It is especially gratifying to learn, as I do from the published proceedings of your honorable body, that senators and representatives who have heretofore acted with a political organization which adopted as one of its principles a denunciation of the acts of a Republican Congress ... should now give expression to their anxious desire to lose no time in embracing this opportunity of ratifying one of the fundamental principles of the Republican party ... and I very much regret that the preparation necessary for a proper presentation of this subject to your honorable body has necessarily caused a short delay, and thereby prolonged the suspense of those who are so anxious to concur.[290] The radicals probably desired the rejection of the amendment, since it would furnish another strong argument to Congress in favor of reorganizing the legislature. Hence, the Radical governor, as his message shows, did not do his best to induce the legislature to ratify, and probably some Radical members for the same reason voted against the amendment or refrained from voting for it. It was defeated in the lower house on March 12,[291] and in the upper on March 18.[292] In the last chapter we saw that Terry excluded five men from the legislature because the board of inquiry had found them ineligible, and excluded nineteen others because they had failed to take the required oath, and had applied to Congress for removal of disabilities. It is safe to assume that all of these twenty-four men were conservatives. Nineteen of them had been elected to the lower house, five to the senate.[293] Immediately after organization, on advice of Bullock and with the sanction of Terry, the senate gave the five vacated seats to the minority candidates,[294] and the house gave fourteen of its vacated seats to the minority candidates.[295] The result was that the Republicans secured a majority in each house.[296] The Republican control thus secured remained uninterrupted for the remainder of 1870. Perfect accord now existed between the governor and legislature, and in the quarrel between Bullock and Angier, which went on with increased acerbity in the press and before a congressional committee,[297] the legislature proceeded to transfer its support to the governor.[298]