanton appealing to Schriver to bring out his whiskey, which Schriver did, and the two men, Thomas and Stanton, drank a little together on Stanton's invitation. With this Thomas's attempt to get possession of the War Office seems to have ended. On the same day the President sent to the Senate for confirmation as Secretary of War the name of Thomas Ewing, Sr. Mr. Ewing was a man of undoubted ability and of the purest loyalty. He had been one of Lincoln's best friends and supporters and was the father-in-law of General Sherman; but the Senate denied that the President had any power to send in a nomination, that is, denied that there was a vacancy. [Sidenote: The House resolution to impeach the President.] On the same day, also, the 22d, the Reconstruction Committee of the House, to whom the resolution for impeaching the President had been referred, reported it back with the recommendation that it be passed, and the chairman, Mr. Thaddeus Stevens, urged that it might pass without debate. But the members began at once to debate it hotly, and continued to do so through the day and deep into the night. The following day was Sunday, the 23d. The House had, therefore, one day of recess in which to cool down. But on Monday the angry determination of the Republican leaders was even more manifest than on the preceding Saturday. All day long the war of words went on. The reproach and the odium heaped upon the President were simply immeasurable. Read from the point of view of to-day, and at this distance from the event, most of it appears highly extravagant, and some of it ridiculous and even puerile. Late in the afternoon the vote was reached, by application of the previous question rule. The House resolved to impeach the President before the Senate by a vote of 126 to 47. All those voting in the affirmative were {174} Republicans, and all those voting in the negative were Democrats. [Sidenote: The committee of the House on impeachment.]