Politicians took sides. Senator Coleman Blease from South Carolina inserted the poem in a Senate resolution. The resolution with its poem were rejected and removed from the "Congressional Record." The vote was based on protests from senators Walter Edge (from New Jersey) and Hiram Bingham (from Connecticut). Senator Bingham described the poem as "indecent, obscene doggerel verse" which gave "offense to hundreds of thousands of our fellow citizens and an offense to the Declaration of Independence and our Constitution." Senator Baise then agreed to withdraw the resolution he said, as a favor to Senator Bingham and not to the negro race.