In the House of Representatives the opposition dwindled to negligible proportions. Public sentiment had been stirred by the sinking of the _Laconia_ and by certain revelations the Administration published disclosing German overtures to Mexico in the event of war, the character of which will be chronicled later. Sensitive to the public pulse, the House was eager to receive the Armed-Ship Bill when it was reported on February 28, 1917, by the Foreign Affairs Committee, which had occupied a couple of days in shaping it. A stirring debate on the bill took place the next day (March 1) under cloture rule, and before the House adjourned that night it had passed the measure by a substantial vote of 403 to 13. The bill was at once sent to the Senate, and was substituted for the Senate Committee's bill, whose provisions conferred larger powers on the President. Expecting the Senate to pass its own bill as a substitute, it was the intention of the House leaders to accept the Senate's measure when it came to them for passage. The measure, however, never passed the Senate. Through the wide latitude allowed for unlimited debate a handful of Senators opposed to any action against Germany succeeded in effectually blocking the bill. The Senate sat late into the night of February 28, 1917, and took up the Armed-Ship Bill the next day. Senator La Follette, who led the successful filibuster against the bill, objected to its consideration, and, under the rule of unanimous consent, would only allow the bill to proceed on condition that no attempt was made to pass it before the next day. A precious day was lost, which sealed the fate of the measure. The bill came before the Senate for continuous debate on March 2, 1917, when it got into a parliamentary tangle. Debate was resumed on Saturday, March 3, 1917. Only a day and a half of the session now remained. Senator Stone who, though in charge of the bill, was opposed to it, found his position untenable and surrendered its conduct to Senator Hitchcock. This course enabled him to join the opponents of the bill openly by contending for an amendment excluding munition ships from armed protection--a revival of the arms embargo he had urged before. But the main obstruction to the bill came from a group of Western senators, who balked every effort for limiting debate or setting a time for a vote. As midnight neared the Administration's supporters saw that its chances of passing before Congress expired at noon the next day, Sunday, March 4, 1917, were of the slightest, and, anxious that the country should know where they stood, these senators, to the number of seventy-five, signed a manifesto reading as follows: "The undersigned, United States senators, favor the passage of Senate bill 8322, to authorize the President of the United States to arm American merchant vessels. "A similar bill already has passed the House of Representatives by a vote of 403 to 13.