The delegates were, to put it kindly, an august group, though Horace Greeley was not inclined to kindness when he dubbed it an “Old Gentlemen’s Convention” whose attendees were “political fossils, who would not have been again disinterred” if not for the crisis at hand. Greeley’s nickname stuck. One elderly delegate died during the conference. The attendees resolved early on to keep all proceedings secret from the public to avoid the likelihood that conferees would play to the press with overlong speeches and inflammatory remarks. The speeches occurred anyway, day in day out, in a ceaseless
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