If he did finally call the committee he had the autocratic power to name a sub-committee for its consideration packed with its enemies, who could be depended upon to bring in an unfavorable report. More sinister still, perhaps, was his power to select the conferees in the case of a disagreement between the two houses because the measure as passed by the senate could be radically altered in conference and completely changed from the form in which it left the senate and could only be rejected or accepted without amendment on its resubmission to the senate. The new senate really deprived the chairman of a committee of any real power in excess of that of any of his colleagues on the committee and reduced him to the harmless status of a presiding officer. Thus the election of Senator Kern to the leadership of the majority at the beginning of the first Wilson administration, with all that followed in keeping with the meaning of that selection, marked a revolutionary change in the United States senate, broke down the fetish of the seniority rule, smashed superannuated precedents and traditions, made difficult if not impossible the domination of the body by a small coterie of men entrenched in powerful chairmanships, and did more toward the democratization of the senate than had been done in half a century. And, what was more remarkable, it was all done with such tact and fairness that within a week the Democratic majority, small as it was, presented to the opposition a solid front prepared to make good the progressive pledges of the Baltimore platform and the pre-election speeches of President Wilson. How faithfully and effectively and unselfishly Senator Kern did his work during the four years of his leadership and especially during the first two years which were crowded as never before in history with vitally important constructive legislation will be discussed later in a single chapter. CHAPTER XV KERN’S FIGHT AGAINST FEUDALISM IN WEST VIRGINIA Scarcely had Senator Kern assumed the leadership of the senate until he was engaged in the most notable and bitter battle of his career against the feudalism of the coal barons of West Virginia. His resolution for a senatorial investigation into the conditions in the Paint Creek district where anarchy was apparently in full flower, with the constitutional guaranties of citizens brushed aside, and men being tried for their lives by drumhead courtmartials while the civil courts were open, was the signal for the marshaling of an army of opposition embracing railroads, coal operators, bankers, all the powerful moneyed interests. Never before in history, in a distinct fight between the working classes on the one side and the great interests on the other, had the masses won in the senate. Never before had a senator just assuming leadership so audaciously challenged defeat. And he won.