For the first time we hear the note of caution in regard to the financial condition. The governor warned the Assembly that it was not satisfactory and was such as to embarrass his administration. He admitted that the credit of the State had not always been used for practicable purposes, but insisted that under proper checks it might be safely used to a still greater extent.[195] The usual expedients were again resorted to: loans were negotiated to meet the interest due; and the floating debt was provided for by the issue or exchange of fresh bonds. But the same extravagance and folly which characterized their actions in 1869 continued undiminished.[196] By the session of 1870 an old feature of parliamentary tactics was introduced: the opposition, though unavailing as to the final vote, had become thoroughly organized for filibustering purposes and threats of recourse to its use were held over the heads of the radicals as a whip.[197] Mr. Lowell proposed once to make a bargain with his party, to which he was opposed on a particular bill, by exchanging his filibustering advantage for a grant of time.[198] By debates on rules of order, appeals from the chair to the House, demands for the roll-call on every little insignificant vote, they were able to waste time and wear out their opponents until practically no business was done at certain sessions.[199] Four of the five measures which were destined to become the most important of the session--indeed of the reconstruction period in Louisiana--and the storm center about which the opposition to the governor gathered, were, together with the appropriation and revenue bills, introduced into the Senate as early as the third day, thus gaining for that active body the questionable distinction of initiative.[200] Nor did that body lose its zeal in pushing legislation, for toward the close of the session bills went through with a haste amazing even after the facility displayed on occasion in 1869. At a single evening session twenty bills were acted on,[201] and yet, despite regular night sessions for about two weeks, the session approached its close without concluding much important legislation,[202] and without making provision for the revenues or expenses of the government. And so, in accordance with the general expectation,[203] the governor on March 3 notified the two houses of the necessity to reassemble March 7 for ten days. In this extra session the Assembly took up and passed the tremendous number of ninety-eight bills, as compared with one hundred and seven in the first session.