What does this sentence mean?
He went to the cafe of one Mike Dolan and shook hands with Mike, who was alone behind the bar.
"Sorry we couldn't make it sooner, Jimmy, me boy," said Mike. "But we had that protest from Springfield to buck against, and the governor nearly balked. Feeling all right?"
"Fine," said Jimmy. "Got my key?"

This is from the short story "A Retrieved Reformation" of O.Henry. Jimmy was sent to prison for opening a safe in Springfield and then was released from there after ten months.
What does " But we had that protest from Springfield to buck against, and the governor nearly balked." mean?

Question

What does this sentence mean?
He went to the cafe of one Mike Dolan and shook hands with Mike, who was alone behind the bar.
"Sorry we couldn't make it sooner, Jimmy, me boy," said Mike. "But we had that protest from Springfield to buck against, and the governor nearly balked. Feeling all right?"
"Fine," said Jimmy. "Got my key?"

This is from the short story "A Retrieved Reformation" of O.Henry. Jimmy was sent to prison for opening a safe in Springfield and then was released from there after ten months. 
What does " But we had that protest from Springfield to buck against, and the governor nearly balked." mean?

Answer

Jimmy had been pardoned, and thus got out of jail early, because of his political connections.  A state governor is the person who has the power to pardon state prisoners.  I guess (but I’m not sure) that the “protest from Springfield” was a protest by somebody against the idea of pardoning Jimmy.  To “buck against” the protest means to fight back against it or to resist it.  (“Bucking” is what a horse does when it kicks its hind legs of the ground to try to make a rider fall off.  So, by extension, it can refer to other kinds of resistance/fighting back).  “Balked” means hesitated or stopped.  So, the idea appears to be that someone’s protest put political pressure on the governor NOT to pardon Jimmy, and that that protest delayed the pardon (“sorry we couldn’t make it [the pardon] [happen] sooner”) because the governor hesitated, but finally the governor granted the pardon.

Answer

Thank you for your comment.

Answer

Well they went against a protest, and the governor hesitated when they were supposed to do it.

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