In the ordinary course of legislative business, the Senate having refused to concur in the Assembly amendment, the bill would have gone back to the Assembly, the Assembly would have receded from the amendment, and the machine's defeat would have been final. But the quick-witted Wolfe saw a way to prevent such action. He promptly moved that the Senate reconsider the vote by which it had refused to concur in the Assembly amendment. Wolfe commanded twenty votes of the Senators present, the anti-machine element nineteen. Wolfe required, however, twenty-one to compel reconsideration. But when the question came up, Wolfe still lacked the one vote necessary for reconsideration, the anti-machine element was still without the necessary twenty votes to tie the Senate, thus giving Warren Porter the deciding vote. Wolfe, however, with his twenty votes, postponed consideration of his motion to reconsider the vote by which the Senate had refused to concur. A somewhat extraordinary parliamentary situation, to say the least. But it answered the machine's purpose. For a week[49a] the machine was able to hold the Senate in deadlock. All business was practically suspended. For hours the reform Senators were compelled to sit in their seats waiting the pleasure of President Porter and President Pro Tem. Wolfe to call the Senate to order. The folly of permitting the machine to organize the Senate was forced home to every good-government man present. The machine because it controlled the Senate organization could and did arrogantly override the rights of the Senate, giving the ultimatum that no business should be transacted until the anti-machine Senators had concurred in the machine amendments to the Direct Primary bill. The machine's play was to bully, bluff or beg one of the anti-machine Senators to desert to the machine, which would have given the machine twenty-one votes, enough for concurrence, or, failing in this, to force the attendance of Senator Stetson, which would have tied the Senate, thus giving Warren Porter the deciding vote. But before Senator Stetson, pale and plainly on the verge of breakdown, could be brought to Sacramento, Senator Black became very ill and was obliged to go to his home at Palo Alto. Thus when Stetson returned, the vote stood 20 to 19, precisely where it had been before. Performer Porter was still denied the privilege of casting the deciding vote. For once the machine found itself squarely against a stone wall, with the sympathy of the public strongly against its creatures and methods. Night after night as the fight went on, the Senate gallery was packed with interested spectators, who cheered the anti-machine Senators to the echo. There were no cheers for the machine, but on one occasion at least the machine was hissed, when one of its creatures attempted an attack on Senator Black.