The sudden and unexpected taking of Camp Jackson carried consternation into the secession legislature, then in extra session at Jefferson City. It was announced to them between five and six o’clock in the afternoon. The members of the Assembly were discussing a militia bill, which, after receiving the news, they passed within fifteen minutes. In haste they sent it to the Senate, where it was passed instanter without debate. This bill, which General Harney later characterized as a secession measure, created a military fund for arming and equipping the militia of the State. All moneys in the treasury collected for other and specified objects were diverted to this purpose. To augment this military fund taxes on the assessed value of property were enormously increased. Even the school tax was subsidized for three years. Moreover, the Governor was authorized to call on the banks for a loan of five hundred thousand dollars. By this bill, the militia were required to take an oath that asserted fealty to Missouri as first and supreme;[27] so dominant was State sovereignty in the minds of these secession legislators. At half past seven the legislature, which had become calmer and in some measure reassured, met once more to discuss the anomalous condition of affairs. But as there seemed to be no immediate danger, these disloyal lawmakers adjourned at half past nine, and, with most of the peaceably disposed inhabitants of Jefferson City, retired for the night. But their rest was soon broken. A little after midnight the bells began to ring furiously; a tremendous thunder-storm was just bursting upon the city; amid vivid lightning flashes, deafening thunderclaps, and torrents of pelting rain, men on foot and on horseback flew through the city, summoning with stentorian cries the legislature to assemble with all possible despatch. It met in secret session at half past three in the morning. Without deliberation it gave the Governor absolute control over St. Louis and conferred upon him extraordinary powers for suppressing insurrectionary movements throughout the State.