They were frequently taunted in debate in the hope that indiscreet answers would furnish campaign material for use in the North.

Sometimes they failed to control their tempers and their tongues and played into the hands of their opponents.

They advocated no great reforms and showed little political vision.

They clung to the time-honored doctrines of the Democratic party--tariff for revenue only, opposition to sumptuary laws, economy in expenditures, and abolition of the internal revenue taxes--and they made ponderous speeches upon the Constitution, "viewing with alarm" the encroachments of the Federal Government upon the sphere of action marked out for the States.
[Footnote 1: See _The Agrarian Crusade_, by Solon J.Buck (in _The Chronicles of America_).] Partly because of constitutional objections, partly because of fear of Federal supervision of the administration of the measure, a majority of the Southern representatives opposed the Blair Bill, which might have hastened the progress of their section.

This measure, now almost forgotten, was much discussed between 1882 and 1890 when it was finally shelved.