This Volume is No. 
 
 1568 
 
 of a Limited Edition 
 
 ^ \ 
 
 Compliments of 
 The Law Association of Philadelphia 
 
Cornell University Library 
 KF 334.P53 
 
 Addresses delivered March 13, 1902, and p 
 
 3 1924 018 763 320 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924018763320 
 
The Law Association of Philadelphia 
 
 Addresses Delivered March 13 1902 
 And Papers Prepared or Republished 
 To Commemorate The Centennial 
 Celebration of The Law Association 
 of Philadelphia Pennsylvania 
 
 
 1802-I9O2 
 
Copyright, 1906, by 
 The Law Association of Philadelphia. 
 
 Made at the Sign of the Ivy Leaf in Philadelphia 
 
PREFACE 
 
 This book is published to commemorate the Centennial 
 of The Law Association of Philadelphia. 
 
 On March 6th, 1900, at a regular meeting a communi- 
 cation from the Library Committee was read, suggesting 
 that the Association would be one hundred years old in 
 March, 1902. At a later regular meeting held June 4th, 
 1901, on motion of John Cadwalader, Esq., it was resolved 
 that the Chancellor and the other officers of the Association 
 be made members of the Committee to be appointed to 
 arrange for a suitable celebration of the Centennial of the 
 organization of this Association in March, 1902 ; and that 
 the Chancellor be authorized to increase the number of the 
 Committee at his pleasure. In pursuance of this authority 
 the Chancellor appointed a General Committee and Sub- 
 Committees, as follows : 
 
 General Committee: Hon. Samuel W. Pennypacker, 
 Chairman, John Cadwalader, John Samuel, Francis Rawle, 
 B. Frank Clapp, William Drayton, Francis Shunk Brown, 
 Jno. Houston Merrill, Geo. Tucker Bispham, Hampton L. 
 Carson, David W. Sellers, William H. Staake, Samuel 
 Dickson, Frank P. Prichard, Wm. C. Ferguson, Secretary. 
 
 Financial and Executive Committee: William H. 
 Staake, John Samuel, Francis Shunk Brown, Frank P. 
 Prichard, Jno. Houston Merrill, Chairman. 
 
 Committee on Addresses: Samuel Dickson, Chairman, 
 John Cadwalader, Francis Rawle, William Drayton, Hon. 
 Samuel W. Pennypacker. 
 
 Committee on Publication: Hampton L. Carson, 
 Chairman, Jno. Houston Merrill, Howard W. Page, Rus- 
 sell Duane, Alfred Percival Smith, William Draper Lewis, 
 John C. Bell. 
 
iv Preface 
 
 At regular meetings of the Association in October and 
 December, 1901, reports were received of the satisfactory 
 progress of the work of the Committee, indicating that the 
 celebration would be of a character to mark suitably and 
 adequately the closing of a century in the lifetime of the 
 organization. 
 
 On March 13th, 1902, the celebration was held in Hor- 
 ticultural Hall, Philadelphia. It consisted of a meeting in 
 the afternoon at which two papers were read; an Intro- 
 ductory Address by the Chancellor, Mr. Dickson, and an 
 Historical Address by the present Chief Justice, then Mr. 
 Justice Mitchell. A reception was held at the same place in 
 the evening. The reception room was decorated hand- 
 somely, and on the walls were hung the valuable portraits 
 belonging to the Association. Both meetings were attended 
 by a distinguished body of lawyers, including representa- 
 tives of the bench and bar of Federal Courts, neighboring 
 States and Cities, National and State Bar Associations, 
 and County Bar Associations in Pennsylvania. 
 
 In his address the Chancellor drew attention to the pro- 
 posed publication of this volume in the following language : 
 
 "Arrangements have, therefore, been made by the com- 
 mittee to secure the preparation of the papers, which will 
 preserve some reminiscences of the life of the bar in the 
 middle of the century, and of the methods of teaching pur- 
 sued in some of the more important offices where systematic 
 instruction was given. One or more volumes to be made 
 up of these papers, and to include also some of the more 
 important speeches and addresses now found only in period- 
 ical or fugitive publications, cannot fail to be of interest to 
 any one who reveres the great men of the past, and will 
 prove that we are not indifferent to 'the moral and intellect- 
 ual affluence of those who have gone before which remains 
 to enrich their posterity.' " 
 
 Immediately after the celebration the Sub-Committee 
 00 Addresses induced members of the Association to pre- 
 pare the papers published herewith, which eventually were 
 
Preface v 
 
 handed to the Sub-Committee on PubHcation. On October 
 6th, 1903, the Committee last named reported to the Asso- 
 ciation as follows : 
 
 To the Chancellor and Gentlemen of The Law Association: 
 
 Your committee, to whom was referred the matter of the publi- 
 cation of the proceedings of the Centennial Celebration of the Law 
 Association, beg leave to report as follows : 
 
 In addition to the introductory address by the Chancellor, 
 Mr. Samuel Dickson, and the historical address of the Honorable 
 James T. Mitchell, the following papers were prepared by request 
 for publication in the centennial proceedings : 
 
 I. "Some Recollections of the Bar of Fifty Years Ago," by 
 John C. Bullitt, Esq. 
 
 II. "Reminiscences of the Bar," by Hon. Clement B. Penrose. 
 
 III. "Some Recollections," by Wm. Rotch Wister, Esq. 
 
 IV. "John Cadwalader's Ofifice," by John Samuel, Esq. 
 
 V. "Sketch of George M. Wharton," by Henry E. Busch, Esq. 
 
 Your committee were of the opinion that the valuable and 
 interesting papers above mentioned should be supplemented by the 
 republication of the following papers dealing with the lives and 
 characters of earlier distinguished members of your Association, 
 first, because taken in connection with the later original papers 
 they will furnish a most interesting and fairly complete series of 
 sketches of leading members of the Philadelphia Bar; and second, 
 because they are literary productions of merit from the pens of 
 well-known members. 
 
 I. "Leaders of the Old Bar," by Horace Binney, Esq. 
 
 II. "A Memoir of William Rawle, LL.D.," by Thomas I. 
 Wharton, Esq., with a letter from Peter Stephen 
 Duponceau, Esq., to the author, containing his recol- 
 lections of Mr. Rawle's life and character. 
 III. "Eulogium on the Life and Character of Horace Binney," 
 by the Hon. William Strong. 
 
 Your committee have reserved for future consideration the 
 question of the propriety of publishing: 
 
 I. The proceedings of the Bar Meeting upon the death of the 
 Hon. John Sergeant, containing Mr. Binney's celebrated address. 
 
vi Preface 
 
 II. A paper read before the Pennsylvania Bar Association 
 upon Wra. Morris Meredith, on June 26, 1901, by R. L. Ash- 
 hurst, Esq. 
 
 III. An address containing an historical sketch of The Law 
 Association of Philadelphia, read by John Samuel, Esq., at the 
 installation of the Law Library in the Public Buildings. 
 
 Your committee recommend that the proposed publication 
 include one or more of the Constitutions and By-Laws of the Asso- 
 ciation, together with a complete list of all officers of the Associa- 
 tion from the beginning, and a list of the officers and members at 
 the date of the Centennial Celebration. If given the discretion to 
 decide whether all the papers mentioned above shall be included 
 your committee will be governed by the proper consideration of 
 space and economy. 
 
 The balance unexpended of the fund collected for the expenses 
 of the Centennial Celebration now in the treasury of the Association 
 is $53.82. This amount will not be sufficient to defray the cost of 
 printing and distributing the proposed publication. Therefore your 
 committee recommend the adoption by the Association of the fol- 
 lowing resolutions : 
 
 I. That the Publication Committee as now constituted be con- 
 tinued. 
 
 II. That said committee be authorized in its discretion to pub- 
 lish all or a portion of the above papers or any additional papers 
 or matter in one or two volumes of proper size. 
 
 III. That the balance of the Centennial Fund now in the treas- 
 ury of the Association be appropriated to pay the cost of said 
 publications, and that the Chairman of the Publication Committee 
 be authorized to draw upon the Treasurer of the Association for 
 such an additional amount as may be necessary. 
 
 IV. That your committee be authorized to solicit from non- 
 contributing members of the Association and others subscriptions 
 to reimburse the Association for the amount paid out of the treas- 
 ury of the Association. 
 
 All of which is respectfully submitted. 
 
 ~ The resolutions recommended by the Committee were 
 adopted by the Association, except that the second resolu- 
 tion was amended to read "that the Committee be author- 
 ized in its discretion to publish all of the papers referred 
 
Preface vii 
 
 to." Subsequently the Committee decided to include the 
 eulogium upon Mr. Chief Justice Tilghman delivered by 
 Mr. Binney on October 13th, 1827. It was evident that 
 the addition of this valuable paper would make the series 
 more complete, and would not be regarded as an abuse of 
 the discretionary power vested in the Committee. 
 
 It is to be regretted that the publication of this volume 
 has been delayed so long. It is hoped and believed, how- 
 ever, that it will be accepted as a valuable and interesting 
 record of the proceedings at the Association's First Centen- 
 nial Celebration. 
 
 Committee on Publication. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Introductory Address ^-^se 
 
 By Samuel Dickson, Chancellor of The Law Association of 
 
 Philadelphia , . I 
 
 Historical Address 
 
 By Hon. James T. Mitchell, Chief Justice of the Supreme 
 
 Court of Pennsylvania 13 
 
 The Leaders of the Old Bar of Philadelphia 
 
 By Horace Binney 79 
 
 An Eulogium Upon the Hon. William Tilghman 
 
 Late Chief Justice of Pennsylvania 
 
 By Horace Binney 154 
 
 Death of Hon. John Sergeant 
 
 Memorial Address 
 
 By Horace Binney 185 
 
 Discourse Illustrative of the Life and Character of 
 Hon. Horace Binney 
 By The Hon. William Strong, Justice of the Supreme Court 
 
 of the United States 204 
 
 A Memoir of William Rawle, LL. D. 
 
 By T. I. Wharton, with a letter from Peter Stephen 
 DuPONCEAU, containing his recollections of Mr. Rawle's 
 life and character 240 
 
 William Morris Meredith 
 
 By R. L. Ashhurst 278 
 
 Some Recollections of the Bar of Fifty Years Ago 
 
 By John C. Bullitt 328 
 
 Some Recollections 
 
 By Wm. Rotch Wister 354 
 
 John Cadwalader's Office 
 
 By John Samuel 366 
 
 Reminiscences of the Bar 
 
 By Hon. Clement B. Penrose, Judge of the Orphans' Court . 375 
 
 George M. Wharton 
 
 By Henry E. Busch 39° 
 
X Contents 
 
 Address '"•^'^^ 
 
 Delivered on the Opening of the Law Library of The Law Asso- 
 ciation of Philadelphia, in the Public Buildings, at Phila- 
 delphia, on March 30, 1 898 
 By John Samuel 393 
 
 Charter 
 
 Of The Law Library Company of the City of Philadelphia, 1802 406 
 
 First By-Laws 
 
 1803 413 
 
 By-Laws 
 
 Adopted 1805 414 
 
 Constitution 
 
 Of The Associated Members of the Bar of Philadelphia, 1821 . 416 
 
 By-Laws 
 
 Of The Associated Members of the Bar of Philadelphia, 1 821 . 422 
 
 Officers 
 
 Of The Associated Members of the Bar, 1821 427 
 
 Members 
 
 Of The Associated Members of the Bar, 1821 . . ... 428 
 
 Officers 
 
 Of The Associated Members of the Bar, 1823 429 
 
 Charter 
 
 Of The Law Association of Philadelphia, as Amended A. D. 
 
 1880, with other amendments to 1901, inclusive 430 
 
 By-Laws 
 
 Of The Law Association of Philadelphia, as Amended to March 
 
 5th, 1901 436 
 
 Standing Resolutions 
 
 Of The Law Association of Philadelphia, 1902 440 
 
 Officers 
 
 Of The Law Library Company of the City of Philadelphia, 
 
 1802-1827 443 
 
 Officers and Members of Standing Committees 
 
 Of The Law Association of Philadelphia, 1827-1902 444 
 
 Officers, Committees and Members 
 
 Of The Law Association of Philadelphia, March 13, 1902 . . 451 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 John Marshall opposite page 
 
 Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States (l8oi- 
 
 J835) 
 From the Painting by Henry Inman ; owned by the Association. I 
 
 William Rawle, LL. D. 
 
 Chancellor (1827-1836) 
 
 From the Painting by Henry Inman; owned by the Association. 32 
 
 Peter S. du Ponceau, LL. D. 
 
 Chancellor (1836-1844) 
 
 From the Painting by Thomas Sully ; owned by the Association 64 
 
 John Sergeant 
 
 Chancellor (1845-1852) 
 
 From the Painting by Thomas Sully ; owned by the Association 96 
 
 Horace Binney, LL. D. 
 
 Chancellor (1852-1854) 
 
 From the Painting by Thomas Sully ; owned by the Association 128 
 
 Joseph R. Ingersoll, LL. D. 
 Chancellor (1854-1857) 
 From the Painting by Thomas Sully ; owned by the Association 160 
 
 William Morris Meredith 
 Chancellor (1857-1873) 
 
 From the Painting by St. Jerome Uhl. In the Treasury Depart- 
 ment at Washington, D. C 192 
 
 Peter McCall 
 
 Chancellor (1873-1880) 
 
 From the Painting by Bernhardt Uhle ; owned by the Asso- 
 ciation 224 
 
 George W. Biddle, LL. D. 
 Chancellor (1880-1891) 
 From a Photograph by Gutekunst 256 
 
 Richard C. McMurtrie 
 
 Chancellor (189I-1894) 
 
 From a Photograph by Gutekunst 288 
 
 Joseph B. Townsend, LL. D. 
 Chancellor (1894- 1 896) 
 From a Photograph 320 
 
xii Illustrations 
 
 George Tucker Bispham <"''"°'"= ^""^^ 
 
 Chancellor (1896-1899) 
 
 From a Photograph by Goldensky 35 2 
 
 Samuel Dickson 
 
 Chancellor (1899) 
 
 From a Photograph by Gutekunst 3^4 
 
 James T. Mitchell, LL. D. 
 
 Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania 
 
 From the Etching by King 416 
 
From a Pitintini; b, Hriin Inmcii 
 
 JoriN I^;Ar..:n/\LL ( 1 733 = \ s>33) 
 
 ■.;hief j':5Ticr. or Tme iv-jPREME cg.'jrt or The "ji^irEi. zr.w e5 
 
INTRODUCTORY ADDRESS 
 
 by 
 SAMUEL DICKSON 
 
 Chancellor of the Law Association 
 
 The completion of a century in the Hfe of the Law Asso- 
 ciation is an event which could not have been permitted to 
 pass unnoticed without disrespect to the memory of the law- 
 yers by whom it was organized and who made the bar of 
 Philadelphia pre-eminent in their own day, and imparted to it 
 the impulse which made it what it has since been and now is. 
 The consideration which we now enjoy, and which is one of 
 the most precious rewards of professional labor, is, in large 
 measure, due to the men who first gave distinction to the 
 name "Philadelphia Lawyer," and left examples of character 
 and conduct which have been the ideals of their successors 
 to the present day. 
 
 It must, therefore, always be profitable, as it is at this 
 time peculiarly appropriate, to recall the history of our bar 
 and to remind ourselves of the conditions and influences 
 which produced the great lawyers of the last century. 
 
 In such a retrospect the most striking fact is that from 
 its first existence as an organized and working body it had the 
 characteristics of a mature and metropolitan bar. The early 
 fame of the Philadelphia lawyer was doubtless largely due to 
 Andrew Hamilton, who had read in Gray's Inn, and might 
 well have made an impression by learning then exceptional 
 as well as by his marked ability, though Mr. Binney says of 
 him that he was not "a scientific and thoroughly trained 
 lawyer." He died in 1741, but he seems to have been "a 
 voice crying in the wilderness," and down to the adoption of 
 the Constitution of 1776 there had been practically no judi- 
 cial administration of the law of the province. All the deci- 
 sions previous to the Revolution, which Mr. Dallas was able 
 
2 Law Association Centennial 
 
 to collect, are contained in twenty-nine pages of his first 
 volume, and it would seem that no homogeneous or scientific 
 bar existed prior to the organization of the new State govern- 
 ment. 
 
 If this be taken as its beginning, the Philadelphia bar 
 included from the very first days of its existence men who 
 would have been regarded as accomplished lawyers in any 
 court, at home or abroad, from that day to this. It was an 
 era of great men, and the representatives of the new world 
 were not inferior to their contemporaries on the other side of 
 the Atlantic. Lord Chatham's remark in reference to the 
 members of Carpenters' Hall convention is well known. "For 
 myself," he said, "I must declare and avow that in all my 
 reading and observation (and it has been my favorite study 
 — I have read Thucydides and have studied and admired the 
 master states of the world), I say I must declare that for 
 solidity of reasoning, force of sagacity and wisdom of con- 
 clusion, under such a complication of difficult circumstances 
 no nation or body of men could stand in preference to the 
 general Congress at Philadelphia." 
 
 In an address to the Associated Members of the Bar of 
 Philadelphia, as the Law, Association was then styled, Mr. 
 William Rawle, who had been a student in the Temple, says 
 of the lawyers of the time of the Revolution : "There were 
 men whom we would not have feared to oppose to an equal 
 number from the excellent bar of Westminster Hall;" and 
 writing in the middle of the century, Mr. Binney says of the 
 leaders of the old bar that "one and all of them would have 
 been regarded as able men in Westminster Hall, more than 
 one of them would have stood at the height of that bar, and 
 their superiors have not, I think, shown themselves in any 
 part of our land." 
 
 But, unlike reading and writing, knowledge of the law 
 does not come by nature, and one who reads or hears of the 
 leaders of the old bar will always naturally inquire how they 
 came to be the accomplished lawyers they are said to have 
 been. The explanation is one which cannot be recalled too 
 
Address by Samuel Dickson, Chancellor 3 
 
 often. They had spared no expense of time or money to ob- 
 tain the best possible legal education before they entered upon 
 the practice of law, and taking all things into consideration 
 no men ever had better opportunities for preparation. In the 
 life of his grandfather. President Reed, William B. Reed 
 says : "Professional education was not at that time thought 
 complete without the advantages which attendance in the 
 Inns of Court was supposed to confer, and many of the 
 young lawyers, at least in the Middle colonies, added two 
 years of study at the Temple to the regular period of instruc- 
 tion at home." Joseph Reed sailed for England in the sum- 
 mer of 1763, and remained a student in the Middle Temple 
 until the spring of 1765. In a footnote the author gives his 
 certificate of membership and memorandum of expenses, but 
 regrets his inability to refer particularly to the course of pro- 
 fessional studies. 
 
 Writing more recently. Dr. Charles J. Stille, a former 
 member of this association, has given in his history of the 
 "Life and Times of John Dickinson" a most interesting 
 account of the Inns of Court and their influence upon the law- 
 yers of the colonies. Dickinson himself had studied for three 
 years in the office of John Moland, Esq., in this city, before 
 going to London, and, having entered the Temple in 1753, 
 did not return to Philadelphia until 1757. Dr. Stille states 
 that of one hundred and fifteen American students who were 
 admitted to the different Inns of Court from 1760 to the close 
 of the Revolution, South Carolina sent forty-seven, Virginia 
 twenty-one, Maryland sixteen, Pennsylvaria eleven. New 
 York five and New England only one or two — just as only 
 one of the sixty-three American graduates from the Univer- 
 sity of Edinburgh between 1758 and 1785 came from New 
 England. He adds that "from Pennsylvania we find as the 
 worthy successors of Dickinson and others who received their 
 legal education in those Inns of Court between the year 1750 
 and 1760, a class of men whom to name is to present a bril- 
 liant array, not only of those who laid the foundation of the 
 reputation of the Philadelphia bar for learning and ability, 
 
4 Law Association Centennial 
 
 but of those also who exerted the most potent influence in 
 building up our political system during the Revolutionary 
 era. In this list are to be found the names of Nicholas Wain, 
 Jasper Yeates, Joseph Reed, Andrew Hamilton, three Tilgh- 
 mans (Richard, Edward and William), Thomas McKean, 
 Jared Ingersoll, Moses Frank, William Rawle, Benjamin 
 Chew and Peter Markoe, all of whom are well known to have 
 been of the highest professional standing not only in the 
 province, but throughout the colonies." 
 
 It is true that no corporate or official instruction was at 
 that time given under the authority of the Inns of Court, and 
 that until Blackstone began his lectures in 1758 no course of 
 study was presented and no public instruction furnished, even 
 in the universities, for students preparing for admission to the 
 English bar. It was customary, however, to read in the office 
 of a preceptor — usually a special pleader or conveyancing 
 counsel — and to enjoy the advantage of his supervision and 
 instruction, as was long the custom in this city. It also 
 appears that those who contemplated going abroad prepared 
 themselves in advance by previous study, and in some cases at 
 least they had been actually admitted, as were Dickinson and 
 Reed, before leaving home. An edition of Blackstone, of 
 which the first volume was published in England in 
 1765, was published in this city in 177 1-2, and it is 
 not probable that any of the young men who went from 
 this city to enter the Inns of Court had failed to make ready 
 to profit by such an experience, for a visit to the old world 
 was not the commonplace affair it has since become. Going 
 from a life so primitive as that of Philadelphia, any youth 
 of sensibility must have been stirred and stimulated by the 
 sights and associations of London, and it would have been 
 strange, indeed, if any student could have been more diligent 
 or better prepared to profit by what he saw and heard than 
 the American of that day, who was beginning to think of 
 what value the great muniments of freedom, which were his 
 birthright as a British subject, were to be to him and his. 
 Westminster Hall and the gardens and halls of the Temple 
 
Address by Samuel Dickson, Chancellor 5 
 
 have not yet lost their charm to the American lawyer who 
 visits them for the first time after reaching manhood; but 
 every day of his life must have been full of interest to the 
 colonist then a student in the Inns of Court. His intercourse 
 with his fellows, his readings in the great libraries, his attend- 
 ance upon the courts and upon the debates of Parliament must 
 have keyed up an ambitious youth to the highest pitch of 
 exertion and urged him to the utmost of his powers. These 
 young Americans, therefore, not only had every advantage 
 which the most favored Englishman could command, but 
 they were able to look at things from a different point of 
 view, and to take their measure, as it were, from the outside 
 — at once native and to the manner born, and yet already in 
 some sense alien in temper, and soon to become citizens of a 
 free and independent state. 
 
 Some of them, too, were welcomed in the best English 
 society, and the intimacy of Richard Tilghman with his kins- 
 man, known to history as Sir Philip Francis, led to the dis- 
 covery in our own day of the one decisive proof, in the way of 
 handwriting, of the authorship of the Letters of Junius. In 
 Twistleton and Chabot's "Handwriting of Junius," the story 
 is told of the visit of the cousins to Bath, and the sending to a 
 young lady of a copy of verses, of which the handwriting, 
 long ascribed to Francis, was said by Chabot to be that of 
 Tilghman. Complete confirmation of this opinion was found 
 in their correspondence, and the suggestion that Tilghman 
 furnished the law of the famous letters may have been well 
 founded. In writing to Philadelphia, Francis says of him : 
 "He leads a pleasant sort of life, and studies law like a 
 dragon." The incident derives an additional interest from 
 the mention in Mr. Binney's eulogium of Chief Justice Tilgh- 
 man of his relationship to Dr. Philip Francis, the translator 
 of Horace, "a scholar accomplished in the literature of the 
 age of Augustus." Many of the others were equally fortu- 
 nate. Their apprenticeship thus enabled them to become 
 familiar by actual handling, if not by complete perusal, with 
 the treatises and reports which contained the great body of 
 
6 Law Association Centennial 
 
 the English law, and to learn the relative value of author and 
 reporter. It afforded opportunities also to associate, in cham- 
 bers, at mess and in their homes, with those who were to 
 become the great men of the profession and of public life — 
 among Dickinson's fellow students in the Middle Temple 
 were Thurlow and Kenyon — and to watch the leaders of the 
 English bar before the jury or addressing the court, and to 
 listen to the debates in the Houses of Parliament — ^Mr. 
 Rawle illustrated Attorney-General Sergeant's manner of 
 speaking by referring to a peculiarity which he had "occasion- 
 ally noticed in the public speeches of Charles Fox" — and, in 
 short, gave them every privilege which could be secured at 
 that day for any student. 
 
 When they came back, after such an experience, to create 
 as it were a bar of their own in the new Commonwealth, they 
 brought with them an ideal of learning, accomplishment and 
 bearing which constituted a standard to which they them- 
 selves conformed, and which they transmitted to their succes- 
 sors. The evidence of their own success does not rest merely 
 upon tradition, though that was derived by men now living 
 from those who spoke from personal knowledge. The coming 
 of Mr. Charles Chauncey to this city was determined by the 
 advice of Chief Justice Ellsworth, who recommended him to 
 do so upon the ground that the bar of Philadelphia at that 
 time was the strongest bar in the country. The Federal as 
 well as the State reports have preserved their arguments, and 
 the leaders of the old bar still live for us in such masterpieces 
 as Mr. Binney painted in his sketches of William Lewis, 
 Edward Tilghman and Jared Ingersoll, and in his eulogiums 
 upon Chauncey, Sergeant and Chief Justice Tilghman. 
 
 Having had thorough preparation, they found from the 
 start abundant occasion for the exercise of the greatest 
 industry and ability. In proportion to its volume, the business 
 of the Philadelphia bar during the years immediately succeed- 
 ing the Revolution down to the end of the wars of Napoleon 
 and the Treaty of Ghent was of unsurpassed interest, variety 
 and importance. To take part in such litigation as then arose 
 
Address by Samuel Dickson, Chancellor 7 
 
 was the best school of the lawyer, and those engaged in it 
 grew to their full stature. Fortunately, they recognized their 
 obligation to those who were to follow them, and they pro- 
 ceeded to establish and carry on a system of apprenticeship, 
 admirably adapted not only to impart instruction, but to build 
 up character. When the office was in the dwelling-house, and 
 the evenings devoted to study and work, it was easy for the 
 preceptor to direct the reading of his students, to test their 
 progress by frequent examinations, and to start them in the 
 drafting of documents, pleadings and opinions which made 
 the vocabulary of the law familiar and its technicalities intel- 
 ligible. 
 
 More valuable were the intimacies which grew out of 
 such relationship, and the student lived in an attitude of ad- 
 miring and affectionate regard for the teacher and exemplar, 
 to whom he looked up, as the phrase then was, as his 
 learned master in the law. The force and value of these 
 influences upon the discipline of the bar cannot be exag- 
 gerated. After three years spent in his office the certificate 
 from a gentleman that the applicant for admission was of 
 good moral character meant something, and the friendships 
 between men of different ages as well as between fellow 
 students and contemporaries, gave homogeneity and unity to 
 the bar. These influences were confirmed by the manner in 
 which the courts were organized down till the Constitution 
 of 1874, as the old District Court was a sort of lawyers' 
 exchange, where all met once a week for friendly and social 
 as well as for professional intercourse. 
 
 It is impossible that there could have been a more com- 
 pact and harmonious body than the members of the Philadel- 
 phia bar so long as these conditions existed, and professional 
 opinion had a force sufficient to influence, if not control, 
 every man's conduct. Hence the Law Association had little 
 to do in the way of enforcing professional discipline, and it 
 made no serious effort to exercise any other function than 
 the maintenance of a law library. Though lacking a proper 
 income or endowment, this one duty was measurably fulfilled, 
 
8 Law Association Centennial 
 
 and the library had the great good fortune to engage, for 
 many years, the interest of one of the most accomplished 
 scholars whoever adorned any bar — the late John William 
 Wallace, Esq., author of that most entertaining and instruc- 
 tive work entitled "The Reporters," and himself subsequently 
 the reporter of the Supreme Court of the United States. The 
 collection gathered under his administration contained many 
 rare and costly books, and was the nucleus of the present 
 library. To meet its increasing needs, due to the rapid 
 growth in the number of State Reports and other publica- 
 tions, application was made to the Legislature for assistance, 
 and by an act of assembly approved April 2, i860, the pro- 
 thonotaries of the courts were directed to collect twenty-five 
 cents in each original suit in the city of Philadelphia, for the 
 use of the association. Shortly thereafter it came to be 
 thought expedient that the librarian should be one who could 
 afford to give a substantial part of his time to its supervision, 
 and Mr. Wallace felt constrained to tender his resignation. 
 His successor had no special knowledge of books, but the 
 members of the Library Committee were always ready to 
 confer and advise. Mr. E. Spencer Miller, Mr. William 
 Henry Rawle and Mr. Asa I. Fish had had experience in 
 annotation and authorship, and had a knowledge and a love 
 of books which made their co-operation exceptionally useful. 
 No group of lawyers ever held to a higher standard of profes- 
 sional and public duty than did the gentlemen who, at that 
 time, composed the Library Committee. Upon my resigna- 
 tion, in 1865, the library passed under the direction of one 
 who was known to be only second to Mr. Wallace as a bibliog- 
 rapher, but who has so applied the learning to be gained from 
 books that, in the study of his opinions, we have forgotten 
 his rare and curious knowledge of books as books — of texts, 
 bindings and editions. Under the care of his successors the 
 library has steadily increased until it now contains over 
 37,000 volumes — or more than thirty times the number in 
 the library of Judge Yeates, which was said to contain at the 
 time of his death, in 18 17, "an almost complete collection of 
 
Address by Samuel Dickson, Chancellor 9 
 
 works on legal subjects." The present income of the associ- 
 ation is sufficient to make all necessary additions, and it may 
 at least be fairly claimed that it is a good working library 
 for the practicing lawyer. Besides its books the collection of 
 busts and portraits, of which the Inman portrait of Marshall 
 is perhaps the chief, is of great and increasing value. It is 
 unnecessary to point out the indispensable necessity of main- 
 taining such a library, not only to the individual lawyer, but 
 to all concerned in the administration of the law, and which 
 of itself constitutes an adequate reason for the being of 
 this association; but is the keeping up of the library 
 all that it is to do in the future? It may be true, as 
 already intimated, that nothing more was needed in the 
 past, but new conditions will impose new duties. The changes 
 which have occurred in the localities once suitable for resi- 
 dence, and in the hours and habits of life, have rendered it 
 impossible to continue the old system of office instruction, 
 and the law students of the country are nearly all in attend- 
 ance at law schools. That of the University of Pennsylvania, 
 which was inaugurated in 1790 by James Wilson, one of the 
 associate justices of the Supreme Court of the United States, 
 in the presence of President Washington, the Cabinet and 
 Congress, with Mrs. Washington and other ladies, was soon 
 closed, — just as Chancellor Kent's lectures were begun with 
 a class of seven in the first year, and two in the second, and 
 given up in the third, as not a single student presented him- 
 self. When our school was reopened in 1850 by Judge 
 Sharswood, it was only to supplement the system of study 
 then in vogue. With its library, founded by George W. 
 Biddle, a former Chancellor of this association, and its large 
 and efficient force of professors and instructors, it offers 
 facilities for acquiring a knowledge of the law as complete 
 as ever were provided. It is essential, however, if the reputa- 
 tion of the bar is to be maintained, that applicants for admis- 
 sion should be compelled to improve these or like advantages 
 in other schools, and that there should be no lowering of the 
 requirements for registration or final admission. The early 
 
lo Law Association Centennial 
 
 lawyers, who went abroad to complete their studies, gave at 
 least five years to preparation, and Chief Justice Tilghman 
 served an apprenticeship of eleven years. The leaders of the 
 next generation expected to spend at least four or five years, 
 after admission to practice, in systematic study, and the course 
 of reading recommended to the novitiate by Judge Shars- 
 wood, would fully occupy from five to seven years. In view of 
 the development of the many new fields of jurisprudence, it is 
 not unreasonable that equally laborious preparation should 
 now be exacted. The members of the faculties of the law 
 schools in the State, and of the Boards of Examiners, should 
 be sustained and encouraged in excluding from the profession 
 all who lack either preliminary training or reasonable knowl- 
 edge of legal principles, and no relaxation of the rules of 
 court should be tolerated. 
 
 Without any unreasonable exertion it is still possible, 
 therefore, to hold up the standards of learning, but the close 
 intercourse of preceptor and student, which linked successive 
 generations of lawyers into an intimacy which almost made 
 them one family, is no longer possible. It behooves those who 
 care for the future to consider what this Association may do 
 to replace the old system of training by furthering the pur- 
 poses, other than the maintenance of the library, which it has 
 undertaken to promote. These objects, as declared in its 
 amended charter, are : 
 
 "i. The general supervision of the conduct of members 
 of the bar, and of all persons connected officially with the 
 administration of the law, or in charge of the public records, 
 and, in cases of any breach of duty on their part, the insti- 
 tution of such proceedings as may be lawful in respect 
 thereto. 
 
 "2. The improvement of the law and of its administra- 
 tion ; the protection of the bar and of judicial tribunals, their 
 officers and members, from invasion of their rights ; and the 
 maintenance of their proper influence." 
 
 Down to the present time, such corporate action as is 
 contemplated in this enumeration of the objects of the Asso- 
 
Address by Samuel Dickson^ Chancellor ii 
 
 ciation has rarely been taken. It has been occasionally neces- 
 sary for the Board of Censors to investigate charges of pro- 
 fessional misconduct, and sometimes to move for the suspen- 
 sion or disbarment of delinquents. The character of proposed 
 or pending legislation has been brought up for consideration 
 and discussion, and suitable candidates for the bench have 
 been endorsed, and their appointment or election recom- 
 mended. In the main, however, professional opinion has been 
 allowed to express itself informally, and it is proper to recog- 
 nize that it has often exerted a controlling influence. The 
 evils anticipated from an elective judiciary have been averted 
 by the establishment of the unwritten law that a judge who 
 has shown himself competent and faithful, is entitled to be 
 re-nominated by both political parties, and to be re-elected 
 without a contest. A current illustration of the rule is 
 afforded in the manner in which the approaching re-nomina- 
 tion of the President Judge of Common Pleas No. 4 has been 
 referred to in the public press, although if noi such precedent 
 existed, it would be made in his case. The time is coming, 
 though, when individual action will no longer sufifice. The 
 increase in the numbers admitted to practice ; the lack of any- 
 thing like general intercourse or acquaintanceship between 
 members of the bar ; and the multiplication of courts, all tend 
 to impair the friendly and fraternal feeling which once per- 
 vaded the profession, and as Judge Sharswood expressed it, 
 made "the bench and bar one brotherhood." In lieu of that 
 almost involuntary union, it is necessary that the energies 
 and force of the bar should be combined and directed by an 
 efficient organization. The Pennsylvania Bar Association, 
 which was chartered in 1895, has already proved itself of the 
 highest value in all matters affecting the interests of the pro- 
 fession throughout the State, and the Lawyers' Club of this 
 city has taken a line of its own in the way of social entertain- 
 ment, which is doing much to bring the members of the judi- 
 ciary and the bar into friendly relations, and both associations 
 merit, and should receive, the cordial support of all able to 
 join them. But the full strength of the Philadelphia bar can 
 
12 Law Association Centennial 
 
 only make itself felt through a local organization, which shall 
 include every practicing lawyer worthy to be admitted to 
 membership. It is much to be desired, therefore, that as a 
 result of this Centennial celebration such modifications may 
 be made in the by-laws regulating the terms and conditions 
 of membership, that no one will hereafter be deterred by the 
 expense. The subject is now under careful consideration, 
 and if all the members of this great bar can be thus united 
 under a single organization, it ought to exercise a dominant 
 influence in upholding and maintaining the standards and 
 traditions of the Philadelphia bar. The full meaning of these 
 words can only be understood by those who have some famil- 
 iarity with the history of this Association, and the men who 
 founded and perpetuated it. Arrangements have, therefore, 
 been made by the committee to secure the preparation of 
 papers, which will preserve some reminiscences of the life of 
 the bar in the middle of the century, and of the methods of 
 teaching pursued in some of the more important offices where 
 systematic instruction was given. One or more volumes to 
 be made up of these papers, and to include also some of the 
 more important speeches and addresses now found only in 
 periodicals or fugitive publications, cannot fail to be of inter- 
 est to any one who reveres the great men of the past, and will 
 prove that we are not indifferent to "the moral and intel- 
 lectual affluence of those who have gone before which remains 
 to enrich their posterity." 
 
 The first duty of the committee having charge of this 
 celebration, however, was to secure a fitting history of the 
 Association, which this day completes one hundred years of 
 service, and happily, our fellow-member, James T. Mitchell, 
 was prevailed upon to prepare an address to which you 
 will now have the pleasure of listening. 
 
HISTORICAL ADDRESS 
 
 by 
 
 HON. JAMES T. MITCHELL 
 
 Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania 
 
 Mr. Chancellor and Brethren of the Bench and the Bar: 
 
 We have met to commemorate a hundred years of united 
 corporate effort in the best interests of the bar and the profes- 
 sion of the law. It is a difficult but perhaps an agreeable effort 
 to put ourselves mentally in the situation of our predecessors 
 of a century ago. The colonists of America came mostly as 
 adventurers, if not as refugees ; in Massachusetts for religious 
 freedom, not for tolerance; in Virginia and Maryland to 
 found a landed aristocracy ; but Pennsylvania was founded as 
 a great princely palatinate for the founder, dominated by 
 humane motives, religious fervor and zeal for liberty of 
 conscience, but backed by wealth, intelligence, influence and 
 high position. Philadelphia speedily became the leading city 
 of the colonies. The founder intended it as a "green country 
 town," but the advantages of wealth and concentrated effort, 
 added to a fertile surrounding country or "hinterland," soon 
 brought it to the front rank. Not even the far-sighted Penn 
 foresaw the nineteenth century's blaze of mechanical progress 
 and subjugation of physical nature, or anticipated the conse- 
 quences. A hundred years ago, Philadelphia's inventors, 
 Fitch and Fulton, had not realized the dreams that were ulti- 
 mately to put Philadelphia in the rear. After a five or six 
 weeks' voyage across the stormy Atlantic, another day or 
 two on the peaceful waters of Delaware Bay and River were 
 not material. The world of that day, commercial and other, 
 was in no hurry. It was not until steam began to reduce time 
 to a count of hours that the inexorable logic of events drove 
 Philadelphia from its prominence. So it came about that in 
 the early years of the eighteenth century Philadelphia became 
 
 13 
 
14 Law Association Centennial 
 
 the leading city, not only in population, wealth and enter- 
 prise, but also as the first center of intellectual activity. Its 
 character was distinctly scientific. Here was the home of 
 Godfrey, Rittenhouse and Hamilton, and hither had come 
 Franklin for a wider field of operation for his universal 
 genius. The medical students of that day went to the foun- 
 tain head at St. Andrew's, and the lawyers to the Inns of 
 Court. They brought back the best legal learning of their 
 day; but here at home they missed the conversations, the 
 readings, etc., of the Inns and that communion which Coke 
 calls the life of the law. The bar was the bar of the United 
 States. Here Congress had held its sessions and the Su- 
 preme Court had sat. One of the earliest and most impor- 
 tant efforts to found a law school was made in the law lec- 
 tures of James Wilson, delivered at the University of Penn- 
 sylvania .and honored at the opening by the attendance of 
 President Washington. 
 
 It is difficult to illustrate the early days of the pro- 
 fession, for want of materials. Nearly sixty years ago, 
 that most learned antiquarian and accomplished gentle- 
 man, the late John William Wallace, endeavored to found 
 a legi-historical branch of this Association, and in the 
 preliminary circular he said: "How sad is it to think that 
 separated not yet by much more than half a century from 
 colonial times, it is impossible for any mind to find materials 
 wherewith at all adequately to illustrate in any particular 
 the provincial bar or bench of Pennsylvania, and only by 
 those whose unreflecting minds will think that what has not 
 been shall be, will it be doubted that unless we strive to avert 
 this result, the same destiny awaits the men of our time on 
 whom we now look as conservators and landmarks of so- 
 ciety and our profession." And ten years later, Mr. Binney 
 wrote of the primitive bar of the province: "We know 
 nothing or next to nothing of the men who appeared at the 
 bar from time to time up to the termination of the colonial 
 government. The statement of Chief Justice Tilghman in 
 the Bush Hill Case (Lyle vs. Richards, 9 S. & R.) reveals to 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 15 
 
 us all we know, and probably all we ever can know in regard 
 to this subject; for, as the grandson of Tench Francis, who 
 was Attorney-General in 1745, and connected by marriage 
 and association with the most eminent families of the bar, he 
 knew as much of the former bar as any of his contempora- 
 ries, and they have all long since departed without adding 
 anything to what he left." Of the first bar after the Revo- 
 lution we have the delightful sketch left by Mr. Binney under 
 the title of "The Old Bar;" and, at the time of the birth of 
 our Association, the leaders were still on the stage, while 
 many of the juniors lived down to the memory of men now 
 not much past middle age. 
 
 The want of a library was the crying need. Books in 
 that day were of value; no longer, it is true, chained to the 
 desk to keep scholars from yielding to temptation, but still 
 scarce and precious. Law books then were not mere mer- 
 chandise. The legal world had not yet surrendered to the 
 manufacturer and the bookmaker, nor would any publisher 
 have dared, even if he could truthfully do so, to send out, as 
 more than one does now, boasting circulars that he makes 
 law books by the million. Books were written by men who 
 had a call to write, and who sought in that way to pay their 
 debt to their profession. 
 
 There is no royal road to learning now any more than 
 then. But the difference is that the men of that day knew it, 
 and were willing to face the arduous ascent, even though it 
 began with black letter and Norman French. Blackstone 
 wrote his commentaries not for students at law but for the 
 landed gentry to whom as country magistrates or hereditary 
 legislators some general idea of the law was a fitting if not 
 an altogether necessary equipment. In 1802 there were but 
 eleven volumes of American reports in print all told. The 
 number published in the yeai; 1900 alone, Mr. Hewitt tells 
 me, was 150 official volumes, besides what Mr. Wallace 
 called a "flying squadron" of side issues, law journals, 
 etc. In the face of this let me read you what Qiancellor 
 Kent, twenty years later, says on this subject: "The States 
 
i6 Law Association Centennial 
 
 are multiplying so fast, and the reports of their judicial deci- 
 sions are becoming so numerous that few lawyers will be 
 able or willing to master all the intricacies and anomalies of 
 local law existing beyond the boundaries of their own State. 
 * * * The danger to be apprehended is that students will 
 not have the courage to enter the complicated labyrinth of so 
 many systems, and they will of course neglect them and be 
 contented with the knowledge of the law of their own State 
 and the law of the United States." And here is his view of 
 the way of the law student : "I have now finished a succinct 
 detail of the principal reporters, and when the student has 
 been thoroughly initiated in the elements of legal science, 
 I would strongly recommend them to his notice. The old 
 cases prior to the year 1688 need only be occasionally con- 
 sulted and the leading decisions in them examined. Some 
 of them, however, are to be deeply explored and studied, and 
 particularly those cases and decisions which have spread 
 their influence far and wide and established principles which 
 lie at the foundation of English jurisprudence. Such cases 
 have stood the scrutiny of contemporary judges and been 
 illustrated by succeeding artists, and are destined to guide 
 and control the most distant posterity. The reports of cases 
 since the middle of the last century ought in most instances 
 to be read in course. They will conduct the student over 
 immense fields of forensic discussion." (i Kent, 445, 
 496.) Do you wonder that men who grew up on that diet 
 were vigorous of brain as well as of body ? 
 
 The bar was small in numbers, necessarily compact and 
 closely connected by business that brought them in daily con- 
 tact as colleagues or opponents; but the esprit de corps 
 needed something more; it wanted a common meeting 
 ground outside of the railed arena, and above all it wanted 
 an arsenal of the gladiator's weapons — a library. The gen- 
 eral need brought a united remedy, and in 1802 it came by 
 the establishment of the Law Library Company. 
 
 The Law Library Company dates from the thirteenth of 
 March, 1802, when the preliminary articles of association. 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 17 
 
 as we should now call them, were signed by the members in- 
 tending to procure the charter. The purpose was set out in 
 the preamble to the charter as follows : "To all men to 
 whom these presents shall come, know ye that we whose 
 names are hereunto subscribed, of the city of Philadelphia, 
 attorneys and counsellors-at-law, being desirous of estab- 
 lishing a law library company within the said city and for 
 that purpose of acquiring and enjoying the powers and im- 
 munities of a corporation or body politic in law according to 
 an act of the General Assembly of the Commonwealth of 
 Pennsylvania, entitled an act to confer on certain associa- 
 tions of the citizens of this commonwealth powers and im- 
 munities of corporations or bodies politic in law, do there- 
 fore by these presents publish and declare that we have 
 associated and do hereby associate ourselves together for the 
 said purpose by the name, style and title of the Law Library 
 Company of the City of Philadelphia." The body of the 
 charter contained the usual provisions about corporate 
 authority to have succession, a common seal, to sue and be 
 sued, etc. ; to hold real and personal estate not to exceed five 
 hundred pounds, shares to be valued at twenty dollars and 
 members of the bar of Pennsylvania eligible. Though the 
 articles were signed on the thirteenth of March, the incor- 
 poration was not complete until their enrollment on May 
 13. At the risk of being a little over-minute, let me read 
 you the formal certification which, in common with the whole 
 instrument, has a fine flavor of antiquity : 
 
 "I, Joseph B. McKean, Attorney-General of the Com- 
 monwealth of Pennsylvania, do certify to the Honorable 
 Supreme Court of the said Commonwealth, that I have 
 perused and examined the instrument above written, and am 
 of opinion that the objects, articles and conditions therein set 
 forth and contained, are lawful. 
 
 JOS. B. McKEAN. 
 
i8 Law Association Centennial 
 
 We, Edward Shippen, Esquire, Doctor of Laws, 
 Chief Justice, and Jasper Yeates, Thomas Smith and Hugh 
 Henry Brackenridge, Esquires, Justices of the Supreme 
 Court of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, hereby certify 
 that we have perused and examined the instrument above 
 written, and concur with the Attorney-General in Opinion 
 that the objects. Articles and Conditions therein set forth and 
 contained are lawful. 
 
 EDWARD SHIPPEN, 
 
 J. YEATES, 
 
 THOMAS SMITH, 
 
 H. H. BRACKENRIDGE. 
 
 Pennsylvania, ss: 
 
 In the name and by the authority of the Commonwealth 
 of Pennsylvania Thomas McKean, Governor of 
 the said Commonwealth, 
 
 To Timothy Matlock, Esquire, Master of the Rolls in and 
 for the said Commonwealth: 
 
 Whereas, It has been duly certified to me by Joseph B. 
 McKean, Esquire, Attorney-General of the said Common- 
 wealth, and by Edward Shippen, Esquire, Doctor of Laws, 
 Chief Justice and Jasper Yeates, Thomas Smith and Hugh 
 Henry Brackenridge, Esquires, Justices of the Supreme 
 Court of Pennsylvania, that they have perused and exam- 
 ined the within act or instrument for the incorporation of the 
 Law Library Company of the City of Philadelphia, and that 
 they concur in Opinion that the objects. Articles and Condi- 
 tions therein set forth and contained are lawful: Now, 
 know you, that in pursuance of the Act of General Assembly 
 in such case made and provided, I have transmitted the said 
 Act or Instrument of Incorporation unto you, the said Tim- 
 othy Matlack, Master of the Rolls aforesaid, hereby requir- 
 ing you to enroll the same at the expense of the Applicants to 
 the intent that according to the objects, articles and condi- 
 tions therein set forth and contained, the parties may become 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 19 
 
 and be a corporation or body politic in law and in fact, to 
 have continuance by the name, style and title in the said in- 
 strument provided and declared. 
 
 Given under my hand and the Great Seal of the State at 
 Lancaster, the Twenty-seventh day of March, in the year of 
 our Lord One thousand eight hundred and two, and of the 
 Commonwealth the Twenty-sixth. 
 
 THOS. McKEAN. 
 
 Secy, fee i dollar. 
 
 By the Governor. 
 
 [seal] T. M. Thompson, Sec. 
 
 Enrolled in the Rolls Office in Commission Book No. 2, 
 page 157, etc. 
 
 Witness my Hand and Seal of office this 13th day of 
 May, 1802. 
 
 [seal] T. MATLACK, M. R." 
 
 Picture to yourselves, gentlemen, if you can, the Su- 
 preme Court of to-day "perusing and examining" the char- 
 ters of the myriad corporations, and certifying that the "Ob- 
 jects, Articles and Conditions" are lawful, and then perhaps 
 being confronted in subsequent litigation by the angtds in 
 herba which they failed to see. 
 
 The official personages connected with the approval of 
 the charter were in themselves characters of interest. The 
 Governor, Thomas McKean, was a signer of the Declara- 
 tion of Independence, first Chief Justice of the Common- 
 wealth, presiding over the Supreme Court for twenty-two 
 years, and then Governor for three successive terms; a 
 strong, somewhat imperious character, an ardent patriot, 
 well fitted for his time. Joseph Borden McKean, the Attor- 
 ney-General, was the son of the Governor, and probably in- 
 herited something of his imperious temper, for he was lame, 
 as the result of a wound received in a duel when a young 
 man. He became president judge of the District Court in 
 
20 Law Association Centennial 
 
 1818. Thomas McKean Thompson, the secretary, was a 
 nephew of Governor McKean, and was the great-grandfather 
 of our late Judge McKennan. Even Timothy Matlack, the 
 recorder, was a noted character. He had been a colonel in 
 the Revolution, was one of the committee of safety and one 
 of the founders of the Free Quakers, more commonly known 
 as the "Fighting Quakers," interest in whom has been so 
 graphically revived of late by our fellow-townsman's novel 
 of "Hugh Wynne." Colonel Matlack was born in 1730 and 
 died in 1829, when nearing his one hundredth birthday. 
 
 The articles of association were signed by seventy-two 
 lawyers, including all the prominent members of the bar of 
 that day. There were William Lewis, Edward Tilghman 
 and Jared Ingersoll, whom Mr. Binney has so pleasantly 
 described as the Leaders of the Old Bar; meaning by that 
 phrase the first bar after the Revolution. Then there were 
 Horace Binney and John Sergeant, juniors, but the coming 
 leaders in the near future; William Rawle and Peter S. 
 du Ponceau, afterwards chancellors of the association, of 
 whom we shall have more to say hereafter. There were Wil- 
 liam Tilghman, afterwards Chief Justice, and Thomas Ser- 
 geant, afterwards a justice of the Supreme Court; Joseph 
 Hopkinson, judge of the United States District Court; 
 Joseph B. McKean, Moses Levy, Benjamin R. Morgan and 
 John Hallowell, all subsequently judges of the District Court 
 of Philadelphia; Walter Franklin, Attorney-General of the 
 State and President Judge of the District Court of Lancas- 
 ter ; Robert Porter, afterwards President Judge of the Berks, 
 Lehigh and Northampton district, who has the unique dis- 
 tinction of having been a cadet officer in the Revolution at 
 the age of eleven and of having been brevetted a lieutenant 
 in the Pennsylvania line after two years of active service at 
 the age of thirteen. He was the grandfather of our late 
 fellow-member, Gen. Robert Porter Dechert, and Henry M. 
 Dechert of the present bar. There were Collinson Read, who 
 in 1801 gave us the first digest of Pennsylvania law, thereby 
 antedating by ten years the perennial Purdon — it is true he 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 21 
 
 called his work "An Abridgment," after the black-letter 
 precedents with which that time was familiar ; but it was the 
 first systematic digest of Pennsylvania law; Alexander J. 
 Dallas, the reporter, and secretary of the treasury under 
 Madison, and Richard Peters, Jr., afterwards the reporter of 
 the Supreme Court of the United States; Miers Fisher, 
 James Gibson, Charles Chauncey, John B. Wallace, Charles 
 Willing Hare, who became a professor in the Law School in 
 its early efforts; Richard Rush, Attorney-General under 
 President Madison, secretary of the treasury under John 
 Quincy Adams, and minister to England. Besides these 
 were James Milnor and Bird Wilson, who, after promising 
 careers at the bar, left it and obtained distinction in the 
 church. Truly this is a goodly list to have their memories 
 survive for a century even in the recollection of their suc- 
 cessors at the bar. 
 
 Turning to the minute book we find the first entry : "At 
 a meeting of the directors of the Law Library Company of 
 the City of Philadelphia on the ninth day of April, 1802, 
 there were present J. B. McKean, Edward Tilghman, Wil- 
 liam Lewis, John B. Wallace." Mr. Wallace was ap- 
 pointed secretary and treasurer of the company. Fox was 
 appointed librarian. It was ordered that the treasurer be 
 directed to call upon the members for their first payment of 
 ten dollars, and that he pay to Mr. Hopkinson the sum ex- 
 pended by him in the purchase of books at auction for the 
 use of the company. The minutes are unsigned — an illus- 
 tration how much less careful lawyers are of their own than 
 of other people's business, nor are they as a rule signed until 
 1823, when John C. Lowber and E. Spencer Sergeant be- 
 came the secretaries. But we have a curious memorandum 
 on the margin of the minute book : "The above and all the 
 subsequent entries marked J. B. W. are in the handwriting of 
 John B. Wallace, Esquire, my father, with which I am well 
 acquainted having often seen him write. John William 
 Wallace, Dec. 31, 1846." 
 
22 Law Association Centennial 
 
 As in all incipient enterprises, the first need was the 
 sinews of war — money, and at the second meeting, on the 
 twelfth of July, 1802, it was resolved that the secretary be 
 directed to collect from the members of the company their 
 second payment of ten dollars, and that he be empowered to 
 import from England, on the best terms he can, a library of 
 such law books as shall be approved of by the directors. At 
 the next meeting, eighth of April, 1803, it was resolved that 
 Messrs. Hopkinson and Wallace be a committee to prepare 
 by-laws for the consideration of the directors, and it is par- 
 ticularly recommended to them to turn their attention to 
 the best mode of regulation of payment of assessments by 
 the members and the transfer of shares of the stock of the 
 company. At the next meeting the by-laws were presented 
 and adopted, and one Fox (first name not given) was ap- 
 pointed librarian at a salary of thirty dollars per year, pay- 
 able ten dollars on the first day of each term. They had no 
 June term then. The directors seem to have ordered a book- 
 case, though the contract does not appear. But on the fifth 
 of December, 1803, Messrs. McKean and Wallace, a com- 
 mittee appointed to examine the accounts of Henry Connelly, 
 report that Mr. Connelly had originally contracted to build 
 the bookcase for the sum of $230, but from the accounts of 
 moneys paid by him it appears that it actually cost him 
 $266.20 exclusive of his own work. Thereupon, resolved 
 that the treasurer be directed to pay to the said Connelly the 
 aforesaid sum of $266.20, provided he will receive the same 
 in full satisfaction of his account. At a subsequent meeting 
 on the eighth of December, 1806, on motion it was ordered 
 that the books be removed to the room adjoining the room 
 now occupied by the Supreme Court and that Mr. Levy and 
 Mr. Hopkinson be a committee to have it done, and they be 
 authorized to sell the bookcase at private or public sale. 
 Where the books were kept in the interim does not appear, 
 nor is the regular place of meeting stated in the minutes, 
 though not infrequently it is noted as held at the office of 
 Edward Tilghman. As he was neither the senior nor the 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 23 
 
 junior among the directors, the use of his office throws very- 
 little light on the custody of the books, though it probably 
 indicates an active interest on Mr. Tilghman's part in the 
 affairs of the company. At a meeting on September 2, 
 1805, it was resolved that Mr. Rawle be a committee to make 
 a catalogue of the books belonging to the company, and to 
 have the same printed, together with the charter and sub- 
 sisting by-laws. And on the second of December of the 
 same year Mr. Rawle laid before the directors the printed 
 catalogue, "which was well approved of by them." The 
 pious care of a descendant to whom the association is in- 
 debted for many years of service as treasurer, has preserved 
 a copy which is now in the library. It is a small duodecimo, 
 of which the catalogue occupies eleven pages and the charter 
 and by-laws the rest. Yet it represents 391 volumes of the 
 most important books of its day. It was richest, of course, 
 in the standard reports and treatises of authority tested by 
 time, and was brought up to date with very notable energy ; 
 a representative collection of reports both at law and in 
 equity from the year books down to Bosanquet and Puller, 
 then in course of publication; the abridgments, institutes 
 and books of entries, Bacon, Brooke, Coke, Comyns, Fitz- 
 herbert, Rolle and Viner; a goodly collection of text-books, 
 among which, besides Blackstone, some of us may still recog- 
 nize the friends (or foes) of our youth, Abbott on Shipping 
 (edition of 1802), Bailey on Bills, Chitty on Bills (edition of 
 1799), Cruise on Uses, Doctor and Student, Feame on Con- 
 tingent Remainders, Fonblanque's Equity, Gilbert on Rent 
 and on Tenures, Hale's History of the Common Law and 
 Pleas of the Crown, Jones on Bailment, Kyd on Awards and 
 on Corporations, Park on Insurance, Peake's Law of Evi- 
 dence, Powell on Mortgages, Reeves' History of the Common 
 Law, Roper on Legacies, Saunders on Uses and Trusts, 
 Sheppard's Touchstone, Swinburne on Wills, and a numerous 
 collection of books of practice, of which the most familiar 
 are Buller's Nisi Prius, Crompton's Practice in the King's 
 Bench, Harrison's Practice in Chancery, and Trials Per 
 
24 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Pais. These were the books with which our predecessors 
 of a century ago were familiar and which in the main they 
 were expected to master, as already quoted from Chancellor 
 Kent. They make but a small show in comparison with 
 many private libraries of to-day, but it was a notable collec- 
 tion, the first and largest of its kind in America, and kept 
 the lead in that respect for many years. Indeed, it was not 
 surpassed as a law library until very recently and now only 
 by a few. When librarian, I was able to report that it con- 
 tained substantially all the English and American Reports 
 both in law and in equity, and was second to no library of its 
 kind in America, except that of the Harvard Law School, 
 which Professor Dicey said at a later day was the most 
 perfect collection of the legal records of the English people to 
 be found in any part of the English-speaking world. 
 
 The compilation of the catalogue was no afternoon's 
 work, yet it was imposed upon Mr. Rawle, and apparently 
 accepted by him without hesitation. Let me pause a moment 
 to consider the conditions that this indicates. Mr. Rawle was 
 then forty-six years of age, in very active practice not second 
 to any unless to the three leaders already mentioned. Imagine 
 the air of amused amazement, or shall I say amazed amuse- 
 ment, with which our own yet youthful chancellor, in spite of 
 his devotion to the interests of the library, would receive the 
 .suggestion now that he should be a committee of one for such 
 a purpose. Those were the days of elegant leisure even in 
 "the practice of the law. Let me digress a moment longer to 
 read an extract from a very great advocate who was trained 
 in that school but lived long enough to look somewhat con- 
 temptuously on modern haste and modern manners. In that 
 book, which his own peculiarities and unconcealed egotism 
 help to make so entertaining, Mr. David Paul Brown says : 
 "We had not then reached the fast age or the awkward or 
 ■careless or indifferent age. No man then sat with his heels 
 higher than his head or planted his feet upon a chair or occu- 
 pied two chairs at once, or threw his leg across its back, or 
 supported himself by clinging on the rail, or got up before he 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 25 
 
 was ready, or sat down before he had finished, or interrupted 
 his adversary, or manifested any restlessness or discom- 
 posure. If they had been translated from the court room to 
 the most refined drawing room their manners and deport- 
 ment would have required no improvement." (i Forum, 
 558.) And yet that same elaborately courteous gentleman 
 had encouraged himself in the peripatetic habit of thought 
 and always walked up and down the room just outside the 
 bar while other counsel was speaking, with sublime uncon- 
 sciousness that in this fast age when we concentrate our at- 
 tention on business, this caged-animal movement backwards 
 and forwards distracts the attention of jury and judge and 
 disturbs the decorum of the court of which he was so earnest 
 an advocate. "For my own part," he says, "although far 
 from presenting myself as an example to be followed, I 
 would not give a walk of twenty feet back and forth in the 
 way of preparation to reply to the argument of an antag- 
 onist, for the most elaborate notes that could be taken. This 
 no doubt is to be attributed to a long-continued habit origi- 
 nating during schoolboy days." 
 
 Returning to the minute book, at the meeting on March 
 3, 1806, it was propounded as a difficulty to the directors that 
 "by the charter the directors for the coming year are to be 
 chosen on the Monday preceding the first day of the first 
 term of the Supreme Court in each year ; that this day being 
 the first day of the first term of the present year, the directors 
 ought to have been chosen last Monday. But that by a new 
 judiciary law which was then in force the first day of the 
 March Term was fixed for the 3rd Monday in March which 
 would have required the election on Monday next, the loth 
 instant, and that it is by the supplement to the judiciary act, 
 which supplement was passed only on Saturday last, that the 
 term was altered to commence on this day." As an illustra- 
 tion of the strict notions of corporate life then entertained, it 
 appears that even as late as 1821 the Law Academy had con- 
 templated branching out into a Society for the Promotion of 
 Legal Knowledge and Forensic Eloquence, which was incor- 
 
26 Law Association Centennial 
 
 porated in 1821, the charter appointing the second Monday 
 of May for the first annual meeting. When the charter day 
 arrived the janitor had failed to unlock the meeting room, 
 and the young lawyers incautiously adjourned without an 
 election. Chief Justice Tilghman, president-elect of the 
 society, was of opinion that failure to elect terminated the 
 society's corporate existence. The difficulty which was pre- 
 sented to the directors of the Law Library Company as above 
 stated was truly a legal conundrum which might pose some 
 of us even in this day when we think we have learned some- 
 thing about corporate law. But the older heads of the Law 
 Library were fertile in resource, and they got over the diffi- 
 culty, like a modern law reformer, by shutting their eyes and 
 ignoring it. They "Resolved that the members be con- 
 vened on Monday next, the loth instant, to elect directors 
 for the present year." And on that Monday it is gravely 
 entered that "At an election March loth, 1806, no opposition 
 was made to the election of the following directors :" 
 
 In 1806 John B. Wallace ceased to be secretary, and the 
 minute book has a gap of several blank pages till 1809. 
 Whether no meetings were held or the minutes were not 
 written up there are no means now of ascertaining. By the 
 next minute it appears that there had been a falling off in the 
 interest and attendance; a new set of directors came in. 
 Rawle, McKean, Hopkinson, Levy, Tilghman and Moylan 
 dropped out. All of them, except Hopkinson, were advanced 
 in years and the probability is they desired to turn over the 
 work to younger men. J. B. Wallace, who had borne the brunt 
 so long, stayed in, and of new ones that came in were Joseph 
 Reed, Jr., James Milnor, John Hallowell, the elder Meredith, 
 and William S. Biddle. At the first meeting John Stevens 
 was appointed librarian, to be paid at the rate of fifty dollars 
 per annum. The librarian was ordered to arrange the books 
 according to sizes and numbers, to clean the windows of the 
 cases, to repair the broken glass and locks and put the room 
 in thorough order prior to examination of the library. And 
 it was further resolved that hand bills be printed containing 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 27 
 
 lists of the members of the Law Library; an invitation to 
 gentlemen of the bar, not members, to become such, a notice 
 that the use of the books hereafter would not be permitted to 
 any but members, and a copy of said list be sent to each 
 member of the bar that is not already a member of the Law 
 Library Company. 
 
 Again at the meeting in December, 18 10, it was resolved 
 that : "Whereas, It is of considerable importance to the pro- 
 fession to increase the funds of the company so as to enable 
 the directors to procure a large stock of books and to add to 
 the collection from time to time all new works of merit and 
 authority, and it is also just and proper that all the members 
 of the bar should contribute to so desirable an object; there- 
 fore, resolved, that the librarian be directed to call upon each 
 member of the bar who is not a member of this company and 
 to request his subscription, and that he be directed to inform 
 those gentlemen that the use of the books by any others than 
 members of the company is expressly prohibited." 
 
 Again at a general meeting of the stockholders in 
 March, 181 8, it was ordered that none but stockholders be 
 permitted to use the books belonging to the library, and that 
 the librarian be directed to put up a copy of this order in 
 some conspicuous place in all the courts. Ordered further, 
 that the librarian obtain a list of the members of the bar who 
 are not stockholders and request them to become so, and that 
 it shall be the duty of the librarian hereafter upon the admis- 
 sion of any gentleman to the said bar, to make the like re- 
 quest of him. At the same meeting it was also ordered that 
 from the first Monday in December to the first Monday of 
 April, annually, hereafter the librarian shall keep the library 
 open from 10 a. m. to 7 p. m., with fire and, if necessary, 
 candles for the use of the stockholders. 
 
 Again at the meeting in March, 1823, it was resolved 
 that the directors be authorized and it is hereby recom- 
 mended to them to appoint a librarian, who shall receive such 
 compensation as they may fix, and to take such other meas- 
 ures as may prevent the books from being used by any per- 
 
28 Law Association Centennial 
 
 sons who are not members. Lawyers, with the free- 
 masonry of the profession, seem to have regarded books 
 as common property and were not always careful as to pay- 
 ing for the right to use them. The practice appears to be 
 incurable, and continued down to my day as librarian. It is 
 hard to deny a book to a member of the bar in the pinch of 
 an argument in the adjoining court room; but, like the sick 
 man urgent for a doctor, when the pinch is over and he is 
 safe again, it seldom seems to occur to him that he owes any- 
 thing. 
 
 In March, 1824, it appears by the treasurer's report that 
 fifty-two new volumes had been added during the year ; that 
 a new catalogue had been printed, including 650 volumes, 
 and that the number of shareholders was then 87. 
 
 I must now go back a few years. From time to time 
 even before 1802 there had been movements among students 
 and members of the bar looking to closer association, to sup- 
 plement, if not to improve, legal education and to advance 
 the mutual interests of the bar. In 1784 a small informal 
 debating society of students had sought to revive the moot 
 courts of the Inns of Court and restore them to their promi- 
 nence in the days of Coke. Again in 1798 another of the 
 same kind. Both were short lived, but finally grew into the 
 Law Academy as their legitimate successor. The law lec- 
 tures of James Wilson, and later those of Charles Willing 
 Hare and of Joseph Barnes, grew out of the same feeling. 
 
 An entry in the minutes of the meeting of March 11, 
 1810, speaks of the Law Society of which Peter A. Browne 
 was president. As Mr. Browne was admitted in 1803 and 
 lived down to my day it is probable that the Society was 
 composed of young lawyers if not of students. But we have 
 no further knowledge of it or of its existence. The untimely 
 fate of the Society for the Promotion of Legal Knowledge 
 and Forensic Eloquence has already been mentioned. But in 
 1 82 1, or shortly before, a society was formed which included 
 the principal lawyers of the day. The minutes have not sur- 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 29 
 
 vived and little is known of its early history; but the con- 
 stitution and by-laws are in print (1821), and the title was 
 The Associated Members of the Bar of Philadelphia Practic- 
 ing in the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. (They never did 
 anything 'for short' then.) The officers were chancellor, 
 vice-chancellor, treasurer, secretary, librarian and two 
 standing committees, one of censors and one of finance. 
 The officers had the usual duties pertaining to their titles. 
 The objects of the society are not set out, but are best indi- 
 cated in the committee of censors, which was the notable 
 point. The duties of the censors were to bestow special at- 
 tention upon the practice of the ba,r and to report to the asso- 
 ciation every member whose conduct professionally may be 
 deemed reprehensible, together with the circumstances of 
 the case; to suggest to the association all alterations or 
 amendments in the rules of practice adopted in the different 
 courts which they may deem wise and beneficial in order that 
 if approved, they may be authorized to present the same to 
 the proper judge or judges for sanction and enforcement, but 
 generally to aim at maintaining the purity of professional 
 practice, and to prevent unfair intrusion upon professional 
 rights. There was also a relief fund to be established, and 
 the committee of finance was to ascertain and report every 
 case in which pecuniary aid or relief ought to be afforded, 
 together with the mode in which the same might be done with 
 the most efficacy with respect to the object and the least 
 pressure upon the treasury. The experience was against the 
 utility of this fund, and in practical operation it failed. The 
 only instance I find in which it was resorted to was in the 
 case of the family "of our late respected fellow member, 
 John Purdon." At the meeting held in December, 1835, it 
 was resolved "that the interest on the present fund invested in 
 five per cents, being the whole amount over which the asso- 
 ciation has any power, shall be paid to the order of Mrs. 
 Purdon until the further order of the board, to be applied 
 by her to the education of the children of our late lamented 
 friend and esteemed professional brother, John Purdon." 
 
30 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Finally, in 1846, the fund was ordered to be merged into the 
 library fund, and though a subsequent effort was made 
 some years later, at the instance of the late Judge Peirce, to 
 revive the fund, it was not thought desirable and has not 
 since been heard of. 
 
 The by-laws indicated a very active and positive so- 
 ciety and contemplated business to be done in a businesslike 
 way. Notice of each stated and special meeting, mentioning 
 the day, hour and place, signed by the secretary, was to be 
 posted in a conspicuous place in the District Court room of 
 this city and county and in the room where the , Supreme 
 Court and Court of Nisi Prius or Oyer and Terminer should 
 be sitting, during the whole week next preceding the day 
 appointed for the meeting. Within half an hour at most after 
 the time appointed for holding the meeting they directed that 
 the chancellor shall take the chair and call the members to 
 order; the roll shall be called in alphabetical order and the 
 secretary shall mark the names of the absentees, after which 
 the association shall immediately proceed to business. Every 
 member who shall be absent at roll call shall be fined one 
 dollar, unless he deliver a suflficient excuse, and no excuse 
 shall be received but sickness, absence from the city, some 
 recent domestic calamity or being necessarily engaged on 
 public business. The absentee shall be bound within ten 
 days after the fine shall be incurred, if present and in health, 
 otherwise in the same period of time after his recovery 
 from sickness, to pay the amount of his fine to the treasurer, 
 or deliver to him a declaration in writing of the cause 
 of his absence, which, if suflficient, shall be received 
 in lieu of the fine. The secretary shall immediately, 
 or as soon as possible after each meeting, deliver to 
 the treasurer a list of the absentees and the treasurer 
 shall, every three months, send or deliver a list of the 
 delinquents to the committee of censors, who shall ad- 
 monish them to comply with the laws of the association, or 
 take such other steps as their prudence shall dictate. And, 
 if their admonition shall be disregarded for three months, 
 the committee shall report their names as wilful delinquents 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 31 
 
 to the association, that it may take order thereon. No de- 
 bate shall take place but upon motion duly made, seconded 
 and afterwards stated by the chancellor. When a mem- 
 ber speaks he shall stand up, address himself to the chair, 
 and avoid desultory remarks. He shall confine himself 
 strictly to the question or point under consideration. No 
 member, while speaking, shall be interrupted unless by the 
 chancellor or presiding member when he shall think fit to 
 call him to order or admonish him to a close adherence to the 
 question under discussion. When a member speaking is 
 called to order he shall instantly sit down or appeal from the 
 call to the society. No member shall speak more than twice 
 on the same question without leave from the meeting. 
 
 The first officers were Jared Ingersoll, chancellor ; Hor- 
 ace Binney, vice-chancellor; William Rawle, Peter S. duPon- 
 ceau, Sampson Levy, Charles Chauncey, John Sergeant, 
 Joseph R. Ingersoll, Thomas Kittera and John M. Scott, 
 committee of censors ; George M. Dallas, secretary. 
 
 The constitution was signed by (yj members, including 
 nearly all the principal members of the bar, and largely the 
 same as the membership of the Law Library Company at the 
 same period. That under these circumstances there should 
 be efforts to unite the two societies is not strange. The 
 wonder rather is that the two had ever been formed. The 
 natural tendencies favored union, but there seems to have 
 been a latent antagonism, or more probably a conservative 
 and a progressive party who stood in the way of united 
 action. The Bar Association had the most money; the 
 Library Company the most valuable property. When the 
 union finally took place the Associated Bar had $1525 in 
 United States six per cent loans, and paid in cash to the 
 treasury $155.88, while the Law Library Company had 
 only $55.91. It may interest some of our financiers to 
 learn from the treasurer's report that in 1830 United States 
 five per cents were at three per cent premium. Those past 
 middle life may well remember just before the civil war it 
 was considered a financial feat on the part of the secretary 
 
32 Law Association Centennial 
 
 of the treasury to borrow $5,000,000 for the United States 
 at 7 3-10 per cent, interest. 
 
 The first communication looking to a union was pre- 
 sented at the meeting of the Law Library Company in 
 March, 1821, in a communication from George M. Dallas, 
 secretary of the Associated Members of the Bar, stating that 
 a committee of three members of this association, consisting 
 of Thomas Kittera, Samuel Shoemaker and William De- 
 lany. Esquires, had been appointed to meet such a committee 
 as may be appointed by the Law Library Company, to ascer- 
 tain and report on what terms the Law Library Company 
 will dispose of their stock. Whereupon the Law Library 
 Company disposed of the communication with a very curt 
 resolution that "It is inexpedient for this company to dis- 
 pose of its stock." The next move came from the Library 
 Company in March, 1 82 5. It was resolved that a committee 
 be appointed to confer with any committee that may be nom- 
 inated on the part of the Law Association to ascertain if the 
 funds of that institution could not be obtained for the pur- 
 poses of this company. At a special meeting in September 
 of the same year the committee reported that they had had a 
 conference with a committee of the Law Association, and 
 had determined, in conjunction with that committee, to apply 
 to their constituents respectively for the appointment of a 
 committee to digest a plan of union. After several inter- 
 locutory reports the committee reported March 30, 1827, 
 that a plan of union had been formed on the basis of amend- 
 ments to the charter of the Law Library Company, and had 
 obtained the sanction of the Attorney-General and of the 
 Supreme Court. And on the second of April, 1827, the 
 new charter was presented, approved by Frederick Smith, 
 Attorney-General, and by Gibson, Chief Justice; Duncan, 
 Rogers and Huston, justices, and signed by 54 of the prin- 
 cipal members of the bar of that day, many of whom lived 
 down to the memory of the present bar not much beyond 
 middle age. The charter was accepted by both parties, and 
 the new institution came into being under its present name 
 of the Law Association. 
 
I r,,,:, a fainlnie 'n I„,n„r, 
 
 '^5^ : s/' s 
 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 33 
 
 We have come now to the present association. Neither 
 of its predecessors absorbed the other, but an amicable union 
 took place which preserved the features of both. The 
 Library Company was regarded as the parent, and it received 
 the members of the other into its own membership, and the 
 new charter came into operation as an amendment to the old. 
 But the Law Library had been governed by a board of seven 
 directors, with no other officers than the secretary and treas- 
 urer elected by the board. The Law Association accepted 
 the organization of the Associated Bar, and elected a chan- 
 cellor, vice-chancellor, treasurer, secretary and three com- 
 mittees, one of censors, one of finance, and one on library. 
 With some minor changes from time to time the same 
 organization has continued down to the present day. 
 
 At the first election the officers of the new association 
 were : Chancellor, William Rawle ; vice-chancellor, Horace 
 Binney; secretary, George M. Dallas; treasurer, Thomas I. 
 Wharton; and the association seems to have proceeded with 
 new life and a hopeful future. 
 
 In December, 1830, a communication from Samuel H. 
 Horn, George Sharswood and Benjamin Gerhard was 
 received, asking, as a committee, on what terms the use of 
 the library of the Law Association might be obtained for 
 the disputants of the Law Academy on the evenings of their 
 meetings. At the next meeting the proposition was favor- 
 ably reported upon, and subsequently the Law Academy 
 made a handsome donation of funds, and from that time for- 
 ward the relations of the two associations have always been 
 harmonious and even cordial. 
 
 As an instance of the seriousness and formality of ac- 
 cession to the privileges of the association, we may recall that 
 at the same meeting the future chancellor, Peter McCall, was 
 proposed for membership, and the application was referred 
 to the board of censors. At the next meeting the censors 
 made a favorable report on the application of PeterMcCall, 
 Esq., for membership and the ballot was then taken, and he 
 was declared to be duly elected. 
 
 3 
 
34 Law Association Centennial 
 
 In March, 1849, ^^^ """^^s were adopted for the gov- 
 ernment of the library, among which were that it should be 
 open from 10 o'clock until 3 p. m., and from 4.30 until sun- 
 set daily throughout the year, except during the months of 
 July and August, on Christmas and New Year's Day, the 
 twenty-second of February and on Saturday afternoons and 
 Sundays, at which times it should be closed. The library was 
 then on the second floor of what is now called Congress 
 Hall, at Sixth and Chestnut, between the rooms of the Dis- 
 trict Court. The east room' was definitely assigned as a 
 conversation room. Conversation in the library room was 
 forbidden. The rule as to closing at sunset no doubt came 
 down from the day, or rather the night, of candles, and at 
 the bottom of it was the very serious risk of fire. Looking 
 at this by-law reminds me of a geographical conundrum that 
 used to be jocosely asked about the Philadelphia Library, 
 which had a similar rule in the days of the autocracy of the 
 librarian, Lloyd Smith : Why is the Philadelphia Library the 
 easternmost point in the United States? Because there the 
 sun sets earlier than in any other place. 
 
 In 1854 the association had reached another ebb in its 
 affairs, and there was apparently no meeting from Decem- 
 ber, 1854, until December, 1857. At the former, Mr. Bin- 
 ney was declared re-elected as chancellor. Mr. IngersoU 
 was elected at the latter. Mr. IngersoU declining, Mr. 
 Meredith was elected. 
 
 In the spring of i860, a very important accession was 
 made to the finances of the association. At the March meet- 
 ing, a committee consisting of Eli K. Price, Benjamin Ger- 
 hard, Edward Hopper and William Henry Rawle was ap- 
 pointed to go to Harrisburg to memorialize the legislature to 
 aid the library. The result was the act of April 2, i860, 
 P. L. 594, granting the association a tax of twenty-five cents 
 on original writs. This was received with great satisfaction 
 and the association resolved that the privilege should be used 
 in a liberal way. At the meeting of April 7 it was re- 
 solved that "in the opinion of this body, the tax given by the 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 35 
 
 act of April 2, i860, should not be collected on the mere 
 filing of all claims or transcripts from aldermen or on the 
 entry of judgments on warrants of attorney docketed in the 
 D. S. B. docket, and the prothonotaries are directed not to 
 collect the tax in such cases." At the same meeting it was 
 resolved that the thanks of the association be tendered to 
 the Hon. Craig Biddle, member of the legislature, for 
 his assistance in passing said act. At the December meeting 
 in i860, Mr. John William Wallace resigned the office of 
 librarian, in view of the increased revenue frorn the tax and 
 the demands upon the librarian for more attention and a 
 broader administration of its affairs. Thereupon, his resig- 
 nation was regretfully accepted, and he was made honorary 
 librarian for life. 
 
 At the meeting in September, 1861, during a discus- 
 sion upon the insurance on the library, Mr. Wallace gave it 
 as his opinion that the library had cost more than $15,000; 
 that this sum might perhaps now replace it, if the books 
 were judiciously purchased in masses and as opportunity 
 offered, while, with regard to many of them, he conceived 
 that they could not be got at all except by accident. 
 
 At the same meeting we have a note of the Civil War in 
 a resolution that "all dues and assessments be remitted to 
 gentlemen while in the military service of the country." 
 
 At the meeting in March, 1862, Mr. Wallace stated that 
 he had in his possession the original charter of the Law 
 Library Company, dated in 1802; that, as appeared by some 
 ancient correspondence in his possession, it had been lost for 
 some time about the year 1807, though soon after that date 
 recovered. It was again lost between its then recovery and 
 the year 1824, since the late Mr. Thomas I. Wharton, who 
 was appointed treasurer in the year just named, did not 
 receive it among the muniments of the corporation and had 
 apparently never possessed it during his term of office, and 
 Mr. Wallace states that he did not receive it on his election in 
 1 84 1 to the treasurership, nor for several years after that 
 when it was brought to him about the year 1846 by the late 
 
36 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Benjamin Tilghman, Esq., whose possession of it seemed to 
 be accidental. The history of the document, he thought, 
 showed that it was liable to be lost, and it being now vener- 
 able as well as important for itself, he moved that it be hand- 
 somely and strongly framed between double plates of glass, 
 so as to be visible on both sides, and be hung on hinges if 
 necessary in the library room, under the supervision of Mr. 
 Fish, which was accordingly ordered. 
 
 In 1867 the project of a general bar society, which had 
 been agitated for some years, came up again, and a commit- 
 tee of twenty-one was appointed at a meeting of members of 
 the bar and a sub-committee of three to confer with the Law 
 Association on a coalition of the association with the pro- 
 posed new society. A committee was appointed. But 
 nothing further seems to have come of it, unless the acces- 
 sion at the June meeting of 52 new members, including a 
 number of prominent lawyers who had not previously joined, 
 may have been a result. 
 
 In March, 1869, a committee was appointed on provid- 
 ing suitable rooms for the library, and it was directed to urge 
 upon the commissioners of public buildings the necessity of 
 accommodations for the library and a consideration of this 
 subject in their plans for the new City Hall. In the mean- 
 while efforts were made tO' procure suitable quarters for 
 immediate use. Prolonged negotiations took place with the 
 Athenseum and the Board of Public Education, which then 
 occupied the first floor of the Athenseum building under a 
 long lease; and it was not until 1876 that those rooms were 
 acquired. It was a very important move in the life of the 
 association. The rooms were far larger, more commodious 
 and more accessible than any it had previously occupied. It 
 remained there until its removal in 1898 to its present quar- 
 ters in the City Hall. 
 
 In 1874 the project of a general society to include the 
 whole bar came up again, and the association appointed a 
 committee to unite with a committee appointed at the meet- 
 ing of the bar. The joint committee made an elaborate 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 37 
 
 report, concluding that it was inexpedient to form a separate 
 society, and recommending a larger membership in the asso- 
 ciation. The sentiment of the profession, however, which 
 became more and more general not only in Philadelphia but 
 throughout the State, finally resulted in the establishment of 
 the Pennsylvania State Bar Association. 
 
 In March, 1878, the association received a very notable 
 gift from Henry Baldwin, Jr., of a complete set of printed 
 transcripts of records of the Supreme Court of the United 
 States, from 1832 to date, and the briefs of counsel from 
 1861. Mr. Baldwin inherited the earlier portion from his 
 grandfather, the distinguished judge of the same name, and 
 had been at much pains and expense to complete the collec- 
 tion and bring it down to date. They filled 278 volumes, 
 and have been continued since by arrangement with the 
 clerk of the Supreme Court. But two other sets are known 
 to be in existence, one owned by the Supreme Court itself, 
 and the other by the Bar Association of the city of New 
 York. 
 
 In December, 1879, the librarian's report showed that 
 there were 11,548 volumes in the library, of which 11 55 had 
 been added during the year at a cost of $2520; includ- 
 ing a full set of the abridgement of the English Patents 
 in 108 volumes given by the British Commissioner of Pat- 
 ents; that the library now had all the digests of reports, 
 American, English and Irish, of any practical value known 
 to the librarian. Also all codes, digests, and revisions of 
 laws, of practical value, known to exist in any of the States. 
 In most of the States also the volumes of session laws pub- 
 lished since the last revision in the respective States. The 
 collection of statute laws was practically complete in twelve 
 of the most important States of the Union, about half com- 
 plete in eight other States, and in the remaining States scat- 
 tered volumes. 
 
 The progress of a library is uneventful and apt to be 
 dry and uninteresting in the telling. In the absence of fire 
 
38 Law Association Centennial 
 
 or flood I have had to give you details from the minute book, 
 and they cover mainly a peaceful and perhaps sluggish rou- 
 tine of business. But they illustrate the sturdy perseverance 
 under circumstances of difficulty and frequently of discour- 
 agement to which we owe the continued existence and pres- 
 ent position of the association. 
 
 But though the library was its starting point, and has 
 been its chief care, the association has not confined its useful- 
 ness even to that most useful purpose. It has watched with 
 jealous eye the conduct of the bar, and made its influence felt 
 as a potent force in the restraint of irregular action outside 
 as well as within its membership. The duty of calling indi- 
 viduals to account for misconduct — always unpleasant — is 
 doubly so when it involves a personal relation such as neces- 
 sarily exists between members of the bar who have in the 
 course perhaps of years been not only antagonists but fre- 
 quent colleagues in the common interests of clients. The 
 association has quietly and unobtrusively, but none the less 
 resolutely, taken up cases which warranted its interference 
 and presentation to the courts. And its board of censors 
 thus backed by official position have never failed to vindicate 
 the cause of justice and the good name of the bar. Cases of 
 disbarment on its motion, though happily not often called 
 for, have been sufficiently frequent to be present in terrorem 
 to evil doers. But its chief service has been in the knowl- 
 edge that it was watching, and still more in the diffusion of 
 its own tone and the emulation it has always inspired in the 
 younger men not to fall below its dominant standard. 
 
 And though it has avoided politics, and has never 
 degenerated into a debating club on public questions on 
 which opinions may differ, it has never neglected matters 
 either of judicial practice or of general legislation which 
 concerned the administration of justice or the interests of 
 the bar. Before leaving this subject, I will recall to your 
 memory a few of the more important of such subjects. 
 
 As long ago as 1841 it was resolved that in the opinion 
 of this association the present rooms in the court houses on 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 39 
 
 Chestnut Street are inadequate for the accommodation of 
 the courts and of the bar and for the transaction of the pub- 
 He business ; that in the opinion of this association the apart- 
 ments in which the records of the courts and the documents 
 belonging to the offices of register of wills and recorder of 
 deeds are kept are insufficient for the purpose and insecure; 
 that a copy of these resolutions be transmitted by the secre- 
 tary to the county commissioners and the county board. 
 And resolved, that a committee of five be appointed to 
 endeavor to procure a better room for the use of this asso^ 
 ciation and to report measures for the enlargement and 
 improvement of the library, and its accomodation. The 
 latter part of this resolution took precedence in the report, 
 and further action upon the court rooms does not appear. 
 But again in 1849 the subject came up, and it was resolved 
 that the accommodations now provided by the county 
 authorities for the administration of public justice, for the 
 preservation of public records and for the Law Library in this 
 city are wholly inadequate; that jury and witness rooms are 
 imperatively required ; that the public records are in danger 
 of inextricable confusion and of loss by fire, theft and decay 
 from damp, and consequently the titles to vast amounts of 
 property are rendered less secure than they should be, and 
 that the room provided for the Law Library is too small for 
 the necessary use of that association. Resolved, that a com- 
 mittee be appointed earnestly to urge upon the city and 
 county authorities in behalf of the bar, the duty which rests 
 upon them of remedying these grievances, which have been 
 already publicly presented as such by several grand juries 
 and by other public information. 
 
 At a meeting in March, 1862, it having been mentioned 
 that a practice had grown up of suitors and their counsel 
 calling upon judges out of court and speaking to them in 
 reference to cases or proceedings before them, a matter 
 which this body regards as highly improper and subversive 
 of justice and calculated to diminish confidence in the judici- 
 ary, it was resolved that it be referred to the committee of 
 
40 Law Association Centennial 
 
 censors to consider and examine the matter and report their 
 views at the earliest day practicable. In this connection I 
 may be permitted to relate an experience of my own when 
 quite a young practitioner. A client of mine who had a 
 very large business as a real estate agent for small prop- 
 erties and who thought he knew a great deal more about law 
 and lawyers, including the judges, than his youthful counsel 
 did, informed me one day that he had called upon the late 
 President Judge Oswald Thompson, and told him about a 
 case that was to come up on the trial list. Very much dis- 
 concerted by such an announcement from my client, I went 
 immediately after court had adjourned and called upon 
 Judge Thompson to assure him that the visit by my client 
 had been not only not at my instigation but wholly without 
 my knowledge, and to tender him an apology and say that, 
 if he thought proper, I would at once retire from the case. 
 Judge Thompson was a highly esteemed and very cour- 
 ageous judge; no man stood higher in the confidence of the 
 bar and the community. He said to me in the most amiable 
 way that I need give myself no concern about it ; while it was 
 not a frequent, it was not an unknown occurrence in his ex- 
 perience for clients to come and tell him about cases; and 
 that for himself he never objected to it. He was quite con- 
 fident that if he knew what was inside of the case as well as 
 outside, it would not hurt him in the administration of 
 justice. 
 
 Another experience I had with the same courageous 
 judge was a few days after I was admitted. I was handed 
 a paper by my preceptor and told to go into the Orphans' 
 Court and move for the appointment of a guardian. The 
 Orphans' Court in those days was held on the first and third 
 Fridays of the month by the judges of the Common Pleas. 
 There were no lists printed, and we had to sit in expectation 
 like small boys in the lower forms of school, with ears open 
 for the call of our cases. While so listening, a member of 
 the bar arose and made an application precisely similar to the 
 one which I had in charge. The way in which he was over- 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 41 
 
 hauled by Judge Thompson as to the facts of the case, the 
 amount of the estate, in what it was invested, the circum- 
 stances of the family and all the other particulars, gave me a 
 great fright. I knew nothing of the case that I had except the 
 formal application in the paper. While thus waiting in 
 great trepidation, my case was called; but, fortunately for 
 me, just as I arose, my preceptor entered the room and I 
 handed him the paper. He arose and stated that he desired 
 a guardian appointed (naming him) for the estate (naming 
 it) ; and was told, in the pleasantest way, by President Judge 
 Thompson, "Certainly, Mr. Biddle, what amount of security 
 would you suggest?" And that was the end of it. The 
 wonderful difference in the treatment struck me so forcibly 
 that I related the whole circumstance to my preceptor, and 
 was answered: "Judge Thompson has the courage to do 
 what he thinks is right. I have always been exceedingly 
 careful in my statements of facts to the court, and he gives 
 counsel the benefit of their behavior in that respect." 
 
 In 1 87 1 the exaction of extortionate fees in the row 
 offices came up for consideration. For the benefit of those 
 who will come after us and perhaps for some of the juniors 
 to whom the term may not be familiar even now, let me say 
 that the administrative offices of the law, the prothonotaries 
 of the District Court, Common Pleas and Supreme Court, 
 the sheriff, the register of wills and the clerk of the Orphans' 
 Court occupied the row of two-story buildings now partly 
 replaced by the restoration of the original arcade on each 
 side of Independence Hall, or, as it was then more popularly 
 called, the State House, and the offices were generally known 
 as the State House row. The abuse was one of long stand- 
 ing; the fees were fixed by statutes running back from 1835 
 to 1 8 14, and long out of accord with the fair requirements 
 of the day. Hence, larger fees and fees for services not in 
 the fee bill had been acquiesced in by the bar from a sense of 
 intrinsic justice. An attempt had been made at correction 
 shortly before my time, under the lead of the late William' R. 
 Dickerson, but so manifestly political in intent and dema- 
 
42 Law Association Centennial 
 
 gogic in manner that it had failed to carry with it the co- 
 operation of the bar. But the abuse grew with indulgence 
 and toleration. The feeling of the bar may be illustrated 
 by an example. Shortly after going on the bench, a case 
 was tried before me which involved in some way — the details 
 of which I have now forgotten — the question of fees ; and a 
 member of the bar of great courage and sincerity, whom I 
 am glad to see here to-day among the seniors, having testified 
 on the witness stand that he had objected to certain charges, 
 was asked by the opposing counsel : "Didn't you know that 
 the fees were entirely inadequate?" he replied, "Yes, I did; 
 therefore I was willing to have my client pay twice or three 
 times the legal rates, but I was not willing to have him 
 robbed." In March, 1871, the subject was discussed by the 
 association with the result of the appointment of a solicitor 
 to prosecute all cases of illegal fees, and of a committee to 
 memorialize the legislature to adopt a system of salaried 
 offices and to propose a fee bill condensed in form and 
 adapted to the present day. The committee was further 
 directed to confer with the officers of the different courts and 
 others whose fees are concerned, or with any committee 
 they may appoint with a view to adjusting a tariff of fees 
 adapted to the present time. The association thus antici- 
 pated the constitution of 1873 and the legislation which has 
 followed its adoption. I have given this somewhat in detail 
 as an illustration of the conservative action, having due re- 
 gard to the rights involved, characteristic of the association. 
 Even this action, however, did not pass unchallenged, as a 
 committee was appointed "to consider the question which has 
 occurred to some members of this association, whether the 
 duty of prosecuting illegal fee taking is one of those legiti- 
 mately belonging to this association." The committee made 
 a divided report on that subject, but the meeting sustained 
 the report in affirmance. 
 
 In 1872 the association made a suggestion, which was 
 adopted by the courts, that members of the bar applying for 
 admission on certificates from other courts be required to 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 43 
 
 submit their credentials to the board of examiners,— a very 
 excellent rule to prevent the city being the refuge of undesir- 
 able newcomers. As in the past all roads led to Rome, so 
 now a great city draws to itself the brains as well as the 
 products of its surrounding country, and thereby increases 
 Its own stock of energy, enterprise and ability. But it also 
 affords a refuge for the unworthy. In the forty-odd years 
 of my acquaintance with the bar I think I am within limit 
 when I say that at least four-fifths of the members of this 
 bar who have had to be dealt with for unprofessional con- 
 duct were men who slipped in from other places, some of 
 whom, at least, this salutary rule would have barred from 
 entrance. 
 
 In the same year (1872) another very salutary rule was 
 adopted by the courts, at the instance of the association, re- 
 quiring money paid into court to be deposited in some of 
 the trust companies, to bear interest for the benefit of the 
 ultimate distributees. 
 
 In 1876 the subject of the crowded state of the Phila- 
 delphia lists, and the fact that writs of error were taken for 
 delay, was introduced by Mr. McMurtrie, and, after confer- 
 ence with the judges, led to the act of May 5, 1876, P. L. 
 115, giving the Supreme Court its present ample power to 
 arrange districts and transfer counties and control the whole 
 subject of hearings. 
 
 These are only a few of the subjects upon which the 
 association has taken appropriate action, but they are all that 
 time allows me for illustrations. 
 
 The chancellors of the association have been representa- 
 tive men of the bar. There is nothing in the charter or the 
 purposes of the association to exclude judges from the office; 
 indeed, its title is suggestively judicial. But an unwritten 
 law has confined the office to practicing lawyers, and not 
 only to those of prominence at the bar, but to those taking 
 interest in the law itself as the science of administrative jus- 
 tice, interest in books as the instruments and vehicles of 
 
44 Law Association Centennial 
 
 learning, interest in the bar itself as a common brotherhood, 
 and in the preservation of its tone and standing as a learned 
 profession. The office has therefore justly come to be re- 
 garded as the highest honor that the bar can pay a fellow 
 member. 
 
 The first of the line, William Rawle, the elder, was pre- 
 eminently a man of the type I have indicated. He was born 
 in Philadelphia, April 28, 1759, of Quaker parentage; com- 
 menced his law studies at the age of nineteen in the ofifice of 
 John Tabor Kempe, the Royal Attorney-General of New 
 York, and finished in the Middle Temple in London. He 
 was admitted to the Philadelphia bar in 1783, and for more 
 than fifty years was one of its most distinguished members. 
 He was appointed District Attorney of the United States for 
 Pennsylvania by Washington, in 1791, and held the office 
 until 1800, when he voluntarily resigned. 
 
 On January 3, 1792, he wrote in his diary: "Mr. Lewis 
 having this day resigned the office of Judge of the District 
 Court for Pennsylvania, it was, by order of the President, 
 offered to me. Considering my time of life, my increasing 
 family, my emoluments and profits at the bar, I thought fit to 
 decline it." He was then thirty-three years of age. He 
 also declined, and for the same reason, the office of Attorney- 
 General of the United States, which Washington tendered 
 to him. 
 
 While holding the office of District Attorney he accom- 
 panied the President and Cabinet in the semi-military, semi- 
 civil expedition to the interior of the State, intended to sup- 
 press the Whiskey Insurrection of 1794. When the absence 
 of accommodations required living under canvas he occu- 
 pied the same tent with Alexander Hamilton, the Secretary of 
 the Treasury. Mr. Rawle was an essentially devout man 
 and adhered conscientiously until the end of his life to the 
 tenets of the Society of Friends, of which he was a member 
 by birthright. On the return of the expedition he was 
 called upon by a committee of Quakers, who inquired of him 
 whether the report which they had heard was correct, that 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 45 
 
 he "had been to war and had borne arms." On his replying 
 that he had not witnessed anything of the former, and that the 
 only arms he had borne had been a penknife wherewith to 
 mend his quill pen, his judges deemed his actions too flagrant 
 and his explanation insufficient, and his membership in their 
 body was taken away from him. He continued, neverthe- 
 less, to attend meeting all his life, and was buried in its 
 grounds, at Fourth and Arch Streets. 
 
 After the death of Jared Ingersoll, in 1822, Mr. Rawle 
 succeeded him as chancellor of the Society of the Associated 
 Members of the Bar, and shortly afterward delivered an 
 address before that body, in which he gave a graphic descrip- 
 tion of the early bar of Philadelphia as he remembered it, 
 and pen portraits of the most prominent of its members 
 whom he knew, being the earliest account which we have of 
 the subject. 
 
 His devotion to the interests of the library I have already 
 noticed in connection with the catalogue of 1805. On the 
 union of the Law Library Company and the Associated 
 Members of the Bar in the Law Association in 1827 he was 
 elected first chancellor, and re-elected year after year until 
 his death in 1836. At the first meeting thereafter, the sec- 
 retary was directed in the notice of the event to accompany it 
 with an expression of affectionate regard for his virtues and 
 the kindness and courteousness of his intercourse, and of 
 exalted respect for the learning, eloquence and talent which 
 he exhibited throughout his honorable and extended career. 
 
 In 1805 he argued the constitutionality of slavery in 
 Pennsylvania, and for many years was president of the 
 Society for the Promotion of the Abolition of Slavery. He 
 was the author of Commentaries on the Constitution, the 
 first and for a long time the leading book on that new and 
 then most difficult subject, as the author of which, says 
 Mr. Francis Wharton, "he will be better known than as the 
 accomplished jurist and powerful advocate." (State Trials 
 of the United States during the Administrations of Wash- 
 ington ajid Adams.) David Paul Brown mentions other 
 
46 Law Association Centennial 
 
 writings, principally on religious subjects; but I have not 
 been able to ascertain that any of them are in print. But his 
 most enduring and probably the most useful work of all his 
 long and useful life was as one of the three commissioners 
 under the resolution of the legislature of March 23, 1830, to 
 revise the statutes of the State. To this work with unflag- 
 ging interest and diligence for six years he devoted his tal- 
 ents, learning and experience, with the result that in the acts 
 passed on the recommendation of the commission between 
 1832 and 1836 we have the most wisely conceived and most 
 clearly expressed statutes in our books, and after nearly 
 three-quarters of a century they are still the law on the most 
 important branches of our civil legislation. 
 
 Mr. Brown, who was his student, sums up his character 
 in these words: "There never was a more enlightened and 
 unblemished advocate, or a more conscientious and valuable 
 citizen. It is a remarkable and beautiful indication of the 
 urbanity of his deportment and the affectionate regard enter- 
 tained for him by members of the bar, that for fifty years, 
 during which time he was engaged in every great and almost 
 in every important cause, he appears never to have had a 
 personal difference or angry dispute with any of his profes- 
 sional brethren. The courtesy and native dignity of his 
 demeanor, while they forbade any invasion of the respect due 
 to others, charmed and subdued those around him, and 
 taught them by example the advantages arising from kind- 
 ness and unity. Towards the bench he was always con- 
 ciliatory and respectful, and whatever might be the result 
 of a cause, having faithfully discharged his duty in its man- 
 agement, he was neither elated by success nor dejected by 
 defeat." (Eulogium upon William Rawle.) The fine por- 
 trait we have of him by Inman would certainly have brought 
 from Lavater a ready acquiescence in such description. 
 
 Peter Stephen du Ponceau, the second chancellor, was 
 an exceedingly interesting character. He was bom June 3, 
 1760, at St. Martin's, in the Isle of Re. His father was an 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 47 
 
 officer in the French army. He was a natural linguist, and 
 in some biographical notes he has told how, when a little past 
 SIX years of age, he happened to see an English grammar in 
 a neighbor's house, "and child-like was delighted with the 
 letters K and W, which my eyes had not been accustomed to 
 seeing. I took the book home and began to study the Eng- 
 lish language. * * * j goon spoke good English. 
 * * * I also wrote English correctly." In this last 
 matter he flattered himself somewhat. While we know 
 from report that he spoke English fluently and in the main 
 correctly, his letters still extant show that he would not have 
 stood at the head of the line at a spelling bee. His father 
 wanted him trained for the army; but his mother wanted 
 him for the priesthood. His nearsightedness seems to have 
 settled the matter, and he was sent to the Benedictine Col- 
 lege of St. Jean d'Angely, and very unwillingly became an 
 abbe. In his intercourse with the English families, how- 
 ever, in the garrison town, he had imbibed some distinctly 
 Protestant views, and he soon found his position as an abbe 
 so uncongenial that he abruptly left it. After some months 
 of rather precarious existence in Paris, translating commer- 
 cial letters from and into English, he was fortunate enough 
 to obtain an appointment as secretary to Baron Steuben, 
 coming with him to this country in 1777. He was commis- 
 sioned a captain in the army and served with Steuben at 
 Valley Forge and in the campaigns in the South until July, 
 1 78 1, when his health appearing to be permanently broken, 
 though he was just twenty-one years of age, he resigned, and 
 came to Philadelphia. He was soon after appointed secre- 
 tary to Robert R. Livingston, the Secretary for Foreign 
 Affairs. In a letter of recommendation for the appoint- 
 ment, Judge Peters says of du Ponceau, "He is a good Latin 
 scholar; French is his native tongue; English he has ac- 
 quired perfectly, and he understands German, Italian and 
 Spanish. He can translate Danish and low Dutch with the 
 help of a dictionary, and a little application will make him 
 master of these." For a youth of twenty-one, who had 
 
48 Law Association Centennial 
 
 spent four years in active service in the army, this is a truly 
 remarkable list of accomplishments. He was admitted to 
 the bar in 1785, and had an extensive practice for about 
 thirty years, when he gradually withdrew, though he lived 
 to be eighty-four years of age, and died March i, 1844. In 
 a discourse upon his death, delivered by Dr. Robley Dungli- 
 son before the American Philosophical Society, a quotation 
 is made from a letter of du Ponceau in which he gives this 
 pleasant account of his ridings on circuit: 
 
 "In the beginning of the present century, during the 
 reign of the embargo, non-intercourse, and other restrictive 
 measures produced by the British orders in council, and the 
 Berlin and Milan decrees, a great number of cases were car- 
 ried up from this city to the Supreme Court of the United 
 States. The counsel engaged in those causes were in the 
 habit of going together to Washington to argue their causes 
 before that tribunal. These were Mr. Ingersoll, Mr. Dallas, 
 Mr. Lewis, Mr. Edward Tilghman, Mr. Rawle, and myself, 
 who am, alas, the only survivor of that joyous band. We 
 hired a stage to ourselves, in which we proceeded by easy 
 journeys. The court sat then, as it does at present, or did 
 until lately, in the month of February; so that we had to 
 travel in the depth of winter, through bad roads, in the midst 
 of rain, hail and snow, in no very comfortable way. Never- 
 theless, as soon as we were out of the city, and felt the flush 
 of air, we were like schoolboys in the playground on a holi- 
 day; and we began to kill time by all the means that our 
 imaginations could suggest. Flashes of wit shot their cor- 
 uscations on all sides; puns of the genuine Philadelphia 
 stamp were handed about; old college stories were revived; 
 macaroni Latin was spoken with great purity; songs were 
 sung — even classical songs — among which I recollect the 
 famous Bacchanalian of the Archdeacon of Oxford, 'Mihi 
 est propositum in taberna mori:' in short, we might have 
 been taken for anything but the grave counselors of the cele- 
 brated bar of Philadelphia. 
 
 "I shall always," he adds, "remember with pleasure 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 49 
 
 those delightful journeys, in which we all became intimately 
 acquainted with each other ; for on such occasions, when free 
 scope is given to the imagination, men appear in their true 
 characters, and no art can prevent them from showing them- 
 selves as they really are. Our appearance at the bar of the 
 Supreme Court was always a scene of triumph. We entered 
 the hall together, and Judge Washington was heard to say, 
 'This is my bar.' Our causes had a preference over all 
 others, in consideration of the distance we had to travel. 
 The greatest liberality was shown to us by the members of 
 the profession who usually attended that court. It was 
 really a proud thing, at that time, to be a Philadelphia 
 lawyer." 
 
 On the acquisition of Louisiana he was offered the Chief 
 Justiceship of the new territory by President Jefferson, but 
 declined. It is doubtful if he was not always more of a 
 scholar and philosopher than a lawyer; but he took great 
 interest in the science of jurisprudence and in the brother- 
 hood of the bar, especially among the younger men. He 
 occupied a very prominent place in the intellectual life of his 
 day, having been first provost of the Law Academy, second 
 chancellor of the Law Association, president of the Historical 
 Society of Pennsylvania and of the American Philosophical 
 Society. In the discourse of Dr. Dunglison, already men- 
 tioned, from which I have taken most of the details of this 
 notice, there is a long list of the literary and scientific insti- 
 tutions to which he belonged, and of his writings and trans- 
 lations on legal, literary and scientific subjects. 
 
 In 1845 du Ponceau was succeeded by John Sergeant, 
 in many respects the most distinguished name in the annals 
 of our bar. He was the son of Jonathan Dickinson Ser- 
 geant, first Attorney-General of the Commonwealth, and 
 was born in Philadelphia in 1779. He graduated from 
 Princeton in 1795 ; spent two years in a commercial counting 
 house, and then entered the office of Jared Ingersoll. He 
 was admitted to the bar in 1799, before he had quite reached 
 
 4 
 
so Law Association Centennial 
 
 the age of twenty. His professional advancement was 
 rapid. "He soon took his station among the foremost," says 
 Mr. Meredith, "and before long, in the very first rank of the 
 bar where he maintained his position during the greater part 
 of half a century." He went early into politics, was elected 
 to the General Assembly of Pennsylvania in 1805 and 1807, 
 and "was Chairman of the Committee on Roads and Inland 
 Navigation, and in that capacity reported the first act giving 
 the direct aid of the State to internal improvements, a cause 
 which he had always deeply at heart and to which he never 
 refused his assistance. To us at present the sum and pur- 
 pose of the appropriation may appear insignificant, but it was 
 the beginning of that system which has since led to such vast 
 results both of expenditure and utility." In 181 5 he was 
 elected to Congress, and served four terms, when he declined 
 a re-election. One of his most notable efforts there was in 
 opposition to the Missouri Compromise in 1820. "During 
 these discussions," says Mr. Meredith, in his address on the 
 death of John Sergeant, "he delivered one of the best rea- 
 soned and most able speeches that have ever been heard in the 
 hall of either house of Congress. It has almost exhausted 
 the argument in favor of the prohibition of slavery in new 
 States and Territories ; and it was no small token of the re- 
 spect and esteem which was then entertained for him, though 
 comparatively a new member and a young man, that he was 
 selected and pitted as the champion of the North against the 
 best abilities of the able and experienced members who main- 
 tained the opposite doctrine. That speech remains, and is 
 still a storehouse from which rich materials are habitually 
 drawn for the discussion and exposition of the subject. 
 Thus Mr. Thomas and Mr. Taylor between them had the 
 honor of originating this compromise; Mr. Sergeant the 
 greater honor of opposing it. It was a measure so inde- 
 fensible in itself, so fraught with injury to the whole coun- 
 try, so politically unjust to a large portion of it, and has 
 been so fruitful of subsequent similar derelictions, so period- 
 ically prolific of an accursed brood that the friends and 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 51 
 
 townsmen of Mr. Sergeant may feel a just pride in the recol- 
 lection of his determined hostility to it." These words, it 
 will be recalled, were written in 1853, eight years before the 
 slavery agitation culminated in armed secession. 
 
 In 1832 Mr. Sergeant was the Whig ca!ididate for 
 Vice-President on the ticket with Henry Clay against 
 Andrew Jackson. He was president of the Constitutional 
 Convention of 1838; was sent to Congress again in 1840; 
 declined a seat in the cabinet of General Harrison and also 
 the position of Minister to England offered him by President 
 Tyler, but in 1847 accepted an appointment by Mr. Marcy, 
 the Secretary of War, as arbitrator to determine the dispute 
 between the United States and the State of Delaware as to 
 the title to the Pea Patch Island. His award definitely set- 
 tled the controversy. And during this long continued and 
 active political career he was diligently occupied also with a 
 large and laborious law practice, which he never gave up or 
 neglected. Having a very clear perception of the instability 
 of politics, as a good servant but a very bad master, he main- 
 tained his independent professional position, and thus 
 avoided the rock on which so many fine lawyers have been 
 wrecked. After the retirement of Mr. Binney from active 
 practice, Mr. Sergeant was, until his death, the undisputed 
 head of the bar. 
 
 I have no personal recollection of Mr. Sergeant, though 
 he did not die until 1852, when I was about entering college. 
 You will, I hope, have this evening some reminiscences of 
 him from the seniors. He is described as dark com- 
 plexioned, with black eyes and hair which remained un- 
 changed to the last, small of stature but of dignified and 
 impressive bearing. There are three well-known portraits 
 of him; one by Robinson, one by Sully, now in the Law 
 Library, and the third, later in life, by Waugh. David Paul 
 Brown speaks highly of the Sully portrait, but Mr. McMur- 
 trie told me that the Robinson, though inferior as a work of 
 art, was the best likeness. "But," added he, "no artist 
 would dare to paint the true length of his upper lip, and no 
 
52 Law Association Centennial 
 
 one could portray its mobility and its expressiveness when 
 he was speaking." 
 
 Of Horace Binney there is little need for me to speak. 
 He was bom in Philadelphia in 1780, and admitted to the 
 bar in 1800 before he was quite of age. For profound and 
 accurate knowledge of the law and for power of clear and 
 cogent reasoning from legal premises, he was ranked by his 
 contemporaries as the head of the bar not only of Philadel- 
 phia, but of the entire country, and such rank has always 
 since been conceded. Some have questioned whether Ser- 
 geant was not the broader and Meredith the more brilliant 
 man ; but such speculations are idle, for he gave himself ex- 
 clusively and uninterruptedly to the law ; and what he might 
 have accomplished in other fields we cannot know. In such 
 matters we may safely rest on the fact that the men of his 
 day whom we knew later as great lawyers, unanimously 
 conceded to him the foremost place. He was elected to Con- 
 gress, but resigned after one session, and it used to be said 
 that his assigned reason was that he was accustomed to asso- 
 ciate with gentlemen ; and this, too, was long before the days 
 of fisticuffs and pitchfork manners in the Senate. 
 
 In 1827 he was offered a seat on the Supreme Court of 
 Pennsylvania, and a little later on the Supreme Court of 
 the United States ; and, on the death of Chief Justice Taney 
 in 1864, the chief justiceship. These he declined, preferring 
 in the earlier instances to remain at the bar, and later having 
 regard to his age. That he would have made a very great 
 judge is beyond doubt ; and though he was advanced in years 
 in 1864 the situation was perilous. The late Chief Justice 
 Taney was a very great lawyer, but his views on constitu- 
 tional questions were not in harmony with the times, and 
 Mr. Binney's name would have been a tower of strength to 
 the union cause. 
 
 He was elected chancellor of the Law Association, on 
 the death of Mr. Sergeant in 1852, probably in deference 
 to his position as head of the bar, for he had resigned the 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 53 
 
 vice-chancellorship in 1836, and I cannot find that he 
 ever presided during the two years that he held the chancel- 
 lorship. It is said that in early life his health was delicate, 
 and he retired from active practice soon after the age 
 of fifty on that account. If he could have forecast the future 
 he would have seen that two-thirds of his mature life was 
 yet before him. When I came to the bar I frequently saw 
 him walking or driving in an open carriage. He lived in 
 Fourth Street below Walnut. He was not in practice, 
 though he still occasionally gave advice and opinions on 
 titles. He was a handsome man of medium size, regular 
 features, blue eyes, snow-white hair and a fresh complexion 
 even at his advanced age. He apparently took life seriously 
 and his expression was somewhat cold and austere. The 
 portrait by Sully in the Law Library is not much like him 
 as I remember him; but as it was painted some thirty years 
 earlier that is not to be wondered at. He died August 12, 
 1875, in his ninety-sixth year, having been for some years 
 the senior graduate of Harvard College and the senior mem- 
 ber of the Philadelphia bar. 
 
 Joseph R. Ingersoll was bom in Philadelphia, June 14, 
 1786. He was the son of Jared Ingersoll, one of the three 
 lawyers described by Binney as leaders of the Old Bar. He 
 graduated at Princeton in 1804; studied law with his father; 
 was admitted to the bar in 1807, and entered almost at once 
 on a large practice. David Paul Brown says, "As a lawyer 
 he combined all the requisites of his diversified profession. 
 He was thoroughly read in legal science, thoroughly skilled 
 in its practice." (Eulogium on the Life and Character of 
 Joseph R. Ingersoll.) He had, however, what may be 
 called the misfortune not only to come to the bar while the 
 great leaders were still there, but to be a few years the junior 
 of Binney, Sergeant, and Chauncey, the indisputable heirs to 
 the succession. His early immersement in business and 
 politics, moreover, interfered greatly with systematic study 
 after his admission. His fame as a lawyer, therefore, rests 
 
54 Law Association Centennial 
 
 mainly on his powers as an advocate. He was a polished 
 and persuasive speaker in the florid and somewhat discursive 
 style of that day, and Mr. Brown calls him the Cicero of the 
 American Bar. 
 
 For thirty years he continued in active practice, and his 
 office was popular with students, the most distinguished of 
 whom was George Sharswood. Mr. Brown has described 
 to us the course of reading, "Laying the groundwork in the 
 study of natural, political and international law and the pop- 
 ular and elegant commentary of Sir William Blackstone, he 
 led them to the fundamental doctrines of tenures and estates, 
 which were followed by the standard treatises of Preston, 
 Fearne, Powell and Sugden." 
 
 He was a lover of literature and art; was president of 
 the Academy of Fine Arts, member of the American Philo- 
 sophical Society, president of the Colonization Society and 
 of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. 
 
 He was also active in politics, in which he belonged to 
 the Henry Clay Whigs, popularly known in later days as the . 
 "old line Whigs." He was a member of Congress from 
 1835 to 1837 and from 1842 to 1849, and Minister to Eng- 
 land under President Fillmore. 
 
 He was elected chancellor of the association in 1854; 
 probably, as in the case of Binney, out of regard for his posi- 
 tion as senior at the bar, as I do not find that he ever attended 
 or presided at a meeting. In 1856 he declined a re-election. 
 
 As I remember him, he was a tall, slender man, some- 
 what bent in his later days, had reddish hair and a sanguine 
 complexion; was a great contrast to his brother, Charles, 
 who was short and dark. He had retired from practice, but 
 still appeared from time to time on public occasions and pre- 
 sided with much dignity and courtesy at the meetings of the 
 Historical Society. He died February 20, 1868, at the ripe 
 age of eighty-two. 
 
 The next chancellor was William Morris Meredith. 
 He was bom in Philadelphia, June 8, 1799; was the son of 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 55 
 
 William Meredith, a well-known member of the bar, and on 
 the mother's side was grand-nephew of Gouverneur Morris 
 and Lewis Morris, the signer of the Declaration of Inde- 
 pendence. He graduated from the University of Pennsyl- 
 vania in 1812, at the early age of thirteen; then gave five 
 years to the study of law, being admitted to practice in 181 7 
 at the age of eighteen. He got into practice slowly; the 
 tradition is that it was ten years before his practice paid his 
 office rent, and in my day he used to be held up as an example 
 for the encouragement of the young lawyers whose clients 
 were few and fees small. He gave this time, however, to 
 diligent study, and was probably among the last of American 
 lawyers who read, as Kent considered necessary, the year 
 books and the principal reports in course. That diligence, 
 however, so equipped him that he was enabled to take prac- 
 tice easily when at last success came, as come it must to such 
 industry and such ability. From the death of John Ser- 
 geant, to whom alone he was second (if even to him), he 
 was the undisputed head of the bar not only of Philadelphia, 
 but of the State. He served the public in many positions of 
 honor; member of the legislature from 1824 to 1828; presi- 
 dent of Select Council of Philadelphia from 1833 to 1849; 
 member of the Constitutional Convention of 1838, and presi- 
 dent of the Convention of 1873 which made our present 
 Constitution ; United States District Attorney under the elder 
 President Harrison ; Secretary of the Treasury under Presi- 
 dent Taylor, and a member of the Peace Convention in 1861. 
 But probably his most signal service to his State and the 
 nation was in 1861. The war found Pennsylvania totally 
 unprepared; the Quaker element had never believed in 
 belligerent preparations and the Mexican War had been un- 
 popular throughout the State. In its own unwavering devo- 
 tion to the Constitution and the Union, Pennsylvania had 
 not believed secession possible. Hence, the first Pennsyl- 
 vania troops were hastily gathered, badly clothed and badly 
 supplied in everything. Complaints were rife, and in the 
 midst of them the resignation of the office of Attorney-Gen- 
 
56 Law Association Centennial 
 
 eral by Mr. Purviance in a curt letter with a mysterious hint 
 of reasons, damaged the administration greatly. It was an 
 anxious time for all patriots and good citizens; and the ac- 
 ceptance by Mr. Meredith of the office of Attorney-General, 
 at once and completely re-established the administration in 
 the confidence of the people; with the result that Pennsyl- 
 vania not only furnished her quota of troops and supplies, 
 but in advance of the national call, organized the famous 
 corps of Pennsylvania Reserves. 
 
 In the Constitutional Convention of 1873, Governor 
 Curtin said, in his remarks on the death of Mr. Meredith: 
 "The executive from whom he received that office (Attor- 
 ney-General) is not ashamed to say to-day in this dis- 
 tinguished presence, that he did earnestly solicit Mr. Mere- 
 dith to take a place near him as his chief adviser, and that 
 his acceptance of the office of Attorney-General dissipated a 
 cloud which hung over the administration, renewed confi- 
 dence, and gave new vigor to executive power. For his 
 service there, if for no other act of his life, the people of the 
 State are under lasting obligations to him, and the executive 
 he served, under a debt of gratitude which he will ever feel 
 and acknowledge." 
 
 Mr. Meredith accepted, but subsequently declined, the 
 position of counsel for the United States at the Geneva Arbi- 
 tration. The reason publicly assigned was the condition of 
 his health, and perhaps that had some weight in the matter; 
 but the generally believed reason among his associates at the 
 bar was his unwillingness to make a professional argument 
 that he did not believe in, and that on being informed of the 
 lines on which the paper books were being prepared in the 
 Department of Justice he peremptorily declined to accept the 
 position. The objectionable argument was subsequently 
 thrown out by the tribunal. It is the least creditable feature 
 of the case, and some very able and well-informed writers 
 have plainly characterized it as a Yankee trick, a make- 
 weight put in to be withdrawn to give an appearance of con- 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 57 
 
 cession and compromise. Mr. Meredith refused to be party 
 to any such transaction. 
 
 He was not merely a good but a great lawyer. Any 
 man who leads the Philadelphia bar, even in a time of lull, 
 must have qualities that would make him a man of mark at 
 any period in Westminster Hall; but in the succession of 
 leaders we cannot look for uniformity of height. There are 
 differences of qualities and so of abilities and professional 
 eminence in the distinguished line of chancellors. It is 
 doubtful if, on the whole, even Binney or Sergeant over- 
 topped Mr. Meredith; certainly no other can be claimed to 
 stand on the same level. He was a more brilliant, more 
 versatile, and probably a readier man than either Binney or 
 Sergeant. Perhaps he was too ready for his final reputa- 
 tion, for ordinary matters came to him so easily that he 
 relied on the moment, and was apt to gather his knowledge 
 of a case as it went along. Sooner or later all old advocates 
 come to this point — the danger point of legal, and I might 
 say of all professional, careers. Chief Justice Gibson was, 
 beyond all question, the most brilliant, versatile and gifted 
 judge that ever sat on an American bench ; but, as a judge, 
 those very qualities made him inferior to Tilghman, for it 
 took a great case to rouse his great powers. Smaller mat- 
 ters came to him so easily that he was apt to slur them. As 
 I knew Mr. Meredith in his later years he suffered somewhat 
 from this tendency, but if the importance of a great case 
 aroused him he showed even then his wonderful powers. 
 Probably for the same reason he was said to have been an 
 unsatisfactory colleague. I have heard from the older men 
 who had been his colleagues that he never indicated his own 
 line of argument, and yet was inclined to find fault with 
 others if they took a different one. 
 
 Mr. Meredith is the first of the chancellors of whom, as 
 a practicing lawyer, I can speak from personal knowledge; 
 for, though I had not the privilege of familiar acquaintance, 
 he was in active practice and recognized leadership from the 
 time of my admission to the bar until his death. I can give 
 
58 Law Association Centennial 
 
 but little of him in the way of personal description, and yet 
 it is perhaps well that I should do that little now, for every 
 year brings its illustration how fleeting are a lawyer's fame 
 and the memory of his personality. When less than a year 
 ago Mr. Ashhurst read before the State Bar Association his 
 admirable memoir of Mr. Meredith, the Philadelphia news- 
 papers spoke of the latter merely as "an eminent lawyer of 
 the early part of the preceding century." In a quarter of a 
 century the most eminent figure in the State had passed out 
 of the memory of the active men of his own city. Of the 
 details of his professional life I havt not time to speak, even 
 if I were able. But fortunately we have all that we can now 
 gather in the admirable memoir of Mr. Ashhurst which I 
 have just mentioned. In depth and ready command of 
 learning, in versatility, in quickness of apprehension, in the 
 keenness of his perception of the weak points of an adver- 
 sary's case, and adroitness in sliding over the dangers of 
 his own, and the weight and vigor with which he enforced 
 his strong points, he has never been equaled at this bar in 
 my day. His address usually was conversational in tone, 
 perhaps partly due to shortness of breath and cardiac troubles 
 from which he finally died ; but, when the case called for it, 
 wit, sarcasm and vehement argument were poured forth in 
 an irresistible torrent. 
 
 His professional tone was as admirable as his intel- 
 lectual qualities. As an illustration, it is related of him that 
 he was opposed to contingent fees and never took one. And 
 Mr. Ashhurst relates that in the Girard Will Case, argued in 
 1844 before the Supreme Court of the United States, "Mr. 
 Meredith was engaged with Mr. Binney and Mr. Sergeant, 
 and their fee was fixed by Councils at $10,000 each. When 
 the case came up for argument, the Supreme Court refused 
 to vary its usual practice, and heard only two counsel, the 
 seniors, Binney and Sergeant, and Mr. Meredith could only 
 sit by. He had taken his full share doubtless in the prepara- 
 tion of the case; but nevertheless returned the fee of $10,000 
 when sent to him, saying he preferred not to take it, as the 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 59 
 
 court did not give him the opportunity of earning it. This 
 action at first sight seems almost Quixotic; but when we re- 
 member that he was at that time president of Select Coun- 
 cils we can understand the delicacy of feeling which 
 prompted it." 
 
 In person he was very large, somewhat over six feet in 
 height and heavily built. His head looked small over his 
 massive shoulders ; but it had a peculiarity somewhat diffi- 
 cult to describe. It seemed to me to convey the impression 
 that the skull was not like most, a solid box made first and 
 the brain put in afterwards, but as if the brain itself was the 
 original and molding force, and had covered itself with a 
 shell hardly large enough, so that it was continually pressing 
 outward and governing the external shape. The late Wil- 
 liam B. Reed had something of the same peculiarity, and is 
 the only other instance that I recall. No portrait of Mr. 
 Meredith that I have ever seen does any justice at all to his 
 imposing presence. 
 
 Any sketch of Mr. Meredith, however brief, would be 
 inexcusably defective if it omitted to mention his ready wit 
 and his overflowing humor. They were irrepressible. This 
 is not the time or place for anecdotes that suffer in the tell- 
 ing ; but I will give one instance since I have it in the words 
 of another. In the Constitutional Convention of 1873 ^r. 
 Wright, of Luzerne, in some remarks upon Mr. Meredith's 
 death, spoke of this quality, and gave the following incident : 
 "In the Atlantic and Great Western litigation, which was so 
 prominent throughout the Commonwealth some years ago, 
 the question arose as to what was in law the filing of a cer- 
 tain paper in the office of the Secretary of State. The 
 opposing counsel said that suspending it on a string in the 
 Secretary's room was a legal filing. Mr. Meredith instantly 
 retorted if that was so, the murderer Probst had a few days 
 past been most effectually filed, as he had been suspended on 
 a very strong string by the sheriff of Philadelphia." Another 
 anecdote is related of him in connection with the late Eli K. 
 Price, who was the author of many acts of Assembly looking 
 
6o Law Association Centennial 
 
 to the limitation of actions, and on one occasion drafted an 
 act preventing the recovery of ground rent on which no pay- 
 ment had been made for twenty years, and sent it to Mr. 
 Meredith for his opinion. Mr. Meredith returned it some- 
 what in this way : "My dear Price : I have looked over your 
 act, and I think it admirable. I venture to add two words to 
 the title, with which I think it will be perfect." The title as 
 Mr. Price sent it to Meredith was "An act for the more 
 secure enjoyment of estates." With Mr. Meredith's two 
 words added it came back "An act for the more secure enjoy- 
 ment of other men's estates." He took the ordinary affairs 
 of life jocosely, and he always reminded me of Olympian 
 Jove looking down with amused compassion on the way 
 poor mortals plagued themselves over trifles. 
 
 I have attempted to indicate the qualities that have 
 marked the chancellors as the chosen of the profession for its 
 official head. The next chancellor, Peter McCall, was the 
 type and exemplar of those qualities, whom every one that 
 knew him was content to follow and emulate. He was an 
 active and attentive member of the association, secretary 
 from 1845 to 1852; and an unconscious tribute to his 
 punctual attendance is found in the minute of one meeting 
 that he was "unavoidably absent, being engaged in the duties 
 of the mayoralty." On the death of Mr. Dallas in 1864 he 
 was elected vice-chancellor, and in 1873 succeeded as chan- 
 cellor, being re-elected until his death in 1880. He attended 
 the meetings of the association with great regularity, and 
 both as vice-chancellor and as chancellor, presided over 
 nearly all of the meetings for many years. He was born 
 August 31, 1809, near Trenton, N. J., though his family had 
 been Philadelphians for a century previous. He graduated 
 from Princeton in 1826, and came to the bar in 1831. He 
 seems to have got into practice early and also into politics, 
 and after having been a member of Councils for several 
 years was elected Mayor in 1844, after which, I believe, he 
 retired from politics and devoted himself to his profession. 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 6i 
 
 Outside of his practice,, he found time to deliver in 1832 
 before the Historical Society, of which he was for many 
 years a member, an address on the progress of the Society of 
 Friends in Pennsylvania and their influence on our institu- 
 tions, literary, benevolent and political; and in 1838 before 
 the Law Academy, of which he was for nearly thirty years 
 vice-provost, an address on the Judicial History of Penn- 
 sylvania. This was a highly creditable contribution to State 
 history gathered with much labor from original sources. 
 There were no Colonial Records then in print, and much of 
 his material, as he told me himself, was obtained by research 
 among the old papers and documents at Harrisburg. From 
 1852 to i860 he was Professor of Pleading and Practice in 
 the Law School of the University of Pennsylvania, and his 
 lectures are an admirably clear and concise compendium of 
 the law on those subjects. It is matter of regret that they 
 are not in print; for I am sure no student could be better 
 qualified to enter on the formless haphazard practice of to- 
 day than by even a brief study of such a masterly exposition 
 of principles which, with all their burden of perhaps super- 
 fluous technicalities, were still the basis of a scientific system. 
 Mr. McCall was a man of rather notably quiet and 
 modest bearing, yet of great force and energy. Slightly over 
 medium height, with dark eyes and complexion and a fine 
 intellectual expression, as may be seen in his portrait in the 
 library. His language was choice and cultivated English; 
 his style of speaking deliberate but exceedingly clear and not 
 lacking in emphasis. Indeed, it habitually conveyed the 
 impression of great reserve force if occasion should require 
 it. He was the last of the old school of lawyers who came 
 into court prepared on their whole case with a brief on every 
 aspect which it might take during the trial or argument. 
 The case never took an unexpected turn or developed a col- 
 lateral question that he had not thought out beforehand. 
 Even the pre-eminently learned, acute, suggestive and I 
 might almost say, discursive mind of Judge Hare rarely, if 
 ever, found him unprepared. 
 
62 Law Association Centennial 
 
 To watch either from the bar or from the bench a trial 
 with such counsel was a great pleasure ; for it was an intel- 
 lectual contest, stripped of clap-trap and demagoguery in 
 any shape. If Mr. McCall tried even an accident case 
 (though they were then not so plentiful as now) no doleful 
 widow in black was paraded with a line of children whose 
 number and uniformity of size suggested a draught on the 
 neighborhood for the occasion. He knew his case when he 
 came into court, and he tried it in the calm confidence of vic- 
 tory on its merits. 
 
 It has been the fate of some men to be better remem- 
 bered by a phrase, an incident, or a single trait, than by more 
 important matters or weightier qualities. There have been 
 officers as gallant and as devoted as the ill-fated commander 
 of the Chesapeake, but their countrymen have forgotten 
 them, while every schoolboy can tell you the name of the 
 man whose dying command was, "Don't give up the ship!" 
 To help a young singer who was to have a benefit at the 
 theatre on the following night, Joseph Hopkinson wrote a 
 song on Sunday afternoon. He thought it an ephemeral per- 
 formance, but he will be longer remembered as the author of 
 "Hail Columbia" than by his fourteen years of distinguished 
 judicial labor. Sir Philip Sidney was soldier, statesman 
 and poet ; but in the splendid court of Elizabeth, side by side 
 with Essex and Leicester and Sir Walter Raleigh, he was 
 "the mirror of knighthood," and by later centuries the poet 
 of Arcadia is well-nigh forgotten in the memory of the finest 
 gentleman in recorded history. A touch of like fate has 
 befallen Mr. McCall. No man who ever met him even casu- 
 ally can hear his name without recalling him at once as the 
 gentleman of the bar. His courtesy was so notable, so uni- 
 form and so unfailing, that it seemed his most prominent 
 trait. His bearing would have been called courtly even in 
 the polite days of old; but his courtliness conveyed no hint 
 of effort or affectation, or even of cultivation ; it seemed bom 
 in him and part of the man himself. Descriptive phrases are 
 but poor vehicles to convey ideas of manners, and I may be 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 63 
 
 permitted to illustrate them by two anecdotes, trivial but 
 characteristic. My first acquaintance with Mr. McCall was 
 when I went to his office to get a ticket for his lectures at 
 the Law School. By the advice of Judge Sharswood I had 
 spread my lectures over four years, and did not take Mr. 
 McCall's until I had been a year at the bar. When I stated 
 to him my desire it happened that I laid down the fee in my 
 own check. He glanced at it a moment, and then asked in 
 whose office I was registered. On my telling him that I was 
 already admitted and had an office of my own, he immedi- 
 ately said that a gentleman who had been admitted and was 
 already a member of the bar, who did him the honor to at- 
 tend his lectures would be most welcome, and that he could 
 not think of accepting a fee from him. This was said with 
 such courtesy and sincerity that I had some difficulty in per- 
 suading him that I was still a student and particularly in 
 need of instruction on practice. My preceptor had always 
 told me it was not worth studying, and would be hammered 
 into me soon enough when I got into business. I may be 
 allowed to say in passing that in the long run this may have 
 been good advice, but it was very uncomfortable for the 
 recipient. Many a bad quarter of an hour I had for several 
 years in learning small matters that any office boy could have 
 told me offhand, and in keeping my ignorance from clients, 
 who had no regard for the distinction between book knowl- 
 edge of what to do and practical ignorance of how to do it. 
 Another illustration was even more trifling, but of a kind 
 that might readily have produced a sensation of ridicule or of 
 annoyance. Standing one summer day in front of the bath 
 houses of the Stockton Hotel at Cape May, I heard a gentle- 
 man say to two elegantly dressed ladies, "Here comes Mr. 
 McCall now;" and as Mr. McCall, just out of the water, 
 came up, the gentleman, with great lack of tact, stopped him 
 and presented him to the ladies. A bathing suit is not a 
 thing of beauty now, and was still less so then. But no 
 prince in his robes of state could have been more courtly than 
 Mr. McCall in his wet and unkempt hair and dripping flan- 
 
64 Law Association Centennial 
 
 nels. With no excuse or apology for his appearance, no sign 
 of irritation or even disturbance at the maladroit introduc- 
 tion, he stopped a moment, exchanged a few sentences with 
 the party, and then bowed and passed on to his bath-house 
 as serenely as if he had been at a state ball. Trivial as the 
 occurrence was it has remained in my memory through all 
 these years as a perfect illustration of perfect manners. This 
 quality so pervaded Mr. McCall's personality that it, to some 
 extent, overshadowed the rest. I think even his friend and 
 eulogist, Mr. Isaac Hazlehurst, was unconsciously led by it 
 to underrate his intellectual capacity and his professional 
 acquirements. 
 
 On the death of Mr. McCall, George W. Biddle, the 
 vice-chancellor, succeeded by virtue of seniority to the 
 chancellorship. He was the junior of a group of excellent 
 lawyers that dominated the active bar when I came to it. 
 George M. Wharton, Henry M. Phillips, St. George Tucker 
 Campbell, and William L. Hirst were the four leaders, sev- 
 eral, if not all, of whom were in every important case. Mr. 
 Meredith was the recognized head of the bar, but he rarely 
 appeared in jury trials, and never without a junior. Mr. 
 Biddle was a few years younger than these. He was born 
 in Philadelphia, January ii, 1818; studied law with Judge 
 Cadwalader, and was admitted to the bar at the age of 
 twenty-one in January, 1839. His progress, I think, was 
 not rapid; for, when I went to his office in the fall of 1855, 
 his practice was still very moderate. But he was elected to 
 Common Council about that time, and soon became known as 
 a diligent and attentive member and a clear, forcible speaker. 
 His practice grew rapidly from that time, and after the death 
 or retirement of his immediate seniors whom I have named, 
 he occupied a prominent place in the eyes of the bar and the 
 public. It was natural that he should do so, for he was a 
 good lawyer, and, as I have said, a clear and forcible speaker, 
 with a command of choice and vigorous English, and above 
 all, he was at his best in the trial of cases, which the general 
 
/ ,.,„! ,1 I'nnill,::' h, TI,«:J:,,< S;.// 
 
 "")'j i c)N'":e/.' I, 
 
 6 V V 1 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 65 
 
 public are apt to think is the only thing a lawyer has to do. 
 His mind was slow, but it quickened under the stimulus of a 
 contest in court ; for he had something of the fighting instinct 
 which his family have from time to time shown in the mili- 
 tary and naval service of the country. In his later years, 
 after his sons grew up, he became interested in young men, 
 and was regarded with a sort of filial devotion by a large 
 number of students in the offices of his sons as well as his 
 own. He was vice-provost of the Law Academy, and in 
 that capacity wrote several valuable addresses, one on the 
 "Lien of Debts of Decedents ;" one on "Contribution among 
 Terre Tenants," and a "Eulogium on Chief Justice Shars- 
 wood." 
 
 In the Tilden and Hayes presidential contest he was 
 one of the so-called "visiting statesmen" in Florida in the 
 interests of Tilden. His last public service was as member 
 of the Constitutional Convention of 1873. 
 
 He resigned the chancellorship in 1891, and died April 
 29, 1897. 
 
 On the resignation of Mr. Biddle in 1891, Mr. McMur- 
 trie was elected his successor, and no tribute more honorable 
 alike to electors and elected was ever paid by the profession 
 to one of its members ; for he commanded it, as he deserved 
 it, solely by force of abilities, attainments and character. He 
 had few of the elements of general popularity, and the few 
 he had he took no pains to cultivate. He was a man of dis- 
 tinct and strongly marked personality. In these days of col- 
 lege and law school bred men, rounded, smoothed and polished 
 into uniformity of excellence, individuality is less common 
 than in the office bred days, which Mr. Dickson has spoken 
 of this afternoon. I am not complaining; the progress of 
 the age is in that direction, and it would be useless to strive 
 against it. Men of affairs who come to the front will 
 always have strong individual traits ; but environment counts 
 also. For general utility, the wholesale product of the fac- 
 tory may be a better article; but it lacks the interest, and 
 
 5 
 
66 Law Association Centennial 
 
 somewhat of the artistic quality of the work that comes from 
 the hands of the individual workman. 
 
 Richard Coxe McMurtrie was bom on a farm in Bur- 
 lington County, N. J., October 24, 1819. His father was 
 an officer in the Navy, and he was named after his maternal 
 uncle, the Hon. Richard S. Coxe, for many years an eminent 
 member of the bar of the District of Columbia. He re- 
 ceived his education in Burlington at the noted school of 
 Mr. Gummere; afterwards at the Muhlenburg School at 
 Flushing, L. I., and entered Bristol College, Penna., but that 
 institution closed its doors before he graduated. Being of- 
 fered a position by Commodore Perry, a friend of his father, 
 he entered the Navy as a captain's clerk, and spent more than 
 a year there. He then came to Philadelphia, and began his 
 studies in the office of Mr. Henry Mcllvaine, and was ad- 
 mitted to the bar in November, 1840. 
 
 Fortunately — I use his own word — business came to 
 him very slowly. But he was a diligent student then, as 
 indeed all his life, even by his own severe standard. In his 
 remarks at the bar meeting on the death of Chief Justice 
 Sharswood, he said : "Students in the proper sense of the 
 word are extremely rare; as a general rule, studentship, in 
 our profession, is impossible. It is idle to talk of a man 
 who is working twelve or fourteen hours a day being a stu- 
 dent; there is no possible time left to him for such study. 
 * * * Those who are fortunately kept back a few years 
 have an advantage over their less fortunate colleagues ; for, 
 after they are once started on a successful career, I think all 
 opportunity for studentship is lost." When in 1845 ^'"• 
 Barr was appointed the first official reporter for the State, 
 Mr. McMurtrie was already sufficiently known to promi- 
 nent members of this bar to be recommended by them for 
 assistant reporter. He filled that position until after Mr. 
 Barr's death in 1849, though his name does not appear on 
 the title page until 2 Jones. 
 
 It was my great good fortune on admission to take the 
 adjoining office to his at 416 Walnut Street, and thus I came 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 67 
 
 to know him well. Nothing could exceed his kindness. He 
 had a large library which he put freely at the service of the 
 young men in the building, saying only, "When you take a 
 book out of the office, put a slip of paper in its place, with 
 your name and the date so that if I happen to want it in 
 a hurry I will know where it is." He had been at the 
 bar eighteen years, and success was coming to him, though 
 he did not then, or ever, command the large popular 
 clientage that his ability entitled him to. But he had a 
 most honorable and agreeable, if not most lucrative prac- 
 tice, for it was like that of an English barrister — more than 
 half his clients were other lawyers. His learning was 
 not only profound and accurate, but at his immediate com- 
 mand. Judge Sharswood has said that the point is not so 
 much to know the law as to know where to find it. In the 
 broad field of modem jurisprudence that is probably the 
 best that the average man, even of studious habits, can hope 
 for. Mr. McMurtrie could do better; he had it always 
 within command. I do not think he often had occasion in 
 later years to search the digests. But he kept a commonplace 
 book for such points in his reading as struck him as worthy 
 of preservation. Most of us did so in that day; but, as 
 business came to us, the book gradually fell in arrears and 
 was finally abandoned. Mr. McMurtrie kept his up, though 
 of course the things that struck him as new or worth noting 
 in his reading grew fewer and fewer as his knowledge ex- 
 panded. I went to him once, after I was on the bench of 
 the Supreme Court, for help on a question which the paper 
 books had passed over, and on which I found it difficult to 
 get a starting point. He hesitated a moment and said : "I 
 can't answer that offhand, but I know that I have read some- 
 thing about it within a few years, and I have it in my book." 
 He got down his book, and in a moment gave me a reference 
 to an authority which started me on the desired line of in- 
 vestigation. His accuracy and readiness of knowledge 
 became known to his fellow-members of the bar, and he was 
 taken into cases by them at first for preliminary advice, and 
 
68 Law Association Centennial 
 
 later into trials where legal lines were likely to be closely 
 drawn, and the extent and accuracy of his learning would 
 enable him to point out with precision whether the evidence 
 fell within or without the boundaries. His later practice, I 
 think, came to him mainly in this way. He was a book 
 lawyer in his early life and had a great contempt for juries, 
 their ignorance and their stupidity. He was far too sincere 
 and open not to show it. But later, as he grew into court 
 practice, he appreciated the merits of a tribunal of common- 
 place men to judge of matters and controversies between 
 men of the same kind. He changed his views, and it is 
 evidence of the elasticity as well as the vigor of his intellect 
 that he became a skillful advocate after the age of fifty. He 
 was the most honest man intellectually that I have ever 
 known. He carried fidelity to the court beyond its actual 
 requirements, and trenched somewhat on the judicial prov- 
 ince — ^perhaps, I ought to say, fidelity to the law rather than 
 fidelity to the court. At the. bar meeting upon his death it 
 was well said by Judge Biddle that Mr. McMurtrie, "if ever 
 a man did, certainly loved his profession, and loved it with a 
 sort of romantic attachment. Any man who violated the 
 great principles of the law was to him a man who could not 
 be tolerated for an instant. No matter from what source 
 the law came, whether from the highest courts in the land or 
 the humblest individual, if it was bad law Mr. McMurtrie 
 looked upon it as a forgery, as a counterfeit, as equivalent to 
 an attempt to pass money which was not entitled to be cur- 
 rent ; and he had no other rule of treating such a thing than 
 by hammering the metal on the counter and denouncing the 
 man who attempted to offer it." With these views he would 
 not argue what he did not personally believe to be the law, 
 even though it might be open to a fair doubt — something of 
 a drawback to an advocate, but it gave him great weight 
 with courts, and even with juries ; for it was plain enough to 
 make itself felt even by them. 
 
 The only public office, so far as I know, that he ever 
 held was as a member of the Board of Guardians of the 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 69 
 
 Poor. The board, at that time, did not stand well in the 
 public estimation; there was dissension and trouble, and 
 there was great need of a strong man to restore public con- 
 fidence. The place was pressed upon him, and accepted with 
 reluctance. The duties were outside of his line of life, and 
 only a sense of public duty induced him to undertake them. 
 But he became very much interested ; he told me himself how 
 he had gone to St. Luke's Hospital in New York and there 
 had seen the neat, pleasant-mannered and intelligent ladies 
 who were acting as nurses ; and he came back sick at heart 
 with the rough, uncouth biddies that were doing like duties 
 at the Municipal Hospital. He entered with great earnest- 
 ness and gave the weight of his influence to the movement 
 that brought into service the English trained nurses, and 
 changed the whole management of the hospital and of the 
 board itself. 
 
 Under a brusque exterior, which totally ignored the 
 small graces of life, he was at heart as kindly a gentleman as 
 ever breathed. His brusqueness was not due to disregard of 
 other people's feelings, but to a pervading and controlling 
 intellectual sincerity which saw no reason why the plain 
 truth should not be even bluntly spoken at all times. Per- 
 haps it was also due partly to one deficiency in the make-up 
 of so accomplished a lawyer — he had small sense of humor. 
 His mind was of a serious and earnest cast. He had no pa- 
 tience with folly of any kind, and he was apt to look at any 
 attempt at fun in the business of life as inexcusable frivolity. 
 The late Charles E. Lex, an excellent lawyer with an irre- 
 pressible humor, well described as a lambent flame that 
 played about everything but never scorched, used to say that 
 when he had a leisure quarter of an hour he knew no more 
 entertaining way of spending it than to tell McMurtrie a 
 joke, and have him analyze it and show him logically how 
 there was no fun in it. Many anecdotes, illustrative of his 
 personal traits of character and manners, are current. But I 
 will give only one, which has the merit of authenticity and 
 displays his absolute intellectual integrity, his freedom from 
 
7o Law Association Centennial 
 
 vanity or pride of opinion and his genuine kindness of heart. 
 Soon after the city passed under the act of 1885, commonly 
 known as the BulHtt Bill, a question arose upon the powers 
 of the Board of Guardians of the Poor. Mr. McMurtrie 
 gave an opinion, and shortly afterwards City Solicitor War- 
 wick gave an official opinion favoring a different construc- 
 tion of the act. Mr. McMurtrie sought a conference, and 
 at the end of it wrote a letter, concluding with this sentence, 
 "You have convinced me that I was wrong, and your con- 
 struction is the right one." A more generous tribute was 
 never paid by the acknowledged head of the bar to a young 
 official, and to make it more emphatic Mr. McMurtrie, for 
 the only time in his life, sent his letter to the public press. 
 He died October 2, 1894, and in an obituary notice it 
 was said : "He had the gift of hard and rugged speech which 
 served to make his meaning both clear and forcible; and 
 while, in a long, active and aggressive life, many disagreed 
 with him, no man ever questioned his sincerity, his abilities 
 or his innate kindness of heart." This was the view of the 
 general public, and is a just though by no means indulgent 
 judgment. I would add that he bore well that supreme test 
 of a man's qualities — that those who knew him best thought 
 the most highly of him. 
 
 His successor, the last of those whose departure we 
 have to mourn, was Joseph Brevitt Townsend, whom, I 
 doubt not, even the youngest of those present remember. 
 He was born at Townsontown, near Baltimore, December 13, 
 1 82 1. His parents moved to Marshalltown, Chester County, 
 Penna., when he was about four years old, and he was edu- 
 cated at Bollmar's Academy, West Chester. He came to 
 Philadelphia in 1837, and began the study of the law with 
 Eli K. Price, with whom he preserved a close and lifelong 
 intimacy and business connection. He was admitted on the 
 twelfth of December, 1842, and died October 11, 1896; and, 
 during all that period, filled an honorable and most useful 
 place at the bar and in the community. He was a well-read 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 71 
 
 lawyer; a wise and prudent counselor, rather a practitioner 
 in real estate and office matters than in active litigation, 
 though he was concerned in many important causes. He 
 gave valuable services to many worthy public charities, was 
 a manager of the Pennsylvania Hospital, and president of 
 the Trustees of the Jefferson Medical College. His profes- 
 sional standard was of the highest and he lived up to it. 
 Throughout his life he showed that firmness of character 
 could be united with amiability of temper and cordiality of 
 manner. His election to the chancellorship in 1894 was a 
 spontaneous tribute to the man as well as to the lawyer ; and 
 I cannot better express the universal feeling upon his death 
 than in the words of Judge Thayer at the bar meeting : "He 
 breathed his last breath, and departed from the scene of his 
 lifelong labors amidst the regrets of all who knew him. 
 How many have felt the comfort of his cheerful, contented 
 and helpful spirit all about him, like the fabled influence 
 which the astrologists in olden days attached to some benefi- 
 cent star which rose and accompanied a human life and 
 threw about its path its constant and healthful radiance." 
 
 Any account, however brief, of the Law Association 
 would be both incomplete and ungrateful if it failed to make 
 special mention of the services of two men to whom, more 
 than to any others in its history, it is indebted — John Wil- 
 liam Wallace and Asa I. Fish. For nearly forty years, to- 
 gether and in succession, as librarian and treasurer, they 
 gave the association, and particularly the library, that close, 
 steady, intelligent personal attention without which it could 
 hardly have continued to exist, certainly not to prosper. 
 What is everybody's business is nobody's business is as true 
 of corporate as of public affairs. A hard working and very 
 busy bar troubled themselves little about the needs of the 
 association. A good library had always been at their service 
 and they expected it to continue so, without apparent thought 
 of the necessity of their own help beyond the payment of their 
 annual dues. Fortunately the association had in its libra- 
 
72 Law Association Centennial 
 
 rian and its treasurer, two who had deeper and more prac- 
 tical insight into its necessities, and a generous willingness 
 to meet them. Through times of apathy and discourage- 
 ment they never lost heart, but kept on to assured success. 
 For many years prior to the increase of income by the grant 
 of the tax on writs, it may be safely said that the balance on 
 the treasurer's books was almost uniformly in his favor and 
 against the association, but if a desirable lot of books was 
 to be had, or other urgent call for money came, neither Mr. 
 Wallace nor Mr. Fish ever hesitated to advance his own 
 funds for the purchase, and to wait patiently for the some- 
 times long delayed day of payment. It is not too much to 
 say of them, as one of the speakers at Mr. Fish's bar meeting 
 said of him in reference to another society, that through 
 these years they carried the Association on their shoulders. 
 
 John William Wallace may be said to have been a 
 hereditary friend of the association, for he was the son of 
 John Bradford Wallace, a prominent member of the bar, 
 whose interest in the Law Library Company, and services to 
 it have already been noticed. The son was born in Philadel- 
 phia, February 17, 1815. His mother was the sister of 
 Horace Binney. He was graduated from the University of 
 Pennsylvania in 1833, and after studying in the office of his 
 father and later in that of John Sergeant he was admitted to 
 the bar in 1836. It does not appear that he ever addressed 
 himself seriously to the practice of the law, for on the death 
 of his father, a few months after his coming to the bar, he 
 inherited a considerable fortune, and thus was not only 
 relieved from the necessity of hard work, but was afforded 
 ample opportunity for the cultivation of his literary and 
 artistic tastes, which were always strong. In some respects 
 this is to be regretted, for his subsequent professional work 
 as reporter, and in the notes which, after the death of his 
 brother, Horace Binney Wallace, he wrote to the series of 
 Leading Cases, in conjunction with Judge Hare, show that 
 he was a well-read lawyer, with a keen legal mind, which, 
 added to his graces of voice, manner and address could not 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 73 
 
 have failed to bring him to high rank at the bar. But, on 
 the other hand, if he had become engrossed with business, the 
 bar would have missed the honor which his books have 
 brought it, and this association would certainly have been 
 the loser in the deprivation of his assiduous and long con- 
 tinued services to it. 
 
 He was elected librarian and treasurer in 1841, and held 
 the former office until i860 and the latter till 1864. Imme- 
 diately on his appointment he set to work to have the library 
 systematically arranged, and the collection of important 
 books made complete. His taste inclined, even thus early, 
 to the historical and antiquarian and led his attention to the 
 black letter folios of the fathers of the law. These he not 
 only gathered but read, and in a few years produced his 
 volume on "The Reporters," the pioneer and still the un- 
 rivaled authority on that subject. It shows a wide range 
 of reading not only in the law and collateral subjects, but also 
 in general literature and history, and while accuracy of in- 
 formation down even to minute details is scrupulously main- 
 tained, the whole, from the quotation from Dogberry on the 
 title page, "Marry, sir, they have committed false report," 
 through to the last chapter, is presented with vivacity and 
 humor that have made it a classic more interesting to a 
 lawyer than the ordinary novel. 
 
 In 1849 he published a volume of reports of cases in 
 the United States Circuit Court of this (the third) circuit, 
 and between that date and 1871 two other volumes, all of 
 which (following the precedent of the Veseys) are known 
 as "Wallace Jr.'s Reports," to distinguish them from a simi- 
 lar volume by his father. 
 
 In 1864 he was appointed reporter to the Supreme Court 
 of the United States and held that office till the close of 1875, 
 when he resigned. The period covered was one of the most 
 important in the history of the court, including great ques- 
 tions involved in the litigation following the war and the 
 reconstruction of the Southern States. As already said, 
 Mr. Wallace's natural tastes inclined to the literary and 
 
74 Law Association Centennial 
 
 artistic. He had a keen eye for the picturesque and the 
 humorous, and a certain tendency to diffuseness not un- 
 natural to a scholar of full and varied learning who had 
 never been held down by the exigencies of practical work to 
 the observance of brevity. But notwithstanding some criti- 
 cisms which these qualities have called forth, his reports are 
 among the very best that we have. He had made a pro- 
 found study, through the best English models, of the art and 
 practice of reporting, and had a fixed and intelligent theory 
 on the subject; he understood the cases he reported, and his 
 syllabus, though sometimes diffuse, never missed the point of 
 the decision. 
 
 After his resignation of the reportership he devoted his 
 leisure to his favorite studies, delivering occasional addresses 
 on historical subjects, always marked with affluence of learn- 
 ing and grace of style. During the last years of his life he 
 gave time and money and attention to the Historical Society 
 of Pennsylvania, of which he was president from 1868 till 
 his death. 
 
 He died January 12, 1884, aged nearly sixty-nine years. 
 In the preliminary memorandum to 109 U. S. Reports his 
 personality is thus summed up by his successor, Mr. Davis : 
 
 "Mr. Wallace possessed a peculiar and charming culti- 
 vation; his acquaintance with history, biography, belles- 
 lettres, and art was varied and exact, his conversation most 
 attractive, and his old-time courtly manner, whether to the 
 young or the old, brought pleasure to both. Last and best, 
 he was an upright, honored and honorable man, and in pub- 
 lic and private, bore himself throughout as became an Ameri- 
 can gentleman." 
 
 Asa Israel Fish, who succeeded Mr. Wallace as treas- 
 urer in 1864, was born in Trenton, N. J., February 16, 1820. 
 His father, Benjamin Fish, was a resident of Trenton, en- 
 gaged in the transportation business, and was one of the 
 projectors and original directors of the Camden and Amboy 
 Railroad and the Philadelphia Ferry Companies. He sur- 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell 75 
 
 vived his son and died in 1885 in his one hundredth year. 
 The son was graduated from Harvard College in 1842 and 
 from the Harvard Law School in 1844, continued his legal 
 studies in Trenton under the direction of Hon. Henry W. 
 Green, subsequently chancellor of New Jersey, was admitted 
 to the bar there, and then came to Philadelphia and was 
 admitted to our bar in 1846. He got rapidly into a very 
 profitable practice, largely, I think, through his father's in- 
 terests in the corporations named, which had a practical 
 monopoly of all transportation between the two largest cities 
 of the country. New York and Philadelphia, and dominated 
 not only the business but the politics of New Jersey to such 
 an extent that it was jocosely but very frequently spoken of 
 as the State of Camden and Amboy. When I came to the 
 bar, eleven years later, Mr. Fish was largely engaged in 
 admiralty and kindred cases in the United States courts, and 
 in questions arising from collisions or contracts in railroad 
 transportation. He was not, however, fond of the trial of 
 cases in court, and gradually confined himself to office prac- 
 tice, though Mr. Dickson recalled at the bar meeting that he 
 had been one of the counsel in the noted case of Farnham 
 vs. Camden and Amboy Railroad Co., 55 Pa., 53, as late as 
 1867. 
 
 But he was always by preference a bookman. His in- 
 terest and his enthusiasm were for learning. How early this 
 preference was developed appears from the fact mentioned 
 by Alfred Lee, Esq., in a brief memoir of him as dean of the 
 Horace Club, that the subject of his commencement essay at 
 Harvard was "The Faery Superstition in English Litera- 
 ture." In the line of his profession he edited, with notes, 
 Selwyn's Nisi Prius, Tidd's Practice, Williams on Execu- 
 tors, and supervised the eleventh edition of Troubat and 
 Haly's Practice, of which he rewrote many chapters himself. 
 He was also one of the original editors of the American Law 
 Register, and with Mr. Henry Wharton edited the nine 
 volumes of the first series. 
 
 Of his long continued and unremitting services to the 
 
76 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Law Association I have already spoken. As treasurer for 
 fifteen years he not only attended to its finances, advancing 
 his own money freely at all times when it would serve the 
 library's interests, but he gave constant and watchful care to 
 the selection and purchase of books, was practically the 
 working member of the library committee and rarely missed 
 attendance at its meetings. He was the one to whom the 
 librarian could always resort for patient attention and intelli- 
 gent advice. 
 
 Outside of his profession his interest was all in learn- 
 ing and in literature. He was one of the four founders in 
 1852 of the Shakespeare Society, now the oldest of its kind 
 in the world, and was its dean down to his death. He was 
 also dean of the Horace Club, the Tennyson Club, and a 
 member of the Civil Law Club. To each and all of these he 
 gave diligent and punctual attendance that stimulated the 
 interest of the other members. He was something of a bon 
 vivant also, and his enjoyment of an intellectual discussion 
 over Shakespeare or Horace was none the less because it was 
 to be followed by a choice little menu of the best things of 
 the season. He was a loving alumnus of his alma mater, 
 and usually attended the Philadelphia dinners. I think the 
 warmest and most enthusiastic speech I ever heard from 
 him was in response to the toast to John Harvard. 
 
 In his later years he gave himself without reserve to 
 congenial studies. His means were ample for his needs. 
 He had married but lost his wife and only child early. He 
 filled their place as far as he might by the company of young 
 people of which he continued fond to the last. Kindly and 
 equable in temper, genial in manners, he lived contentedly in 
 the companionship of his books and his friends, and departed 
 this life on the fifth of May, 1879, to the regret of all who 
 knew him. 
 
 I have thus, Mr. Chancellor and gentlemen, performed 
 to the best of my ability the duty you have imposed upon me. 
 In so doing I have given you details and trifles, probably 
 
Historical Address by Chief Justice Mitchell "j"] 
 
 some that you may think below the dignity of history if not 
 of the occasion ; and I have discussed persons and their qual- 
 ities and actions with perhaps imprudent frankness. But 
 here, among brethren of the bar on the occasion of the cen- 
 tennial of an association of lawyers, I have thought it ex- 
 cusable, and a certain obtrusion of my own personal views 
 has been unavoidable. I claim for them only that they are 
 my sincere views, formed and expressed as impartially as 
 the judicial habits of thirty years could inspire. But I have 
 been sufficiently a student of the past to know that the 
 memoirs, the ana, the side lights of history derive their inter- 
 est and their value from small details and from frankness and 
 sincerity. "The proper study of mankind is man," and 
 nothing in the whole range of humanity is of such universal 
 interest as the higher grades of gossip. Whether in the 
 classic anecdotes of Plutarch or the lively frivolities of Pepys 
 and Grammont, gossip about notable persons and periods 
 holds its perennial interest in spite of time. In our humbler 
 way we must trust for our excuse to the interest of our audi- 
 ence in the subject, from association, and from community 
 of labors and pursuits in the same field. 
 
 A review of its work redounds to the credit of the Law 
 Association. From the day of small things, through diffi- 
 culties and discouragements, it has fostered a library, now a 
 noble repository of learning in every branch of the law, for 
 scholars as well as for the daily toilers of the profession. It 
 has interested itself in the morals and conduct of the bar 
 with moderation and discretion ; has exerted its influence on 
 legislation as well as on litigation, and always for patriotic 
 and beneficial ends. It has maintained the tone of profes- 
 sional ethics, and has been recognized as doing so with 
 courageous and undeviating fidelity, so that, though it has 
 never had in its membership the majority of the whole bar, 
 it has always had the best, and has been the recognized organ 
 of the highest professional opinion. 
 
 Manners change, and men change with them. The 
 conservatism of the bar has given way somewhat to the un- 
 
78 Law Association Centennial 
 
 deniable, perhaps irresistible tendency of the age towards 
 commercialism. All the mbre need is there to hold fast to 
 ancient ideals, so that at all times the nucleus, even if small, 
 shall preserve high and noble traditions. 
 
 In the confidence derived from the study of what our 
 predecessors have done, we look forward to the younger men 
 to make a like record for the century to come. 
 
 The following note, giving subsequent details as to the library, has 
 been prepared by Mr. Hewitt : 
 
 Samuel Dickson, now the Chancellor of the Law Association, succeeded 
 Mr. Wallace as Librarian in December, i860, and upon his resignation in 
 1865, was succeeded by James T. Mitchell, now Chief Justice of Pennsylva- 
 nia. At this time the library had grown to nearly 6000 volumes, crowded 
 into the two rooms in the old District Court building, but it was a very 
 complete collection of Reports. (See ante, p. 24.) 
 
 In 1871 George Tucker Bispham (Chancellor of the Law Association 
 from 1896 to 1899) became the Librarian, and in December, 1872, the books 
 were moved to the third story of the building at the southeast corner of 
 Sixth and Walnut Streets. At this time the library contained 8000 volumes, 
 and some progress had been made in collecting the statute laws of the 
 different States. 
 
 In 1874 Francis Rawle relieved Mr. Bispham of the active cares con- 
 nected with library management, and two years later, in December, was 
 formally appointed Librarian and held this office until August, 1892, when 
 he resigned ; he was subsequently a member of the Library Committee for 
 several years. The long years of Mr. Rawle's incumbency were marked by 
 a notable advance. In this period the income of the Association flowed in 
 somewhat larger currents, and the membership was larger than had been 
 the case in the earlier decades. 
 
 In 1S74 the library possessed some 8500 books. In 1892 the collection 
 numbered 27,000 volumes. The membership in 1874 was 332 ; in 1892, 479. 
 The period was marked by the preparation of the card catalogue and by the 
 continuation of Mr. Baldwin's important collection of the Briefs and Tran- 
 scripts of Records in cases before the Supreme Court of the United States. 
 (See ante, p. 37.) A like collection of paper books of the Supreme Court 
 of Pennsylvania was begun and has since been kept up. The statute law 
 of the various States of the Union received especial attention, and the library 
 advanced in that respect into a leading place. 
 
 In 1887 the growth of the library, and the increased extent of its use 
 by the members of the Association, required more constant attendance on 
 the part of the Librarian than had been possible under the earlier system, 
 and John H. Ingham became Assistant Librarian, holding the position until 
 August, 1892, when Mr. Rawle resigned and the present Librarian, Luther 
 E. Hewitt, was elected. The library has grown to 43,197 volumes (Decem- 
 ber, 1904). From two untrained assistants, who sufficed in 1876, the force 
 has now grown to eight assistants to the Librarian. 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 79 
 
 THE LEADERS OF THE OLD BAR 
 OF PHILADELPHIA 
 
 by 
 
 HORACE BINNEY 
 
 ** One touch of Nature makes the whole world kin, — 
 That all with one consent praise new-born gawds. 
 Though they are made and moulded of things past. 
 And give to dust that is a little gilt 
 More laud than gilt o'erdusted," 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 In the title of these sketches, "The Old Bar of Philadel- 
 phia," refers to the first Bar after the Declaration of Inde- 
 pendence. 
 
 Of the primitive Bar of the Province, we know nothing ; 
 and next to nothing of the men who appeared at it from 
 time to time, up to the termination of the Colonial govern- 
 ment. The statement of Chief Justice Tilghman, in the Bush 
 Hill case,^ reveals to us all we know, and all that probably we 
 can ever know, in regard to the subject; for, as the grandson 
 of Tench Francis, who was Attorney-General in 1745, and 
 connected by marriage and association with the most eminent 
 families of the bar, he knew as much of the former bar 
 as any of his contemporaries, and they have all long since 
 departed without adding anything to what he left. "From 
 what I have been able to learn," said the Chief Justice, "of 
 the early history of Pennsylvania, it was a long time before 
 she possessed any lawyers of eminence. There were never 
 wanting men of strong minds, very well able to conduct the 
 business of the Courts, without much regard to form. Such 
 in particular, was Andrew Hamilton, the immediate prede- 
 cessor of Mr. Francis, and the father of the testator ; but Mr. 
 Francis appears to have been the first of our lawyers who 
 mastered the technical difficulties of the profession. His 
 
 1 Lyle V. Richards, 9 Serg. & Rawle. 
 
8o Law Association Centennial 
 
 precedents of pleadings have been handed down to the present 
 day; and his commonplace book, which is in my possession, 
 is an evidence of his great industry and accuracy." "Mr. 
 Francis succeeded Mr. Hamilton, and Mr. Chew succeeded 
 to Mr. Francis, in the office of Attorney-General, and in pro- 
 fessional eminence." 
 
 Mr. Chew remained at the bar until 1774, and was 
 Chief Justice of the Supreme Court from that time until the 
 former order of things passed away ; and although there are a 
 few other names, at the same epoch, to be added to these 
 three, yet the narrowness of the tradition, taken altogether, 
 the constitution of the Provincial Supreme Court, in which 
 the Chief Justice was commonly the only lawyer, the total 
 absence of every note of judicial decision until 1754, and the 
 all but total until after 1776, had caused that Bar to disap- 
 pear from nearly all memories at the beginning of the present 
 century; and therefore, in the middle of the fourth genera- 
 tion since the Revolution, I have taken the liberty of referring 
 to the earliest bar under the new order of things, as being 
 the Old Bar of Philadelphia. From that time to the present, 
 the bar of this City has been an identity, superintended by 
 competent and frequently very able judges, whose proceed- 
 ings have been vouched by authoritative reports, and having, 
 at all times, among its leaders, men of legal erudition and 
 ability. It is not, however, to ignore the primitive bar, so 
 much as to give its due precedence to the first bar of the 
 Commonwealth as a scientific bar, and as the true ancestry 
 of the present bar, that I have used the language in the title- 
 page. ' 
 
 The description of the subjects of sketch as the leaders 
 of the Bar, may appear to be too definite; but although 
 definite, it is not meant to be exclusive. It must not imply 
 that there were no others who held the position of leaders. 
 The three in particular were the seniors, by a few years, of 
 all the bar, and were generally the most prominent in the 
 professional as well as in the public eye. My own freer asso- 
 ciation with them has induced me to select them from the 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 8i 
 
 body, and to pay to them a debt which, though it may have 
 too little dignity to be called a debt to the law, is a debt 
 or duty to their learning and ability in the law. In the 
 new order of things introduced by the American Revolu- 
 tion, these gentlemen largely contributed to establish the 
 reputation of the bar of this City. Their professional ex- 
 ample and learning were of great and extensive use in their 
 day, and ought to be handed down by something better than 
 such fugitive pages as these. 
 
 A lawyer who has passed his youth and early manhood 
 in the society of such men, is the happier for it through life, 
 and especially in old age. On all occasions of vexation or 
 weariness with things near at hand, he can escape at pleasure 
 into the past of these men, which was full of their influence, 
 full also of judicial independence and dignity, and full of 
 professional honor, with unlimited public respect ; f rom^ which 
 scene the few clouds that are to be found in the clearest skies 
 have been absorbed or dispelled by time, and to which the 
 clouds of his own day, if there are any, cannot follow him. 
 
 Philadelphia, March, 1859. H. B. 
 
 William Lewis. 
 
 It may be thought that I select a very narrow and local 
 theme when I attempt to sketch some of the personal and 
 professional characteristics of a lawyer of the Philadelphia 
 bar, who was little more than a lawyer, though he was a 
 great lawyer, and who culminated in his profession more 
 than sixty years since. But I adopt the theme, in some de- 
 gree, because it is narrow and local, and is therefore more 
 within my compass; and because it is beyond the memory 
 of most of the living, and therefore, in the advantages of 
 personal recollection, is pretty much an octogenarian per- 
 quisite of my own. What I write upon the subject, cannot 
 be of any general interest. It is too remote, and too limited. 
 
 6 
 
82 Law Association Centennial 
 
 It wants the essential, and, at this day, all-engrossing attrac- 
 tions of the new and the various or diversified; and it will 
 want, what alone can supply the place of these attractions, 
 a treatment that is a substitute for the subject. But it is a 
 debt that I would pay; the joint debt, perhaps, of several, 
 which has fallen, according to law, upon the longest liver; 
 and I would pay it for them and for myself. A general in- 
 terest in the transaction is therefore comparatively indififer- 
 ent to me. I expect, consequently, that no one out of the 
 Pennsylvania bar, and very few who are not of the Phila- 
 delphia bar, will look at it; and, except to this bar, I offer 
 neither invitation nor inducement to put aside for it, even 
 for an hour the more stimulant interests of the day. 
 
 Has not the modern race of lawyers everywhere under- 
 gone some change from the old times, by rising or falling 
 into the Athenian category, — the very large class of those 
 who spend their time in telling or hearing some new thing ? 
 There are, at least, professional tendencies that way, which 
 make them less and less curious of anything that savors 
 of a former age. Most of the old limitations have been 
 abridged, and the exceptions to them cut away, to save the 
 labor of looking back. Old authorities no longer divide 
 with old wine, the reverence of either seniors or juniors. 
 Most of the old law books, that used to be thought almost 
 as good a foundation for their part of the truth, as the 
 prophets and apostles are for the whole truth, are taken 
 away, I rather think, from the bottom of the building, and 
 thrown into the garret. That Littleton upon whom Coke 
 sits, or seems to sit to the end of things, as Carlyle says, has 
 fewer than of old, I suspect, to sit with hirn for long hours 
 to alleviate the incumbrance. For the most part, as I am 
 told, the incumbent and the succumbent lie together in the 
 dust, which uppermost not many care to know. All the 
 Entries, Brooke, and Coke, and Levinz, and Rastall, and the 
 others, have made their exits some time ago, and will not 
 appear again before the epilogue. Almost any law book 
 that is more than twenty-one years of age, like a single 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 83 
 
 lady who has attained that climacter, is said to be too old 
 for much devotion. Indexes, Digests, and Treatises, which 
 supply thoughts without cultivating the power of thinking, 
 and are renewed with notes and commentaries de die in diem, 
 to spare the fatigue of research, are supposed to be the best 
 current society for student as well as for practitioner. Such 
 are the rumors which float upon the air. "Old things are 
 passed away, all things are new," — a great truth in its own 
 sense when it was first spoken, and always — is now thought 
 to be true in all senses, and renewable from year to year, 
 forever ; and lawyers give as ready a welcome to new things, 
 and turn as cold a shoulder to the old, as the rest of the world. 
 Such is the apprehension. 
 
 I ought therefore to be, and am, very shy about writing 
 anything upon an antiquated subject, with even an apparent 
 direction to this body of men generally; and therefore I 
 repeat that I do not expect the perusal of what I write, 
 either in regard to the very strong and accomplished lawyer 
 whose name is at the head of my page, or of the two whose 
 names are to follow, by any but a few of the lawyers of the 
 Philadelphia bar, either themselves senescent, and in the 
 practice of turning their eyes occasionally backward as 
 well as forward, or some young lawyer, who bears in his 
 veins some of the blood of the old bar; and if the latter 
 description shall do me that honor, I may give him a useful 
 reminder of the oblivion that has fallen upon some of the 
 ablest of the profession, and which will come upon him 
 some day, though he shall live to be among the most able. 
 He may be led, perhaps, to seek an antidote for the appre- 
 hension ; and I can assure him that he will have no difficulty 
 in finding it, if he "seek diligently." 
 
 At the age of the American world in which Mr. Lewis 
 lived, or rather in which he came to adult age and charac- 
 ter in his profession, there was no crowd of cities in our 
 country to prevent a marked local reputation at the bar of 
 a particular city, from passing freely through the length 
 and breadth of the inhabited land; or from being enlarged 
 
84 Law Association Centennial 
 
 by the mist of distance, as is universally the case in such 
 a condition of society. It happened in that day, and prob- 
 ably from this circumstance, that from Maryland to Massa- 
 chusetts, there was, in several of the States, some one name 
 at the bar which, in the view of persons removed a few 
 hundred miles, loomed very large, and overshadowed all 
 other lawyers in the same State. Theophilus Parsons at 
 Boston, Luther Martin at Baltimore, and William Lewis at 
 Philadelphia, were respectively such overshadowing names. 
 In one or two of the instances, the shadow disappeared 
 altogether in coming up to the object; for, at that point, 
 names of less general mark were found to be free from all 
 eclipse. In all, perhaps, the shadow was, by the same ap- 
 proach, reduced to a penumbra. Mr. Parsons, of Boston, 
 was regarded, in Philadelphia, as the first and comparatively 
 the only great lawyer in Massachusetts. In Boston, Mr. 
 Dexter, who was also a great lawyer, was considered his 
 equal in intellectual powers, as indeed he was equal to any 
 one; but in maturity and fulness of legal learning. Parsons 
 was held to be the first. The same, perhaps, may be said 
 in regard to Mr. Martin and one or more of his brethren at 
 the Maryland bar. Nearly the same of Mr. Lewis. But 
 although Mr. Lewis was the senior of the Philadelphia bar, 
 and was in reality a very able as well as eminent lawyer, his 
 reputation was, from accidental circumstances, more tran- 
 scendent abroad than at home. It was very great at home; 
 but there was at least one at his side who, in some respects, 
 stood out in a clearer light before the members of his own 
 bar, and one or two others who were near to them, by what 
 lago calls "the old gradation, where each second stood heir 
 to the first." 
 
 There was at the same period as great learning and emi- 
 nence at the bar of New York, as at any of the bars of the 
 country; but the greatest name at that bar did not belong 
 exclusively, nor even principally, to the bar; and the fame 
 which had followed the greater relations of his military and 
 political life, drew distant attention away from the profes- 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 85 
 
 sional talents which at that time adorned the bar of New 
 York. Such a man as Richard Harison would have been 
 deemed a great lawyer anywhere. Mr. Van Vechten, of 
 Albany, of the old Dutch stock, stood like a sea-wall of the 
 old country, against the irruption of any bad law into the 
 causes he sustained. But both these gentlemen were better 
 known at home than abroad. For large and original spec- 
 ulation, Hamilton was a greater lawyer than either of them ; 
 but in legal erudition, perhaps, not the equal of either. 
 Hamilton's considerable and very available learning in the 
 law, was overshadowed by his learning in public or politi- 
 cal law, by his versatile talents, by his marvellous powers 
 of formation and order in war and government, and by the 
 great relations, military and civil, in which he stood to the 
 coimtry. I am not aware, therefore, of anything, accidental 
 or otherwise, which caused any one name at the Bar of New 
 York, in the last century, to loom so large, in the distance, 
 in its professional dimensions, as to prejudice the pretensions 
 of other names at the same bar. 
 
 This distant reputation was by no means a decisive test 
 of superiority at the bar. It proceeded as often from great 
 public interest in the questions with which the advocate had 
 grappled successfully, as it did from his own general ability 
 and learning. 
 
 There is some proof of this in the reputation of Andrew 
 Hamilton, of whom a word from Chief Justice Tilghman 
 has been said in the Preface. He was not a scientific or 
 thoroughly-trained lawyer; but he gained almost unlimited 
 fame by his defence of John Peter Zenger, in the Supreme 
 Court of New York, upon an information of libel, in the 
 year 1734. It was the spirit of Independence, even at that 
 early day in the Colonies, that lifted him up to general ad- 
 miration, and to professional distinction. And yet his argu- 
 ment, which we have, it is said, from his own pen, treats of 
 no such topic. He merely claimed to liberate the jury from 
 the authority of some disagreeable law, and of an obnoxious 
 Court holding its appointment from the Crown. No lawyer 
 
86 Law Association Centennial 
 
 can read that argument without perceiving, that, while it 
 was a spirited and vigorous, though rather overbearing, 
 harangue, which carried the jury away from the instruction 
 of the Court, and from the established law of both the 
 Colony and the Mother Country, he argued elaborately 
 what was not law anywhere, with the same confidence as he 
 did the better points of his case. It is, however, worth re- 
 membering, and to his honor, that he was half a century 
 before Mr. Erskine, and the Declaratory Act of Mr. Fox, in 
 asserting the right of the jury to give a general verdict in 
 libel as much as in murder; and, in spite of the Court, the 
 jury believed him, and acquitted his client. 
 
 I was familiar with the praise of Mr. Parsons, in Massa- 
 chusetts, while I was receiving my education at Cambridge, 
 and am still thankful for the opportunity I enjoyed of wit- 
 nessing, in the Supreme Court of that State, in a session at 
 Cambridge, for the County of Middlesex, in 1795 or 1796, 
 an exhibition of intellectual gladiature of the brightest kind, 
 between Parsons, as counsel for one Claflin, indicted of 
 blasphemy under a statute of Massachusetts, and James 
 Sullivan, the Attorney-General of the State. The wide repu- 
 tation of Mr. Parsons was in no respect accidental. 
 
 The Court was held by Dana, Chief Justice, Paine, Sum- 
 ner, and Dawes, Justices. The blasphemy I will not repeat, 
 but it gave Mr. Parsons an occasion or opportunity of show- 
 ing up some of the supposed phases of Calvinistic theology, 
 or, more accurately, some of the opinions or statements of 
 writers supposed to be of that school, which gave counte- 
 nance, he thought, to what was charged against Claflin as 
 blasphemy, and were, if anything, rather worse. I supposed, 
 at the time, that there was no other help for Claflin ; and I 
 dare say that, bad as any blasphemy may be, there may be 
 found in some extreme views of very dififerent schools of 
 theology, something quite as bad. But the marvel was, to 
 see the promptness and acuteness with which Parsons re- 
 peated, explained, applied, and enforced his citations in the 
 best form for his client. My imagination fired at the spec- 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 87 
 
 tacle of this omnis homo, as well furnished in theology as in 
 law, and of as much repute for Greek as for English, So- 
 cratic in his subtlety, and not otherwise in his careless dress, 
 his purple bandanna handkerchief curled loosely over his 
 neckcloth, and his reddish-brown scratch, something awry, 
 — he all the while pouring from under it the doctrines he 
 had culled, and weaving them up with the subtlest ingenuity, 
 to make a covering broad enough for Claflin. It was a glory 
 of the bar. But the stiff old Statute was too much for 
 him. I think I recollect a part of Claflin's sentence, so 
 strange to the ear of a Pennsylvania lawyer — that he should 
 sit an hour upon the gallows, with the rope round his neck ! 
 Barring the rope, I should have been willing to sit there 
 for two, not for blasphemy, nor alongside of Claflin, but to 
 hear a repetition of Parsons. When I returned to Phila- 
 delphia, I was not surprised at the reputation which there 
 surrounded the name of Theophilus Parsons. 
 
 William Lewis was a native of Chester County, in the 
 State of Pennsylvania, where his birth took place about the 
 year 1745. Both of these facts, however, rest upon early 
 report, rather than upon authentic record. His condition 
 in early life was that of the sons of country people gener- 
 ally, at that time. He used to say, as I have heard, that he 
 had driven wagon in early manhood; and I know that he 
 was very proud of his skill in driving a pair of spirited 
 horses to his phaeton at an advanced period of his life. 
 His early education was no doubt imperfect; but by the 
 force of strong native powers he acquired, pretty much by 
 self-teaching, a good English education; and while he was 
 studying law in the office of Nicholas Wain, an eminent 
 Quaker and highly respectable lawyer, he mastered enough 
 of Latin and French to read the old Entries and Reports, and 
 he read them faithfully. His literary tincture was light. I 
 rather suspect that it did not amount to what may be called 
 the middle tincture, now pretty common among us; but all 
 his life, after I knew him, he was something of a purist in 
 
88 Law Association Centennial 
 
 language, and very exact in pronunciation, according to the 
 best standards; and, with some satisfaction, would correct 
 an error in either respect by an educated man, which his 
 ear detected at the bar. He must have read law intensely 
 at some period of his life, for no man of his day knew the 
 doctrines of the common law better. 
 
 He came to the bar in Philadelphia before the adoption 
 of the Constitution in 1 776, as his friend, Edward Tilghman, 
 also did. The books in the office of the Prothonotary of 
 the Supreme Court, of that early day, and in that of the 
 Common Pleas of Philadelphia County, from which Mr. 
 Williams has made his printed Catalogue, cannot be relied 
 on as evidence of iirst admissions to the Bar. The Cat- 
 alogue records the admission of Edward Tilghman as of 
 March, 1783; whereas his cousin. Chief Justice Tilghman, 
 says, in Lyle vs. Richards, that he was in practice at the bar 
 in 1774, which was immediately after his return from the 
 Temple. Mr. Lewis, by the same Catalogue, was admitted 
 in September Term, 1777, the first Supreme Court which 
 was held by Chief Justice McKean, after his appointment 
 and that of his associates, in July and August, 1777, under 
 the new Constitution, and was put to flight, in the same 
 month, by the entry of the British into the city. There 
 must have been a previous admission, in these instances, by 
 a Colonial Court. Mr. Lewis's name appears as counsel in 
 one of Mr. Dallas's notes, in September, 1778, a case of 
 high treason, and not a very probable position for a gentle- 
 man in the first year of his practice; and Mr. Tilghman's 
 appears in a case decided at Nisi Prius in August, 1773, 
 which may be a mistake of a year in the date, or the case 
 may have been concluded in Bank in the following year. 
 During the whole of the Revolution, and for years after- 
 wards, Mr. Lewis was engaged in nearly all the important 
 causes, and especially in cases of high treason, for which he 
 had a special vocation and capacity, and of which there was 
 a plentiful crop in our City of Brotherly Love, up to the 
 advent of peace. "For the divisions of Reuben, there were 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 89 
 
 great searchings of heart," in those days; and the oc- 
 cupation of the City by the enemy, from the close of Sep- 
 tember, 1777, to the middle of June, 1778, did not heal nor 
 allay them. Perhaps this city was the only judicial school 
 in the country for the law of treason; and it was in this 
 school that Mr. Lewis got his full growth in crown law, and 
 held his high position in it, pretty much without competi- 
 tion, to the close of the century. In treason causes, he was 
 uniformly on the side of the defendant, and was generally 
 successful; and this was the accident that diffused his repu- 
 tation so far and so widely. He never showed more vigor, 
 self-possession, and dignity, in subsequent periods of his 
 life, than in this description of cause. His deep learning 
 and facility in the law of treason and of other- high crimes, 
 was remarkable. He had studied the law of treason, espe- 
 cially, with passion; and had mastered all its details, the 
 law of its process, evidence, and trial, as well as the offence 
 itself. He knew every vicious excess that had been perpe- 
 trated or attempted in furthering the doctrine of construc- 
 tive treason, for which he felt the utmost abhorrence. He 
 had at the tip of his tongue, all the gibes and scorns that 
 prosecuting attorneys had spit into the faces of the accused, 
 in the oppressive spirit of former times; and would repeat 
 them with disdain at the first symptom of renewal in his 
 presence. I cannot forget the vehemence, amounting to 
 rage, with which, in rebuke of some harsh general reproba- 
 tion of a prisoner upon trial, he arraigned as an example 
 to be forever abjured, the Attorney-General Coke, for his 
 brutal language to Sir Walter Raleigh, on the trial of the 
 bye and the main. "Thou viper! I thou thee, thou traitor." 
 — "Thou art thyself a spider of hell."— "Go to, I will 
 lay thee on thy back for the confident est traitor that ever 
 came to the bar." 
 
 In a letter of the 15th of December, 1778, from President 
 Reed to the father of Jared Ingersoll, afterwards of the 
 Philadelphia bar, which is published in "The Life and 
 Correspondence of President Reed," by his grandson, there 
 
90 Law Association Centennial 
 
 seems to be a pretty broad slur upon the members of this 
 bar at that epoch; on one part of it as not possessing con- 
 siderable abilities, smd upon the rest as being destitute of 
 political virtue. This, at least, is one of the several ver- 
 sions of a clause in the letter. "Qur lawyers here," says 
 President Reed, "of any considerable abilities, are all, as I 
 may say, in one interest, and that not the popular one." 
 President Reed was at that time in the popular interest him- 
 self, though he had been as much opposed as any one to the 
 Constitution of 1776, — its plural executive and single legis- 
 lature, and its universal oath of office to do nothing directly 
 or indirectly to prejudice the Constitution and Government, 
 that is to say, not to alter, or to counsel or attempt the alter- 
 ing of, a single feature of it, — until he took office under it 
 himself. On the happening of that event, he led or fol- 
 lowed a popular interest of a certain kind, in the adminis- 
 tration of Government. Those times had not yet got into 
 joint; and perhaps the best spirit in which to read the 
 words of the contemporary actors on every side, is to make 
 the largest abatement from that which is written with the 
 most bitterness and personality. The "popular interest" 
 was undoubtedly, in one sense, the interest of the Confed- 
 eration, of independence, and of success in the pending 
 conflict. To be false to this, was always a great, and some- 
 times a just reproach. But there was also a "popular in- 
 terest," to some extent, in a prospective policy, that would 
 leave no man at liberty to counsel moderation or temper, 
 either in social intercourse or in, legal regulations, any more 
 than the Constitution of 1776 did to any one of its officers, 
 judicial, civil, or military, in regard to change, or the recom- 
 mendation of change, in its own stipulations. In the eyes 
 of this "popular interest," every Quaker was a Tory or 
 traitor; and all social affinities with that body of men, a 
 body of great respectability, wealth, and order, were re- 
 garded as implicating the party in a lesser or greater treason, 
 like the bye and the main of Sir Walter Raleigh and his 
 friends. We must read such times with the personal glos- 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 91 
 
 sary of the writer or speaker at our side, or we shall often 
 fail to understand them. If President Reed meant to de- 
 scribe James Wilson, John Ross, Alexander Wilcocks, 
 William Lewis, Edward Tilghman, and William Bradford, 
 who were all at the bar in December, 1778, and were unde- 
 niably men of "considerable abilities," as being untrue to 
 the Confederation, to independence, or to the success of 
 the country in her struggle, then he wrote from a very 
 partial and prejudiced view. None of these men certainly 
 were of the prescriptive party, nor were they farther from 
 that than from unfaithfulness to the country. Having some 
 knowledge of President Reed's relations in social life, I can- 
 not believe that such was his meaning. I incline to think that 
 he meant no more by it, than that the able part of the bar was, 
 at that time, on questions of local policy, the losing party 
 at the polls, in which the President was successful. He 
 probably meant no more than to woo his friend's son to his 
 own side in politics, as the best for an opening at the bar; 
 and as the clause admits of this interpretation, I prefer 
 adopting it. Mr. Lewis was an adherent of the Declara- 
 tion of Independence, but he was not bitterly prescriptive ; 
 and was entitled to much higher praise than that of not re- 
 fusing his professional aid to those who were hounded by 
 some of the "popular interest," on account of the treason 
 of quiet wishes and preferences for something better than 
 a prescriptive government. He was a republican, and the 
 open and uniform friend of Washington, and of Washing- 
 ton's friends and principles, as were thousands of the best 
 men in Philadelphia, at the side of Mr. Lewis, who, never- 
 theless, were not, in a certain sense, in the "popular in- 
 terest." 
 
 The prominence of the city of Philadelphia as the seat 
 of the Congress of the Confederation, and her superiority 
 in population and commerce, up to the removal of the seat 
 of the Federal Government to the city of Washington, in 
 1801, may account in some degree, for the diffusion of Mr. 
 Lewis's celebrity, which partook of the distinction awarded 
 
92 Law Association Centennial 
 
 to the city. But it was not in criminal law alone, that he 
 was deemed by other cities, to be the most able man at the 
 bar. He was a person of great intellectual ardor, and of a 
 strong grasp of mind; and both in law and politics, and 
 other matters too, he took firm hold of whatever interested 
 him. His great devotion was, of course, to professional 
 studies. He explored every field of law, common, constitu- 
 tional, international, commercial, and maritime; and with 
 singular predilection, that very intricate close or quarter of 
 the common law in which the doctrine of pleading is, or 
 formerly was, fenced up from easy access, even against many 
 of the profession. If the fences have been lowered, and in 
 some parts prostrated, in modern times, it may be doubted 
 whether it has not been more for the benefit of estrays, than 
 for the culture of the proper flock, and the good of those 
 who profit by their thorough breeding. The abuse of the 
 doctrine has, at times, been excessive, and is properly re- 
 strained or remedied; but the abolition of it, supposing it 
 to be possible, would make a Babel of the court room. It 
 was Mr. Lewis's notion that nothing but good pleading 
 could prevent a "confusion of tongues, upon every important 
 trial ; and every sound lawyer is probably of his opinion. 
 
 He was much interested in the abolition of slavery within 
 the State of Pennsylvania. Since his death, some questions 
 have been raised in regard to the part, whether active or 
 consultative, that he took in promoting the Act of ist March, 
 1780, "for the gradual abolition of slavery in Pennsyl- 
 vania;" and I do not mean to raise any question of my 
 own. But I am perfectly clear that, in his lifetime, and 
 at the beginning of this century, when others who may 
 now be thought to have been actors in the matter, were 
 living, Mr. Lewis was currently spoken of, at the bar, as 
 the draughtsman of that Act. Whether the Preamble, as 
 well as the enacting clauses, were said to have come from 
 his pen, I cannot report, because the distinction has first 
 been made since Mr. Lewis's death. Though, in 1779, he 
 was not a lawyer of long standing, he was abundantly ma- 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 93 
 
 ture for the work, and that was the day of young men in 
 the courts and throughout the country. The old men, in 
 genera], as they always do, and beneficially too, clung to 
 associations of early life, and did not enter freely upon the 
 responsibilties of the new public life that had sprung up 
 around them. 
 
 During the two administrations of Washington, and 
 continuously during life, Mr. Lewis was a thorough Fed- 
 eralist, amusingly anti-gallican, and entirely anti-Jeffer- 
 sonian; and upon law questions of difficulty that arose in 
 the Executive Department, though he was not an official 
 adviser, he was familiarly consulted by General Hamilton, 
 the Secretary of the Treasury, with whom he continued on 
 terms of confidence and mutual respect during General 
 Hamilton's life. The memorable argument of Hamilton, 
 in 1 791, upon the constitutionality of the Bank of the 
 United States, or rather of the Bill to incorporate the Sub- 
 scribers to the Bank, was read to Mr. Lewis before it was 
 sent to the President, as I have heard from Mr. Lewis him- 
 self, as well as from one of General Hamilton's sons; but I 
 have never heard a surmise that it was in any respect 
 altered in consequence of this. Its great principles were 
 discussed between the two, sitting in Mr. Lewis's office, or 
 walking in his garden, until all the reasons of the Secretary 
 of the Treasury, and the answers to the objections of the 
 Secretary of State, and of the Attorney-General, were 
 scrupulously examined and weighed. No lawyer could have 
 been better in such a consultation than Mr. Lewis, who 
 was fertile in the suggestion of doubts, and quick in the 
 solution of them, and had an admirable coup d'ceil to discern 
 the strong and weak points of assault and defence. 
 
 That argument of General Hamilton, it should be re- 
 membered, first enunciated the great rules of interpretation, 
 by which the powers delegated by the people of the United 
 States to Congress, were to be construed; and they were 
 afterwards tested by the Supreme Tribunal of Federal law, 
 and stood the test then and for sixty years from the adoption 
 
94 Law Association Centennial 
 
 of the Constitution. I hope to be excused for thinking that 
 no judicial argument, before or since, has shaken, or ever 
 will shake, those rules of interpretation; and that none 
 other can maintain the constitutional relations of the States 
 and the United States, the one to the other, and give supe- 
 riority to each in its proper sphere. How much the battle- 
 axe of party may make the lighter scale in some measures 
 the heavier in all, remains for future history. None but a 
 parricidal arm would cast it in; nor can it remain there 
 very long without deranging the orbit of each system, and 
 generating a new centre of gravitation, when both systems 
 may be "folded up as a vesture." If State Rights mean 
 anything to the contrary of that argument, they mean that 
 the United States shall not be administered by a fair con- 
 struction of the Constitution, but by the platforms of party. 
 
 It was a compliment of the first order from the great 
 statesman and constitutional lawyer who elicited the argu- 
 ment, to submit it to the lawyer of Pennsylvania, whom 
 he called into consultation ; and Mr. Lewis was justly proud 
 of it, and constantly glorified the man who prostrated, for 
 the time, the political metaphysics of Mr. Jefferson, the 
 first man, on his part, also, who broached the doctrine of 
 strict construction against the United States, and of the 
 most liberal, consequently, for the reserved rights of the 
 people and the States. Mr. Jefferson was a true son of Vir- 
 ginia, in his ambition for State supremacy, until he was 
 elected to the Presidency. After that, he surrendered, with 
 modest diffidence, his doctrine of strict construction, to ob- 
 tain an empire from France. If his friends were satisfied 
 that Louisiana could be brought into the Union without an 
 amendment to the Constitution, he "certainly would acquiesce 
 with satisfaction;" "but the less that was said about any con- 
 stitutional difficulty, the better;" "and it would be desira- 
 ble for Congress to do what was necessary in silence." These 
 are his own words. Happy adaptability ! Greatest of man- 
 agers ! 
 
 Mr. Lewis was always ready to render the like patriotic 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 95 
 
 service to the administration of the Father of his Country; 
 and it was no doubt from this motive, that he accepted the 
 commission of District Judge of the United States for the 
 Pennsylvania District, in the summer of 1791, and held 
 it until the spring of 1792, when Judge Peters was ap- 
 pointed. He must have foregone, for the time, his large 
 professional emoluments, to meet a public exigency on the 
 death of Judge Francis Hopkinson. Mr. Jefiferson, in his 
 letter to Mr. Hammond, on the subject of interest on the 
 British debts during the period of the Revolution, cites the 
 opinion of Mr. Lewis in support of his own views; and to 
 meet this question judicially, was perhaps one of his motives 
 for accepting temporarily the appointment. 
 
 In February, 1794, he was counsel for the petitioners 
 against the election of Albert Gallatin to the Senate of the 
 United States, by the Legislature of Pennsylvania, and was 
 heard before the Senate; the first occasion on which the 
 Senate opened its doors to professional counsel, or to the 
 public. 
 
 The objection to Mr. Gallatin was an alleged defect of 
 citizenship. He was a native of Geneva, in Switzerland. 
 He arrived at Boston, in the United States, in May, 1780; 
 and in October following, he went to reside at Machias, in 
 the District of Maine, where he remained a year, and per- 
 formed some volunteer military service. He afterwards 
 owned land, and resided in Virginia, and took an oath of 
 allegiance to that State in October, 1785; and supposing 
 this, and not his residence and military service at Machias, 
 to have been the commencement of his citizenship, then he 
 had not been a citizen nine years, which the Constitution 
 requires, when elected. The question has ceased to be of 
 any interest; but it was a great point at that day, when a 
 rising party wanted Mr. Gallatin's financial knowledge and 
 quick eye to point their batteries against the policy of 
 Washington. Mr. Lewis gave himself to the frustration of 
 this object with infinite satisfaction, and succeeded in the 
 Senate by a very slim majority. But substantially it was 
 
96 Law Association Centennial 
 
 no success, as Mr. Gallatin was elected to the next House 
 of Representatives. 
 
 But it was in the special field of his profession, that Mr. 
 Lewis best exhibited the depth and the purity of his legal 
 learning and principles, and the fine- ideal of a great lawyer 
 and advocate by which he was animated. His devotion to 
 the maintenance of the just authority of the Court and jury, 
 and of the rights of the bar, and of the parties and people, 
 which the study of the common law is so apt to inspire, 
 was not less, than to the repression of any unjust assump- 
 tion by either of them. In criminal causes especially, what- 
 ever powers or prerogatives had been given by Magna Charta, 
 the Constitution, or the law, either to the Courts or the peo- 
 ple, for the vindication of public justice and order, or for 
 the defence of personal liberty and reputation, had a sleep- 
 less guardian in him ; and he kindled at nothing sooner than 
 an invasion of any of these great securities on any side, to 
 the prejudice of either Court or jury, or of the independ- 
 ence of the bar, or of the full exercise of defence against 
 criminal accusation. In professional life constantly, and in 
 public life when he was called to it, his learning and powers 
 of research, his energy, and his oratory, not seldom rising 
 to the highest order of forensic eloquence, were freely devoted 
 to this his almost ruling passion. 
 
 He achieved a great victory at the bar, and also in the 
 Legislature of Pennsylvania in the year 1788, when a spirit 
 of factious jealousy, under the lead of a very ardent and 
 determined man, aspired to deprive the Supreme Court of 
 the State of one of its most ancient and necessary powers. 
 As counsel, Mr. Lewis had asserted and maintained the 
 right of the Court to punish Colonel Oswald by fine and 
 imprisonment, without trial by jury, for a contempt of 
 Court, in the columns of a newspaper; and in the Legis- 
 lature he defeated a very active effort, by some of the strong- 
 est members of the country, to impeach Chief Justice 
 McKean and certain of the Judges for having exercised the 
 power. He did this, though McKean was no friend of his. 
 
From a Painting hy Thomas Su!l_ 
 
 Ovjned hy ihr ^-Isioc iiilion 
 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 97 
 
 nor he of McKean. The distinction without a difference, 
 except on the wrong side, as to contempts committed out 
 of the presence of the Court, did not then, nor for many- 
 years afterwards, prevail; but prevailed finally by positive 
 enactment, rather more perhaps because it was an abridg- 
 ment of judicial power, the terriculum of the democracy, 
 than for any weightier reason; for the most penetrating 
 and corrupting of contempts, such as requires immediate 
 redress, to take an obstruction out of the very path in 
 which a Court of justice is moving at the time, is a con- 
 tempt out of Court, upon the face of a widely diffused news- 
 paper. The laggard redress by indictment is a mere name 
 and a shadow, as ineffectual as a reprieve after execution 
 executed. As far as I know, it has never been resorted to. 
 The impartial trial of a cause which can be made to excite 
 the public interest and passion, is at this time of day hardly 
 possible in Pennsylvania. The Judges must now see in the 
 public press, everything which prejudice and venality may 
 choose to exhibit to their disturbance; and they cannot pre- 
 vent the jurors from also seeing it. The fillet with which 
 fiction covers the eyes of Justice to make her blind to the 
 inequality of the parties, is taken from her eyes, and her 
 arms are pinioned with it. The old doctrine of contempt 
 of Court is an immense safeguard to trial by jury. 
 
 There was a subsequent occasion, on which Mr. Lewis 
 with much decision asserted the dignity of his profession, 
 and the rights of the defendant and the jury, in opposition 
 to the Court. In this case it was the eloquence of action 
 and not of words. 
 
 He had been counsel for John Fries, an insurgent of 
 Northampton County, in Pennsylvania, upon a former trial 
 before Mr. Justice Iredell, of the Supreme Court of the 
 United States, and Peters, the District Judge, upon an in- 
 dictment for treason, where the law had been fully dis- 
 cussed, and Fries had been convicted. A new trial was 
 awarded by the Court on the ground of declarations by a 
 juror, ascertained by the defendant and his counsel after the 
 
 7 
 
98 Law Association Centennial 
 
 verdict had been rendered. Before a jury was empanelled 
 for the new trial, Mr. Justice Chase, of Maryland, who was 
 in the seat before occupied by Judge Iredell, informed the 
 bar that the Court had made up their opinion upon the law 
 of treason involved in the case; and to prevent being mis- 
 understood, they had reduced it in writing, and had directed 
 copies to be made for the District Attorney, the counsel of 
 Fries the prisoner, and the jury; which were then handed 
 for distribution to the Qerk of the Court, who placed them 
 on the table at the bar. Mr. Lewis with some deliberation 
 and solemnity rose from his seat, slowly approached the 
 papers, and lifting one of them to his eyes, gave a short 
 glance at it, and threw it down upon the table. He then 
 withdrew, and retired fromi the place he had occupied, with- 
 out uttering a word. Mr. Edward Tilghman approached 
 him, said a few words to him about the innovation, and 
 after the transaction of some other business, the Court ad- 
 journed for the day. On the next morning, when the cause 
 was called, Mr. Lewis informed the Court, that upon full 
 and solemn consideration, he declined proceeding as counsel 
 for the prisoner, as the Court had prejudged the law; and 
 Mr. Dallas, his colleague, declared himself to the same 
 effect, though with a hesitation, he said, which he would 
 not have felt, if the Court had not appointed him as assist- 
 ant counsel for the prisoner. There was profound silence, 
 and deep sensation at the bar, and the Court had no doubt 
 been previously led to expect it; for Judge Chase informed 
 the counsel, that they were not bound by the opinion, but 
 might contest it on both sides, and Judge Peters expressed 
 a wish that the counsel would proceed, and take the course 
 they should think proper. The papers, he said, were with- 
 drawn. The Judge had probably deferred to Judge Chase, 
 and let the papers go as the opinion of the Court, without 
 any very cordial sanction. Mr. Lewis, with few, but distinct 
 and solemn words, replied: "The Court has prejudged the 
 law of the case — the opinion of the Court has been declared 
 — after such a declaration, the counsel can have no hope of 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 99 
 
 changing it, — the impression of it must remain with the 
 jury, — the counsel, therefore, will not act in behalf of the 
 prisoner." The effect was electric; for Mr. Lewis had the 
 full sympathy of the bar. 
 
 Judge Chase, however, did not forget his personal dig- 
 nity, nor the dignity of the bench, upon hearing this definite 
 reply. He immediately rejoined to the effect, that then, with 
 God's help, the Court would be the counsel of the prisoner, 
 and would see that he had a fair trial. And no doubt he 
 had a fair trial, and was convicted a second time, and sen- 
 tenced to death. But the pardon that ensued was not im- 
 probably induced, in part, by what had happened. The 
 life of the prisoner was saved, and the conduct of Judge 
 Chase was made an article of the impeachment subsequently 
 preferred against him by the House of Representatives ; and 
 sixteen out of thirty-four senators recorded against him, 
 upon that charge, the vote of guilty. The larger number 
 voted for his acquittal, upon the ground, probably, of the 
 absence of all corrupt or oppressive intention. It was ac- 
 knowledged that the previously declared opinion of the Court 
 had been sound in point of law. 
 
 I was present at this scene, in April, 1800, and have given 
 it as my memory retains it. The act of the Court was not 
 regarded by the bar as one of intended oppression of either 
 the prisoner or his counsel, but as a great mistake, result- 
 ing, in part, from the character of the principal judge, a 
 very learned and able man, but confident and rather im- 
 perious, and in part from his greater familiarity with the 
 Maryland practice, where the judge used to respond, and 
 perhaps still does, more exclusively for the law, and the 
 jury for the facts, or rather more dividedly or separately, 
 than was, in point of form, the usage in Pennsylvania. In 
 a criminal cause like this, however, the course of the Court 
 would probably have been regarded as a mistake anywhere. 
 It served as a signal lesson tO' stimulate the sense of profes- 
 sional independence, in asserting all the rights of counsel, 
 
loo Law Association Centennial 
 
 of the accused, and of the jury, in criminal causes; and 
 fitly closed Mr. Lewis's career in this description of case. 
 
 The range of judicial questions which occurred between 
 the peace of 1783, with Great Britain, and the end of the 
 last Federal Administration of the Government, in the year 
 1801, the most brilliant part of Mr. Lewis's professional 
 life, and when his intellectual powers were certainly in 
 their zenith, was remarkably large and important. Before 
 the country had attained the lawful age of man or woman, 
 the fullest demands for judicial wisdom and experience 
 were upon it. Questions of prize and of the jurisdiction 
 of the admiralty, — questions concerning the rights of am- 
 bassadors and the privileges of consuls, — concerning the 
 obligations of neutrality, the right of expatriation, the right 
 of naturalization by the States, the construction of the treaty 
 of peace with Great Britain, the case of the Virginia debts, 
 and of confiscations and attainders complete or incomplete 
 before the peace, the constitutional powers of the Federal 
 Courts, the powers of Congress, the constitutionality of the 
 carriage tax, the nature and characteristics of direct taxes 
 imposed under the Federal Constitution, — questions of con- 
 flict between the authority of the States and of the United 
 States, and between the States severally under the Confeder- 
 ation, and cases of high crimes, both at sea and on land, 
 against the United States, were rising up from day to day 
 for solution ; and in most of them Mr. Lewis took a part, and 
 held a position, that was worthy of the questions, and worthy 
 of his own powers also. 
 
 His general manner in arguing an important cause, can- 
 not be well appreciated by the reader, without some recol- 
 lection of his rather peculiar person and countenance; and 
 yet the effect of the whole man in action, was so remote or 
 different from the appearance of his person at rest, that no 
 one could infer the one from the other. At rest, strictly 
 speaking, he never was, while in Court; but when he was 
 not trying or arguing a cause, he was quizzing or joking, 
 or mooting or smoking, generally in a state of unrest. 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar ioi 
 
 "When fully engaged in argument he saw nothing and thought 
 of nothing but his cause ; and, in that, would sometimes rise 
 to the fervor and energy of a sibyl. 
 
 He was about six feet in height as he stood, and would 
 have been more if he had not been bent back to a perpendicular 
 from the curve, — not a stoop of the shoulders, — in which 
 he habitually inclined forward. At the same time he was 
 very spare of flesh, and destitute of almost all dimensions 
 but length. 
 
 His countenance was intellectual, but its general effect 
 was hurt by his spectacles, and by the altitude and length 
 of his nose, of which nevertheless, he was immensely 
 proud. The nose so entirely absorbed the expression of his 
 eyes and the rest of his features, that most of the young 
 gentlemen at the bar, in his time, could draw a striking 
 likeness of Mr. Lewis, by a simple outline of his nose. When 
 the spectacles were entirely removed from his eyes, to see or 
 read near at hand, you perceived that their expression was 
 kindly and gentle ; but when he looked through his glasses at 
 the Court or jury, they assumed the expression that belonged 
 to the sentiment or passion that moved him, and sometimes it 
 was a rather truculent one. 
 
 He abominated the Galilean invention, as he called it, of 
 pantaloons, and stuck to knee breeches all his life! and, 
 under the same prejudice, he adhered to hair powder and a 
 cue, because the French revolutionists had first rejected 
 them from their armies. When he presented himself, in 
 what he deemed the only forensic dress, a full suit of black 
 and powdered head, even a stranger would expect to hear 
 something worth hearing from that animated and imposing 
 figure; and by the first sentences of his speech, usually ad- 
 dressed, with a self-confident sweep of the head, and in a 
 deep baritone voice, to the Court, and, if necessary, to the 
 jury, the attention of every one would be arrested. 
 
 His first attitude was always as erect as he could make it, 
 with one hand insinuated between his waistcoat and his 
 shirt, and the other lying loose upon his loin; and in this 
 
102 Law Association Centennial 
 
 position, without any action but that movement of the head, 
 he would utter two or three of his first sentences, generally 
 well-prepared to introduce some notice of the position and 
 solicitude of his client, or some special characteristic of the 
 case, and almost universally, some general principle or truth 
 that he held to underlie his client's cause, and to bespeak the 
 favor of the Court and jury. Then, with a quick move- 
 ment, and sometimes with a little jerk of the body, he would 
 bring both his hands to his sides, and begin the action. 
 And it was pretty vehement action from that time to the 
 conclusion; his head dropping or rising, his body bending 
 or straightening up, and his arms singly or together re- 
 lieving his head, and doing their part of a rather animated 
 duty, but without a vestige of grace or preparation in any 
 of his movements, all of them, however, sympathizing with 
 the temper or expression of the moment. His voice never 
 failed him. It was deep, sonorous, and clear to the last; 
 and his pronunciation, without the least monotony or affec- 
 tation, always conformed to the best standards in the lan- 
 guage. 
 
 He had one, and I think only one, peculiarity, which 
 never deserted him in solemn speaking, though it was not 
 observable in conversation. It was not, strictly speaking, 
 an accent, nor a pronunciation, but rather had the air of an 
 impediment, — a lingering upon a few unemphatic words as 
 if he could not get them out. It was no impediment, how- 
 ever; but he dwelt upon them with the purpose of making 
 them more emphatic. Clear and plain were two of these 
 words. He was sometimes faulty in his taste, even in a 
 grave harangue; and one of the recollections of this which 
 remains the most distinctly with me, reminds me of this 
 peculiarity, and at the same time of his sleepless anti-galli- 
 canism. 
 
 He was arguing a very grave cause in the Supreme 
 Court of the United States on a morning which had brought 
 the news of some fresh atrocity in the French Revolution; 
 and, after laying down a position of law, and proving or de- 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 103 
 
 fending it with great strength and skill, having no relation 
 however to France, or to the Revolution, or to anything 
 associated with either, he exclaimed, "And this, may it please 
 your Honors, is as cul-lear, and as pul-lain as that the Devil 
 is in Paris, and that nobody can doubt." Plain was always 
 pul-lain, and clear cul-lear, in Mr. Lewis's solemn arguments. 
 There were two or three other words of one syllable, with 
 an / as the turning letter, that he clung to in the same manner 
 in his harangues. 
 
 It may be perceived, from this account of him, that Mr. 
 Lewis never dozed in his speeches, nor let any one else 
 doze, who was within hearing. Yet he was never vocifer- 
 ous. His voice was not sweet, but it was a fine working 
 voice for a court room. He was animated, sonorous, and 
 continuous or sustained to the end, without break or pause, 
 except to lift his spectacles, and cast his eye upon his sheet 
 of notes ; and he brought all his arguments to a close within 
 a reasonable compass of time. 
 
 It would be regarded by every one who knew him, as a 
 defect in this description of Mr. Lewis, if two or three of 
 his maculce, perhaps nebulas, were painted out, or left without 
 notice, since he was as well known by them as by his better 
 parts, and he took as little pains to cover them up. The 
 spots or clouds were in the outward man, and the deepest 
 of them not so deep perhaps as he inclined to have it 
 thought. They did not touch his professional integrity, nor 
 his fidelity to the law. 
 
 He smoked cigars incessantly. He smoked at the fire- 
 place in Court. He smoked in the Court Library. He 
 smoked in his office. He smoked in the street. He smoked 
 in bed; and he would have smoked in church, like Knock- 
 dunder, in the Heart of Mid Lothian, if he had ever gone 
 there. The servitude was unremitting, as to a most im- 
 perious master. It did not look like an accommodation 
 to health or to taste, but like submission to a conquest by 
 external power. 
 
 The smoking in bed was, in one instance, literally verified 
 
^°4 Law Association Centennial 
 
 by myself and my venerable master, upon a winter journey 
 to the Supreme Court at Washington, in the year 1809, 
 when, in the days of coaching, we passed our first night at 
 Head of Elk; and I called Mr. Ingersoll's attention to it, 
 after we had got into our respective beds in the same large 
 room, and the last candle had been extinguished. The 
 cigar was then seen firing up from Mr. Lewis's pillow, and 
 disappearing in darkness, like a revolving light on the coast. 
 He was once ordered into the custody of the Marshal, by 
 Judge Chase, who affected to believe that the audacity was 
 in some interloper at the chimney corner of the court room ; 
 but Judge Peters explained, sotto voce, and it passed. The 
 cigar did not reappear in that presence. In the Supreme 
 Court of the State it was winked at before the time of 
 Chief Justice Tilghman; but soon after he came to the 
 bench, it was relegated to the Library. It had been tol- 
 erated the longer because no one imitated the example, and 
 it had the asserted apology of weak health. 
 
 Mr. Lewis sometimes exhibited a stain of an antecedent 
 day, in indelicate allusions at the side bar, and in the pres- 
 ence of younger men, as well as of his contemporaries, with 
 all of whom he did not seem to be unwilling to have it 
 pass, that he led a careless, convivial, and half-libertine life, 
 much beyond the reality. This, however, was while he was 
 a widower, having no young children about him, and before 
 his second marriage to a most pleasing lady who survived 
 him. The influence of the sex, as much perhaps as better 
 moral perceptions and taste, has, in later times, expelled 
 such opprobia from the presence of gentlemen everywhere. 
 
 But the spots most annoying to the bar, were discernible 
 in his practice there, in the later years of his life, without, 
 however, committing his professional honor, or bringing 
 any serious inconvenience upon his clients. They were, it 
 is true, not constantly seen, but still not unfrequently. He 
 was singularly chary of his reputation for skill and efficiency 
 in the trial of causes; and if he was not well prepared at 
 the necessary moment, as sometimes happened when he 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 105 
 
 grew older, he would baffle the bench and the bar in their 
 efforts to bring him into action. In such an emergency he 
 would show a great fertility of device in eluding the trial 
 or argument for the time, and when every other failed, he 
 would be inimitably indisposed in health. His great resort, 
 if compelled to go on, and he had the conclusion of the ar- 
 gument, was to study his cause while it was in progress be- 
 fore the court, as he could do, intensely, and bring out new 
 points, after his adversaries had closed upon all that had 
 been advanced in the opening. The court was compelled 
 to meet this practice by a general rule prohibiting new 
 points by the concluding counsel. The rule was general, 
 but the aim of it was exclusively directed at Mr. Lewis. He 
 was never uncandid, except from some such necessity, — 
 which a better use of that part of his time, which belonged 
 to his clients, would have obviated. There seemed to be no 
 native taint in him; his heart was kind and true, his prin- 
 ciples in general were manly, and his friendship sincere and 
 constant. He looked upon this practice, unfortunately, I 
 think, as a license of professional strategy in the service 
 of his clients. A little less confidence in his intellectual 
 powers, and a little more prudence in the economy of time, 
 would have saved him from a distrust on such occasions 
 by the older men of the bar, which might sometimes be 
 seen when they were opposed to him in the trial of a 
 cause. 
 
 These were spots in the sun, you may say ; but from the 
 time I first knew him, they were observable and observed; 
 so much so, that to have omitted all notice of them, would 
 have impaired the truth of the description, personal and 
 professional, that I have endeavored to give of him. 
 
 The last cause he tried was Willing vs. Tilghman, in the 
 spring of 1819; where, on behalf of the late Chief Justice, 
 the defendant, I opposed him. I well remember that the 
 Chief Justice, who had been his contemporary at the bar, 
 and who was urgent for the trial, expected that I should 
 have to meet Mr. Lewis's now very usual effort for procras- 
 
^°6 Law Association Centennial 
 
 tination, and stood near me to affirm my opposition, until 
 the jury was sworn, when he retired from the court room. 
 In the course of Mr. Lewis's reply, he became faint, and sat 
 down, but soon recovered himself and went on. On this 
 occasion his indisposition was certainly unfeigned. He never 
 appeared in Court afterwards, and died in the month of 
 August following. 
 
 There can be no doubt whatever that Mr. Lewis was a 
 very learned lawyer, fully awake to the elevation and dig- 
 nity of his profession, and prompt to maintain them when- 
 ever vindication was necessary, though occasionally unbend- 
 ing a little too much at the side bar. He was a clear 
 and logical reasoner, and of very vigorous mind, rising at 
 times, in his oral arguments, to the highest eloquence of 
 reason, though no man cultivated less the graces of oratory. 
 He was moreover subtle, ingenious, full of resources, and 
 perhaps as shining an advocate in a bad or doubtful cause, 
 as he was able in a good one. In some points he was not 
 without resemblance to Saunders, his favorite authority, in 
 both the strength and weakness of his parts — something 
 less strong perhaps, and decidedly less weak. He contrib- 
 uted much to elevate the standard of law and of professional 
 effort at the bar; and if he had possessed a little more 
 retenue, might have done as much for the standard of man- 
 ners, wherein he fell something short; less however in re- 
 ality, than by contrast with the high professional carriage 
 of his eminent contemporaries. 
 
 Edward Tilghman. 
 
 I place in advance of some remarks of the present day 
 a short sketch of this admirable lawyer, written a few years 
 since for a work which was published in Philadelphia. 
 
 "Tilghman (Edward) ; an eminent lawyer of the State 
 of Pennsylvania, at the bar of Philadelphia. He was born at 
 Wye, on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, on the nth of 
 December, 1750, of an old and respectable family, which in 
 
^o8 Law Association Centennial 
 
 the system by the aid of commentaries, and to fill it up by 
 the desultory reading of treatises and reports, according to 
 the bent of the student, without much shape or certainty in 
 the knowledge so acquired, until it is given by investiga- 
 tions in the course of practice. A good deal of law may 
 be put together by a facile or flexible man in the second of 
 these modes, and the public are often satisfied with it; but 
 the profession itself knows the first, by its fruits, to be the 
 most effectual way of making a great lawyer. Edward 
 Tilghman took the old way, and acquired in it not only 
 great learning, but the most accurate legal judgment of any 
 man of his day, at the Bar of which he was a member. No 
 one of his contemporaries would have felt injured by his 
 receiving this praise. Upon questions which to most men 
 are perplexing at first, and continue to be so until they have 
 worked their way to a conclusion by elaborate reasoning, 
 he seemed to possess an instinct, which seized the true 
 result before he had taken time to prove it. This was no 
 doubt the fruit of severe and regular training, by which his 
 mind became so imbued with legal principles, that they un- 
 consciously governed his first impressions. In that branch 
 of the law which demands the greatest subtlety of intellect, 
 as well as familiarity with principles, the chapter of con- 
 tingent remainders and executory devises, he had probably 
 no superior anywhere. An eminent Judge has said of him, 
 'that he never knew any man who had this branch of the 
 law so much at his finger ends. With all others with whom 
 he had had professional intercourse, it was the work of time 
 and consideration to comprehend; but he took in with one 
 glance all the beauties of the most obscure and difficult 
 limitations. With him it was intuitive, and he could untie 
 the knots of a contingent remainder or executory devise as 
 familiarly as he could his garter.' When this can be justly 
 said of a lawyer — and it was said most justly of Edward 
 Tilghman — nothing is wanting to convey to professional 
 readers an adequate notion of the extent of his learning, 
 and the grasp of his understanding; for the doctrines upon 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 109 
 
 these subjects are the higher mathematics of the law, and 
 the attainment of them by any one, implies that the whole 
 domain lies at his feet. Mr. Tilghman was also an advocate 
 of great powers — a master of every question in his causes — 
 a wary tactician in the management of them — ^highly ac- 
 complished in language — a faultless logician — a man of the 
 purest integrity and of the brightest honor — fluent without 
 the least volubility — concise to a degree that left every 
 one's patience and attention unimpaired — and perspicuous 
 to almost the lowest order of understandings, while he was 
 dealing with almost the highest topics. How could such 
 qualities as these fail to give him a ready acceptance with 
 both courts and juries, and to make him the bulwark of 
 any cause which his judgment approved? An invincible 
 aversion to authorship and to public office, has prevented 
 this great lawyer from being known as he ought to have 
 been, beyond the limits of his own country. He has prob- 
 ably left nothing professional behind him but his opinions 
 upon cases, now in various hands, and difficult to collect, 
 but which, if collected and published, would place him 
 upon the same elevation with Dulany, of Maryland, or 
 Fearne, the author of the work in which he most delighted. 
 The Chief Justiceship of the Supreme Court of Pennsyl- 
 vania was offered to him by Governor McKean, upon the 
 death of Chief Justice Shippen; but he declined it, and 
 recommended for the appointment his kinsman, William 
 Tilghman, who so much adorned that station by his learn- 
 ing and virtues. 
 
 "It is instructive to record, that the stem acquirements 
 and labors of this eminent man never displaced the smiles 
 of benevolence from his countenance, nor put the least 
 weight upon his ever buoyant spirit. His wit was as play- 
 ful and harmless, and almost as bright, as heat lightning 
 upon a summer's evening. It always lit up the edges of 
 the clouds of controversy that surrounded the bar, and 
 sometimes dispersed the darkest and angriest. A more 
 frank, honorable, and gentlemanly practitioner of the law, 
 
^^° Law Association Centennial 
 
 and one more kind, communicative, and condescending to 
 the young students and members of the bar never lived. 
 The writer of this article, thirty years his junior, regards it 
 as his greatest good fortune to have been admitted to the 
 familiar intimacy of Edward Tilghman, and to have enjoyed 
 not only instruction from his learning and wisdom, but an 
 example of life in his cheerfulness and serenity, during the 
 vicissitudes of health and fortune which chequered his declin- 
 ing years." 
 
 The preceding article was written by request of a daugh- 
 ter of Edward Tilghman, for the supplementary volume of 
 the Encyclopaedia Americana, edited by Professor Vethake, 
 now Provost of the University of Pennsylvania. As it has 
 been reprinted more than once in the public journals, I do not 
 break it up into a rather fuller sketch of its eminent sub- 
 ject, but leave it unaltered, as a condensed account of Mr. 
 Tilghman's parentage and education, and of his profound 
 attainments in the deep-sea learning of the law, far off 
 from common soundings, as well as of his pleasant wit 
 and most benign temper. But it may be useful to give a 
 little further extension and detail to the subject, by some 
 particulars of his education in the law, and of his profes- 
 sional and personal character. A notice of them in the 
 article would have extended it too much for the work in 
 which it was published, and perhaps would have imparted 
 to it either a too professional or a too familiar air. These 
 particulars are as fresh with me now as when I first knew 
 them, some of them sixty years ago, and will not be, I think, 
 without interest to such of the members of the bar as recol- 
 lect him or have heard much of him. 
 
 Of the perfect confidence of the Judges in his opinions, 
 I will refer to two or three instances in this place, without, 
 at present, including an obituary notice immediately after 
 his death, which will be allowed to be authoritative when 
 I shall name its author. 
 
 In the well-argued and important case of Findlay's 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar hi 
 
 Lessee vs. Riddle, reported in 3 Binney, 139, the question of 
 law was one of those which are sometimes called gordian. It 
 was a devise of an estate to A. for his natural life, and after 
 his decease, if he shall die leaving lawful issue, to his heirs 
 as tenants iw common, and their respective heirs and assigns 
 forever; but in case he shall die without leaving lawful 
 issue, then to B. his brother, to hold to him and his heirs 
 and assigns forever. Of course, "the pinch of the case," 
 as Judge Brackenridge called it, was in the word heirs, as 
 first used, whether it was to be regarded as a word of limita- 
 tion, or as a word of purchase; that is to say, whether A. 
 took an estate tail, or an estate for life only. Chief Justice 
 Tilghman, before whom the cause was tried at a Circuit 
 Court, told the jury that the inclination of his mind was 
 rather in favor of the opinion that A. took only an estate 
 for life; but as it was a question of considerable difficulty, 
 he would reserve the point; and he directed the jury to find 
 a verdict in correspondence with his inclination. Of the 
 same opinion were all the Judges finally. Judge Bracken- 
 ridge, in giving his opinion, said that "something was 
 thrown out in the course of the argument at the bar, by 
 the counsel contending for the estate tail," — the same gentle- 
 man who afterwards, as a Judge of the same Court, so dis- 
 tinctly affirmed the supremacy of Edward Tilghman in this 
 branch of the law, — "of a confidence in what the opinion 
 would be, of the elder of the profession, were it taken on 
 this devise. The case being held under advisement, and it 
 so happening that I had an easy opportunity, I put the case 
 to one of the eldest and ablest of the profession in the State, 
 and totally unconcerned in the matter, but submitted merely 
 as a problem in legal science, in that abstruse part of it, the 
 doctrine of devises and contingent remainders. His note to 
 me I hold in my hands, and will read it." And then fol- 
 lows, in the printed report, without the author's name, a 
 page of short, close, pithy sentences, after the writer's 
 fashion, affirming the estate for life only, and unloosing the 
 
^12 Law Association Centennial 
 
 knot "familiar as his garter." The writer of that note was 
 Edward Tilghman. 
 
 Another instance of the respect entertained for him by 
 the foremost Judge on the bench occurred in my presence. 
 It was a case in which Chief Justice Tilghman did not 
 concur with the argument of his cousin, and put to him two 
 or three objections, which were answered, and the argument 
 then was pressed in its first direction. At the close, the 
 Chief Justice said, "Mr. Tilghman, I have so much respect 
 for your judgment, and so much knowledge of your sin- 
 cerity in what you press, that I will look further into the 
 point." 
 
 A third occurred in the great case of the Bush Hill 
 estate, Lyle vs. Richards, 9 Serg. & Rawle, which grew out 
 of a common recovery, that I had conducted with his sup- 
 port and advice. It was in this case that Judge Duncan, 
 after Mr. Tilghman's death, pronounced the eulogy upon 
 him that is mentioned in the article. 
 
 In that emphatic praise. Judge Duncan said of him, 
 "that, with one glance, he took in all the beauties of the 
 most obscure and difficult limitations. With him it was 
 intuition." And this was so far true, that it had that 
 appearance. But Mr. Tilghman's intuition, in such cases, 
 took in more than is included in the letter of Mr. Locke's 
 definition. It was not only the immediate perception of 
 the agreement or disagreement of two ideas in the party's 
 own mind, but the immediate grouping of reasons and 
 authorities, and the unconscious comparison of them, and 
 the giving out the true result in a moment, as it happens 
 with an accomplished performer on the organ, who ex- 
 presses a whole score without consciously perusing the parts 
 of it. This was, in reality, deduction so infinitely quick, 
 that it had the appearance of intuition. 
 
 It was this quick and accurate glance that distinguished 
 him in his arguments at the bar. The difference between 
 cases which to some men appeared contradictory or discord- 
 ant, — the little more or the little less in circumstance, — he 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 113 
 
 knew, and could touch as quickly as a musician touches the 
 flats and sharps of the key-board; and he did it without the 
 least affectation of learning, passing along them, from one 
 key to another, with the purest modulation, and bringing 
 them into harmony with the key of his own argument. 
 
 No man talked less at the bar for talk's sake, or less 
 frequently resorted to words for want of thoughts. His 
 plain and direct reasoning was very rarely embellished by 
 anything that was collateral. He kept the narrow and 
 straight way, and culled little or nothing from the fields 
 alongside ; yet he intermixed the reasons of the law with its 
 principles, so smoothly and shrewdly, that he never was dry 
 or abstruse. When he began, he generally meant to say all 
 that he afterwards said, rarely or never leaving his path; 
 and when his argument was at an end, he did not utter a 
 word to round it ofif, — no peroration, no retouching, no 
 supplemental answers to objections, — all had been noticed 
 and disposed of in due order as he advanced. 
 
 In no instance did he argue a cause superficially, nor in 
 any did his cousin, Chief Justice Tilghman, decide a cause 
 hastily. The characteristics of both, as to preparation, de- 
 liberation, and caution, were the same. The case of Newlin 
 vs. Newlin, i Sergeant & Rawle, which asserted the right of 
 a married woman to dispose of her separate trust estate, 
 unless restrained by the deed of trust, was argued by Ed- 
 ward Tilghman and John Sergeant, and was decided in 
 Bank, after mature consideration, by Chief Justice Tilghman 
 and Yeates, who delivered full opinions, affirming the right. 
 The case of Lancaster vs. Dolan, i Rawle, in the time of 
 Chief Justice Gibson, overruled Newlin vs. Newlin, and 
 swept away every vestige of authority from a married wo- 
 man, during coverture, to alienate or pledge her separate 
 trust estate. Chief Justice Gibson said that "Newlin vs. 
 Newlin was hastily determined upon an exception to evi- 
 dence." He never made a greater mistake, unless when he 
 overruled the authority. It was argued upon pre-existing 
 authorities, which are cited in the report, and came before 
 
 8 
 
^^4 Law Association Centennial 
 
 the Court upon a writ of error to the Common Pleas. It 
 has taken more than one Act of Assembly to patch the hole 
 in the law that was made by Lancaster vs. Dolan, and it is 
 not well patched yet. Chief Justice Gibson has delivered 
 good opinions ; but he never was less sure-footed than when 
 the shadow of his predecessor fell upon his path. Imagine 
 the terror of the old authorities at the flash of his cimiter in 
 Ferree vs. The Commonwealth, 8 Sergeant & Rawle: "For 
 myself, I shall never consent to give efifect to a claim by the 
 husband, or those in his stead, to what was at any time the 
 wife's real estate, where it is possible to defeat it by any 
 construction, however forced!" Where is the limit to the 
 possibilities of forced construction? Where is the wisdom 
 of a crotchet that would tie the hands of all womankind 
 because a few of them are thought not to have wills of 
 their own? 
 
 With a certain description of juries, and by similar intui- 
 tion of all that bore upon his case, Edward Tilghman was 
 nearly irresistible. He talked to the panel as if he was one 
 of them; as if he was opening to his brethren the path in 
 which they had to walk with him in the discharge of a duty, 
 that was a duty of conscience equally to them and to him- 
 self. This of course implies that he knew his jury would 
 understand him, and that he thought his case would bear 
 any quantity of sifting. If he thought either the jury or 
 his cause in fault, he threw nothing away upon either, and 
 reserved himself for a better occasion. But, at all times, 
 his sense and shrewdness, occasional pleasantry, and con- 
 stant air of sincerity made it delightful to listen to him. 
 He never condescended to propitiate a dishonest prejudice, 
 rarely a prejudice of any kind. He would laugh at it, and 
 sometimes give it a touch of the whip ; but he never coaxed 
 it or wheedled it or set up a counter prejudice to contend 
 with it. Some of this may at times be proper, but it was 
 not his way. If he thought his cause a good one, and the 
 tribunal an intelligent one, he walked to victory with the 
 most easy and assured step possible. In such a case, before 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 115 
 
 Judge Washington, I heard him once say at the conclusion 
 of his argument, when a colleague was to follow him, "I 
 have now finished what I had to say in the case, and I will 
 let my colleague lose it if he can ;" and this he said without 
 the least vanity or triumph, but as if he was merely giving 
 a voice to what others had thought before he was done. 
 
 But we must not infer, from this account of him, that the 
 knowledge of remainders and executory devises came to 
 him, or comes to any man, by inspiration. He worked hard 
 for what he knew, and began early. I have read those 
 note books, recording his attendance in Westminster Hall, 
 from 1772 to the beginning of 1774; and there, at his age 
 of twenty-two, I have seen, as any one may, the seeds and 
 plants which grew up into that marvelous intuition. The 
 books are in the form of receipt books, with clasps at the 
 end, of a size to be easily carried in the hand. Law being 
 recorded at one end, and Equity at the other; and are full, 
 it would seem, of all the cases of importance which had 
 been argued in his time. They note the points or ques- 
 tions, the name of the counsel who argued, a summary of 
 their arguments and authorities, the dicta of the Judges, 
 and the opinion of the Court, sometimes abbreviated almost 
 into short-hand, half a word, and frequently the initial and 
 final letters being made to stand for a word, connectives 
 being omitted where they could be implied; and there is, 
 in some instances, an authority or a remark of his own 
 interlined, showing that he had taken the notes in Court, 
 perhaps on his knee, and had conned them over in private, 
 especially such as involved great principles, like Goodright 
 vs. Patch, where Lord Mansfield explained his opinion in 
 Wigfall vs. Brydon, and perhaps damaged that case a little, 
 and in Doe vs. Burville, a case of cross-remainders, Camp- 
 bell vs. Power, and other cases bearing on Mr. Tilghman's 
 favorite subject. His accuracy of language, and perspicuity, 
 are remarkable throughout. In one case, Morgan vs. Jones, 
 he says, "Upon what legal grounds Lord Mansfield founded 
 his opinion, in what particular way he effectuated the inten- 
 
ii6 Law Association Centennial 
 
 tion, and according to what rules, I could not understand, 
 being in a crowd and at a distance. However, this I heard 
 him say plainly : ' 'Tis now settled that marriage and having 
 children is a revocation of a will of land.' " His constancy 
 in attending the arguments and judgments in the several 
 Courts — for his note books report the cases in the King's 
 Bench, Common Pleas, High Court of Chancery, and, in 
 a few instances, the sittings before Lord Mansfield — is re- 
 markable; and the precision of his abbreviated words, in 
 noticing what fell from counsel or Court, much of which 
 was technical and abstruse, was striking, at his age, and 
 shows him to have been not only a vigilant, but a most 
 intelligent, student; and, as he followed his profession with 
 ardor, it is not difficult to understand the cause of that 
 "intuition" of which Judge Duncan spoke. There was so 
 much in his own mind to behold, and he had looked upon it 
 so frequently and habitually, in at least the great department 
 of estates and tenures, that his quickness and certainty were 
 like those of the eye when it takes in a landscape or a 
 picture. 
 
 Besides the labor and attention which his note books 
 imply, they also bear frequent traces of the same pleasant 
 sparkle which so often twinkled like a star in the face of 
 our own bar and court. 
 
 It is probable that Lord Mansfield maintained great 
 dignity on the bench, and delivered himself with some 
 formality and elegance, more, on occasions, than the juniors 
 thought necessary. One of the note books has this note: 
 "1773, May 21. Lord Mansfield, 'I will not give judg- 
 ment to-day, but on Monday.' N. B. Lord Mansfield said 
 this with usual perspicuity and emphasis." 
 
 Again : "King's Bench. Thursday, 7 Feb. 1774. Camp- 
 bell vs. Hall, Esquire. Special verdict. Lord Mansfield, 
 'What a farrago Sir John gave us yesterday!' — meaning 
 Sir John Dalrymple, in the matter of Literary Property. 
 Sir Richard Aston. 'Strange stuff ! His criticism upon "no 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 117 
 
 longer" was against him.' Lord Mansfield. 'Sad stuff, Sir 
 Richard ! This will prove sad stuff.' " 
 
 Again. In this instance the words are given with Mr. 
 Tilghman's abbreviations : 
 
 "Indt. sp. conts. wds. of J. of P. in Ex. of Off. Objt. not 
 suff'y certain. Rex vs. Barn" 
 
 "Burland. 'Where only one time in Indt. v. and a. must 
 rel. to that. Adt. and ibid, verbt. in Indt. stds. for both 
 stroke and asst. Hawks. Hale.' " 
 
 " ', ad idem. Indt. is that was a Justice on 
 
 6th June, and that a petty sess'n was held before him and 
 an'r, and deft, then and there spoke the words, 'you don't 
 do justice.' " 
 
 "Serg. Davy. 'I won't trouble your Lds. with a wd. from 
 Hale or Sergt. Hawkins, but I believe a word or two from 
 
 Sergt. Davy will do. Indt. is, was a Justice before 
 
 6th June, and ever since has been. Ergo, if then and there 
 refers to the 6th June, he must have spoken the words "be- 
 fore and ever since.' " 
 
 "Ld. M. ' 'Tis a flat objection.' " 
 
 A Mr. Morgan, a barrister of that day, is well known to 
 have acquired the sobriquet of Frog Morgan, from his 
 manner of citing Cro. Eliz., Cro. Jac, Cro. Car., as Croak 
 Elizabeth, etc., and not Crook. His voice probably assisted 
 to nick the name. Mr. Tilghman never omits to give him a 
 fling. 
 
 One of the note books records : "Mr. Morgan, with much 
 solemnity, moved for an information against a constable for 
 refusing to run after a person against whom he had a war- 
 rant, when that person ran away ; and for jeering and derid- 
 ing the Overseers of the Poor, who obtained the warrant." 
 
 "Sir Richard Aston. 'The constable ought to have run; 
 but it is not a fit subject for an information. Indict him.' 
 So Frog took nothing by his motion." 
 
 In another case, — Lord Sandwich against Miller, a mo- 
 tion to change the venue — after noting the argument of 
 
ii8 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Serjeant Glyn, contra, the note proceeds, "Morgan, n. b. 
 Frog, ad idem." 
 
 A triplet on the first page of the note-book runs thus : — 
 
 " My prayer grant, ye Gods, and your altars shall smoke. 
 That as he goes home, Frog's neck may be broke, 
 And then we shall never more hear the whelp croak. " 
 
 The temper of this profound lawyer was as remarkable 
 as his learning. His pleasantry made a luminous circle 
 around him whenever he was in a cluster of his friends; 
 and it was particularly bright when two or three of them 
 accompanied him in a walk for recreation. On such occa- 
 sions, quotations from English or Latin poetry, in aid of his 
 pleasantry, were frequent and pointed; but he was neither 
 a jester nor a satirist. His wit seemed to escape from him, 
 its flow was so easy and lambent, and it neither raised a 
 blister nor left a sting in any one. A friend, who could 
 appreciate his wit, called at his office to pay his honorarium. 
 "1 am come, Mr. Tilghman, to pay you for winning my 
 cause, which delights me;" and then pulling a purse of 
 gold from his pocket, and taking some broad pieces from 
 it, — "Come, hold out your hand, — one, two, three, four, — 
 tell me when to stop." Mr. Tilghman looked at him with 
 his bright smile, and replied, — 
 
 " Lay on, Macduff, 
 And damn'd be him that first cries — ' Hold — enough ' !" 
 
 The world seems to be of opinion that this might be a 
 motto for the Barrister's Arms; but it would hardly be 
 a sufficient distinction. 
 
 His friends were rather a select body, and it was with 
 them that this airy temper was freest. Those with whom 
 he was most intimate derived from his unreserve the same 
 sort of compliment to themselves that Cotton did from Izaak 
 Walton's keeping company with him. "For my father Wal- 
 ton," says Cotton, "will be seen twice in no man's company 
 that he does not like, and likes none but such as he believes 
 to be very honest men, which is one of the best arguments. 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 119 
 
 or at least of the best testimonials, that I either am, or that 
 he thinks me one of those, seeing that I have not yet found 
 him weary of me." It is thought, however, that old Izaak 
 overvalued a little the morality of his adopted son. 
 
 Mr. Tilghman's heart, moreover, was as true as his 
 temper. No one was less demonstrative, or made fewer pro- 
 fessions, but he held to those he loved with hooks of steel; 
 and if these were ruptured, the wrench seemed to give his 
 heart the greater susceptibility. 
 
 There was the utmost simplicity in his dress, and in his 
 address and manners. Though no man was less a Quaker, 
 no man less affected decorative forms of any kind. He 
 never wore black, that I recollect, at the bar, nor hair 
 powder, though everybody else wore it; nor appeared to 
 give a thought to his outward appearance, though he was 
 always perfectly well kept. He was rather of short stature, 
 spare of flesh, and of delicate but well-proportioned frame. 
 His complexion was fair, and his brown hair was without a 
 thread of gray in it to the last. His face was oval, his nose 
 slightly aquiline, and the shape of his forehead and chin 
 corresponded with this outline. But his eyes and his mouth 
 were his most expressive features; his mouth even more 
 than his eyes. Whatever was the thought that was to come 
 from him, grave or gay, the motion of his lips, before he 
 spoke, was the harbinger of its character. Indeed, it was 
 not difficult to tell what reception he gave to an argument 
 he was listening to, by the opening and shutting of those 
 flexible and mobile valves. When a little pinched, you might 
 easily discover it, by his chewing one of them, until he had 
 cleared away the difficulty. But over all his countenance, 
 and over all his acts, in Court or out of Court, a kind and 
 intelligent nature had diffused the expression of truth, wis- 
 dom, and sincerity. There are very few now living, at the 
 bar, who have any remembrance of his person, and I have 
 therefore given this detail. 
 
 In August, 1798, a person, most respectably connected, 
 who was a neighbor of Mr. Tilghman's, and in the kindest 
 
I20 Law Association Centennial 
 
 relations with him, as he was with many, committed a 
 number of forgeries, which became known, simultaneously, 
 after the banks had closed for the day, and drove him to 
 immediate concealment and flight. I recollect well the deep 
 resentment of the city. This individual had abused Mr. 
 Tilghman's confidence, and had injured him in point of 
 fortune; and no one heard, at that time or afterwards, any- 
 thing to palliate the crime he had committed. I may add 
 that he was never permitted to return to his family, but 
 died in exile from Pennsylvania; not, however, without 
 having given proofs of repentance, by efforts in a humble 
 way, to do good to the poor and to the sick, as far as his 
 limited supply from others permitted. 
 
 In the night that followed the discovery, when he was 
 about to fly, Mr. Tilghman, knowing that he must depart 
 in poverty and wretchedness, took a large purse of gold in 
 his hands, and went to his place of concealment. The only 
 words he spoke to the flying man, when he entered his 
 
 room, were these : " , I laid up this for a rainy day ; 
 
 but as I do not believe that any trouble can fall on me or 
 mine as bitter as yours, take it, and may it do you good 
 Farewell !" 
 
 Yet trouble did fall upon him, without his fault, and of 
 unutterable bitterness too; and he bore it with a fortitude 
 and resignation in which no martyr could have surpassed 
 him. He let concealment feed upon his fortune, and upon 
 his health, that he might keep pain from those he loved. 
 The sacrifice may have been a misjudgment on his part. 
 There were some who thought it was; but it would have 
 been a bold word to express to one whose judgment for 
 everybody else was the best in the world. I knew him and 
 saw him in the agony of that day, and reverenced him for 
 the heroism of the fortitude with which he parted with 
 nearly all his active property, put down his carriage, and 
 sold his long-accustomed habitation, that his determination 
 might be accomplished without possibility of failure. In 
 the last walk of any length that he took, — from the city to 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 121 
 
 his farm in Delaware County, about eighteen months before 
 his death, — I was his only companion; and while crossing 
 the last field to his house, he stopped at a fence, and told 
 me that two days before he had accomplished the full sacri- 
 fice. The only comment that he made was, "I am sorry that 
 my good wife must, for the rest of her days, go afoot." 
 
 Mrs. Tilghman was a daughter of Benjamin Chew, a 
 Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania before 
 the Revolution, and afterwards President of the High Court 
 of Errors and Appeals. Up to the time of her husband's 
 death, she was for many years in infirm health, and some- 
 times suffered almost the extremity of pain and illness, 
 becoming the cause of constant solicitude to him; but she 
 survived him twenty-six years, for several of them with 
 improving health, the compensation perhaps of some of the 
 luxuries she had been compelled to forego, and at length 
 died at the venerable age of ninety-one. Cheerfulness and 
 a gentle temper, which she had shared with him, did not 
 leave her even to the latest hour, but were sustained by the 
 public respect, by the affectionate kindness of her surviving 
 son and two daughters, and by the regard and reverence of 
 all her husband's friends. 
 
 I should probably, at some period of my life, have made 
 this sketch of Edward Tilghman, without request, from my 
 admiration of his learning and virtues, and also from the 
 debt I owed him, which has given a zest to every word that 
 I have written of him. He launched me in my profession. 
 I pray to be excused for relating the personal anecdote. 
 
 More than fifty years ago, Samuel W. Fisher, the Presi- 
 dent of the Philadelphia Insurance Company, came one 
 morning into my small office, then having abundant room 
 for all my visitors, and gave me a retainer to argue the 
 case of Gibson against that Company, which I afterwards 
 reported.^ Mr. Gibson, the plaintiff, who was a member of 
 the bar, and my master in the law, Mr. Ingersoll, were to 
 argue it against me. The question regarded the proper 
 
 'i Binn. 405 
 
122 Law Association Centennial 
 
 mode of adjusting a particular average under a clause in 
 a Respondentia Bond; and it was new, and not without 
 difficulty. It came before the Court upon exceptions to a 
 report or award under the Act of 1703, made by Edward 
 Tilghman, with the concurrence of another member of the 
 bar, against the opinion of the third referee, who was also 
 a member of the bar; and it turned altogether upon princi- 
 ples of commercial law. I examined the papers, and then 
 said to Mr. Fisher, the president, "You are not going to 
 leave me alone in this cause? You know who is against 
 me?" "I know all that," he said, "but I will not retain 
 anybody else. Go on, and make the best of it." After the 
 award was confirmed, I asked Mr. Fisher why he had been 
 so short in refusing me a colleague. He replied, "that he 
 had done as he was told to do." Mr. Tilghman had told him 
 to retain me, and had said, "put it on his own shoulders, 
 and make him carry it. It will do him good." The lesson 
 may be good for others. The most cheering effect of it to 
 myself was its giving me the assurance of the good will of 
 such a man as Edward Tilghman. 
 
 The obituary notice of him which appeared in the news- 
 papers a few days after his death, and which I have said 
 would be allowed to be authoritative when I should name 
 the writer, may very fitly conclude this little memorial. 
 Its author was Chief Justice Tilghman. 
 
 "Died, on Wednesday, ist November, 18 15, in the sixty- 
 fifth year of his age, Edward Tilghman, Esquire, of this 
 City, counsellor at law. 
 
 "Although the usual style of funeral eulogium has almost 
 leveled all distinction of character, yet departed merit has 
 dues which should not be withheld. Mr. Tilghman de- 
 scended from an old and respectable family in the State of 
 Maryland, and was placed at an early age in the Academy 
 of Philadelphia, where he obtained as good an education as 
 this country could afiford. From nature he received a clear 
 and strong understanding, with a disposition for close and 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 123 
 
 laborious study. At school he was distinguished for classi- 
 cal attainments, which he preserved unimpaired amidst the 
 occupations of an active and busy life. The profession of 
 the law was his choice, and his subsequent eminence proved 
 that he had not mistaken his genius. He possessed a deep 
 knowledge of principles, and his sense of duty led him to a 
 thorough investigation of facts in all his causes. His style 
 of speaking was such as might be expected from his turn of 
 mind, — unambitious of ornament, but commanding atten- 
 tion from its intrinsic weight. Regardless of the passions, 
 his arguments aimed at the head, and seldom missed their 
 mark. In stating the evidence, he was remarkably upright; 
 and, on points of law, he gave full weight to the argument 
 of his adversary, and met it without evasion. He never 
 refused a- just attention to the opinions of others, however 
 inferior to him; and the unassuming manner in which he 
 delivered his own, gave a character of kindness to his su- 
 periority, which conciliated affection, while it commanded 
 respect. To his professional excellence, his brethren of the 
 bar have recently borne mournful but honorable testimony; 
 and from his example the younger members may derive the 
 useful lesson, that although declamation may glitter, yet 
 success is most surely attained by industry, integrity, and 
 sound legal knowledge. In private life, Mr. Tilghman was 
 no less estimable than in his professional character. His 
 temper was cheerful and benevolent, his friendship warm 
 and steady, and his unshaken integrity has been proved on 
 trying occasions. In the domestic scene his family best know 
 his value. Long will they lament their loss, and never will 
 they repair it." 
 
 Jared Ingersoll. 
 
 Jared Ingersoll, of the Philadelphia bar, my learned 
 master in the law, was a native of the Colony of Connecti- 
 cut, and was born at New Haven in the year 1750. 
 
 His father, of the same name, was a distinguished 
 lawyer in the Colony, and was her agent in England, jointly 
 
124 Law Association Centennial 
 
 with Richard Jackson, Lord Grenville's secretary, who was a 
 member of the Parliament which inaugurated Lord Gren- 
 ville's scheme of taxing the Colonies. 
 
 It is to him, the father, that we owe the preservation of 
 Colonel Barre's famous burst of eloquence in reply to 
 Charles Townshend, when he boasted that the Colonies had 
 been planted by England's care, nourished by her indul- 
 gence, and protected by her arms, and therefore ought not 
 to grudge a contribution to her treasury. Mr. Ingersoll, who 
 was in the gallery of the House of Commons at the time, 
 immediately wrote out the brilliant reply of Barre, and trans- 
 mitted it to Connecticut; and from one of her journals it 
 passed into all American hearts, and has become a first lesson 
 in oratory to her sons. 
 
 Jackson, and Franklin, and Ingersoll, and all the Colonial 
 agents in England, were opposed to Lord Grenville's scheme 
 of taxation; opposed to it as unconstitutional as well as in- 
 expedient. But none of them thought that the Stamp Act 
 of March, 1765, would be resisted by the Colonies; and Mr. 
 Ingersoll consented even to assist the ministerial plan of 
 distributing the stamps through American agents, to in- 
 sinuate them the better among the people. He therefore 
 returned to his Colony in August following, with the com- 
 mission of Stamp-master. But in a very short time he 
 learned something of his people that he had never appre- 
 hended before. During his absence, and while the Stamp 
 Act was passing through Parliament, the people from New 
 Hampshire to Georgia had resolved not to pay a stamp tax ; 
 and as this was the first assertion of the right by the Parlia- 
 ment of England, had made up their minds to take the bull 
 by the horns, at all risks. 
 
 On Mr. Ingersoll's arrival home, his fellow-colonists at 
 first endeavored to persuade him to resign his commission; 
 but he reasoned with them, doubted whether there was 
 anybody he could resign to, doubted if it would be of any 
 avail, and kept them in suspense. He then heard of 
 menaces, extending to property and person, and cast about 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 125 
 
 for protection, by the usual means; but, finally, with some 
 astuteness, thought of asking the direction of the Legisla- 
 ture, at Hartford, knowing that while they liked the Act of 
 Parliament as little as he did, they would as little like to 
 resist it, and therefore might give him their countenance in 
 adhering to his commission. 
 
 To attain this end, he left New Haven, as he thought, 
 privately, to put himself and his commission under the direc- 
 tion of the Legislature at Hartford ; but his caution was of 
 little avail. That inquisitive and curious people knew all about 
 his movements. They divined his purpose, and were on the 
 traces of his incognito; and, when he arrived on horseback 
 within five miles of Hartford, he found himself riding into 
 a body of five hundred mounted men, who were in something 
 like battle array, though armed with nothing more deadly 
 than staves like broom handles; and with them he had to 
 ventilate, on the broad street of Wethersfield, the definitive 
 question of the commission. This body did not mean that the 
 Legislature should be appealed to on the subject; and, per- 
 haps, the Legislature was very much obliged to them for 
 their intentions. They insisted upon Mr. Ingersoll's resign- 
 ing his commission on the spot. 
 
 The parley was long, but it was vain. It lasted for three 
 hours and more, and neither party convinced the other. Mr. 
 Ingersoll seems to have been as tenacious a reasoner, and 
 as acute, as his son proved to be. It availed nothing but to 
 show his coolness and skill. At length, when the hours 
 were exhausted, and there were symptoms of impatience, 
 he asked what was to happen if he did not resign ; and they 
 told him — "his fate." He might guess what that would be, 
 in the general; but not liking any particular aspect of it, 
 he concluded that it was better to do what he was told to 
 do. He wrote and signed a resignation of his commission 
 as Stamp-master. He pulled off his hat, and hurra'd three 
 times for "Liberty and Property," after they had deprived 
 him of both ; and then, knowing that he was bound to Hart- 
 ford, they marched with him to the outside of the Hall of the 
 
126 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Legislature, and left him there at liberty to go in, or to go 
 home, as he might think best. 
 
 This was the first, and, perhaps, the best-conducted case 
 of lynch law that our books report. It shed no blood, it 
 broke no bones, and it accommodated the constituted au- 
 thorities to their heart's content. The Stamp Act was dead, 
 and the death could not be laid at their door. A striking 
 feature to disprove personal malice on any side was this : 
 that, although affidavits were taken and filed, and some 
 show made of calling out the judicial authorities, Mr. In- 
 gersoll named no names, though he knew the leaders as 
 well as they knew him. 
 
 Such a contest would ordinarily have driven the weaker 
 party into exile, or the extremity of opposition; but in this 
 case it did neither. Mr. Ingersoll, the elder, was loyal to 
 the British Constitution and to the Crown, as were hun- 
 dreds of thousands of the Colonists in the same day; but 
 he never was a loyalist in the special sense, and his refusal 
 to surrender his commission except by the application of 
 vis major, did not alienate the people from him, nor him 
 from them. He remained in his natal homestead; but 
 during the ten years of irritated pride on one side, and of 
 dogged contumacy on the other, which intervened between 
 the repeal of the Stamp Act and the Declaration of Inde- 
 pendence, he was more of an observer than an actor ; and as, 
 in the later years of that decade, the country waxed more 
 and more warm, and the attention of young men was turn- 
 ing more and more every day to arms rather than to the 
 law, he sent his son, in the year 1774, from the contagious 
 atmosphere of Connecticut, to finish his law education in 
 London. 
 
 Mr. Ingersoll, the son, continued in that school until 
 shortly before or after the Declaration of Independence, 
 when he embarked for France, and resided there until the 
 autumn of 1778. From that country to his own he passed 
 in an American letter of marque, flagrante hello, and, as I 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 127 
 
 have heard him say, came pretty much under water, from 
 press of sail, to avoid disagreeable interviews on the way. 
 
 His London life, from his own account, as well as from 
 that of Edward Tilghman, his contemporary for part of the 
 time, must have been pretty equally divided between study 
 and pleasure; though in the allotment for the latter, he 
 included a large portion of exercise on foot. In the sum- 
 mer season he lived in the country, ten miles from his place 
 of study in the city, and not unfrequently footed that inter- 
 val both morning and afternoon. As a proof of the extent 
 to which females in England use their feet and limbs in the 
 same healthful way, he told me that one of the daughters of 
 his hostess sometimes accompanied him, and, after dropping 
 him in the city in the morning, trotted back with him at 
 the close of the afternoon. The value of that exercise was 
 his frequent theme. He profited by it in his youth, and 
 was able in his old age to dispense with it, by the confirma- 
 tion it had given to his health. It is as necessary a founda- 
 tion for a lawyer as his professional studies. Both sexes in 
 our country, and especially in our cities, would take more 
 of it, if our climate, like that of England, and of the Con- 
 tinent generally, would give its more frequent consent; but 
 few of them take as much of it as they might; for to the 
 habitual walker, a cloud is not so often a shower-bath as 
 it is a parasol, nor is the sun so much a scorcher to the 
 quick-footed as to the slow. Next to St. Peter's full ordi- 
 nance, it deserves universal observance by men of our pro- 
 fession, that "if they will love life and see good days" they 
 must give a fair portion of their practice to their legs. 
 After doing my best, one morning, to overtake Chief Jus- 
 tice Marshall in his quick march to the Capitol, when he 
 was nearer to eighty than to seventy, I asked him to what 
 cause in particular he attributed that strong and quick step ; 
 and he replied that he thought it was most due to his com- 
 mission in the army of the Revolution, in which he had 
 been a regular foot practitioner for nearly six years. 
 
 From relations of friendship between Mr. Ingersoll's 
 
128 Law Association Centennial 
 
 father and Joseph Reed, then recently elected a member of 
 the Supreme Executive Council of Pennsylvania, under the 
 Constitution of 1776, and chosen President of that body by 
 the joint ballot of the General Assembly and Council, the 
 son vfas encouraged by President Reed to remove to Phila- 
 delphia for advancement in his profession; and he accord- 
 ingly removed thither in 1778, was admitted to the bar in 
 January, 1779, married the eldest daughter of Charles 
 Pettit in 1781, and continued in professional service in that 
 city all the active years of his life, and died there at the 
 age of seventy-two, on the thirty-first of October, 1822. He 
 had his English education in the law, consequently, some 
 years after he had attained his majority. 
 
 Though encouraged to remove to Philadelphia by the 
 President of the Executive Council, and promised his pat- 
 ronage, which no doubt he received as far as it could be 
 afforded, Mr. Ingersoll's success at the bar, like that of 
 every other lawyer of eminence, was, and must have been, 
 his own work. He received a retainer from the State, 
 during President Reed's administration, as an assistant to 
 the Attorney-General, Mr. Sergeant, in the matter of the 
 Proprietary estates, which were vested in the Commonwealth, 
 as the Act of Confiscation calls it, in the year 1 779 ; and the 
 Reports show him to have been associated with the counsel 
 of the State in one or two cases in the year 1780. He was 
 in friendly, and, by his marriage, in family relations, with 
 President Reed, during the three years of his presidency, 
 and until his death in 1785; and was an executor of his 
 will. But President Reed's political ardor during his term 
 of office, and an embittered opposition to him which had 
 been kindled among men of business and importance, in 
 Philadelphia, did not make his return to the bar, in 1781, 
 very easy or agreeable; nor, as I have heard Mr. Ingersoll 
 say, did his mind return willingly to the pursuits of the law. 
 The patron, therefore, must have been more willing than 
 able to assist him; and in a short time Mr. Reed's health 
 gave way, and after visiting England in 1783, he returned to- 
 
nc 
 
 
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 1 '".02 1 f',r..% 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 129 
 
 ■wards the close of 1784, and without attempting to resume 
 his profession, died on the fifth of March, 1785. Mr. Inger- 
 soll wanted no other patron than his own talents, learning, 
 integrity, and industry ; and if he had wanted any of these, 
 no patron could have raised him to the great elevation which 
 he attained at the bar. 
 
 His professional character, fairly and not partially de- 
 scribed, is that of a very sound and well-read lawyer, and a 
 most consummate advocate. Though he was strong as a 
 lawyer in learning, and in the accomplishments which assist 
 the application of it, his great forte was at the bar, in the 
 face of an intelligent jury, and, indeed, of any jury; and 
 second only to that, was his power with the court. In his 
 full vigor, which continued for nearly twenty years after the 
 year 1797, I regard him as having been without comparison 
 the most efficient manager of an important jury trial among 
 all the able men who were then at the bar of Philadelphia. 
 
 His priority in this species of service was, I think, gen- 
 erally acknowledged; and it is my purpose to show, here- 
 after, with as much brevity as I can, what were the intel- 
 lectual qualities, and especially the intellectual temperament, 
 which led to this superiority ; and how far his falling a little 
 short of this great excellence, in some other exercises of 
 his profession, is traceable to the same characteristics. 
 
 He was invited, or encouraged to come to Philadelphia, 
 pretty much under the postulate, that he was to prepare 
 himself for the popular side in politics, which President 
 Reed, in his letter of third December, 1778, to Mr. Ingersoll's 
 father, described as not being the side upon which any of 
 the bar of Philadelphia, who possessed considerable abili- 
 ties, were to be found. What that side was, in the appre- 
 hension of Mr. Reed, it would be useless to investigate in 
 such a sketch as this. The Whig side was, by no means, 
 of one complexion; and among the opponents of President 
 Reed, who was a Whig, were true Whigs whose colors 
 never changed. Some of the features of what he probably 
 regarded as the popular side were eliminated even in his 
 
 9 
 
130 Law Association Centennial 
 
 own time; and if an adhesion to the Constitution of 1776 
 was the test, it was becoming less and less strong every day, 
 until, with general consent, it was rejected by all, as it was 
 first rejected by him. A young practitioner of the law, 
 who had gone with ardor into the harness of President Reed 
 during his presidency, might have found himself where the 
 President did at the end of that short career. 
 
 Mr. Ingersoll had, at no time of his life, a warm predilec- 
 tion for politics. He had the common aspiration of all 
 patriotic men, after the peace with Great Britain, and the 
 failure of the Confederation, to see the people settled under 
 a Constitution that would build up a nation, and would 
 promote and secure the public welfare; and, in the general 
 effort to this effect, he took part, by accepting the place of a 
 delegate from Pennsylvania to the Convention which formed 
 the Constitution of the United States; but, with the excep- 
 tion of this service, from May to September, 1787, I am not 
 aware that he held or sought a position in any popular or 
 representative body whatever. He was what is called con- 
 servative, in politics; that is to say, he was not, by consti- 
 tutional temper, a rebuilder or reconstructor of anything that 
 had been once reasonably well built; nor was his favor- 
 ite order of political architecture the democratic. After the 
 great subversion in 1801, he was found as rarely as any- 
 body in Pennsylvania on the side of the majority. He was 
 known to be inclined to the contrary, so far that, with or 
 without his consent, he was selected in that State, in the 
 year 1812, as the opposition or anti-Madisonian candidate 
 for the office of Vice-President of the United States; but 
 his general course did not manifest a very lively sympathy 
 with extremes in any direction. Mr. IngersoU's devotion, 
 after I knew him, was to the law, singly and unremittingly, 
 •with a decided preference for its investigations and labors; 
 nor did anything, until old age came upon him and impaired 
 his sight, break ofif or interfere with the great engagement 
 of his life. 
 
 He was the first Attorney-General of the State under the 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 131 
 
 Constitution of 1790, and held the office by Governor 
 Mifflin's appointment until Governor McKean's election in 
 1799, when he retired for, or was superseded by, the son of 
 Governor McKean ; and he held the same office by appoint- 
 ment of Governor Snyder, after his election in 1808; and 
 this professional office, and the Presidency of the District 
 Court for the City, for a short time in the last years of his 
 life, were the only offices that at any time drew him away 
 from his extensive private practice. Governor Snyder ap- 
 pointed him without his "application or expectation;" and 
 when, in that Governor's last term, the Secretary of State 
 intim.ated to him that the Governor and others thought that 
 the principal law-officer should reside at Harrisburg, the 
 seat of government, Mr. IngersoU replied with great dig- 
 nity in his letter of resignation in December, 181 7, that "the 
 Governor knew the inconveniences of his residence when 
 he appointed him ; and that if they had increased, in his own 
 apprehension, he would have saved the Governor the ex- 
 pression of a wish for his resignation; but that, yielding to 
 the Governor's official opinion and authority, he should retire 
 from office, as he entered it, at the Governor's request." 
 
 His person, carriage, and manners, and even his dress, 
 had the same aspect in my eyes, and probably in the eyes 
 of all who knew him, from his middle life to the very close 
 of it. 
 
 He was of good height, three or four inches short of six 
 feet, spare of flesh, and perfectly well made and erect, ex- 
 pressing much dignity, with the ease and air of good society. 
 His complexion was fair and his hair light-colored, and his 
 features not large or salient, though sufficiently defined and 
 strong; the lower part of his face, particularly the mouth 
 and chin, being very well developed and expressive. Though 
 to this caste of complexion and features striking expression 
 does not so commonly belong as it does to faces in which 
 the features are more irregular, and the shadows deeper, 
 yet nothing could be more manly and clear than the whole 
 tone of his countenance. The perpendicular walls of his 
 
132 Law Association Centennial 
 
 head, and the ample roof of the chamber which contained 
 his brain, with the breadth of the lower part of the face, to 
 which I have adverted, gave a very firm and compact ap- 
 pearance to the whole head; and the limner who seized 
 upon these, seized the governing expression of the mass. 
 The best likeness I ever saw of him was a small and rough 
 pencil-sketch, made by the late Gideon Fairman, while Mr. 
 Ingersoll was addressing one of his most spirited speeches 
 to a jury of which Fairman was a member. He gave it to 
 me while Mr. Ingersoll's head was yet in the attitude by 
 which the artist was struck. It was produced by a very few 
 strokes of the pencil, which shows, of course, that the head 
 was a speaking one. 
 
 His carriage was rather remarkable, and, at this time of 
 day, when familiarity in address and manner is much more 
 common in our courts than it used to be, would be generally 
 remarked. There was a measure, and the observance of 
 breeding in all that he said and did. He was full of atten- 
 tion when you spoke to him, and uniformly regardful of 
 good manners in his reply; but there was little playfulness, 
 no jocularity, nor the slightest attempt at repartee, though 
 he had a keen sense of both wit and humor. When you 
 saw him walk in the street, or pace the floor of the court 
 room, it was difficult to resist the impression that in early 
 life he had received a military training; and the dress of 
 the pre-democratic age, a full suit of black, or of light 
 brown or drab in the warm season, with knee-breeches and 
 shoes, and long after others had abandoned the usage, hair- 
 powder and a cue, very much assisted the impression. His 
 uniform air of self-possession and purpose, together with 
 the outward attributes I have noticed, gave him decidedly 
 the look of the old ofificer. But he was entirely free, as the 
 best of that class, of everything like assumption or presump- 
 tion, or the assertion of command, where it would have 
 been in the least out of place. On the contrary, he gave to 
 every member of the bar his due in civility and respect, 
 and to those with whom his intercourse was intimate, he 
 was both gracious and cordial. 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 133 
 
 He passed with some for a rather proud man, perhaps the 
 consequence of this soldierly carriage, and of the forms of 
 life in which he had been bred up, and continued to observe. 
 But the charge in regard to him was even more unjust than 
 it generally is, proceeding as much from that fault in the 
 accuser, as from any serious liability to it in the accused. 
 He had nothing about him that, in his intercourse with others, 
 whether equals or inferiors, tended to abase anybody. He 
 was not generally, familiar or communicative. That was 
 the whole. He was not born or brought up in an age 
 in which the worshippers of popularity press hands or lift 
 hats to as many as they can ; but he offered and reciprocated 
 civility wherever it was due; and where he professed either 
 respect or regard, he was uniformly sincere. In one sense 
 and respect he probably was a proud man; and unless we 
 use the word only in the condemnatory sense in which the 
 Scriptures appear to use it, he was none the worse for being 
 so. The poor moralists approve the emotion, though they 
 have not succeeded in giving it a name, by which it may be 
 distinguished from a very different one, of which it bears 
 some of the outward marks. "He had that generous elation 
 of heart, which is the pride of conscious virtue," — virtue in 
 his relations with mankind,— virtue that is above the per- 
 petration of a wrong, and spurns a temptation to dishonor. 
 We mean this, when we say that a man's virtue is lofty. No 
 man that I ever knew, lived further away from the fault or 
 the toleration of a dishonorable act. His personal virtue 
 was as straight-upward and erect as his person; but he was 
 a religious man also, in open and full communion with the 
 Presbyterian Church, of which he was a member to his 
 death, and made as humble an estimate of his own moral 
 attainments, as if the life he led had been anything but 
 what it was, in close correspondence with his duties. 
 
 At one period his domestic relations passed under my 
 own observation, and no one could be more faultless in them. 
 His kindness and even tenderness to his children were strik- 
 ing. Oppressed as he was sometimes with business, and 
 
134 Law Association Centennial 
 
 generally obliged to crowd a good deal of it into a small 
 portion of time, I never knew him to be so much ab- 
 sorbed by it, as to make him put aside a request from 
 them, or cut short any of their appeals. I well recollect 
 that on one occasion, when he was instructing me in regard 
 to obtaining some of the means for his preparation in a 
 cause of much importance and urgency, his youngest son, a 
 little fellow of seven or eight years of age, ran into his ofifice 
 with a piece of dough on the back of a fire shovel, and lay- 
 ing the shovel on the hot ashes, said, "Pa, mind my cake," 
 and ran off to his play. The response was, "Tsut, tsut" 
 drawing in his breath with his tongue, "well, I suppose it 
 must be so." This was his usual manner upon such inter- 
 ruptions. 
 
 With the world generally, except in matters of business, 
 his intercourse when I knew him first, and I believe after- 
 wards, was not large. His intimate friends were few and 
 select, and, for the most part, such as bore a family relation 
 to him. He was upon a kind footing with all his contem- 
 poraries at the bar, but not upon an intimate one with more 
 than a very few. He was neither a taciturn nor a reserved 
 man; but was eminently discreet in his language, and said 
 little to no purpose. 
 
 After this description, I will state my impression, rather 
 than attempt to give an analysis, of Mr. Ingersoll's mental 
 powers, as applied in both the study and the public manage- 
 ment of his causes; though as they exhibit what I think 
 are rather unusual phenomena of the mind, they would 
 probably be worthy of a very full one. 
 
 After a long acquaintance with him, and understanding 
 him through his mode of teaching, and by frequently ob- 
 serving him in court, and in the course of consultations, I 
 came to distinguish between the active and the passive state 
 of his mind, or between its warm and its cold state. The 
 difference may frequently be observed in men ; but with him 
 it was so marked, that at times the cold state might have 
 passed for a disruption of continuity between the mind and 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 135 
 
 the faculties. No man was better constituted to show that 
 the mind is a subsisting and organic subject, and neither a 
 mere succession of ideas or impressions, nor a confederacy 
 of independent powers without root in a spiritual body that 
 excites and directs them all. He was a fine practical study 
 for a metaphysician. The intellectual constitution of Mr. 
 Ingersoll, as illustrated in his professional life, proved ex- 
 perimentally to the observer, that although consciousness is 
 the supreme and fundamental faculty of the mind, yet that 
 this, and all the faculties, have their times of somnolency 
 and of sleep, and of waking, renovation and energetic action ; 
 and that they are inherent in a great essence, by which they 
 are stimulated and educated to the work of their several ends, 
 according to their respective nature and use, or to the de- 
 mands of their work, or of their great motive centre and 
 source. 
 
 In what may be called the passive state of Mr. Ingersoll's 
 mind, two or three or more of his faculties would seem to 
 be reposing in it, without giving out any clear evidence of 
 their activity or life. They were, apparently, lying deep in 
 the bosom of their matrix, or like sympathetic ink on the 
 paper, waiting the influence of the requisite heat to make 
 them perceptible; while others would be in a state of gentle 
 action, as if they had not yet gone to sleep, or were just 
 awaking. This was, indeed, the normal condition of his 
 mind in its negative or unexcited state. The law which he 
 had read faithfully, and facts of various kinds which he 
 had collected, would, both of them, be written upon his 
 memory, and would, nevertheless, in that state, seem to have 
 sunk in and disappeared, so as not to be legible, for the 
 time, even to himself. But the moment that the electric 
 flash of excitement passed through his mind, the spiritual 
 body itself would seem to awake; the necessary faculties 
 would wake along with it, and the law and the facts, which 
 had seemed before to have gone from the surface, would 
 stand bright up in the memory, and the influence work from 
 faculty to faculty, with instantaneous quickness and truth. 
 
136 Law Association Centennial 
 
 These different conditions of the mind were not made evi- 
 dent by much change of expression in his countenance or 
 person. What it was that specifically put his mind into 
 the positive state, I never ascertained with certainty; but, 
 as I always perceived it, when he was engaged in court, and 
 often perceived the contrary, when he was studying or pre- 
 paring a cause in his office, I inferred that it was emulation 
 or opposition, and, probably, a mixture of both. A par- 
 ticular antagonist might excite him, or the expectation of the 
 bar in a cause of importance, or the confidence and vivacity 
 of his opponent. 
 
 In the negative state of his mind, he did not himself 
 appear to place confidence in the operation of any of his 
 faculties, nor had he his true vigor in either department, 
 whether his memory, his reason, or ■ his imagination ; and 
 the latter was as full of activity with him under excitement 
 as either of the other two, — not a poetical imagination cer- 
 tainly, which takes its flights into the higher regions of light 
 and ether, but a different form of it, most important for its 
 uses in the law, where it is an active suggester of relations 
 in life and in the concerns of men, not generally obvious, 
 and is frequently of immense service in the explanation of 
 legal principles, and in the elucidation of facts and evidence. 
 In the proper state of excitement, his mind woke up into 
 immediate energy, and the required faculties sprang to their 
 appropriate work, as if they were new-born, and not merely 
 refreshed by repose. Dr. Reid's remark is no doubt very 
 true, "that the difference of minds is greater than that of 
 any other beings of the same species;" but Mr. IngersoU 
 exhibited and illustrated another truth, something akin to 
 that, that the difference of the same man's mind from itself 
 is, at times, as great as it is from the mind of any other 
 man. 
 
 Mr. IngersoU had a very considerable body of learning in 
 the law, as well as of general information and literature, 
 that was sufficiently at command; and, in ordinary conver- 
 sation, you did not perceive any deficiency in it; but when 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 137 
 
 he was cold and unexcited, its flow was by no means rapid, 
 and he was not quick to perceive the bearing of what he 
 knew upon the subject presented to him. Very different 
 was the case with Edward Tilghman, who, in several de- 
 partments of law-learning, not knowing more, and of com- 
 mercial law knowing perhaps less, brought his knowledge 
 to bear instantly upon the point or points of a case, like a 
 charge of the electric fluid. Mr. Ingersoll did not open his 
 eyes immediately to the full light that was in him. He 
 would seem to be in that state which the old writers call 
 darkling, a diminutive of dark. In this condition of his mind, 
 his faculties would seem not to have light enough to wake 
 them up; and if he then sat down to write an opinion upon 
 a case, he might miss it; and a day afterwards, when 
 something had occurred to put his mind into the proper 
 glow, he would be surprised that he had not before seen 
 what was then conspicuously clear to him; or if he drew a 
 special plea, or a law paper which required that he should 
 group all the facts at once, or the principles of law that 
 ruled them, the probability was not small that, in a differ- 
 ent state of mind, he would be the first to find a flaw in it. 
 
 In preparing his causes for trial or argument, he seemed 
 to feel this peculiarity, and to provide for it in some degree 
 by the stimulus of motion on the floor, and by suggesting 
 contradictions or opposition on the other side, to work up 
 against them. There was a door of communication between 
 his front and back offices, the upper half of which was 
 glazed like a window, so that what was going on in either 
 room could be seen in the other, though not distinctly heard. 
 No one could have read law with him without perceiving that, 
 in these preparations, he was a complete peripatetic. He 
 would sit for a moment at his table and write, and then 
 would rise and pace the floor, not unfrequently stopping and 
 holding out a hand, or nodding, or shaking his head, and 
 then return to his table, and write again, and so repeat the 
 process for an hour or more, until the work was elaborated ; 
 and those who saw his briefs knew that the labor had not 
 
138 Law Association Centennial 
 
 been brief, not perfunctory. Yet nearly all this preparation 
 seemed to be thrown away when he got into action at the 
 bar. He did not resort to his brief with any frequency, 
 and was as clear, and full, and precise, in regard to what 
 had unexpectedly arisen, or been first suggested against 
 him at that time, as he was in regard to what had occupied 
 him in the study. In the vivid state of his mind,^ he saw 
 and heard everything that concerned his cause, both that 
 which promoted, and that which impaired, his chance of 
 success; and every needful principle of law, with its quali- 
 fications, was present to him, all the strength and weakness 
 of his position, all the concessions of his adversaries, how- 
 ever unemphatic or slight, and the minutest facts that were 
 in evidence on either side. But all this time the glow or 
 excitement was in the intellect, and not perceptible in either 
 voice or action. 
 
 From these characteristics, it is easy to obtain the reason 
 or cause of his extraordinary excellence as an advocate, and 
 of the shade that sometimes came over its brightness, when 
 he was acting as an adviser or judge. What he did when 
 his mind was cold was one thing; what he did during the 
 strong action of his mind was another. Though he could 
 not always write ofif-hand an impregnable plea or opinion, 
 he could criticise it on his legs with the greatest acuteness 
 and strength. His cold opinions had not, by any means, 
 the persuasion or force of his oral arguments. Perhaps he 
 was not so extensively learned in the law of Tenures, and 
 of Remainders, and Executory Estates, as his finished friend 
 and compeer, Mr. Edward Tilghman; yet, even in this line, 
 as Lord Brougham remarks of Erskine, who was also want- 
 ing in this and some other kinds of law learning, "he could 
 conduct a purely legal argument with the most perfect suc- 
 cess," by the force of industry previously applied, by the 
 cautious limitation of his positions, which were always taken 
 within the range of his acquired knowledge, and by the bright 
 light of his intellect, which made clear to him the bearing of 
 everything that he said upon the controverted point. But he 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 139 
 
 was most complete and ready, at all times, in commercial law, 
 m which, from his great practice, he was the most frequently 
 called to think and to speak; and which, better than black- 
 letter learning, suited the texture of his mind. 
 
 When he rose to a jury, no lawyer could be better pre- 
 pared with a knowledge of the facts, and of the law that 
 bore upon them; and he chose his point of assault, and his 
 field of defence, with the tact and decision that belong to a 
 first-rate commander. No stratagem of the enemy could 
 seduce him from either. He might be driven from them by 
 force, but not turned by artifice or false attack. His eye 
 was open, and his spirit alert, during the whole contest; 
 and woe betided the adversary that took a false position, or 
 used an illogical argument, or misstated a fact against him. 
 If he felt strong in his case, he might give the error a short 
 correction or rebuke, and pass on to the direct application 
 of his own means; but if he was at all doubtful of his vic- 
 tory, he fastened upon the mistake with a grasp of death, 
 and would repeat and reiterate and multiply his assaults upon 
 it, until there did not remain a shadow of excuse for the 
 blunder. In such a juncture, his having a weak and doubt- 
 ful cause, it was of no importance to Mr. Ingersoll whether 
 the blunder was in a material point or not; for he enter- 
 tained the opinion, and was much governed by it in practice, 
 and was perhaps more than half right in his impression, 
 that if he could satisfy the jury that his antagonist was 
 decidedly wrong in anything, they would not always dis- 
 tinguish whether it was in the main thing or not. As to 
 catching him in a blunder, material or otherwise, it was 
 out of the question. The thing never happened. He was 
 infallible in every statement he made, whether of principle 
 or of evidence; and the only hope of the opposite side was 
 to show that what he said might be true, without helping 
 his cause. 
 
 He was, moreover, remarkably wary in abstaining from 
 all admissions or concessions that could in any way be 
 turned to his prejudice; so much so, that, before a jury, I 
 
140 Law Association Centennial 
 
 hardly ever knew him to concede or admit anything. This 
 circumstance, undoubtedly, shows the great vigilance that 
 his mind was called to, in the action in which he was en- 
 gaged. Nothing is more common than for gentlemen of 
 the bar to endeavor to win upon the jury by the appear- 
 ance of candor, in admitting what they think is of no im- 
 portance at all, to give more color to their sincerity in 
 insisting upon what they deem more important. But Mr. 
 Ingersoll knew its dangers; and without ever being un- 
 candid, he always compelled the adversary to win his cause 
 by his own strength. 
 
 He once told me an anecdote that he had heard of bar 
 practice in one of the States, which, perhaps, had fortified 
 him in his own practice to the contrary. The bar of that 
 state, as the story ran, were accustomed, when a special 
 verdict, or a case stated, was opened in Bank, to relieve one 
 another and the Court, by setting forth, orally, what each 
 admitted in his adversary's favor, and therefore would not 
 be disputed by him. On one occasion, when Judge Chase, 
 of the Supreme Court of the United States, presided, an 
 old lawyer began to state his admissions, and went on with 
 them with some prolixity, Judge Chase taking a note of 
 them for some time, and then stopping. As the old gentle- 
 man persevered to make other admissions, the Judge became 
 restive, and at last broke out: "You may sit down, old 
 gentleman; you need not make any more admissions. You 
 have admitted all your case away, half an hour ago." The 
 practice, if it existed, came to an end probably soon after 
 that. 
 
 Few lawyers were so facile, plausible, and quick as Mr. 
 Ingersoll was in suggesting distinctions, either in principle, 
 or in testimony, to relieve himself from a difficulty that 
 pressed him; which is also a trait of a quickened mind. 
 And I think we may discover a trace of this talent in the 
 only speech that Mr. Madison records of him, in his Minutes 
 of the Federal Convention; a very short, but, for the occa- 
 sion, a very fortunate and persuasive one. 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 141 
 
 There was no question that graveled the Convention 
 more than the very last they were to decide, namely, in 
 what form or manner the proposed Constitution of the 
 United States was to be attested by the delegates, to give it 
 the best effect with the people. 
 
 Almost every delegate of much distinction in the body 
 had objected to some parts of the Constitution; and very 
 few had approved of all its clauses, as well as of its omis- 
 sions and exclusions. 
 
 Those who were most desirous of its success with Con- 
 gress and the people, wished an unanimous signature, not 
 for the States only, but by the delegates personally. Gen- 
 eral Hamilton especially who, according to Mr. Madison, 
 said that "a few characters of consequence, by opposing, or 
 even refusing to sign the Constitution, might do infinite 
 mischief," expressed "his anxiety that every member should 
 sign." "No man's ideas," he said, "were more remote 
 from the plan than his own were known to be; but was it 
 possible to deliberate between anarchy and convulsion on 
 the one side, and the chance of good to be expected from 
 the plan on the other?" I give his language in Mr. Madi- 
 son's words, without entering into the question of Mr. Madi- 
 son's accuracy in all respects. 
 
 Three prominent members, however, Randolph and 
 Mason, of Virginia, and Gerry, of Massachusetts, had, on 
 the previous day, declared their determination not to sign; 
 and it was apprehended that others reserved themselves for 
 the final action. 
 
 Gouverneur Morris had very adroitly put into Dr. 
 Franklin's hands a form of motion, declaring unanimity in 
 one respect, which it was not easy to gainsay ; and, after an 
 excellent speech in his own style. Dr. Franklin moved the 
 Convention, that the Constitution should be signed by the 
 members, and offered, as a convenient form, the words 
 which had been placed in his hands : "Done in Convention 
 by the unanimous consent of the States present;" but, in 
 the discussion which followed, Mr. Morris himself, with the 
 
142 Law Association Centennial 
 
 view no doubt to gain some of the delegates who might 
 dissent from the form, remarked, that the signing by the 
 members in the form proposed attested only the fact that 
 the States present were unanimous. 
 
 This very suggestion was the ground of objection by one 
 of the most frank and honorable men in the Convention, 
 Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, of South Carolina, who said 
 that if the meaning of the signers should be left in doubt, 
 his purpose would not be answered. He should sign the 
 Constitution with a view to support it with all his influence, 
 and wished to pledge himself accordingly. 
 
 This alarmed Dr. Franklin; and though in his written 
 speech he had expressed his desire "that every member 
 should put his name to the instrument," and "that for their 
 own sakes, and for the sake of posterity, they should act 
 heartily and unanimously in recommending this Constitu- 
 tion, if approved by Congress and confirmed by the Con- 
 ventions," he now said "that it was too soon to pledge 
 themselves, before Congress and their constituents should 
 have approved the plan." 
 
 Here was a crop of distinctions and difficulties, — a 
 pledge to support the Constitution at all events, — or a mere 
 attestation of the fact that the Convention had agreed to it 
 according to parliamentary rule, — or a partial signature by 
 the members, — or no personal signature at all; and no one 
 could predict the result. Immediately after Dr. Franklin 
 sat down, Mr. Ingersoll rose and said, "that he did not 
 consider the signing as a mere attestation of the fact, or as 
 pledging the signers to support the Constitution at all events, 
 but a recommendation of what, all things considered, was 
 the most eligible." 
 
 It was at the close of this remark, that the question was 
 taken upon Dr. Franklin's motion; and although the manly 
 aversion of General Pinckney and Pierce Butler to an am- 
 biguous attestation divided South Carolina, the motion was 
 agreed to by every other State, and every member signed 
 it, Pinckney and Butler included, except the three from 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 143 
 
 Virg-inia and Massachusetts, whom I have named. And it 
 would have been better if they had accepted Mr. Ingersoll's 
 distinction ; for the event has falsified the predictions of the 
 two Virginia delegates; and the Massachusetts delegate, 
 who predicted from the Constitution a crisis in his own 
 State, and spoke of democracy as "the worst of all political 
 evils," afterwards contributed his best to make the govern- 
 ment the thing he had deprecated. 
 
 The soundness of Mr. Ingersoll's general positions with 
 a cautious exclusion of what, though possibly comprehended 
 in them, he did not mean to admit, was one of his forensic 
 characteristics. 
 
 His oratory was of a very high order for both classes of 
 men to whom it was addressed, not varying materially, 
 whether before the jury box, or the Bench, except in topics 
 or illustrations. It was clear, earnest, logically connected, 
 rarely or never rising to the highest flights, but always on 
 the wing, not wanting in vehemence on a proper occasion, 
 and always sufficiently animated to keep every one awake. 
 Before the court his weapons were from the armory of the 
 law and the facts of his case exclusively. Before the jury 
 he seized with dexterity and effect upon every honest preju- 
 dice that could enlist the feelings of the panel. He never 
 stumbled upon an awkward phrase, nor said a bitter thing, 
 nor uttered a pointless expression, nor began a sentence 
 before the thought was ready for it, and the language 
 for the thought. He was not voluble nor rapid. His words 
 did not interfere with each other; nor, in any height of 
 excitement, did his voice bray, nor his arms lash the air, 
 nor his foot explode upon the floor. Neither was he hesitat- 
 ing or slow as if he was inquiring for the next word, nor 
 monotonous as if he was reading from a stereotyped memory. 
 But, with just the proper tone and measure, rising suf- 
 ficiently above the natural key of conversation to give some- 
 thing like air or rhythm to his language, and speaking 
 as from his brain and not from his brief, he proceeded, with 
 proper pauses and variations of time, from beginning to end, 
 
144 Law Association Centennial 
 
 without a single breakdown or trip in word or thought. I 
 have known a distinguished leader in the British House of 
 Commons utter sentence after sentence with some rapidity, 
 and come bolt up to the last word of his last sentence, 
 without finding it at home. He had to trust, therefore, to 
 a chance selection, and ended in a platitude. This is not, I 
 think, a very common American failing ; but the same thing 
 has sometimes happened at our own bar, and with rather 
 clever men, too. But it never happened to Mr. Ingersoll. 
 He was on his feet always, whatever might be the foot- 
 ing of his cause; and his step, whether quick or other- 
 wise, was sustained to the point where he intended to pause. 
 Without affectation of ornament, or the use of coloring 
 words in the place of imagination, he would proceed from 
 hour to hour, if the cause required it, giving out a regular 
 current of pertinent thoughts and manly words to the close. 
 It was impossible for any one to be more clear and intel- 
 ligible, in the whole design of his speech, and in every 
 phrase of it; and equally impossible, in any part of it, to 
 detect an instance or occasion in which temper, dignity, man- 
 liness of carriage, or gentlemanliness of manner had been 
 either forgotten, or studiously remembered by him, so natural 
 and habitual were these observances with him. 
 
 It was not an unfrequent thing with him to begin his 
 summing up in conclusion to the jury with an apothegm, 
 or some historical fact, that was apposite to the main matter, 
 and thus, from the outset, to win the attention of the panel, 
 and assist the impression of his address, by assuming the 
 connection of his claim or defence with an indisputable 
 truth. On one occasion he was counsel for a party who had 
 gone beyond the legal line of retaliation for sharp words 
 spoken of his mother. "Gentlemen of the jury," he began, 
 "we are informed by a traveler in Africa, that universally 
 among her savage tribes, they have a saying that is worth 
 our remembering : 'Strike me, but do not curse my mother.' 
 The most imbruted negro on the Senegal or Gambia has 
 this instruction from his wild nature. How much clearer a 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 145 
 
 voice speaks the same language to civilized man, who derives 
 his manhood from the bosom and training of a refined and 
 loving woman! We must take care not to be surpassed 
 in manliness and filial affection by a brutish negro." This 
 is an instance of his manner. It was also, to some extent, the 
 manner of William Lewis. Their practice may recommend 
 it to others ; but, unless the speaker has the last word, it is 
 not always difficult to turn an edge of the same kind against 
 him. Mr. Ingersoll, however, was eminently successful 
 at the jury-bar. I knew him to gain all his causes, and they 
 were many, at a long session held by Judge Washington; 
 and when I reminded him of it, he said: "Yes; I have had 
 good luck." It was the good luck that probably had all the 
 other antecedents to success in a lawsuit, required by Dr. 
 Franklin, — "a good cause, a good lawyer, a good jury, and a 
 good judge." "Good luck" was the Doctor's last requisite. 
 
 I have described Mr. Ingersoll's characteristics with the 
 greater confidence and particularity, because I knew him 
 longer and better than any of my seniors at the bar. I not 
 only read law with him, but, while his powers were still in 
 their vigor, I had attained to practice in that line in which 
 he had held a position of command, and associated him 
 with me as often as I could. I was both happy, and just to 
 my clients in doing so; for I had great admiration of him, 
 and great confidence in him, and knew both the intellectual 
 and moral foundation on which I reposed. He was a man 
 of the purest honor personally, and of the strictest fidelity 
 in his profession. Both of them, in a general way, were 
 well known to the city; but his honor was more especially 
 known to myself, by circumstances which did not pass to 
 
 , the knowledge of many others. It is rather a singular fact 
 in the history of the Philadelphia bar, that at least five of 
 its most conspicuous members in his time, came to the close 
 of their business and lives with rather inadequate provision 
 for their families, which, nevertheless, did not proceed from 
 
 extravagant living, nor from wild and abortive speculation. 
 
 In three of the instances it might be traced to responsibilities 
 
146 Law Association Centennial 
 
 that were assumed for, or cast upon them by, other persons. 
 The carriage of men in the decline of life, under a weight 
 of obligations which must either impair the comfort of their 
 families, or imperil their own integrity, is literally the ex- 
 perimentum crucis of their honor; and I do not recollect one 
 of them who did not bear the cross, as their descendants 
 must now rejoice that they- bore it. 
 
 Our city has one fault in common with all cities, and 
 with mankind in general; and another that is local, and, at 
 this day, rather uncommon. And she has so many good quali- 
 ties, that she may bear to be told of her defects. 
 
 Like all the world, she rushes to the notice of what is 
 new, and puts old merits and services into the wallet, which 
 Shakespeare makes Ulysses say, Time "hath at his back," 
 
 "Wherein he puts alms for oblivion, 
 A great-sized monster of ingratitudes. 
 Those scraps are good deeds past; which are devour'd 
 As fast as they are made, forgot as soon 
 As they are done. ' ' 
 
 The other is the more uncommon fault. It is not to be re- 
 gretted that Mr. Ingersoll's day, and that of the really able 
 men who were at his side, was not, in any part of our 
 country, the day that has since dawned, and it is hoped has 
 got beyond its meridian ; a day of puffing and ballooning of 
 everybody and thing, however little above the ordinary stat- 
 ure or quality, sometimes indeed when it is below it. His 
 day was a day of becoming modesty, and of some per- 
 sonal dignity, in all the professions, and nothing will be 
 gained by our day's becoming otherwise. But these quali- 
 ties furnish no excuse to a great city for indifference to the 
 really great talents that are sometimes found in connection 
 with them. And this is the fault referred to, that she has 
 been hitherto, and perhaps immemorially, indifferent or in- 
 sensible to the abilities of her sons, who have gained their 
 first public consideration elsewhere. She is wanting in 
 civic personality, or what is perhaps a better phrase for the 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 147 
 
 thought, a family unity or identity. She does not take, and 
 she never has taken, satisfaction in habitually honoring her 
 distinguished men as her men, as men of her own family. 
 It is the city that is referred to, as distinguished, perhaps, 
 from the rest of the State. She has never done it in the 
 face of the world, as Charleston has done it, as Richmond 
 has done it, as Baltimore has done it, as New York has done 
 It, or at least, did it in former times, and as Boston did it, 
 has done it, and will do it forever. She is more indifferent 
 to her sons than she is to strangers; and this perhaps may 
 be the reason why other parts of the State so much more 
 readily advance their own men to public office and distinc- 
 tion. 
 
 The fact has been often stated for sixty years past, but is 
 not easy to explain, nor will I attempt to account for it with 
 any confidence. Perhaps it grows out of her Quaker origin. 
 It is certainly in harmony with it, to put nothing more 
 striking than a drab-colored dress upon the men who have 
 done their best for her. It is in the key of Quaker manners 
 of old times, — of Quaker moderation and equability. It 
 may, to some extent, be a result of the division of parties in 
 the Proprietary time, the Country against the City, as for 
 the most part adherents of the Proprietary, but with a 
 minority in favor of the Assembly, enough to break their 
 own people into disunion. To this day, the Country of Penn- 
 sylvania is against the City in everything, and for no existing 
 cause that can be stated. In recent years, the composition 
 of the city gives the best explanation of the fact ; for while 
 there is something like a general temperament in the life and 
 manners of the city, there is no city whose significant popula- 
 tion is less homogeneous. We are by no means one, but 
 very many, in origin and education ; and not so likely to have 
 a family heart to our distinguished men as either the South 
 or the East. 
 
 But, without explaining it, we may regret it. If it be 
 modesty, it is a virtue that has its inconveniences. There is 
 no need, certainly, of putting everybody of good figure 
 
148 Law Association Centennial 
 
 into scarlet, or flame color, and sending them up by gas, 
 that they may be seen afar; but it is both just to individuals, 
 and profitable to a city, to give to its really able men in 
 every profession or walk, such prominence and decoration 
 as will bring to both a due share of consideration from the 
 country at large. It helps the community, and it helps the 
 individual. It warms him, and draws him out, or disposes 
 him the more readily to be drawn out. It gives him con- 
 fidence and enlarges him both in power and productiveness. 
 
 The elder Matthews, an inimitable mimic and droll, at 
 one of his first appearances in the Philadelphia Theatre, 
 when I was present, found his audience rather unrespon- 
 sive to him. "I tell you what," said he, turning to a group 
 in the orchestra near him, "if you want me to make you 
 laugh, you must laugh at me." This is human nature, and 
 shows that even first-rate talents require the occasional dew 
 of public sympathy and praise. 
 
 Full public justice was not done to Tilghman, Lewis, In- 
 gersoll, Rawle and Dallas, who occupied the front seats at 
 the bar of Philadelphia at the close of the last and the 
 beginning of the present century. It was done at the bar, 
 and it was done in other States, but it was not done gen- 
 erally in the city. The night is now settling fast upon 
 those memories which go back to their meridian, or even to 
 their declining sun ; and this is one motive of my imperfect 
 attempt, in three or four cases, to remove the obscurity that 
 is coming upon names, which at one time, within the halls 
 of the law, were surrounded by as pure a light, and as 
 bright, as is now shining anywhere in any part of our 
 country. One and all of them would have been regarded 
 as able men in Westminster Hall. More than one of them 
 would have stood at the height of that bar. Their supe- 
 riors I think have not shown themselves in any part of our 
 land; and among those who have followed on the same 
 spot, the praise of being next after ought to have satisfied 
 the foremost of them that I have known. 
 
 There is another influence that has led to these sketches. 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 149 
 
 Mr.^ Ingersoll's day at the bar was moreover the day of 
 judicial tenure during good behavior. It ought not to be 
 forgotten what sort of men were made at the bar, by that 
 tenure of judicial office, any more than we should forget 
 who were the judges that adorned it, and shed their influ- 
 ence upon all around them. 
 
 We are now under the direction of a fearful mandate 
 which compels our judges to enter the arena of a popular 
 election for their offices, and for a term of years so short as 
 to keep the source of their elevation to the bench contin- 
 ually before their eyes. At least once again in the life of 
 every judge, we may suppose he will be compelled by a 
 necessity, much stronger than at first, to enter the same 
 field; and the greater the necessity, the less will his eyes 
 ever close upon the fact. It is this fact, re-eligibility to 
 office, with the hope of re-election, that puts a cord around 
 the neck of every one of them, during the whole term of 
 liis office. It is transcendently worse than the principle of 
 original election at the polls. Doubtless there is more than 
 one of the judges who had rather be strangled by the cord 
 than do a thing unworthy of his place; but the personal 
 characteristics of a few are no grounds of inference as to 
 the many; nor are even the mischiefs already apparent a 
 rule to measure the mischiefs that are in reserve. We must 
 confess that a system is perilous which holds out to the best 
 judge, if he displeases a powerful party, nothing better 
 than the poor-house, which a late eminent Chief Justice 
 saw before him, and committed the great fault of his life, 
 by confessing and avoiding it. The mind of the public, of 
 all parties, is becoming apprehensive upon the subject; and 
 well may it be so, even among party men, for parties change 
 suddenly, and once in every five or ten years we may be 
 sure that the chalice will come round to the lips of those 
 who have drugged it. No man can be too apprehensive of 
 the evil, who thinks the law worth preserving as a security 
 for what he possesses, and no lawyer who regards it as a 
 security for his honor and reputation. For what can it give 
 
150 Law Association Centennial 
 
 of either, if the wheels of the instrument receive a twist or 
 bias through party fear or favor, or are so ignorantly and 
 presumptuously governed, as to let them cut and eat into 
 each other, until they work falsely or uncertainly ? 
 
 At the formation of the Federal Constitution in 1787, 
 the tenure of the judicial department was thought by our fore- 
 fathers to be not only the guarantee of that department, but 
 the best guarantee of all the departments of government. 
 What guarantee is there for the Constitution itself, if you 
 emasculate the judicial department, the only one that is a 
 smooth, practical, wakeful, and efficient defence against in- 
 vasions of the Constitution by the Legislature, — the only 
 one that can be efficient in a republican representative gov- 
 ernment, whose people will not bear a blow, and therefore 
 require a guarantee whose blow is a word? A leasehold 
 elective tenure by the judiciary is a frightful solecism in 
 such a government. It enfeebles the guarantee of other 
 guarantees — the trial by jury — the writ of habeas corpus — 
 the freedom and purity of elections by the people — and 
 the true liberty and responsibility of the press. It takes 
 strength from the only arm that can do no mischief by its 
 strength, and gives it to those who have no general in- 
 telligence to this end in the use of it, and therefore no 
 ability to use it for their own protection. The certainty 
 and permanence of the law depend in great degree upon 
 the judges; and all experience misleads us, and the very 
 demonstrations of reasons are fallacies, if the certainty and 
 permanence of the judicial office by the tenure of good 
 behavior are not inseparably connected with a righteous, as 
 well as with a scientific administration of the law. What 
 can experience or foresight predict for the result of a system, 
 by which a body of men, set apart to enforce the whole law at 
 all times, whatever may be the opposition to it, and whose 
 duty is never so important and essential as when it does 
 so against the passions of a present majority of the polls, is 
 made to depend for office upon the fluctuating temper of a 
 majority, and not upon the virtue of their own conduct? 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 151 
 
 But an equally inseparable connection or dependency 
 exists between the bar and the bench, — between the knowl- 
 edge and virtue of the respective bodies. A good bar can- 
 not exist long in connection with a favor-seeking bench, — 
 a bench on the lookout for favors from the people or from 
 any one. Such a Bench is not an independent body, what- 
 ever some of the judges may be personally. Nobody thinks 
 it is. The Constitution of 1837, and the people, declare 
 that it is not, by the very principle of the recurring elective 
 tenure. Under a false theory, and for a party end, they 
 meant to make it a dependent body, by abolishing the ten- 
 ure during good behavior. The bench, therefore, as now 
 constituted, is not raised sufficiently above the bar to com- 
 mand it by the power of its political constitution. The 
 bar is constitutionally the higher body of the two, the more 
 permanent, the more independent, and, popularity being 
 the motive power, the more controlling body, though only 
 for its personal and several ends. This is the fatal derange- 
 ment that the present judicial tenure makes between the 
 two corps. The subordinate becomes the paramount. The 
 private and personal will controls the public; not by reason, 
 not by virtue, not always openly, but by influence. 
 
 In our cities and principal towns, the bar is a large and 
 diversified body. Like the web of our life, it is a mingled 
 yarn, good and ill together; and the ill yarn is not always 
 the weakest, nor the least likely, by its dye, to give hue and 
 color to the whole. Venal politicians, — leaders in the pop- 
 ular current, — minglers in it for the purpose of leading it, 
 or at least of turning the force of its waters to their own 
 wheels, — adepts in polishing up, or in blowing upon or dull- 
 ing the names of candidates for judicial office, — students in 
 the art of ferreting out the infirmities of judges, and track- 
 ing the path of their fears, — such men are always to be 
 found in such a body, and to be found in most abundance 
 at the bar of a court that has a weak constitution. It is 
 there that thrift waits upon them. There is no need that 
 the pregnant hinges of their knees should be crooked to the 
 
152 Law Association Centennial 
 
 judges, if they only be to those who make them. Where 
 is the independent bench, that can habitually exercise the 
 restraining or the detersive power, to prevent such "faults" 
 of the bar from "whipping the virtues" out of court, or 
 breaking down their influence upon the mass? And if the 
 bench — not individual judges — if the bench, as the Con- 
 stitution makes it, cannot steadily and uniformly, without 
 special virtue or particular effort, repress the professional 
 misconduct of every member of the bar, whatever be his 
 popular influence and connections, what honor or esteem 
 will professional distinction obtain from the world, and what 
 sanction will professional integrity have at the bar ? 
 
 It is no comfort to think that the people, or at least a 
 large number of them, must be present sufferers from such 
 a state of things, and that, finally, all of them must take 
 their turn; for the whole people must suffer from a dis- 
 ordered bar. But the more cutting evil must fall on the 
 honorable members of the bar, who regard their own dis- 
 tinction in it as an estate in character for those who are 
 to succeed them; and who, if their community be gener- 
 ally vitiated, must see the inheritance of honor which they 
 would lay up for their children, day by day sapped and 
 undermined, while they are toiling against the hour-glass, to 
 find at last in their best acquisitions nothing better than the 
 sand at the one end, or the emptiness at the other. 
 
 The bar of Philadelphia, I doubt not of all Pennsylva- 
 nia, but of the former I may speak scienter, was, for nearly 
 half a century, under the judicial tenure of good behavior, an 
 honorable Bar, professionally and personally. If there were 
 spots or blemishes, they did not meet the face of the court, 
 and rarely the face of the day. The serene virtue of the 
 bench was no more disturbed than its strength was chal- 
 lenged by them. Without any doubt, very many honorable 
 and able lawyers are still extant at it, and so are pure and 
 unterrified judges. But is there no symptom of change? 
 Perhaps not great. Is the countenance of the public to- 
 wards the bench and the bar the same that it was in times 
 
Binney's Leaders of the Old Bar 153 
 
 past? Perhaps not exactly. Both the fact and the causes 
 of it are worthy of much observation by the bar, and by 
 everybody. 
 
 Whether the connection between bench and bar, how- 
 ever, be such as has been suggested, or the full influence of 
 learned and honorable members of the profession must always 
 be felt, whatever be the tenure of the bench, in either suppo- 
 sition it must be profitable to lawyers of virtuous aspiration 
 to recall their predecessors of distinguished name, and to 
 corroborate their own virtue and influence at this day, by 
 examples from the old "good behavior" bar of Philadelphia. 
 
AN EULOGIUM UPON 
 THE HON. WILLIAM TILGHMAN 
 
 Late Chief Justice of Pennsylvania 
 by 
 
 HORACE BINNEY 
 
 Philadelphia, July 7, 1827. 
 
 Dear Sir: Immediately after the death of Chief Justice 
 Tilghman, the members of the bar expressed a wish that an 
 eulogium should be pronounced upon his character; and hav- 
 ing passed a resolution to that effect, they appointed a com- 
 mittee to make the necessary arrangements. We now request 
 that you will suffer us to impose the duty upon you ; feeling 
 as we sincerely do, that we shall thus gratify the anxious 
 desire of our professional brethren, and that justice will be 
 fully done to the merits of the deceased. 
 
 With great esteem and respect, your friends and obedi- 
 ent servants, Charles Chauncey, 
 
 Joseph R. Ingersoll, 
 Horace Binney, Esq. John M. Scott. 
 
 Philadelphia, July 9, 1827. 
 Gentlemen: I am extremely sensible of the honour 
 which you have done to me by the request communicated in 
 your note of the 7th instant. My inability to do justice to the 
 eminent person referred to, ought I fear to deter me from 
 attempting to portray his character ; but my deep veneration 
 for the virtues and learning of Chief Justice Tilghman, will 
 not permit me, under any sense of my own defects, to ques- 
 tion the wishes of my brethren of the bar. 
 
 I am, very faithfully, your friend and servant, 
 
 Ch. Chauncey, ^ Horace Binney. 
 
 J. R. Ingersoll, >■ Esquires. 
 John M. Scott. J 
 
Binney's Chief Justice Tilghman 155 
 
 At a meeting of the Bar of Philadelphia, held at the 
 Hall of the Circuit Court of the United States, on the thir- 
 teenth day of October, 1827, William Rawle, Esq., Chair- 
 man, John Sergeant, Secretary, 
 
 The following resolution was unanimously adopted: 
 
 Resolved, That the thanks of the bar be offered to Mr. 
 Binney, for his discourse pronounced this day, equally 
 worthy of the profession, the subject, and the speaker; and 
 that he be requested to furnish a copy for publication. 
 
 W. Rawle^ Chairman. 
 Attest, 
 
 John Sergeant^ Secretary. 
 
 EULOGIUM. 
 
 Gentlemen of the Bar of Philadelphia: 
 
 If the reputation of the living were the only source from 
 which the honor of our race is derived, the death of an emin- 
 ent man would be a subject of immitigable grief. It is the 
 lot of few to attain great distinction, before Death has placed 
 them above the distorting medium, through which men are 
 seen by their contemporaries. It is the lot of still fewer, to 
 attain it by qualities which exalt the character of our species. 
 Envy denies the capacity of some, slander stigmatizes the 
 principles of others, fashion gives an occasional currency 
 to false pretensions, and the men by whom the age is here- 
 after to be known, are often too much in advance of it to 
 be discernible by the common eye. All these causes combine 
 to reduce the stock of living reputation, as much below the 
 real merits of the age, as is below the proper dignity of man ; 
 and he who should wish to elevate his spirit by great exam- 
 ples of wisdom, of genius, and of patriotism, if he could not 
 derive them from the illustrious dead, would have better rea- 
 
iS6 Law Association Centennial 
 
 son than the son of PhiHp, to weep at the limits which con- 
 fined him. To part with the great and good from a world 
 which thus wants them, and not to receive thereafter the 
 refreshing influence of their purified and exalted fame, would 
 be to make Death almost the master of our virtue, as he 
 appears to be of our perishable bodies. 
 
 The living and the dead are, however, but one family, 
 and the moral and intellectual affluence of those who have 
 gone before, remains to enrich their posterity. The great 
 fountain of human character lies beyond the confines of life, 
 where the passions cannot invade it. It is in that region, 
 that among innumerable proofs of man's nothingness, are 
 preserved the records of his immortal descent and destiny. 
 It is there that the spirits of all ages, after their sun is set, 
 are gathered into one firmament, to shed their unquenchable 
 lights upon us. It is in the great assembly of the dead, that 
 the philosopher and the patriot, who have passed from life, 
 complete their benefaction to mankind, by becoming imper- 
 ishable examples of virtue. 
 
 Beyond the circle of private affections which cannot 
 choose but shrink from the inroads of Death, there is no 
 grief then for the departure of the eminently good and wise. 
 No tears but those of gratitude should fall into the graves 
 of such as are gathered in honor to their forefathers. By 
 their now unenvied virtues and talents, they have become a 
 new possession to their posterity, and when we commemorate 
 them, and pay the debt which is their due, we increase and 
 confirm our own inheritance. 
 
 We are assembled, my brethren, to pay a part of this 
 debt to one, to whom we shall be greatly in arrear, after we 
 have exhausted all our terms of respect and endearment. We 
 come to honor one who, during a long life, was an honor to 
 his profession and his country. We come to lay claim to his 
 reputation as part of our own, and as an accession to that 
 invaluable estate, which is to pass from generation to genera- 
 tion of this commonwealth, to all future time. It is in obedi- 
 ence to your call, that I shall endeavor to show the value of 
 
Binney's Chief Justice Tilghman 157 
 
 this claim by a sketch of the life and character of the late 
 Chief Justice Tilghman. 
 
 William Tilghman was born on the twelfth of August, 
 1756, upon the estate of his father, in Talbot County, on the 
 Eastern Shore of Maryland, about a mile from the town of 
 Easton. 
 
 His paternal great grandfather, Richard Tilghman, 
 emigrated to that province, from Kent County, England, 
 about the year 1662, and settled on Chester River in Queen 
 Anne's County. 
 
 His father, James Tilghman, a distinguished lawyer, 
 is well known in the profession in Pennsylvania, as Secretary 
 of the Proprietary Land Office, and as having brought that 
 department, by the accuracy of his mind and the steadiness 
 of his purpose, into a system as much remarked for order 
 and equity, as from early defects it threatened to be other- 
 wise. 
 
 His maternal grandfather was Tench Francis, the elder, 
 of this city, one of the most eminent lawyers of the province, 
 the brother of Richard Francis, author of "Maxims of 
 Equity," and of Dr. Philip Francis, the translator of Horace. 
 
 It is not surprising to find among the collateral ances- 
 tors of the late Chief Justice, the author of one of the 
 earliest compends of scientific equity, and a scholar accom- 
 plished in the literature of the age of Augustus. 
 
 In 1762, his family removed from Maryland to Phila- 
 delphia. 
 
 In the succeeding year he was placed at the Academy, 
 and in the regular progress of the classes came under the 
 instruction of Mr. Beveridge, from whom he received his 
 foundation in Latin and Greek. 
 
 Upon the death of Beveridge, his place was filled provis- 
 ionally by Mr. Wallis, who was perfectly skilled in the 
 prosody of those languages, and who imparted to his pupils 
 an accuracy, of which the Chief Justice was a striking 
 example. 
 
 Dr. Davidson, the author of the grammar, succeeded 
 
158 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Beveridge, and with him the subject of this discourse re- 
 mained, till he entered the College in the year of 1769, Dr. 
 Smith being then the Provost, and Dr. Francis Allison the 
 Vice-Provost, the latter of whom instructed the students in 
 the higher Greek and Latin classics ; and such was the devo- 
 tion to literature of the eminent pupil of whom we are speak- 
 ing, that after he had received the Bachelor's degree, and 
 was in the ordinary sense prepared for a profession, he 
 continued for some time to read the classics with the benefit 
 of Dr. Allison's prelections. 
 
 I record these circumstances, because the Chief Justice 
 himself has recorded them. He seems, throughout life, to 
 have recurred with grateful delight to the studies of his early 
 youth, to which he was able to refer his taste for letters, the 
 bond that united him to society, after almost every other had 
 been painfully broken. 
 
 In February, 1772, he began the study of the law in this 
 city, under the direction of the late Benjamin Chew, then at 
 the head of his profession, afterwards Chief Justice of the 
 Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, and at the close of the High 
 Court of Errors and Appeals, its venerable President. 
 
 In the office of this gentleman he continued until Decem- 
 ber, 1776, devoting himself to Littleton, and Coke, and 
 Plowden, and the other fathers of the Common Law, at that 
 time the manuals of the legal student, and at no time post- 
 poned in his estimation and regard, to the more popular 
 treatise of later days. 
 
 From 1776 to 1783, partly on his father's estate, and 
 partly at Chestertown, whither his family had removed, he 
 continued to pursue his legal studies, reading deeply and 
 laboriously, as he has himself recorded, and applying his 
 intervals of leisure to the education of a younger brother. 
 When, therefore, in the spring of 1783, he was admitted to 
 the courts of Maryland, we may infer that an apprenticeship 
 of eleven years, had filled his mind with legal principles, 
 sufficient to guide and enlighten him for the rest of his life. 
 
 In 1788, and for some successive years, he was elected 
 
BiNNEY's Chief Justice Tilghman 159 
 
 as representative to the Legislature of Maryland. His temper 
 and habits were not perfectly congenial with active political 
 life, nor was he at any time attracted by that career; but he 
 was a republican, in the catholic sense, and took an active 
 part in procuring the adoption of the Federal Constitution, 
 to which as well as to its founders, and great first administra- 
 tor, he felt and uniformly declared the most profound attach- 
 ment. 
 
 In 1793, a- few months previous to his marriage with 
 Margaret Allen, the daughter of Mr. James Allen, he 
 returned to this city, and commenced the practice of the law, 
 which he prosecuted until his appointment by President 
 Adams, on the third of March, 1801, as Chief Judge of the 
 Circuit Court of the United States for this circuit. 
 
 His powers as an advocate, but more especially his 
 learning and judgment, were held in great respect by this 
 community, surrounded notwithstanding as he was, by men 
 of the first eminence in the land. His law arguments, which 
 some now present may recollect, were remarkable for the dis- 
 tinctness with which he presented his case, and for the 
 perspicuity and accuracy with which his legal references were 
 made to sustain it. He was concise, simple, occasionally 
 nervous and uniformly faithful to the Court, as he was to the 
 client. But the force of his intellect resided in his judgment; 
 and even higher faculties than his as an advocate, would have 
 been thrown comparatively into the shade by the more strik- 
 ing light which surrounded his path as a judge. 
 
 The Court in which his judicial ability was first made 
 known had but a short existence. It was established at the 
 close of the second administration of our government; and 
 although this particular measure was deemed by wise men on 
 all sides, and is still cited by many of them, as the happiest 
 organization of the federal judiciary, yet, having grown up 
 amid the contentions of party, it was not spared by that, 
 which spares nothing. In a year after its enactment, the law 
 which erected the Court was repealed; and judges who had 
 
i6o Law Association Centennial 
 
 received their commissions during good behavior, were 
 deprived of their offices without the imputation of a fault. 
 
 An intimate friend of the Chief Justice has informed 
 me that in all their intercourse, he had never known him to 
 allude to the circumstances of having been a judge of that 
 Court. There was doubtless a painful recollection connected 
 with it. It is known that his opinion was against the validity 
 of the repealing law ; for in a very able protest, published by 
 Judge Bassett, another member of the same Court, in which 
 the breach of the constitution was strenuously asserted, he 
 remarks, "If any ditterence between me and my associates 
 in office exists, it relates merely to the point of time for 
 expressing our sentiments. I can confidently assert, that, 
 on deliberation, they coincide with me in other respects." 
 
 After the abolition of the Circuit Court, Mr. Tilghman 
 resumed the practice of his profession, and continued in it 
 until the thirty-first of July, 1805, when he was appointed 
 President of the Courts of Common Pleas in the first district. 
 
 He remained but a few months in the Common Pleas. 
 In the beginning of the year 1806, Mr. Shippen, the Chief 
 Justice of the Supreme Court, yielded to the claims of a ven- 
 erable old age by retiring from the office, and on the twenty- 
 fifth of February, Mr. Tilghman was commissioned in his 
 place by Governor M'Kean, himself a great lawyer and 
 judge, and interested as a father in the Court which he had 
 led on to distinguished reputation in the United States. 
 
 From the moment of the late Chief Justice's appoint- 
 ment to that of his death, most of us, my brethren, have 
 stood around him, and have witnessed the great work upon 
 which his reputation rests. His life has been on the bench — 
 his family has been the bar — his children are now before me. 
 So obvious have been his walks to all — so radiant with that 
 light which is reflected from the path of the just, that no part 
 of them is unknown to you ; and I shall but revive the impres- 
 sions and assist the recollections of each, while I endeavor 
 to sketch the extent of his labors, the character of his judg- 
 
r rr„„ a I'ain 
 
 VI I 1 
 
 L.[J. I 
 
 "■ o, - ,. I ci -: 
 
 :[-i/^: iCELix^r. i s.^i-v i .e.. 
 
Binney's Chief Justice Tilghman i6i 
 
 ments and of his mind, his temper and disposition, social, 
 moral, and religious. 
 
 The higher judicial offices in our country are posts of 
 great distinction, and they owe it to their attendant exertion 
 and responsibility. They put in requisition the noblest facul- 
 ties of the mind, the finest properties of the temper, and not 
 unf requently they task to the utmost the vigor of an unbroken 
 constitution. Very few, if any, of their duties are mechanical. 
 There is no routine by which their business is performed 
 without the expenditure of thought. The cases which come 
 before the judges are new either in principle or in circum- 
 stances ; and not seldom the facts which ask for the applica- 
 tion of different principles, are in the same cause, nearly in 
 equipoise. There is consequently an interminable call upon 
 the judge to compare, discriminate, weigh, adopt, reject, in 
 fine to bring into intense exercise his whole understanding. 
 Where the profession is candid and well instructed, nothing 
 that is obvious, and little that can be made so without deep 
 consideration, is referred to the decision of the judges. For 
 them the universal intelligence of the world is at work to 
 complicate the contracts and the duties of men. For them 
 are reserved those Gordian knots, which, although others 
 may cut, they must at least appear to untie. Every judgment 
 is made under great responsibility to the science; it must 
 be a rule for the future, as well as for the past. It is made 
 under an equal responsibility to the parties ; the judge is the 
 defaulter, when through his means the defaulter escapes. It 
 is under a higher responsibility to heaven — the malediction 
 of an unjust sentence is heavier upon him that gives, than 
 upon him that receives it. 
 
 He who, through a large portion of the short life of 
 man, properly sustains such an office, studying all his causes 
 with the intenseness of personal interest, improving the 
 science by adding daily confirmation to the defences of 
 liberty, reputation and property, and at the last standing 
 clear in his great account of justice impartially administered 
 to the poor and the rich, the guilty and the innocent— he 
 
1 62 Law Association Centennial 
 
 that does this is entitled to all the homage which man ought 
 to render to man, and may claim, but not till then, to stand by 
 the side of our venerated Tilghman. 
 
 From the time he took his seat on the bench at the 
 March Tei-m, 1806, for the space of more than ten years, he 
 delivered an opinion in every case but five, the arguments in 
 four of which he was prevented from hearing by sickness, 
 and in one by domestic affliction ; and in more than two hun- 
 dred and fifty cases, he either pronounced the judgment of 
 the Court, or his brethren concurred in his opinion and rea- 
 sons without a comment. 
 
 His attention from the beginning to the end of the 
 twenty-one years that he presided in the Supreme Court, was 
 undeviatingly given to every case; and he prepared himself 
 for all that required consideration at his chamber, by taking 
 an accurate note of the authorities cited by counsel, and of 
 the principal heads and illustrations of their arguments. 
 
 This labor was not performed to accumulate the evi- 
 dences of his devotion to business, nor under subjection to an 
 inveterate habit. He was far above all this. He did it under 
 a sense of conscientious duty to retain such minutes as would 
 enable him to examine the authorities, and to review the 
 observations of counsel, after the illusion and perhaps the 
 excitement of the public discussion had gone by. The con- 
 tents of twenty volumes of reports, and upwards of two thou- 
 sand judgments, most of them elaborate, all of them suffi- 
 ciently reasoned, very few upon matters of practice, or on 
 points of fugitive interest, attest the devotion of his judicial 
 life; and although it is not meant to deprive of their share 
 of the merit of these labors, the eminent men who survive 
 him on the bench, and who remain to continue and I hope to 
 exalt the fame of our jurisprudence, I may say, and they will 
 cheerfully admit, that he was the presiding spirit of their 
 consultations, as he was of their Court. 
 
 In addition to these strictly official duties, the Legisla- 
 ture of Pennsylvania committed to the Judges of the 
 Supreme Court, in the year 1807, the critical duty of report- 
 
BiNNEr's Chief Justice Tilghman 163 
 
 ing the English statutes in force within this commonwealth. 
 The duty is called critical, for so undoubtedly it was con- 
 sidered by the Chief Justice. The service exacted an unlim- 
 ited knowledge of our colonial legislation, and of the prac- 
 tice and administration of the law in the Province, through a 
 period of nearly a century, in which there was not the light 
 of a reported case. It required also an intimate familiarity 
 with the written law of England, its history both political 
 and legal, and a knowledge of the impressions which it had 
 given to and received from the Common Law, during the 
 course of many centuries. The selection moreover was to be 
 made in the chambers of the judges, without the aid of that 
 best of all devices for eliciting the truth, an ardent, free, and 
 ingenuous discussion by counsel. I need not say to the pro- 
 fessional hearer, that the task was Herculean. In the course, 
 however, of less than two years, it was performed; and the 
 profession and the public are indebted to it for an invaluable 
 standard of reference in a province of the law, before that 
 time without path or guide. It is not perfect, it has not the 
 obligation of judicial authority. I speak the sentiments of its 
 principal author. Some statutes are perhaps omitted. Still 
 the original work will remain as a monument to those by 
 whom it was erected, and who may now be said to rest 
 beneath it. If it shall increase at all, it will be by the con- 
 tributions which the hand of respect and affection shall bring 
 to swell the tribute to the venerable dead. 
 
 The labors thus recited, my brethren, in addition to 
 what we know to have been performed at nisi prius, and in 
 circuits through the State, entitle this eminent Judge to the 
 praise of great industry, a virtue which it is an offence 
 against mortality to call humble, in one who is the keeper 
 both of his own talent and not seldom of that of others also. 
 It was, however, industry of the highest order — a constant 
 action of the intellect practically applied. 
 
 But the character of his mind as it shines forth in his 
 judgments is a subject of much livelier interest. 
 
 The first great property which they disclose, is his vener- 
 
164 Law Association Centennial 
 
 ation of the law, and, above all, of the fundamental Common 
 Law. There is not a line from his pen that trifles with the 
 sacred deposit in his hands by claiming to fashion it accord- 
 ing to a private opinion of what it ought to be. Judicial 
 legislation be abhorred, I should rather say, dreaded, as an 
 implication of his conscience. His first inquiry in every case 
 was of the oracles of the law for their response ; and when he 
 obtained it, notwithstanding his clear perception of the jus- 
 tice of the cause, and his intense desire to reach it, if it were 
 not the justice of the law, he dared not to administer it. He 
 acted upon the sentiment of Lord Bacon, that it is the foulest 
 justice to remove land-marks, and that to corrupt the law is 
 to poison the very fountain of justice. With a conscious- 
 ness that to the errors of the science there are some limits, 
 but none to the evils of a licentious invasion of it, he left it to 
 our annual legislatures to correct such defects in the system, 
 as time either created or exposes; and better foundation in 
 the law can no man lay. 
 
 Those who study his opinions, while they may remark 
 that he was unusually sparing in references to authority, will 
 find that it was the result of selection and not of penury. He 
 was not, however, what is sometimes termed a great case 
 lawyer. His memory did not appear to be tenacious of insu- 
 lated decisions; nor is it usual for men of philosophical 
 minds, who arrange the learning of their profession by the 
 aid of general principles, to be distinguished by their recollec- 
 tion of particular facts. With the leading cases under every 
 head, those which may be called the light-houses of the law, 
 he was familiar, and knew their bearings upon every passage 
 into this deeply indented territory ; but for the minor points, 
 the soundings that are marked so profusely upon modem 
 charts of the law, he trusted too much to the length and em- 
 ployment of his own line to oppress his memory with them. 
 It was not his practice to bring into his judgments an his- 
 torical account of the legal doctrine on which they turned, 
 nor to illustrate them by frequent references to other codes, 
 to which, nevertheless, he was perfectly competent by the 
 
Binney's Chief Justice Tilghman 165 
 
 variety as well as by the extent of his studies. His prefer- 
 ence was rather to reduce the sentence he was about to pro- 
 nounce, as a logical consequence from some proposition of 
 law which he had previously stated and settled with great 
 brevity. No Judge was ever more free both in mind and 
 style from everything like technicality. He never assigned 
 a technical reason for anything, if another were at com- 
 mand, or if not, without sustaining the artificial reason by an 
 explanation of its grounds. At the same time his knowledge 
 embraced all the refinements of the law, and he took an 
 obvious satisfaction in showing their connection with sub- 
 stantial justice. 
 
 His arguments are further distinguished by perspicuity, 
 precision and singleness. 
 
 No careful reader was ever at a loss for the meaning of 
 the Chief Justice, and his whole meaning. His language is 
 transparent ; you see through it, instantly, the purpose of the 
 writer. There is no involution, no parenthesis, no complica- 
 tion. Everything is direct, natural, and explicit. His style 
 without being dry, and possessing upon proper occasions such 
 embellishments, even, as a severe and critical taste would 
 permit, is made up, in general, of terms and phrases so 
 entirely ascertained in their meaning, as to defy the extrac- 
 tion of a double sense, an excellence of the very first order 
 in judicial compositions. This precision was the result of an 
 accurate adjustment of ithe argument before he committed it 
 to paper. His opinions, such as they appear in the earliest 
 reports of them, and I presume the same of the whole, were 
 published from the first draught, in which it was rare to find 
 either erasure or interlineation; and I recollect no instance 
 in which he was asked by the counsel, or induced by his own 
 review, to give an explanation of them. This was, indeed, a 
 natural consequence of that singleness, to which I have 
 alluded as a striking feature of his judgments. He paid little 
 respect to what are called dicta, opinions collateral to the 
 matter of judgment, from whatever quarter they might 
 come. He pronounced none himself. His concern was 
 
i66 Law Association Centennial 
 
 with the point in issue, and nothing else ; and he kept his eye 
 on that, as a mariner does upon the Pole-star. 
 
 All his opinions are, moreover, remarkable for their 
 admirable common sense and their adaptation to the common 
 understanding. There is no reaching after what is recondite, 
 or abstruse, no affectation of science. The language of the 
 law, as he uses it, is vernacular, and his arguments are the 
 most simple that the case will bear. They are not an intricate 
 web, in which filaments separately weak obtain strength by 
 their union, but a chain, whose firmness arises from the 
 solidity of its links, and not from the artifice of their 
 connection. 
 
 But that quality which exalts his judgments the most in 
 the estimation of the public, is the ardent love of justice 
 which runs through them all. His appetite for it was keen 
 and constant; and nothing could rouse his kind and courte- 
 ous temper into resentment, more than a deliberate effort to 
 entangle justice in the meshes of chicane. The law was his 
 master; he yielded implicit obedience to its behests. Justice 
 was the object of his affections; he defended her with the 
 devotion of a lover. It is the high praise of his administra- 
 tion, and of the profession, too, that the occasions were rare 
 in which his efforts did not bring them into harmonious 
 co-operation. 
 
 Is it not worthy of remark that judgments such as 
 these, which enjoyed universal respect, were nevertheless, 
 free from everything like pretensions ? Chief Justice Tilgh- 
 man could have done as much with this bar, by the force of 
 his authority, as any Judge that ever sat in his seat. His 
 investigations were known to be so faithful, his reasonings 
 so just, and his convictions so impartial, that there would 
 have been a ready acceptance of his conclusions without a 
 knowledge of the steps which led to them. He asked, how- 
 ever, for submission to no authority, so rarely as to his own. 
 You may search his opinions in vain for anything like per- 
 sonal assertion. He never threw the weight of his office into 
 the scale, which the weight of his argument did not turn. 
 
Binney's Chief Justice Tilghman 167 
 
 He spoke and wrote as the minister of reason, claiming 
 obedience to her, and selecting with scrupulous modesty such 
 language as, while it sustained the dignity of his office, kept 
 down from the relief in which he might well have appeared, 
 the individual who filled it. Look over the judgments of 
 more than twenty years, many of them rendered by this 
 excellent magistrate after his title to unlimited deference 
 was established by a right more divine than that of kings, 
 there is not to be found one arrogant, one supercilious, 
 expression turned against the opinions of other judges, one 
 vain-glorious regard toward himself. He does not write 
 as if it occurred to him that his writings would be examined 
 to fix his measure, when compared with the standard of great 
 men, but as if their exclusive use was to assist in fixing a 
 standard of the law. 
 
 It is to all these qualities that Chief Justice Tilghman 
 owed the confidence of his brethren on the Bench. It does 
 not occur to me at present, that his opinion at nisi prius or on 
 the circuit was ever overruled, nor that his judgment in the 
 banc was made ineffectual by a majority of the Court, except 
 in a single instance; and it will not be deemed offensive to 
 say, that when the same question shall recur it will probably 
 be considered without any decisive influence from this 
 unsupported case. 
 
 If the Common Law were a science, in which the mind 
 of a judge might speculate without impediment, as in some 
 others, it would be natural to ask, what new principles he has 
 added to the code, or what new combinations he has made to 
 increase its vigor. It is such an inquiry that imparts interest 
 to the biographical notices of men, who have been eminent 
 in Physics, in the higher branches of the Mathematics, and 
 emphatically of such as have been distinguished actors in the 
 formation of political constitutions, or of new codes of law. 
 There is a freedom and expansiveness in some parts of 
 science that even imagination may be invited to attend upon 
 genius as it explores them ; and the legislator especially, or 
 the founder of new governments, is so little restrained in his 
 
i68 Law Association Centennial 
 
 movements, that the personal character of the individual 
 becomes the pervading soul of the work, and looks out for 
 every part of it. But the law, as a practical science, depends 
 mainly for its value, upon retaining the shape and nearly the 
 same dimensions from day to day. A speculative, inventive, 
 imaginative judge is a paradox. No one can reasonably ask 
 what a judge has invented or devised, or even discovered. 
 His duty and his praise are in the faithful administration of 
 a system created to his hands ; a system of principles, the just 
 development of which affords sufficient scope for genius, 
 without destroying what is established, or innovating in the 
 spirit of a law-giver. If ever his labors approach the merit 
 of discovery, it is when he reforms or brings to light what 
 had a previous existence, but had been perverted or obscured. 
 
 In some particulars of great interest to the profession, 
 the late Chief Justice had the merit of relieving our code 
 from perversion and obscurity of this description. He has 
 certainly reinstated a statute of indispensable use, and 
 which was imperceptibly giving way to judicial legislation 
 here, as it has thoroughly done in England, the Statute of 
 Limitations in actions of assumpsit. On this subject he dis- 
 tinctly led the way in Pennsylvania ; and in every particular 
 in which he was not restrained by authority, he has brought 
 our courts back to the truest interpretation. He has, as it 
 were, reclaimed this resting place for the unfortunate from 
 an irruption of the ocean. 
 
 He led the way also, and has resolutely persevered, in 
 opening the large rivers of this Commonwealth to the great 
 work of public improvement, by rejecting the inapplicable 
 definitions of the English Common Law, which would have 
 subjected them to the claim of the riparian owners. 
 
 He has followed up that work which his father is said 
 to have begun, by giving the force of his mind and influence 
 to the establishment of such rules, as make the Land Office 
 system harmonize with every other part of our code. 
 
 But his great work, that at which he labored with 
 constant solicitude, but with scarcely a passing hint that he 
 
Binney's Chief Justice Tilghman 169 
 
 was engaged in it, is the thorough incorporation of the prin- 
 ciples of scientific equity with the law of Pennsylvania, or 
 rather the reiterated recognition of the Bench, that with few 
 exceptions they form an inseparable part of that law. 
 
 The distinction between law and equity is well under- 
 stood by the profession, but difficult to explain to popular 
 apprehension. It is a great but prevalent mistake, to sup- 
 pose that a Court of Equity is the reproach of the Common 
 Law, whereas it is its praise, at least the praise of its illus- 
 trious origin. The Common Law, being originally the law 
 of freemen, of that Saxon stock from which is derived the 
 freest race upon earth, left nothing to the discretion of the 
 judge or the monarch. It was itself the great arbiter, and 
 ruled every question by principles of great certainty and gen- 
 eral application. In its earliest day, a day of comparative 
 simplicity, its general principles and forms embraced and ad- 
 justed almost every transaction : and when they did not, the 
 authority of the Common Law Courts was legitimately ex- 
 tended by new writs devised in the then incipient Chancery. 
 The refinements of later times, the invention of uses, and 
 afterwards of trusts, the complications of trade, the defects 
 incident to the multiplied operations of men, all tended to 
 produce controversies which the judges of the Common Law 
 could not, consistently with their integrity and the integrity 
 of their rules, adjust with perfect effect; and hence the 
 development of the Court of Chancery. It is a great miscon- 
 ception of that Court, to suppose that it overturns the Com- 
 mon Law. Equity is a part of the Common Law ; and a Court 
 of Chancery is the homage paid by a free constitution to the 
 integrity of the Courts of Common Law. It is the handmaid 
 of those courts. It restrains dishonest men from applying 
 the general rules of those tribunals to cases which they 
 ought not to embrace, it extends to the upright the benefit of 
 a rule of those courts, of which a defect in circumstances 
 deprived them, and it attains its purposes by a process, 
 between parties, and through a method of relief , almost neces- 
 sarily different from those of the Courts of Common Law, but 
 
170 Law Association Centennial 
 
 in perfect analogy with what the rules of those courts effect 
 where they properly apply. It is no more the reproach of the 
 Common Law, that it has a department of equity, than that it 
 has a department of Admiralty Law, or Ecclesiastical Law. 
 There is no more reason why the original constitution of the 
 Courts of Common Law should be destroyed, by blending 
 with their principles and practice the rules of a Court of 
 Chancery, than by uniting with them the rules of the Admir- 
 alty. It is a question of having two Courts to execute 
 different parts of the same system, instead of one; and the 
 experience of England, and of most of these States, is better 
 than volumes, to show that the purity and vigor of both 
 law and equity are maintained by preventing their inter- 
 course in the same tribunal. That their separation is 
 unfriendly to the people, is refuted by the great examples 
 of Maryland, Virginia, and New York, and by the example 
 of all the States in their federal capacity. 
 
 It is the misfortune of Pennsylvania that the want of a 
 Court of Chancery has left her tribunals no alternative but 
 that of attempting this difficult incorporation. Her Chancery 
 history is short and striking. 
 
 There is no such Court among the institutions of 
 William Penn, or of his day. That this was the consequence 
 of a jealousy of the principles and practice of that Court 
 entertained by the people, is not indicated by their early 
 judicial history. It was more probably owing to a question 
 connected with the introduction of the Court, and under the 
 influence of which it met an early fate, in whom, according 
 to the constitutional law of that day, the office of chancellor 
 ought to vest, and whether it could be legally executed except 
 by one, who, under the great seal of England, acted as the 
 king's representative. The prerogative lawyers of the colony 
 held the negative of that question; yet the alleged necessity 
 for the Court was such, and such the attachment to both its 
 forms and principles, that the Legislature, by a mere resolu- 
 tion, requested Sir William Keith to hold a Court of Chan- 
 cery, and it was accordingly opened under the proclamation 
 
Binney's Chief Justice Tilghman 171 
 
 of that governor, in August, 1712. During the rule of a less 
 popular governor in 1736, the organization of the Court 
 was denounced by the assembly as a violation of the Charter 
 of Privileges, and at the same session a bill was sent up for 
 the approbation of Governor Gordon, establishing superior 
 and inferior courts of equity in the ordinary way. The 
 prerogative objection recurred, it became a party question, 
 the bill was not approved. Chancery powers were no further 
 exercised, and Pennsylvania lost the system, because her 
 Governors and representatives could not agree by whom the 
 office of Chancellor should be held. 
 
 It may be supposed that the circles of this party feud 
 grew larger as they advanced, and that they finally encom- 
 passed the Court itself. Such probably was the case at the 
 commencement of the revolution. Scientific equity fell 
 under general proscription, and with some few exceptions 
 was made to give place to a spurious equity, compounded of 
 the temper of the judge and of the feelings of the jury, with 
 nothing but a strong infusion of integrity to prevent it from 
 becoming as much the bane of personal security, as it was 
 the bane of science. 
 
 It was to expel this usurper, that the days and nights 
 of Chief Justice Tilghman were devoted, a work suggested 
 it is true by that distinguished predecessor to whom he owed 
 his office, but consummated by himself and his colleagues, to 
 whom we owe a debt not to be acquitted, for having fully 
 established the principles of methodized and scientific equity 
 in their just sway, as a part of the Common Law of the land. 
 He achieved this work, at the same time, without the 
 slightest innovation upon legal forms, upholding them on the 
 contrary as the only instruments for the administration of 
 equity, except where the Legislature otherwise directs. No 
 one ever knew him usurp a power of any kind, still less a 
 power of Chancery, of which his very affection for the 
 system seemed to make him apprehensive. He has expressed 
 the opinion, that the Legislature would, at no distant day, 
 find it expedient to provide for Trusts, as well as for other 
 
172 Law Association Centennial 
 
 subjects of Chancery jurisdiction; but, in the meantime, he 
 has taught us how to clothe a large body of equity principles 
 in the drapery of the law. In those cases, in which equity 
 consists in the very methods of her administration, the Chief 
 Justice looked for final relief from the representatives of the 
 people; and he waited patiently, and was content that they 
 should wait, the instruction of time. Is the hope vain, that 
 the opinion of this pure and enlightened Judge may be 
 received instead of that instruction? 
 
 Let it not be supposed, however, because he was 
 deeply imbued with the principles of equity, that he was 
 therefore latitudinarian. His equity was as scientific as his 
 law. It was the equity of the Hardwickes, the Thurlows, 
 and the Eldons of England, of the Marshalls, the Washing- 
 tons, and the Kents of the United States ; an equity without 
 discretion, fixed as the principles of the Common Law, and, 
 like it, worthy of the freemen of whose fortunes it disposes. 
 
 It is in the points already noticed, without referring to a 
 mass of invaluable adjudications on particular questions of 
 law, that the late Chief Justice has made an impression upon 
 the science in this Commonwealth. His influence upon it, 
 cannot be forgotten. He will not be remembered merely as 
 an upright and able judge, who has maintained the dignity 
 of his profession and office, but as one who has stamped his 
 peculiar principles and modes of thought upon the code, and 
 who has imparted to it as much of the philosophical cast of 
 his own mind, as could with safety be carried into a science, 
 that is as well a science of authority, as it is of principles. 
 
 In the department of Penal Law he was relieved by his 
 office from frequent labors, although he annually presided 
 in a Court of Oyer and Terminer for this county. His knowl- 
 edge of this branch of the law was extensive and accurate ; 
 his judgment in it, as in every other, was admirable. His 
 own exemption from moral infirmity might be supposed to 
 have made him severe in his reckonings with the guilty ; but 
 it is the quality of minds pure as his, to look with compassion 
 upon those who have fallen from virtue. He could not but 
 
Binney's Chief Justice Tilghman 173 
 
 pronounce the sentence of the law upon such as were con- 
 demned to hear it ; but the calmness, the dignity, the imparti- 
 ality, with which he ordered their trials, the deep attention 
 which he gave to such as involved life, and the touching man- 
 ner of his last office to the convicted, demonstrated his sense 
 of the peculiar responsibility which belonged to this part of 
 his functions. In civil controversies, such excepted, as by 
 some feature of injustice demanded a notice of the parties, he 
 reduced the issue pretty much to an abstract form, and solved 
 it as if it had been an algebraic problem. But in criminal 
 cases, there was a constant reference to the wretched persons 
 whose fate was suspended before him; and in the very 
 celerity with which he endeavored to dispose of the accusa- 
 tion, he evinced his sympathy. It was his invariable effort, 
 without regard to his own health, to finish a capital case at 
 one sitting, if any portion of the night would suffice for the 
 object; and one of his declared motives was to terminate as 
 soon as possible that harrowing solicitude, worse even than 
 the worst certainty, which a protracted trial brings to the 
 unhappy prisoner. He never pronounced the sentence of 
 death without severe pain; in the first instance it was the 
 occasion of anguish. In this, as in many other points, he 
 bore a strong resemblance to Sir Matthew Hale. His awful 
 reverence of the Great Judge of all mankind, and the humility 
 with which he habitually walked in that presence, made him 
 uplift the sword of justice, as if it scarcely belonged to man, 
 himself a suppliant, to let it fall on the neck of his fellowman. 
 My brethren, we may be permitted to say, that these 
 properties of a great Judge were adorned by manners, the 
 combined effect of a benevolent heart and of a fine educa- 
 tion, which made his intercourse with the Bar, and theirs 
 with him, an unbroken circle of affection and respect. The 
 practice of the law is not without its trials to a Judge of the 
 happiest temper. The efficiency of the advocate, in some 
 causes, depends upon his giving the rein to his ardor, and in 
 moving with a velocity which kindles others as well as him- 
 self. These rapid movements are unfriendly to a nice selec- 
 
174 Law Association Centennial 
 
 tion of phrases, and to that deference to the opposing senti- 
 ments of the Court, which the due order of a judicial tribunal 
 demands. It argues little against the Judge or the advocate, 
 that in cases like these, there should be momentary lapses of 
 the temper. But whose memory is so unfaithful as to record 
 one such incident in the judicial life of Chief Justice Tilgh- 
 man? He knew the respect of the Bar for him to be so 
 cordial, that he never suspected offence; and they knew his 
 integrity and fidelity to the law to be such, that they never 
 placed his judgment on any occasion, to the account of 
 prejudice, partiality, or impulse. The reign of sound law 
 and impartial justice in the Supreme Court of the State, has 
 therefore been the reign of courtesy and kindly feelings 
 between the Bench and the Bar; and though dead, he will 
 continue to speak as if living, in favor of this natural and 
 delightful union. 
 
 Upon the whole, his character as a Judge, was a com- 
 bination of some of the finest elements that have been united 
 in that office. Among those which may be regarded as 
 primary or fundamental, were a reverential love of the Com- 
 mon Law and a fervent zeal for justice, as the end and 
 intended fruit of all law. The former was enlightened by 
 laborious study in early life, the latter was purified, like the 
 constitution of his whole mind, by a ceaseless endeavor to 
 ascertain the truth. In the service of these exalted affec- 
 tions he never faltered. His eflFort in every cause was to 
 satisfy them both; and by attention to the researches of 
 others, patient inquiry for himself, and a judgment singu- 
 larly free from disturbance of every kind, he rarely failed 
 to attain his object. Other Judges may have had more 
 learning at immediate command, none have had their learn- 
 ing under better discipline, or in a condition more effective 
 for the duty on which it was employed. His mind did not 
 flow through his opinions in a stream of exuberant rich- 
 ness, but its current was transparently clear, and its depth 
 was never less than the subject required, however profound. 
 He was moreover equal to all the exigencies of his office, and 
 
Binney's Chief Justice Tilghman 175 
 
 many of them were great, without any such exertions as 
 appeared to disturb the harmony, or even the repose, of his 
 faculties ; and he has finally laid down his great charge, with 
 the praise of being second to none who have preceded him 
 in it, and of leaving his countrymen without the expectation 
 or the desire of seeing him surpassed by those who shall 
 follow him. 
 
 The judicial faculties and virtues which I have thus 
 endeavored to sketch, could never have been the companions 
 of disorder in the mind, the affections, or the life of the indi- 
 vidual. My Lord Coke has made to the aspiring student of 
 the law, this striking appeal, too flattering perhaps, except 
 while the venerable portrait of the late Chief Justice is still 
 before us : "Cast thine eye upon the sages of the law that 
 have been before thee, and never shalt thou find any one that 
 hath excelled in the knowledge of these laws, but hath drawn 
 from that divine knowledge gravity and integrity." He 
 pronounces this knowledge to be irreconcilable with a loose 
 and lawless life, and gives the result of his large experience, 
 that he has never seen any man of excellent judgment in the 
 Common Law of England, "but was withal, being taught by 
 such a master, honest, faithful, and virtuous." The Chief 
 Justice was not only thoroughly taught by this master, but 
 he came into the school accomplished in elegant learning; 
 and long before he left it there was associated the training 
 of another school, worthier far than the Common Law, of 
 the exalted eulogy of Sir Edward Coke. 
 
 His early education, it has been remarked, was excel- 
 lent. He was an accomplished Latin Scholar, but, to his 
 own regret, had suffered his Greek to fall away by desue- 
 tude. The literature of the former language, he kept con- 
 stantly fresh in his mind. His memory was stored with 
 beautiful Latin, which he has been heard to repeat, as it were 
 to himself, when the occasion recalled it and his modesty 
 did not care to pronounce it aloud. On all his circuits 
 and journeys into the districts of the Supreme Court, his 
 companions were the Bible, a Latin author, and some recent 
 
176 Law Association Centennial 
 
 treatise of distinction in the law. Upon the last that he ever 
 made, he refreshed his recollections of the Pharsalia. It is 
 perhaps no idle fancy to suppose that he may have read, with 
 almost a personal application, the prophetic appeal of the 
 Spectre to the race of Pompey : 
 
 * * * Veniet quae iwisceat omnes 
 Hora duces. Properaie mori * * * 
 
 Such a name and such an example are of great efficacy 
 in the inquiry concerning the fittest basis of liberal education. 
 All the faculties of his mind were thoroughly developed, 
 he accumulated large stores of knowledge, he brought them 
 into daily use, he reasoned accurately, he conversed elegantly, 
 his tastes were refined, the pleasures which it brought to him 
 were pure, his imagination was replete with the beautiful 
 forms of ancient poetry, he was adequate to the functions of 
 one of the most exalted offices, he knew little of the natural 
 sciences, and his education was such as has been described. 
 It would be unjust to him, however, to say that he under- 
 valued knowledge of any kind, and least of all that knowl- 
 edge which is opening every day to the world, and to this 
 part of the world especially, new sources of wealth, and new 
 proofs of the wisdom and beneficence of Deity. On the 
 contrary, with that diffusive liberality for which he was con- 
 spicuous, he gave his counsel and his money to every plan for 
 increasing this species of knowledge; but it cannot be 
 asserted of him, that he recommended it in any of its 
 branches as an instrument for unfolding the faculties of 
 youth. He regarded these sciences as treasure for accumu- 
 lation, after education had performed its office. For the 
 great work of training the minds of young men to liberal 
 pursuits and to the learned professions, his opinion was 
 anchored upon the system by which he had been reared him- 
 self, the system of the American Colleges. 
 
 While the Chief Justice continued his intercourse with 
 the learned ancients, he found leisure in the intervals of 
 office, for the literature of his own language, in which he was 
 
Binney's Chief Justice Tilghman 177 
 
 extensively versed, and for which he possessed the keenest 
 rehsh ; and it is to these two sources that he owed the purity 
 of his style, where nothing coarse or vulgar ever appeared, 
 and which, without being affected or elaborate, was remark- 
 able for the absence of all words of questionable authority. 
 
 His moral qualities were of the highest order. It has 
 been said, that the panegyrists of great men can rarely direct 
 the eye with safety to their early years, for fear of lighting 
 upon the traces of some irregular passion. But to the subject 
 of this discourse, may with justice be applied the praise of 
 the Chancellor D'Aguesseau, that he was never known to 
 take a single step out of the narrow path of wisdom, and that 
 although it was sometimes remarked he had been young, it 
 was for the purpose not of palliating a defect, but of doing 
 greater honor to his virtues. Of his early life, few of his 
 contemporaries remain to speak; but these few attest what 
 the harmony of his whole character in later years would 
 infer, that his youth gave presage by its sobriety and exem- 
 plary rectitude, of all that we witnessed and admired in the 
 maturity of his character. It is great praise to say of so 
 excellent a Judge, that there was no contrariety between his 
 judgments and his life; that there was a perfect consent 
 between his public and his private manners; that he was an 
 engaging example of all he taught, and that no reproach 
 which, in his multifarious employment, he was compelled to 
 utter against all the forms of injustice, public and private, 
 social and domestic, against all violations of law, from crime 
 down to those irregularities at which, from general infirmity, 
 there is a general connivance, in no instance, did the sting 
 of his reproach wound his own bosom. Yet it was in his 
 life only, and not in his pretensions, that you discerned this 
 his fortunate superiority to others. In his private walks he 
 was the most unpretending of men. He bore constantly about 
 him those characteristics of true greatness, simplicity and 
 modesty. Shall I add, that the memory of all his acquaint- 
 ances may be challenged to repeat from his most unrestrained 
 conversation, one word or allusion, that might not have 
 
 12 
 
178 Law Association Centennial 
 
 fallen with propriety upon the ear of the most fastidious 
 delicacy. 
 
 His manners in society were unusually attractive to 
 those who were so fortunate as to possess his esteem; and 
 they were the reverse to none, except those who had given 
 him cause to withhold it. Their great charm was sincerity; 
 and though unassuming and retired, they never failed to 
 show the impress of that refinement in which he had passed 
 his life. 
 
 The kindness of his nature appeared in the intercourse 
 that he maintained with his fellow citizens, notwithstanding 
 the claims of his station. He probably entertained Mr. 
 Burke's opinion, that as it is public justice that holds the 
 community together, the Judges ought to be of a reserved 
 and retired character, and wholly unconnected with the politi- 
 cal world. He certainly acted up to all that the sentiment 
 asserts; and he found the benefit of it, the community did 
 also, in a ready submission to those judgments, more than 
 one, in which a suspected infusion of party would have been 
 a disturbing ingredient. No one who knew him in private 
 life had, however, any reason to doubt his opinions, when the 
 occasion fitly called for their expression. Not deeming it 
 discreet to meet his fellow citizens in those assemblies where 
 either politics or their kindred subjects were to be discussed, 
 he seized with the more avidity such occasions of intercourse 
 as were presented by meetings for public improvement, for 
 philosophical inquiry, or the cultivation of literature; and in 
 particular he attended with great interest to the concerns of 
 the American Philosophical Society, of which he was chosen 
 President, on the death of Dr. Patterson, in the year 1824, 
 and to those also of the Athenaeum, of which he was the 
 first, and during his life, the only President; the Trustees of 
 the University of Pennsylvania rarely missed him from his 
 seat, or the United Episcopal Churches, of this city, from 
 their Vestry, as the Warden of his venerable friend and 
 pastor Bishop White. It was in this way that he diminished 
 the distance to which his office removed him from society; 
 
Binney's Chief Justice Tilghman 179 
 
 keeping however a constant eye upon that office, even when 
 he moved out of his orbit, and taking scrupulous care that 
 no external contact should be of a nature to disturb his move- 
 ments when he returned to it. 
 
 It was upon an occasion when a very delicate question 
 agitated the country, that he mentioned to a friend a trans- 
 action in his life, which, although in a certain sense public 
 in its character, is even at this time not extensively known. 
 His reason for adverting to it illustrates in a striking man- 
 ner his deference to the demands of his station; while the 
 passage in his life to which it refers discloses his sentiments 
 upon the embarrassing question of negro slavery : a question 
 however upon which, in some of its practical bearings, he 
 thought it an act of infinite rashness to judge other men, and 
 in regard to which he almost concealed his own decided pro- 
 ceeding, lest it should appear to reproach the judgment of 
 his kinsmen and friends. 
 
 Having been asked to take part in a public meeting in 
 this city upon what has been called the Missouri question, 
 he thought it expedient to decline. "My office," he said, 
 "compels me often to decide upon this irritating question of 
 slavery; and it is not expedient to take part in a public dis- 
 cussion that might bring my impartiality into doubt. No 
 one who knows the arrangement that I have made with the 
 slaves which belonged to me, will doubt my fervent wish to 
 see the evils of this institution mitigated, and, if possible, 
 extinguished." The arrangement was an instrument executed 
 on the twenty- fourth of April, 18 11, by which he emanci- 
 pated four of his slaves immediately, nine others in succes- 
 sive periods of from three to seven years, and the residue, 
 twenty-five in number together with their issue, on the first 
 day of January after they should respectively attain the age 
 of twenty-seven years. There was but one prescribed impedi- 
 ment to this emancipation, unlawful absence from duty, wil- 
 fully or by imprisonment for crime ; in which case the party's 
 freedom was deferred for treble the term of his absence. 
 The benevolent proprietor lived to see this emancipation 
 
i8o ■ Law Association Centennial 
 
 obtained by twenty, and he has secured its benefit to those that 
 remain. He has secured it in the best way, by making it the 
 reward of fideUty and virtue, and by so regulating it both as 
 to time and numbers, as to give its objects the best chance of 
 establishment in the community. 
 
 The temper of the Chief Justice was singularly placable 
 and benevolent. It was not in his power to remember an 
 injury. A few days before his death, he said to two of his 
 friends, attendant upon that scene, "I am at peace with all 
 the world. I bear no ill-will to any human being ; and there 
 is no person in existence, to whom I would not do good, and 
 render a service, if it were in my power. No man can be 
 happy who does not forgive injuries which he may have 
 received from his fellow-creatures." How suitable was this 
 noble conclusion to his exemplary life! What a grace did 
 this spirit impart to his own supplications! This was not a 
 counterfeit virtue assumed when the power to retaliate was 
 wasted by disease. It was not the mere overflow of a kindly 
 nature, unschooled by that divine science which teaches 
 benevolence as a duty. It was the virtue of one, who, in his 
 eulogium upon his eminent friend. Dr. Wistar, who had filled 
 the Chair of the Philosophical Society, thus made known the 
 foundation on which his benevolence was built. "Vain is 
 the splendor of genius without the virtues of the heart. No 
 man who is not good, deserves the name of wise. In the 
 language of Scripture, folly and wickedness are the same; 
 not only because vicious habits do really corrupt and darken 
 the understanding, but because it is no small degree of folly 
 to be ignorant, that the chief good of man is to know the 
 will of his Creator, and to do it." 
 
 It was under the influence of this sentiment, that his 
 fortune became the refuge to the unfortunate, far more 
 extensively than his unostentatious manners imported. 
 Notwithstanding the panoply which protected him from the 
 assaults of this world, he was like the feeblest of his race, 
 naked and defenceless against the dispensations of Heaven. 
 His bosom suffered many and deep lacerations ; but they had 
 
Binney's Chief Justice Tilghman i8i 
 
 the propitious effect of opening his heart to mankind, instead 
 of withering and drying up its affections. He was gentle, 
 compassionate, charitable in many of the senses that make 
 charity the first of virtues; and long after his leaves and 
 branches were all torn away, there was more than one that 
 reposed in the shade of his venerable trunk. His closing 
 years finely illustrated the remark, that the heart of a good 
 man is like a good soil, which is more fertile by the plough- 
 share that tears it and lays it open, or like those plants 
 which give out their best odors when they are broken and 
 crushed. 
 
 An interesting record which this venerable man left 
 behind him, acquaints us with many of his most private 
 thoughts, and presents him in a relation which no man can 
 renounce, and which, when duly observed, is the appropriate 
 light wherein to behold an eminent Judge, the relation of 
 man to his Creator. 
 
 His birthday, the twelfth of August, was habitually 
 appropriated to the review of the past year, to self-examina- 
 tion, and to intercourse with God ; and it will not be deemed 
 irreverent in us, the only children he has left, to cast an 
 affectionate eye upon this record, and to draw encouragement 
 and counsel, as well as increased veneration for his character, 
 from the touching disclosure it makes of his fortitude, resig- 
 nation and piety. 
 
 The first of the series which has been found, begins 
 on the twelfth of August, 1804, when he completed his 
 forty-eighth year. He says : "My health is good, my con- 
 stitution unimpaired, but I am deeply impressed with the 
 uncertainty of life. Let me prepare to follow the numerous 
 friends who have left this world before me. The last stage 
 of my residence on earth is approaching. Time is pre- 
 cious. I must not suffer it to be wasted in indolence, or 
 thrown away on light amusements. I have endeavored dur- 
 ing the course of this day to strengthen my mind with vir- 
 tuous resolutions, and I hope my endeavors have not been 
 useless." He then repeats the resolutions he had formed for 
 
i82 Law Association Centennial 
 
 the government of his life, among which is that of "letting 
 no day pass without prostrating himself before the Supreme 
 Being, in meditation, thanksgiving and prayer;" and he 
 concludes his memorial by offering, as he expresses it, "with 
 grateful heart, his unworthy thanks to the Almighty and 
 merciful God, for past favors, far exceeding his merits, 
 and by imploring with all humility, that He would graciously 
 assist his weak endeavors to keep the resolutions he had 
 made." 
 
 He continues this review for several years, during 
 which his strain is that of gratitude for constant benefac- 
 tions; but in the year of 1817, the clouds gathered around 
 him, the countenance of his beneficent Creator seemed to be 
 withdrawn, and the night of his old age was approaching, 
 with the promise of but one feeble and ill-assured ray to 
 relieve it from total darkness. He had been one of ten 
 brothers and sisters, to all of whom he had borne the ten- 
 derest affection. He had been a husband, enjoying for a 
 short time the happiness of that sacred relation. He had 
 been the father of one child, devotedly loved for her intelli- 
 gence, filial affection, and piety. Mark with what a celestial 
 temper, if I may so speak, he records the flight of all these 
 blessings. "I have now attained the age of sixty-one, and 
 survived parents, brothers, sisters, wife, and child. But few 
 of my dearest connections remain in this world. May this 
 reflection induce me so to use the short remainder of my life, 
 as may recommend me to Thy favor, and procure me the 
 happiness of once more meeting my departed friends, accord- 
 ing to my confident hope. Lord Thou hast taken away the 
 child which Thou hadst given me. I murmur not. Blessed 
 be Thy name." 
 
 Before the twelfth of August, 1820, that feeble ray 
 which was promised to his declining days, was extinguished. 
 The only child of his only daughter was taken from him. 
 Yet observe how the light of the divine philosophy shone 
 inward, and dispelled the gloom in which unassisted man 
 ■would have sunk in despair. "Great God, during the last 
 
Binney's Chief Justice Tilghman 183 
 
 year, Thou hast thrown me on the bed of sickness, and raised 
 me up from it. Thou hast taken from me, my last earthly 
 hope. I submit to Thy providence, and pray that Thou wilt 
 grant me fortitude under all my afflictions. I am sure that 
 whatever is ordained by Thee is right. May I never forget 
 that Thou art always present, the witness and judge of my 
 actions and thoughts. My life is hastening to an end. May 
 I, by Thy gracious assistance, so employ the remainder of 
 it, as not to be altogether unworthy of Thy favor." 
 
 On the last anniversary that he ever saw, he begins his 
 paper with the prophetic declaration : "This day completes 
 my seventieth year, the period which is said to bound the life 
 of man. My constitution is impaired, but I cannot suffi- 
 ciently thank God, that my intellects are sound, that I am 
 afflicted with no painful disease, and that sufficient health 
 remains to make life comfortable. I pray for the grace of 
 the Almighty to enable me to walk during the short rem- 
 nant of life in His ways. Without His aid I am sensible that 
 my efforts are unavailing. May I submit with gratitude to 
 all His dispensations, never forget that He is the witness of 
 my actions and even of my thoughts, and endeavor to honor, 
 love, and obey Him, with all my heart, soul and strength." 
 
 It is no longer wonderful that this venerated man per- 
 formed his duties to universal acceptance, when we discern 
 the spirit, better far than the genius of Socrates, from 
 which he asked counsel. The ancients would have said of 
 him, that he lived in the presence of all the Deities, since 
 prudence was never absent from him. The holders of a 
 better faith must say, that it was to no poetical deity, nor to 
 the counsels of his own mind, but to that "grace" which his 
 supplications invoked, that he owed his protection from most 
 of the lapses to which fallible man is subject. 
 
 That "remnant of life" to which his last memorial 
 refers, unfortunately for us, was short as he had predicted ; 
 but he walked it as he had done all that went before, accord- 
 ing to his devout aspiration. He continued to preside in the 
 Supreme Court with his accustomed dignity and effect, until 
 
184 Law Association Centennial 
 
 the succeeding winter, when his constitution finally gave 
 way, and after a short confinement, on Monday, the thirtieth 
 of April, 1827, he closed his eyes forever. It will be long, 
 very long, before we shall open ours, upon a wiser Judge, a 
 sounder lawyer, a riper scholar, a purer man, or a truer 
 gentleman. 
 
 The private life of this eminent man, was the reflection 
 of an unclouded mind, and of a conscience void of offence; 
 and such external vicissitudes as marked it, did but ripen his 
 virtues for their appropriate scene hereafter. The praise of 
 his public career is that it has been barren of those incidents 
 which arrest the attention, by agitating the passions, of man- 
 kind. If it has grown into an unquestioned truth, that the 
 poorest annals belong to those epochs which have been the 
 richest in virtue and happiness, it may well be admitted that 
 the best Judge for the people, is he who imperceptibly main- 
 tains them in their rights, and leaves few striking events for 
 biography. 
 
 His course does not exhibit the magnificent variety of 
 the ocean, sometimes uplifted to the skies, at others retiring 
 into its darkest caves, at one moment gay with the ensigns 
 of power and wealth, and at another strewing the shores with 
 the melancholy fragments of shipwreck; but it is the equal 
 current of a majestic river, which safely bears upon its bosom 
 the riches of the land, and reads its history in the smiling 
 cities and villages, that are reflected from its unvarying 
 surface. 
 
 Such is the praise of the late Chief Justice Tilghman. 
 He merited, by his public works and by his private virtues, 
 the respect and affection of his countrymen; and the best 
 wish for his country and his office is, that his mantle may 
 have fallen upon his successor. 
 
DEATH OF HON. JOHN SERGEANT 
 
 MEMORIAL ADDRESS 
 by 
 
 HORACE BINNEY 
 
 Agreeably to a call for the purpose, the Bar of Phila- 
 delphia met on Friday, the 26th of November, 1852, at 12 
 o'clock, in the United States Circuit Court room, to express 
 their sense of the severe bereavement sustained by them in 
 the death of the Hon. John Sergeant. The Hon. George 
 M. Dallas called the assemblage to order; and on his 
 motion, the Hon. John Bannister Gibson was called to the 
 chair, and George M. Wharton and Peter McCall, E^qrs., 
 were appointed secretaries. 
 
 The Hon. William M. Meredith then rose, and in the 
 following terms introduced a series of resolutions: 
 
 Mr. Chairman: Before ofifering the resolutions which 
 I am about to propose for the adoption of the bar on the 
 death of John Sergeant, I desire to state that they go beyond 
 the tokens of respect and regret usual on similar occasions. 
 On the loss of an associate of greatly more than ordinary 
 merit, it is becoming that there should be an expression of 
 something more than ordinary sensibility. 
 
 Mr. Sergeant was born in this city, and lived here for 
 seventy-three years, during fifty-three of which he was, as 
 an advocate and counsellor, one of the ministers of justice. 
 He has been known and honoured for half a century, and in 
 ability, in learning, in integrity, in liberal fairness, and in 
 habitual courtesy, he has maintained the reputation of the 
 bar of Philadelphia, and supported the inherent dignity of 
 the profession. 
 
 In speaking of a few of the more prominent points of 
 his character I shall but give a voice to the feelings and 
 opinions of all who surround me, among whom are included 
 friends of his youth, associates of his manhood, and reverers 
 
i86 Law Association Centennial , 
 
 of his age. Earnest and convincing as an advocate, he was 
 wise and faithful as a counsellor, and remarkable as a 
 lawyer for comprehension, vigorous and clear intelligence, 
 for patience of investigation and force of argument. 
 Truth, directness, and fidelity pervaded his character. 
 
 Immersed throughout life in great professional con- 
 cerns, he found time to perform, with uncommon interest 
 and ability, the duties that devolved on him as a citizen. 
 His countenance, his wealth, his aid, his active and energetic 
 exertions, by word and deed, were given with devotion and 
 effect to the support of all the primary interests of society; 
 to every effort to uphold the cause of morals and order, or 
 advance the progress of learning; or establish in permanent 
 institutions the interests of humanity and justice. On the 
 larger stage of public duty, on which his career was long 
 and his position conspicuous, he was always faithful to his 
 country — ^never neutral in his feelings — always decided in 
 the expression of his opinions. Often involved in the 
 political heats of the hour, his earnest sincerity and manly 
 frankness, while they conciliated the attachment of his 
 political friends, commanded at all times the respect of those 
 who differed from him most widely and most warmly in 
 sentiment. 
 
 He who was so mindful of his duties towards man 
 could not well be otherwise than humble and true in his 
 fidelity to the Almighty. He fulfilled his duties to society 
 by the example of regular attendance on public worship, and 
 lived and died as became a sincere and pious Christian. 
 Therefore his age was pleasant and tranquil and his death 
 full of peace, and therefore he is mourned by the friends to 
 whom he was endeared, by the profession which he adorned, 
 by the community which he benefited, and regretted by every 
 citizen of our common country who is capable of appreciat- 
 ing private virtue and public service. 
 
 Sir, it becomes us, the members of the bar of Phila- 
 delphia, who have enjoyed the advantage of the bright 
 example during his life, to strengthen and extend its influ- 
 
Binney's John Sergeant 187 
 
 ence by the honours which we pay to his memory. I there- 
 fore move the following resolutions : 
 
 Resolved, That we lament the bereavement which this 
 profession sustains in the death of John Sergeant, who for 
 so many years had made part of its distinction and pride, 
 and who, throughout his long and active career, has been 
 eminent, not more for his abilities than his virtues, and is 
 worthy of admiration, not more for his great devotion to 
 his client than for his fidelity to justice and the law. 
 
 Resolved, That we honour the sense of moral responsi- 
 bility and the spirit of diffusive benevolence, by which our 
 late fellow-citizen was so usefully connected with this com- 
 munity at large, which led him constantly to look beyond 
 the possession of talents, to a comprehensive and beneficent 
 use of them; and while serving individual interests and 
 justice in the unremitted labors of a long and active and 
 most useful professional career, animated his efforts in every 
 cause of social and public improvement. 
 
 Resolved, That the members of this bar will assemble 
 in this place half an hour before the time which shall be 
 appointed for his funeral, that they may pay to his memory 
 the respect of attending it in a body. 
 
 Resolved, That a Committee of nine persons, to whom 
 the Chairman and secretaries are requested to associate 
 themselves, be appointed by the Chairman, to convey to the 
 family of Mr. Sergeant a copy of these resolutions, as an 
 expression of sympathy in their great and irreparable 
 bereavement. And that, as a further token of respect to his 
 character, the proceedings of this meeting be published in the 
 papers of this city, in the National Intelligencer at Wash- 
 ington, and, with leave of the Supreme Court of this State 
 and the Circuit Court of the United States, be inserted as 
 an obituary in the next volume of their printed decisions. 
 
 The resolutions were seconded by Mr. Binney, who 
 spoke as follows : 
 
 Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen of the Bar: I concur in 
 these resolutions. I approve and second them with my 
 
i88 Law Association Centennial 
 
 whole heart, warmly and sincerely. They are beyond the 
 common scope, as Mr. Meredith has remarked, and therefore 
 I approve of them. I do not do this as a ceremony, or in 
 mere conformity with the custom which has grown up at 
 this bar within the last thirty years, the custom of making 
 some offering or tribute to every member of the bar that 
 departs this life. The usage proceeds unquestionably from 
 an amiable source, but I have never been able entirely to 
 approve of it. It impairs the expression of spontaneous- 
 ness, cordiality, and sincerity, which every such commemo- 
 ration ought to have, and must have, to be of any value. 
 The death of Mr. Sergeant, if there had been no such cus- 
 tom, would have brought this bar together by an instanta- 
 neous and irrepressible emotion. They would have offered 
 him these resolutions with one mind and one heart, and 
 would have adopted them with one unanimous voice. I 
 exclude from my mind all influence of the custom, which, 
 in ordinary cases, is taken by the world as a formality, and 
 produces a bad rather than a good effect. I yield to the 
 influence and impulse of the occasion and second these reso- 
 lutions with my whole heart. I am sure they will be 
 adopted by the bar with the same feeling, and with entire 
 unanimity. 
 
 I might, indeed, Mr. Chairman, spare myself the pain 
 of saying any more, and you the trouble of hearing it, after 
 having listened to these resolutions, which comprehensively, 
 as well as specifically, draw the character of Mr. Sergeant, 
 in its breadth, in its depth, and in its highest import. But 
 I know what is expected of me, however painful it is for me 
 to meet the demand. I know what is expected of me as his 
 friend and contemporary. I know that it is expected of me 
 to dwell, not in general terms of eulogy upon his character, 
 but upon some of his personal characteristics, which have 
 been exhibited to me in the course of a very long and inti- 
 mate association with him. You expect, from my long 
 acquaintance with him, from our constant association for so 
 many years, that some points of his character, some char- 
 
BiNNEY^s John Sergeant 189 
 
 acteristics of his mind, which have struck me, and were not 
 always so discernible in the public demonstrations that he 
 gave, should be made known to you. It is only for the pur- 
 pose of adverting to these particulars that I ask your atten- 
 tion for a few moments. 
 
 Mr. Sergeant began, continued, and ended his adult 
 life in the presence of some of the persons who are now in 
 this audience. Its outset, you either know or have heard, 
 was without censure, or reproach, or the shadow of either. 
 His was an honourable and virtuous youth. And he con- 
 tinued from year to year, during his whole life, increasing 
 his titles to respect and honour every day, until he achieved 
 the highest degrees of both — as wise men estimate degrees 
 of honour and respect — by merit, and not by accident, or 
 fortune, or the breath of popular applause. He has rounded 
 the whole circle of his life, fully, completely, perfectly. He 
 has descended to his rest with the mild serenity and beauty 
 of the setting sun, after a course as uninterrupted and reg- 
 ular as the annual movement of the earth itself round that 
 orb. He has more than lived out what the Psalmist calls 
 "the days of our age." He has escaped the "labour and 
 sorrow" that are foreboded to the strength that attains 
 "fourscore;" and now from henceforth, by the necessity 
 which makes the past unchangeable, there is to be no decline 
 nor decay in his bright example. I regard Mr. Sergeant as 
 a fortunate man. 
 
 I have said, Mr. Chairman, that his adult life was 
 begun, continued, and ended in the presence of living wit- 
 nesses that are before me. Most of you have seen a part of 
 it. Some of you have seen a considerable part of it. There 
 is one, and perhaps only one, who has seen the whole of it, 
 and he is not the calmest to speak of it, nor the fittest to 
 judge of it ; and, it may be, is the least competent to repre- 
 sent it as it ought to be represented. But, as I have known 
 him long, and known him well, with an intimacy that was 
 never surpassed between two men, it is my duty to exhibit 
 
190 Law Association Centennial 
 
 my impression of it as it remains and ever will remain with 
 me, as clearly as I can. 
 
 I knew him well; I respected him truly; I honoured 
 him faithfully. I honoured and respected him to the end 
 of his life. I shall honour and respect his memory to the 
 end of my own. No trivial incongruities of feeling or 
 opinion, — no misinterpretations however arising, — no petty 
 gust, — no cloud of a hand's breadth, which may and will 
 chill or overcast the common sky of the truest friends in a 
 life of fifty-five years, ever for a single instant disturbed the 
 foundations of my regard for him, or even reached the 
 depths in which they were laid. These foundations were 
 laid upon his principles, as I well knew them fifty years ago. 
 They were laid deep upon that sure basis; and they were 
 beyond the reach of change or chance, as his principles were. 
 Mr. Sergeant and myself were fellow-students in the office 
 of the late Jared Ingersoll — a name that I can never men- 
 tion without the profoundest veneration, as my master and 
 guide in the law, — and it was the good fortune of both Mr. 
 Sergeant and myself to be raised under the eye of such a 
 man, at such a time. It may not be known to the present 
 age, but it is an indisputable fact, that in that venerable 
 man's person there were almost two distinct natures, of dif- 
 ferent qualities, though both of them excellent : his nature 
 in reflection and his nature in action. In reflection, he was, 
 or appeared to be, rather slow, uncertain, deliberate — pois- 
 ing and balancing thought against thought, and authority 
 against authority, as if he did not wish to approach the con- 
 clusion ; and the consequence of it, I believe, was, that while 
 he was generally, and for the most part right, if he ever was 
 otherwise it was because the truth of the conclusion was 
 hurt by the slowness of the process. This was one nature. 
 But when he came into action, he was the most clear, 
 decided, bold, acute, far-sighted man, that I have ever seen 
 in my life, as it regarded all the purposes of his cause; and 
 he sprang to his conclusion instantly and fearlessly, as if he 
 came to it by inspiration. In both of these natures, however 
 
Binney's John Sergeant 191 
 
 different in their character, he was a fine example to the 
 students in his office, whom he permitted to know him, and 
 to trace, as it were, the steps of his mind even in its coldest 
 operations; and often did we hear him, through the glass 
 door of his office on the other side of the way, treading his 
 regular steps across the floor, and soliloquizing the points 
 of an opinion or a cause, for the purpose of giving himself 
 the stimulus which he felt that he required. When he got 
 before a jury he was the most dangerous adversary that any 
 gentleman could meet. In my perhaps partial opinion, he 
 was the ablest advocate of the bar before a jury, when he 
 was in his prime and vigour, whether his cause was good or 
 bad; and before the Court also, if his cause was good, or 
 probably so. Mr. Sergeant was admitted into Mr. Inger- 
 soll's office some few, perhaps half a dozen, months before 
 me. We were of the same age within a short month. He 
 was admitted to the bar a term in advance of me; he in 
 December, 1799, and myself in the following March. 
 
 In Mr. Ingersoll's office Mr. Sergeant was a faithful 
 student — addicted to little pleasure — social, cheerful, and 
 gay, with the friends whom he preferred; and giving to 
 myself, without stint, all the leisure time he had, by night 
 and by day, for the purpose of refreshment, or of mutual 
 benefit, in the course of our studies. He had at that time, 
 what all have since observed, an extraordinary quickness of 
 thought, and an equally extraordinary grasp or compre- 
 hension of the thought or argument that was opposed to him. 
 Whatever he studied he knew well; and, when he left the 
 office, was as accomplished a student as ever was admitted 
 to the bar. Mr. Ingersoll's opinion of him was such that, 
 as I recollect, upon one occasion, when I went to the master 
 to solve a point which my ignorance had not comprehended, 
 he said to me, "Go to Mr. Sergeant: he has been over 
 that, and he can tell you, if anybody can." I accordingly 
 went to him, and he told me. This remarkable power of 
 Mr. Sergeant, his quickness of thought, and grasp of com- 
 prehension of whatever was submitted to him, either on the 
 
192 Law Association Centennial 
 
 same side or against him, you must have been familiar with. 
 I saw it in its bud ; you have seen it in its development. It 
 was the same flower more fully developed, but having, from 
 the strength of my first impression, no more freshness or 
 beauty to me at any hour than when I saw it in its opening. 
 He had, with this most striking and available faculty, 
 another that was peculiar to him. He manifested more of 
 it when he was young and in middle life, than he afterwards 
 thought fit to use; because, perhaps, there were at times 
 some inconveniences arising from it. But I state it, as it 
 will serve to show the character of his mind. He had the 
 faculty of condensing in an adage, or in a colloquial expres- 
 sion, drawn from the mother-wit and humour of the people, 
 an answer to a proposition that he rejected, which at least 
 took out of the argument all the affectation it may have 
 had, if it did not effectually overthrow it. At times this 
 faculty was peculiarly effective with the jury; and it often 
 cut as deeply into the adversary as it did into his argument. 
 But with the increasing elevation of his walk, and the full 
 ascertainment of his strength, he made a more sparing use 
 of it. 
 
 In addition to his quickness, grasp of thought, and 
 power of comprehension, he derived, through an excellent 
 education, the art of arranging his arguments with perfect 
 skill, according to the rules of the most effective logic ; and 
 he was able to penetrate the want of it in anybody that was 
 opposed to him. He never split hairs. He never confused 
 his premises and conclusion, by blending them together or 
 involving them in anyway; and he never permitted anyone 
 to do it against him ; and he marched to his conclusion by a 
 path or paths that he was willing to let everybody trace and 
 examine after he had completed the passage ; and it was not 
 safe for any man to do otherwise with him. 
 
 His first striking success at the bar you all remember, 
 or will remember it, when I state that it was in the case of 
 Bender vs. Fromberger, in 1806. I need not say what that 
 case was. As often as I have thought of it, and of its effect 
 

 
 
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Binney's John Sergeant 193 
 
 upon him, I have thought, as any person acquainted with 
 the case and counsel will think, when he refers to Ackroyd 
 and Smithson, in Lord Campbell's Life of Lord Eldon. It 
 settled his position at the bar — it settled it with the Court ; 
 for, though, after gaining the cause upon the matter of 
 pleading, and gaining also one of the points, and an import- 
 ant one, upon the merits — that of the return of the purchase- 
 money, with interest, upon a covenant of general warranty 
 — he lost it upon the other, that is to say, the claim to indem- 
 nity to the value of the improvements, yet he gained more 
 than he had lost in the compliment that was paid him from 
 the Bench, and is introduced into the report, that, if any 
 argument would have shaken the opinion of the judge, it 
 would have been Mr. Sergeant's. This was fully equivalent 
 to what Dunning said to Mr. Scott, when he rose to sup- 
 port a case at the assizes in opposition to Ackroyd and 
 Smithson. "Sit down, Mr. Scott, I will not hear you. 
 Are you not the Mr. Scott that argued the case of Ackroyd 
 and Smithson?" Mr. Scott said that he did argue it. 
 "Then, sir, I will not hear you. I have read your argu- 
 ment in that case, and I defy you, or any man in England, 
 to answer it." 
 
 Mr. Sergeant, I need not say, advanced from that time, 
 steadily and uninterruptedly, until he came to the position 
 that he finally held. His progress was more rapid than that 
 of some of his contemporaries ; but at length they 
 approached nearly to his position; and it was from being 
 concerned myself frequently on the same side with him, that 
 I came at length to know the peculiar habits of his mind, to 
 which, perhaps, some of the bar may be strangers. Any 
 man, in any position, at that time could know what his 
 powers were. No man could so well know as myself the 
 manner in which he brought his powers into action. 
 
 I have said that he was quick, comprehensive, logical. 
 His mind was, moreover, altogether of a suggestive char- 
 acter. He did not like to read for the purpose of thinking; 
 he thought for the purpose of reading, to corroborate or to 
 
 13 
 
194 Law Association Centennial 
 
 rectify his thoughts. Whether that would be the better 
 way with minds less suggestive than his own is more than 
 I can say. It was his striking way; and while sometimes 
 it exposed him to inconvenience, at other times it gave him 
 a sort of electric power that was altogether marvellous. 
 He was not, according to my impression, the best in con- 
 sultation with his colleague. He would think — (and that 
 was his delight) — he would suggest, and he would reason; 
 but it was in a manner comparatively cold, and without 
 approaching the true bearing either of the authorities or of 
 the case. He always had this preference to the last day of 
 his professional life : for I have witnessed it not many years 
 before its conclusion. Whenever I was concerned with 
 him, I certainly relieved him from all the practical incon- 
 veniences of it. I relieved him, except upon one occasion, 
 when, unfortunately and unexpectedly, the whole burden 
 of an important cause was thrown upon himself. But, then, 
 as I understood, he raised himself up from under the whole 
 weight, and cast it upon the opposite side with extraordinary 
 effect, by the defensive exercise of his speculative power, to 
 gain the time that was necessary for the more precise con- 
 sideration of the case, and the authorities bearing upon it. 
 I refer to the case of the Lessee of Livingston vs. Moore. 
 Upon that occasion, Mr. Sergeant and myself being 
 together, this sort of adaptation of one to the other was per- 
 fectly well known and understood between us. The prepa- 
 ration of the case and general bearings of it were left to me, 
 and he gave himself no further concern. He thought of it 
 generally; he had the general principles of the law in his 
 mind; he had suggested various matters, and, in fine, all 
 the work that his mind had to do was done ; but everybody 
 knows that it is not the mind alone that must work at the 
 bar, to work effectually. The cause was called on when 
 Judge Hopkinson sat in that chair where Judge Gibson now 
 sits. It was a cause of vast magnitude. It was a cause of 
 great public interest. It was the Nicholson case; and the 
 day before it came on I was stretched upon my bed with an 
 
Binney's John Sergeant 195 
 
 acute inflammatory attack, which entirely disabled me. He 
 sent for my eldest son, and asked what he should do. He 
 made his motion to the Court the next day for the continu- 
 ance of the cause in consequence of my illness; but there 
 being another counsel engaged on the same side, the Court 
 refused his motion, and quite properly, too. Mr. Sergeant 
 was, then, to go into that cause without the aid of a pioneer, 
 trusting to what the preceding counsel, who was from the 
 country, could furnish. That counsel had worked for his 
 own mind, but not for Mr. Sergeant's. After he had spoken 
 some forty minutes to the cause, and said all that he thought 
 material, but which was not all that was material for the 
 cause, nor for Mr. Sergeant, who was to follow him, he said 
 that no man of understanding would detain the Court by 
 speaking for a longer period in such a cause than three- 
 quarters of an hour. There was the predicament ; and how 
 did he relieve himself from it? You know the discursive 
 character of his reasoning when he thought it necessary. 
 You know the manner in which his pregnant mind would 
 throw off suggestion after suggestion, always connected 
 more or less with the subject, having the due character and 
 order of ratiocination, tending apparently to the conclusion, 
 even when he saw himself that it was something wide 
 of it. This was his defensive speech against the order of 
 the Judge ; and after he had talked the clock down, he went 
 into his office, and on the next morning — how much of the 
 night he gave to it I do not know, not less than the whole, if 
 it were a short summer night — he came into Court, and as I 
 understood from those who witnessed it, made a most clear, 
 effective, and decisive effort, which gained the cause. Dur- 
 ing the session afterwards, we argued the same cause 
 together at Washington, with the same success. This was 
 the character of his mind. When the burden rested upon 
 himself he prepared his causes well; but when he had his 
 choice, it was the delight of his mind to think, speculate, to 
 suggest, and to leave to another mind the work of more pre- 
 cise preparation. 
 
196 Law Association Centennial 
 
 I need not say what was the extent of his learning, or 
 the effectiveness with which he handled every cause that was 
 submitted to him; you have been the witnesses of that. But 
 I may speak of what were the moral qualities of the man dur- 
 ing his whole career at the bar. His honour and integrity 
 in all that regarded the profession or the management of 
 his cause were not only above impeachment or imputation, 
 but beyond the thought of it. So distinct and universal was 
 this impression that if any man had directed a battery of 
 that sort against him, the recoil would have prostrated him 
 to the earth. His heart, his mind, his principles, his con- 
 science, his bond to man, and his bond to Heaven, which he 
 had given early, and which, to the last, he never intention- 
 ally violated, would have made it, humanly speaking, impos- 
 sible to him to swerve from his integrity. It is the best 
 example for the rising generation to have before them. He 
 was perfectly fair. There was no evasion, no stratagem, 
 no surprisal, no invocation of prejudice, no appeal to 
 unworthy passions ; he was above, far above, all this. Mr. 
 Sergeant had too much strength, indeed, to make use of 
 such arts, to say nothing of his virtue. He was charitable 
 in doing work at the bar without pecuniary compensation, 
 though not without reward; he had that which in his judg- 
 ment was the best. But he did not do it ostentatiously. He 
 did not do it by proclamation, informing the Court in the 
 presence of the bystanders that he had not received a fee, 
 but that it would make no difference with him. He never 
 let his left hand know what his right hand did. Still less 
 did he ever impose upon the left hand of others, by inform- 
 ing them of what his right hand had not done. He was in 
 every respect internally, in the heart, a most kind man. I 
 do not mean that he was kind by routine — kind by cere- 
 monial courtesy. I mean that he was kind in principle, and 
 kind in the affections of his heart. Mr. Sergeant was a 
 man of a most refined, delicate, and susceptible organization. 
 His instincts, quicker than his thoughts, would perceive, or 
 think they perceived, the appearance of a disposition to 
 
Binney's John Sergeant 197 
 
 assail or wound him personally; and he would sometimes 
 repel and retort the injury or the sting, where there was no 
 intention of either the one or the other. But he was plac- 
 able, and not self-excusing. When the delicate tissue of his 
 nerves was smoothed and quieted down, and the language 
 of the heart came forth, it was not only clear and plain, but 
 the very countenance with which he expressed it was both 
 attractive and seductive. It drew you more completely 'to 
 him, and more away from yourself. His best friends knew 
 this quality, and that it was the accompaniment of a sensi- 
 tive and rather susceptible nature, and it never diminished 
 their regard for him. Having spoken of his manners at the 
 bar, and the example he gave to the bar, I ought to speak of 
 the range of his mind as the conclusion of the whole matter. 
 The range of Mr. Sergeant's mind was just as wide as the 
 whole circle of his professional necessities. He knew the 
 bearings of every part of the law, although he had not pene- 
 trated into every nook and corner of it. But he could draw 
 his resources from every part with equal ease, when it was 
 necessary. And it was often a matter of doubt in my own 
 mind with what branch of the law he was most conversant. 
 He had acquired an early training in criminal law, and in 
 that he not only went before his contemporaries, but he 
 stood on one side of them, walking a different line. He 
 was, of course, generally accomplished, as you may judge 
 from what I have said. But if he had any predilection — 
 and I think he had — the discursiveness of his mind inclined 
 him to such questions as would not fetter him by the chains 
 of authority, but would suffer him to choose for himself the 
 path in which his own suggestive powers could work freely. 
 Upon more than one occasion he rose to the highest degree 
 of excellence in the class of constitutional questions. They 
 were the best suited to him. But he worked with ease and 
 vigour in many fields. It was not altogether so with our 
 predecessors at this bar. Although they were all competent, 
 able, and effective men, there was a marked difference in them 
 in respect to their particular excellence. Mr. Lewis was the 
 
198 Law Association Centennial 
 
 crown lawyer — the criminal lawyer by way of eminence. Mr. 
 Edward Tilghman was the lawyer for estates and tenures, 
 devises and remainders. Mr. IngersoU, Mr. Dallas, and 
 Mr. Rawle were most able advocates, and more able than 
 others in commercial law. And Mr. duPonceau was the 
 prime leader in maritime and public law. At that time the 
 preference was given by all of them to the leader in that 
 particular branch upon which the case might depend. In 
 modem times, I believe this practice is forgotten and passed 
 away. General finish and accomplishment prevail, and 
 there is no one now can claim to himself a prominent ability 
 in any particular branch. So much for Mr. Sergeant's pro 
 fessional character and professional life. 
 
 In early life he had a decided attraction to politics and 
 to political position. He left two of his contemporaries in 
 making that selection, and he was gratified to the extent of 
 his wishes by employments in public life, frequently and 
 generally, from the year 1805 to 1837; from 1805, when he 
 was just known at the bar, to 1837, when he was at the head 
 of the bar, and also at the same time at the head of the con- 
 vention for reforming the Constitution of the State. He 
 had afifinities for public and political questions, and felt a 
 strong attraction to the incidents of public life. How nobly 
 he maintained himself afterwards ; how truly he proved his 
 qualifications for the position ; with what fine manners, pure 
 morality, personal dignity, and exalted talents he sustained 
 himself there; how extensively and constantly he gratified 
 the pride of his constituents; what great profit accrued 
 from his services to the city, the State, and the country ; and 
 how faithfully and strenuously he asserted the authority of 
 the Constitution, and of the whole Constitution, I need not 
 tell you. It was all a virtuous delight to him. He loved 
 the stirring debate, the sympathetic combinations of men, 
 the excitement, the agitation, the hopes, and. the very fears 
 of the pending issue, and the triumph of victory ; and defeat 
 was no depression to him, nor did it bring the least despond- 
 ency. Nothing prevented him from immediately rallying 
 
Binney's John Sergeant 199 
 
 with new tactics and new vigour for another campaign. I 
 witnessed and sympathized with his deHght; and he often 
 spoke of it. But Mr. Sergeant was not a man of affecta- 
 tion; he had not a particle of it in his nature. He was him- 
 self totns atque teres, as to all his duties, private, profes- 
 sional, and public. He reconciled every one of them with 
 the others, and with as much ability as any man I ever knew. 
 He reconciled all his public life with his professional life, 
 and carried on a regular and extensive practice in the courts, 
 while he held one of the highest positions in Congress. I 
 personally knew that he never lost sight of them ; and, if he 
 had, he knew that, in that sincerity which was the bond of 
 our common intercourse, he would have received, and would 
 have expected to receive, an admonitory suggestion from 
 myself. When he was offered the mission to Panama he 
 consulted me in reference to it; for we were in a profes- 
 sional relation in important causes — one particularly — that 
 if I had thought it had been wrong, he would have thought 
 it a desertion, and would have declined the appointment. 
 He told me that he was prepared to do so. I told him to 
 go, and that I would be happy in bearing any portion of the 
 burden in his absence. He afterwards consulted me in 
 regard to a mission to England, which, if my memory serves 
 me, was a mission anterior to that which is said to have been 
 offered him by General Taylor. He wrote me a letter from 
 Washington asking me what I thought of it in all its rela- 
 tions ; and I wrote to him that if he could go to England, 
 and afterwards leave the mission without returning to the 
 bar, he ought to do so; but if he could not, that he ought 
 not to go; and he refused it. He was a man who would 
 never sacrifice to public life his private or contracted duties 
 in such times as we have lived in. He was a man of too 
 much discernment, and knew too well the state of things in 
 which we live, to have made a sacrifice there which would 
 have involved a larger sacrifice elsewhere. He was, no one 
 can doubt, possessed of a deep love of country, of patriotism 
 in its highest sense, of the desire of extensive usefulness; 
 
200 Law Association Centennial 
 
 but he never thought, and it would be a gross injustice for 
 anyone to think, that a deep love of country, patriotism, and 
 a desire of extensive usefulness, cannot consist with a devo- 
 tion to the concerns of private and professional life, and the 
 rejection of public service. He never spoke of his public 
 life as a sacrifice, nor was it so; still less did he speak or 
 think of professional life, or any form of useful private life, 
 as being a selfish seclusion. He had too much sense, rea- 
 son, and justice for that. He would not surrender to 
 rebuke, in that way, the friends that were by his side, and 
 were never from his side. If this is a defensive word, let 
 me remark that it is on behalf of the dead, rather than the 
 living. In all points of his character, Mr. Chairman, in all 
 positions that he took, in all the manifestations of his mind, 
 he was open, sincere, consistent, and faithful to that main 
 principle within him, that he was bound, and ever bound, to 
 all that he had assumed towards his friends, and towards 
 his own family. That it takes an iota from his praise, no 
 one can suppose. 
 
 Mr. Chairman, I have gone over Mr. Sergeant's life, or 
 parts of it, with as much detail as I can trust myself with, at 
 such a meeting, and at such a time. I have endeavoured 
 to forget my own feelings, by going, more than is common 
 on such occasions, into matters that were professional, and 
 that have a general reference to his intellectual power and 
 tastes. It has been a relief to myself, and, I hope, not unin- 
 teresting nor unprofitable to you. 
 
 Of Mr. Sergeant's relations to his family I need not 
 speak — I cannot speak. While the artery of domestic love 
 is bleeding, as theirs must now bleed, I have no skill to bind 
 it up — no styptic to staunch it. They have the deep, the 
 most deep and sincere sympathy of the bar and of the public. 
 They have higher and better consolations than this. They 
 have his example, his teaching, his personal prescription for 
 himself. They will look to all that, and that is all they can 
 or need look to. They will look to God, the Saviour, and 
 find the relief which he found. They will take hold of the 
 
Binney's John Sergeant 201 
 
 staff that supported him, and it will support them. There 
 is no other cure, there is no other relief for such a wound. 
 
 Mr. Chairman, and Gentlemen of the Bar, it has pleased 
 God that I should survive my two contemporaries of more 
 than half a century — Charles Chauncey and John Sergeant. 
 From the tenacity with which most men hold to life, such a 
 survivorship may seem to be desirable; but it is not wisely 
 desirable by any man, for it cannot be reverently asked of 
 Heaven. Mr. Webster, in his beautiful letter to his old 
 schoolmaster, Mr. Tappan, has himself said to this effect: 
 Master Tappan, we may ask that God's kingdom may come 
 and be universally established upon earth; we may pray 
 that his will may be done by us and by all men ; we may ask 
 for our daily bread; we may pray for forgiveness of sins, 
 for escape from the snares of temptation, and for deliver- 
 ance from evil; but beyond this, we hardly know for what 
 good to supplicate the Divine mercy. Doubtless Mr. Web- 
 ster thought that a prayer for wisdom was included in our 
 Lord's prayer; and so it is; but we may ask directly and 
 expressly for wisdom, and if to the granted prayer there 
 should be added length of days, the prayer will consecrate 
 the gift, and it will be safe. But we may not ask for length 
 of days. We ought not to ask it. Old age has its pains, its 
 disappointments, its mortifications, and its evils ; and unless 
 the Divine Wisdom shall overshadow and crown us, the 
 boon we ask may make that age worse than the "labour and 
 sorrow" which the Psalmist foreshadows for it. Ask it 
 not. Ask for wisdom, and length of days may be granted, 
 if it is in the pleasure of God. But ask not for length of 
 days. 
 
 It has been my most grateful, most painful duty to 
 declare to this bar, upon two occasions, the impressions that 
 have been left upon me by the death of these two eminent 
 men. Let no man envy me the task, however great the 
 satisfaction may be, in short retrospect to myself. Hence- 
 forth no such duty remains to me. I have uttered the last 
 words at a bar meeting upon the departure of friends. T 
 
202 Law Association Centennial 
 
 have probably uttered my final words to the bar of Philadel- 
 phia, except the expression of my most cordial regards, and 
 my most affectionate salutations to you all. 
 
 Mr. Dallas then said: 
 
 Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen of the Bar: It is impos- 
 sible that any one person can really desire to hear a single 
 word added to what has already been said, so beautifully and 
 impressively. There lives no man on the face of the earth 
 so competent to appreciate the character and virtues of John 
 Sergeant as the man who has just finished speaking. From 
 early life, throughout a period exceeding one-half a century, 
 his opportunities of scrutinizing the qualities of the deceased 
 have been unceasing, and the capacity to do so has been equal 
 to the eminence of these qualities. Mr. Chairman, reiterat- 
 ing the remark of an Athenian sage, we have been told that 
 Mr. Sergeant has been fortunate. Of the happiness or 
 fortune of men it is impossible to speak until they are dead. 
 But, perhaps, as the members of a numerous bar, we should 
 be able to say that, independent of his uniformly excellent 
 and unblemished life, Mr. Sergeant was fortunate and happy 
 in other and most material circumstances. He was fortu- 
 nate and happy in his associations at the bar. Throughout 
 the fifty years of active, energetic life here, who was on his 
 right and who on his left? With what minds did he come 
 in conflict? What examples of excellence had he before 
 him? He was fortunate there. But of all pieces of good 
 fortune, there is one thing that will address itself now 
 strongly to the consideration of every gentleman present. 
 He is fortunate in having the praises just poured upon him, 
 coming from such a source. I do not, therefore, sir, wonder 
 at the truth of the proposition with which I started — that 
 there cannot be a single individual present that would wish 
 to the effective, powerful address we have just heard one 
 word added as homage to the memory of Mr. Sergeant. It 
 is complete in itself. 
 
Binney's John Sergeant 203 
 
 After some other remarks by the Hon. C. J. Ingersoll, 
 the resolutions offered by Mr. Meredith having been unani- 
 mously adopted — 
 
 The Chairman appointed the following committee in 
 accordance with the last resolution : Messrs. Binney, Dallas, 
 Meredith, James S. Smith, H. J. Williams, T. I. Wharton, 
 J. M. Scott, E. K. Price, and E. D. Ingraham. 
 
 The meeting then adjourned. 
 
 John Bannister Gibson, 
 
 Chairman. 
 
 George M. Wharton, 
 P. McCall, 
 
 Secretaries. 
 
DISCOURSE ILLUSTRATIVE OF THE LIFE AND 
 CHARACTER OF HON. HORACE BINNEY 
 
 by 
 
 The HON. WILLIAM STRONG 
 
 Justice of the Supreme Court of the United Slates 
 
 Gentlemen of the Bar of Philadelphia, of The Lww Associor 
 tion, and of the American Philosophical Society : 
 Forty years ago, in this Hall, on an occasion much like 
 the present, Mr. Binney commenced his eulogy of Chief 
 Justice Marshall with the following remark, "The Providence 
 of God is shown most beneficently to the world, in raising 
 up, from time to time, and in crowning with length of days, 
 men of pre-eminent goodness and wisdom." The thought 
 thus expressed is worthy of recall to-day. At intervals, all 
 along the line of human history, and especially in enlightened 
 communities, men have appeared, who, by their native endow- 
 ments, their thorough culture, their ceaseless energy, and 
 their moral worth, have raised themselves to a plane above 
 
 In August, 1875, soon after the death of Horace Binney, the Bar of 
 Philadelphia, The Law Association of Philadelphia, and the American 
 Philosophical Society, united in requesting the Hon. William Strong, Justice 
 of the Supreme Court of the United States, to deliver an Eulogium upon 
 Mr. Binney's life and character. 
 
 At a meeting of the Joint Committee of the Bar of Philadelphia, The 
 Law Association of Philadelphia, and the American Philosophical Society, 
 held on the sixth of January, 1876, James J. Barclay, Chairman, William 
 M. Tilghman, Secretary, the following resolution was unanimously 
 adopted : 
 
 Resolved, That the thanks of the Committee be presented to the 
 Hon. William Strong for his address — alike worthy of the subject and the 
 speaker — delivered last evening, on the life and character of the late 
 Horace Binney ; and that he be requested to furnish a copy for publication. 
 
 To James J. Barclay, Esq., Chairman, etc.: 
 
 Dear Sir : — I have received the resolution adopted yesterday by the 
 
 Joint Committee of the Bar of Philadelphia, The Law Association, and the 
 
 American Philosophical Society, and, as requested, I place the "Address" 
 
 at the Committee's disposal. 
 
 I am very respectfully, etc., 
 
 W. Strong. 
 Washington, January 7, 1876. 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 205 
 
 that of their fellows; men who have been in advance of all 
 their cotemporaries, and to whom the rank of leaders has been 
 universally conceded. Such leaders have arisen in every 
 department of social life, in the learned professions, among 
 the devotees to fine arts, in the regions of invention, in the 
 explorations of natural science, in mechanical pursuits, in 
 those of commerce, and even in the department of agricul- 
 ture. Occasionally some noted one has lifted his standard 
 of attainment higher than that of any of his predecessors, and 
 has gone forward beyond their utmost reach. Such men are 
 among the best gifts to the world, of a beneficent God. It is 
 through their agency society makes progress. They lead the 
 onward way. Their lives lend attractive force to that which 
 is truly valuable. They present models for imitation, and 
 their achievements stimulate to a generous rivalry. Their 
 standard, "full high advanced," is ever visible, and it calls, 
 with a noiseless but persuasive voice, to those who are behind 
 to move onward. No one can over-estimate the value of such 
 a life to young men in the legal profession, if it be kept ever 
 in view. If they have not mistaken their calling, it must win 
 their admiration, and stir the noblest impulses of their hearts. 
 It is a perpetual reproof of contentment with any attainments 
 less than the highest possible, a rebuke of character and con- 
 duct unbecoming the best aims, and it gives courage for the 
 grandest efforts. 
 
 Happily the lessons of such a life are beyond the reach 
 of death. They are the rightful property of more than one 
 generation. They ought never to fade into oblivion. To pre- 
 serve them with gratitude for the past and with hope for the 
 future, is a duty which the living owe to themselves and to 
 those who shall come after them. And this duty is best per- 
 formed as a skillful painter preserves in memory the subject 
 of his portrayal. A portrait is not a life, it is true, but it 
 recalls a life. So a delineation of character and achievement, 
 if it be accurate, prolongs the influences the character is fitted 
 to exert. It is therefore in obedience to your desire to per- 
 petuate, so far as may be, the instruction and example of a life 
 
2o6 Law Association Centennial 
 
 more than commonly eminent and useful, that I am to speak 
 to you of Horace Binney. 
 
 He was born in Philadelphia on the fourth day of Janu- 
 ary, A. D. 1780, in a house belonging to Thomas Williams, 
 in what was then known as the Northern Liberties, and in the 
 neighborhood of Front and Coates Streets. He was of Scotch 
 and English descent. The earliest paternal ancestor of whom 
 he had knowledge was John Binney, who, in 1680, resided 
 with his wife Mercy, in the town of Hull, Boston Bay, in 
 [New] England, and from whom he was the fifth by descent 
 in right line. The family came to this country about that 
 time and settled in Hull, Massachusetts.* The grandfather of 
 Horace was Barnabas Binney, a shipmaster and merchant of 
 Boston, and his father (bom in 1751), named also Barnabas 
 Binney, was a surgeon in the revolutionary army, attached 
 to the Massachusetts line, whence he was transferred to the 
 Pennsylvania line. After his transfer he settled permanently 
 in Philadelphia, and, in 1777, he married Mary, the eldest 
 daughter of Henry Woodrow, a man of Scotch ancestry, a 
 whig in politics, of great purity of character and uprightness 
 of life. Dr. Barnabas Binney was a man of liberal education, 
 and a graduate in 1774 of Brown University, where he at- 
 tained the highest distinction in his class. Thence he came 
 to this city, and attended medical lectures at the University, 
 in due time receiving from it a degree. He was an accom- 
 plished "belles-lettres" scholar, and acutely sensitive to the 
 beauties of English literature. He wrote with ease and ele- 
 gance, and he cherished both the taste and the talent for 
 poetical composition. Withal his intellectual powers were 
 fine, and he had a strength of principle, a decision and energy 
 of action, and a sensibility and tenderness of feeling that 
 commanded the respect of all who knew him, and greatly 
 endeared him to the circle of his domestic friends. 
 
 *Iq reply to an inquiry as to the accuracy of this statement Charles C. Binney, 
 Esq., grandson of Mr. Binney, writes as follows: — "The earliest paternal ancestor 
 of whom I have knowledge, was John Binney, who. in 1680, resided with his 
 wife Mercy in the town of Hull, Boston Bay, Massachusetts, and from whom he 
 was the fifth by descent in right line. The family came to this country from Eng- 
 land, probably not long before that date." 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 207 
 
 Dr. Binney's wife, the mother of Horace, was also a 
 superior person. In many points her intellectual traits and 
 those of her husband were much alike. She had besides a 
 keen perception and taste for wit and humor, and a remark- 
 able faculty for catching and imitating personal peculiarities 
 of manner, voice, and almost of look. In the character of her 
 mind there was a large element of the dramatic. Her manner 
 was impressive, and she had that rare union of dignity and 
 ease which woman alone possesses, without the appearance of 
 effort, and which she only can teach. 
 
 At the age of six years, Horace was sent to his first 
 school, which, for a short time, was the Friends' Alms 
 House School, in Walnut Street between Third and Fourth. 
 Very soon afterwards, he entered the Grammar school of the 
 University of Pennsylvania, where he remained until his 
 father's death, which occurred in 1787. Thus early, when 
 only seven years of age, he was left an orphan, in charge of a 
 widowed mother. In 1 788 he was placed in a school at Bor- 
 dentown. New Jersey, where he continued three years, and 
 acquired the reputation of being the best scholar in the 
 school ; beginning thus early to give promise of what he after- 
 wards became. His attainments in knowledge of the Greek 
 language especially, must have been remarkable for a youth 
 of only ten or eleven years. And not only was his scholar- 
 ship of an high order, but his conduct was such as to com- 
 mend him to the confidence of his teachers, for he was pro- 
 moted to be "guider" of boys older than himself. 
 
 Leaving Bordentown in 1791, he returned to his 
 mother's residence, in Philadelphia, then on Market between 
 Fifth and Sixth Streets, immediately opposite the residence 
 of General Washington, and adjoining that of Alexander 
 Hamilton. There he frequently saw the first President of the 
 United States, as also Mrs. Washington, who was his 
 mother's friend, of both of whom he had perfect recollection 
 throughout his life. There he was also a witness of the cere- 
 monies of the day; imposing ceremonies, which were rem- 
 nants of colonial usages derived from^ the mother country. 
 
2o8 Law Association Centennial 
 
 but which long since went into desuetude. What effect such 
 associations and opportunities had upon his youthful mind, 
 never wanting in a pure and generous ambition, may readily 
 be conjectured. 
 
 In 1 791 his mother entered in a second marriage with 
 Dr. Marshall Spring, of Watertown, Massachusetts (now a 
 suburb of Boston), and in 1792 he went to reside with his 
 stepfather, for whom he ever after felt warm affection and 
 profound respect. Soon thereafter he was sent to a board- 
 ing-school near Medford, six miles from Boston. Even then, 
 though only twelve years old, he was prepared for admission 
 to college, but he was considered too young to enter, and he 
 was sent to school rather to grow older, than to increase his 
 intellectual preparation for college life. He did not remain 
 long at Medford, because of a conviction he had that his 
 master was incompetent to instruct him in the Greek lan- 
 guage. An interesting incident is related of his short school 
 life there, illustrative of his confidence in the accuracy of his 
 knowledge, and of his resolute adherence to that which he 
 believed correct, even to the extent of what may be considered 
 rudeness. On the day after his arrival at school, he was 
 called up to recite to his new master a Greek lesson in the 
 New Testament. He began with confidence, but he had not 
 proceeded far when he was stopped, and told he was wrong, 
 and what the master deemed the proper translation was given. 
 Instead of accepting the correction silently, he insisted that 
 he was right and that the master was wrong. This brought 
 immediately the rebuke, "Is this your Philadelphia polite- 
 ness?" to which he replied, "It is my Philadelphia Greek, 
 sir." 
 
 After leaving the school at Medford, he was placed in 
 the care of a clergyman at West Cambridge, in whose family 
 he remained until July, 1793, when he entered the Freshman 
 class at Harvard University, the President of which, at that 
 time, was the Rev. Joseph Willard, D. D. and LL. D. In the 
 autumn after his admission he unfortunately lost his mother 
 by her death, and thus became doubly an orphan. How he 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 209 
 
 acquitted himself in colleg-e is shown by the fact that on his 
 graduation in 1797, he divided the first honor of his class 
 with a single classmate. 
 
 It was at Bordentown and at Harvard that Mr. Binney 
 laid the foundation on which he subsequently built his char- 
 acter and his fame. Protected by Divine Providence, as he 
 was wont to acknowledge, against the perils that even then 
 beset the paths of young men in a college course ; having an 
 ardent desire for distinction in his class, a desire which for- 
 bade any deviation from moral rectitude, and sternly resisted 
 every temptation to indolence, or vicious indulgence; he 
 secured for himself all the advantages of mental and moral 
 culture, which the most advanced collegiate education in this 
 country could then give. Through his entire college life his 
 intercourse with the officers of the institution was one of 
 tminterrupted respect on his part, and of affectionate confi- 
 dence on theirs. Knowledge, of course, he acquired, but that 
 was the least of his acquisitions. He acquired the art and the 
 habit of study, with an unfading love for it, and this acquisi- 
 tion was permanent. It continued to be his delight and a 
 great element of his power until the close of his life. Never 
 for a moment did he make the mistake, into which so many 
 fall, of considering the primary object of a liberal educa- 
 tion to be securing a knowledge of facts, or of arts, or of 
 sciences which might be useful in after life. This knowledge 
 he knew would decay. He sought and he obtained the "art 
 of all arts the best," — that of setting the mind intently upon 
 a subject of thought, and holding it there until the subject 
 is thoroughly understood. 
 
 This power or art of study which he acquired during 
 his college life, he ever regarded as his most important gain, 
 and many years afterward he spoke of it as such. Much of 
 what he acquired he said he had lost. His knowledge of the 
 Latin and Greek classics, as well as of the higher mathe- 
 matics, had fallen away from disuse, though he had preserved 
 enough to assist his children in their education, "but," he 
 added, "the unfading art which I acquired at college was 
 
 14 
 
2IO Law Association Centennial 
 
 that of study, and if the acquisitions of knowledge I then 
 made by it are faded, or fallen from the surface, * * * 
 certainly the art or faculty of study has never left me." His 
 appetite for study while he was in college was so great, that 
 on one occasion, instead of going to his stepfather's, where 
 he was always happy, he remained in his chambers in one of 
 the college buildings during an entire autumnal vacation, 
 and studied every day of it fourteen hours. Habits and tastes 
 like these were his constant shield, as well as his instruments 
 of power; and long after his graduation he was able to say, 
 "I look back to my college life with great satisfaction. I was 
 a fair student of everything I was required to learn, and it 
 does not now occur to me that I ever missed a recitation, or 
 the chapel service at six in the morning, winter or summer. 
 * * * I have no recollection that during those four years 
 I ever did a thing to make my friends blush, and their praises 
 when I left college gave me courage to begin my first steps in 
 the world." 
 
 During the year immediately preceding his graduation 
 he began to look forward to his life work. His father and his 
 step-father having been physicians, it was to be expected that 
 his attention would be turned to the profession to which they 
 had belonged. Accordingly he felt a strong desire to study 
 medicine and surgery, and he attended a course of lectures on 
 anatomy delivered by Dr. Warren, the father of one of his 
 favorite classmates. He also read some medical books. But 
 his step-father earnestly dissuaded him from attempting the 
 profession, and induced him to give up all thought of it. 
 
 After his graduation in July, 1797, he remained in the 
 family of an aunt in Providence, Rhode Island, about three 
 months. During the summer and autumn of that year, the 
 yellow fever prevailed in Philadelphia. In November he 
 came to Philadelphia to make it his permanent home, still 
 undecided what employment he would select, but fitted in an 
 unusual degree to enter upon any line of life, and to make for 
 himself a place and a name. No thought of rest or of self- 
 indulgence after his four years of intense application, diverted 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 211 
 
 him from an earnest purpose to do what he could. He had 
 been turned away from the profession for which he had a 
 decided preference, and to which all his reading that was not 
 scholastic had been directed. He felt no special attraction to 
 any other, and the uncertainty of success in the legal pro- 
 fession, of which he had heard much, made him hesitate to 
 select that. Without much reflection, therefore, he turned his 
 attention to mercantile life, and requested Dr. David Jackson, 
 his guardian, to apply to Cunningham and Nesbit, a firm of 
 large shipping merchants in this city, to receive him into their 
 counting-house as an apprentice. Fortunately for himself, 
 fortunately for the bar, and fortunately for the country, the 
 counting-room was full, and the merchants had no place for 
 him. It was then he made choice of the legal profession, and 
 at his instance Dr. Jackson requested Mr. Jared Ingersoll to 
 receive him into his ofHce as a student of law. Mr. Ingersoll 
 consented, and thus the work of life was determined. So 
 narrowly did he escape a calling, to which he was apparently 
 not best adapted, and so Providentially was he led into the 
 profession which he subsequently so much adorned. He had 
 no friends in Philadelphia to advise him, none, at most, suffi- 
 ciently acquainted with his peculiar qualifications to advise 
 him judiciously, though he had been told by his step-father 
 that if he selected any of the learned professions, it ought to 
 be the law. 
 
 Among the fellow students in Mr. Ingersoll's office were 
 John B. Wallace, who afterwards married his sister, and 
 John Sergeant, both young men of remarkable mental force, 
 and of indomitable ambition, and both of them were, from 
 the commencement of his apprenticeship, his life long friends. 
 Somewhat later he contracted an intimate friendship with 
 Mr. Charles Chauncey which continued unbroken until the 
 latter's death. 
 
 How faithfully he improved the opportunities which 
 Mr. Ingersoll's office afforded him may be inferred from what 
 he had done in college, and may be known from what he was 
 after his call to the bar. He had learned to study, and in 
 
212 Law Association Centennial 
 
 study, not in mere reading, he found his chief delight. Of 
 course to him the new science to which his attention was 
 directed, presented attractions above everything else. His 
 steadfast effort was to learn his profession accurately. With 
 this he suffered nothing to interfere, and he firmly resisted all 
 the social temptations which assail young men in large cities. 
 He had resources for recreation within himself. He was ex- 
 tremely fond of music, playing well upon the flute, and sing- 
 ing with great sweetness of voice. Indeed, to the last days of 
 his life music was to him a great joy, and in the education of 
 his children he sought attentively to give them musical ac- 
 complishments. The two years and more which he spent in 
 Mr. Ingersoll's office were passed with great advantage to 
 himself, and he never forgot the debt of gratitude he owed 
 to his preceptor. In after years he paid it to that preceptor's 
 memory in a manner that delighted the bar, and set up an 
 enduring monument of his own respect and affection. 
 
 Having completed his apprenticeship, Mr. Binney was 
 admitted to the bar of the Court of Common Pleas on the 
 thirty-first day of March, 1800, though he was then but little 
 over twenty years of age, and at the March Term of 1802 
 he was admitted to the bar of the Supreme Court of the State. 
 At the time of his admission the Supreme Court consisted of 
 Shippen, Chief Justice, and Yeates, Smith and Breckenridge, 
 associate justices. Before these men he made his first appear- 
 ance in the highest court of the State, and from them he 
 received a kindly treatment that he never failed gratefully to 
 remember. 
 
 In the year 1800, and through the early part of this cen- 
 tury the eminent men who led the legal profession in the city 
 were William Lewis, Edward Tilghman, Jared Ingersoll, 
 William Rawle, William Tilghman, and Alexander James 
 Dallas. To these may be added Mr. duPonceau, distin- 
 guished especially by his knowledge of admiralty law. They 
 were men of varied accomplishments, but they were all men 
 of power, conspicuous in the city and throughout the state, 
 and to them was entrusted nearly the whole of the important 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 213 
 
 legal business of the community. To a young man just 
 entering the profession, the prospect of success in obtaining 
 employment may have seemed gloomy. The business com- 
 munity, who most need the assistance of lawyers, were sup- 
 plied, and well supplied. There seemed to be no room for 
 other lawyers, and those who occupied the field were too 
 strong in themsehes, and too strongly entrenched in the con- 
 fidence of the public, to be displaced. In truth, however, the 
 circumstances that might have been thought to interpose 
 almost insurmountable obstacles to professional success were 
 adjuvants to it. The well-prepared and ambitious young 
 men, who, on their admission, found at the bar a body of 
 practitioners so eminent as were those I have named, monop- 
 olizing the honors and the emoluments of the profession, 
 were taught at once to lift their own standard high. They 
 learned that no moderate attainments, no half-hearted efforts, 
 no imperfect preparation would meet the necessities of their 
 case. They grew indeed for a time in the shade, but it was a 
 healthy shade. The exhibitions of mental power, of legal 
 learning, and of professional skill which they constantly wit- 
 nessed were instructive to them, the subjects of their thought 
 and conversation, and incentives to severer study. It cannot 
 be doubted that no inconsiderable portion of the power and 
 skill of Mr. Binney, Mr. Sergeant, Mr. Chauncey and others 
 who honored the Philadelphia bar, and gave it a wide reputa- 
 tion during the first half of the present century, was due to 
 the fact that at the commencement of their professional life, 
 they were introduced into association with the leaders of the 
 old bar, a body of men who would have graced Westminster 
 Hall in its palmiest days. They may have thought their 
 apprenticeship hard and long, but it yielded abundant fruit. 
 
 Mr. Binney was not discouraged by the outlook. With 
 a resolute will, with patient waiting, and with unintermitted 
 devotion to study, he bided his time — and it came. His suc- 
 cess in obtaining employment was not speedy. For six years 
 after his admission to the bar, he had a most meager clien- 
 tage, and, as he remarked afterwards, his porridge would have 
 
214 Law Association Centennial 
 
 been very insipid, if he had had to buy salt for it with what 
 he made at the bar. But the time was not lost. He employed 
 it largely in waiting upon the courts, and watching the course 
 of trials, a practice which he afterwards often commended to 
 young men, assuring them that, if attentive, they would learn 
 as much in court as they could in their ofifices, during the 
 same hours, and that what they learned would be more useful 
 to them in acquiring the art of managing causes. 
 
 In April, 1804, he was married to a daughter of Col. 
 John Cox, of Trenton, New Jersey, an efficient officer in the 
 quartermaster's department during the revolutionary war, 
 and the union thus formed continued through the long period 
 of sixty-one years, until her death. 
 
 In the year 1806 he was elected a member of the Legis- 
 lature of the State. He served as such, however, but a single 
 year, declining a re-election. While he was a member, one or 
 two memorials of the Chamber of Commerce and one for the 
 incorporation of The United States Insurance Company were 
 committed to his charge. These brought him intO' association 
 with the merchants and underwriters of the city, and so satis- 
 factory was his management of the trusts committed to him, 
 that immediately after the close of his membership much pro- 
 fessional business relating to insurance flowed in upon him. 
 To Mr. Edward Tilghman, one of the leaders of the "Old 
 Bar," he was indebted for his launch into this department of 
 practice. Mr. Binney has himself given an account of his 
 start in his most interesting sketch of three of those leaders. 
 The case committed to his sole charge by the advice of Mr. 
 Tilghman was "Gibson vs. The Philadelphia Insurance Com- 
 pany," reported in i Binney, page 405. It was one of diffi- 
 culty, and it involved the application of principles not familiar 
 to most members of the profession even at the present day. 
 The report shows that it was very ably argued by him, and 
 with success. It was the second case which he argued in the 
 Supreme Court of the State, and it was the beginning of the 
 large success for which he had waited so long, and for which 
 he had made such thorough preparation. The insurance busi- 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 215 
 
 ness was never, perhaps, better, at any time, or at any bar, 
 than it was in Philadelphia, from 1807 to 18 17, including the 
 ten years between his substantial entrance into practice, and 
 his attainment of the full reputation and employment which 
 he held undiminished during his continuance in professional 
 life. 
 
 In these years, pressingly engaged as he was in profes- 
 sional duties, he prepared and published his six volumes of 
 reported decisions of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, 
 covering the period from 1799 to 1814. To this work he was 
 invited by Chief Justice Tilghman, soon after his return from 
 the Legislature. That he received the invitation from such a 
 source, before he had obtained any considerable practice, and 
 when he was only twenty-seven years old, was a very high 
 testimonial to the confidence which his abilities, his culture, 
 his habits and his character had won for him in the best quar- 
 ters. Mr. Edward Tilghman's faith in him, as exhibited in 
 the incident to which I have referred, illustrates the respect he 
 had gained from the leaders of the "Old Bar," whose judg- 
 ment was not likely to err. Of his reports I must make only 
 brief mention. Fortunate would it be for any court of last 
 resort, and fortunate for the legal profession, if all reports 
 had equal merits. Certainly throughout the six volumes the 
 reporter gave irrefragable proofs of his ability to comprehend 
 legal arguments, and to restate them with clearness in a con- 
 densed form. His analysis of the facts upon which the judg- 
 ments were rendered, was rigid and accurate, and his head 
 notes expressed exactly what the court decided. No com- 
 plaints have ever been made that his syllabus was not sus- 
 tained by the case. When the reports came from his hands 
 they left nothing to be desired. They must always be re- 
 garded as the work of an accomplished lawyer. It is not an 
 easy matter to report well, and it is very rare that any reporter 
 gives full satisfaction to the court and to the bar. The art 
 requires not merely fairness, accuracy, and ability to com- 
 prehend what was argued and decided — it requires all that 
 and more. It demands ability to gather from the mass of 
 
2i6 Law Association Centennial 
 
 facts in the record those that really constitute the case, and to 
 state them lucidly, omitting all that are not material, and 
 overlooking none that are. It demands also power to extract 
 from the opinion of the court the legal principles adjudged to 
 be applicable to the facts, and to restate them in short, and 
 with perfect accuracy. By the universal judgment of the 
 profession, such a reporter was Mr. Binney. His authorship, 
 as a reporter, ceased in 1814 on the publication of his sixth 
 volume. 
 
 After 1807 his professional engagements were very 
 large, not only in insurance cases, but in all kinds of impor- 
 tant business. He seemed to pass at one bound from his long 
 apprenticeship in waiting into acknowledged leadership. He 
 divided the business of the courts with the eminent men who, 
 when he came to the bar, held all that was worth holding. 
 How great his share became, and how completely he won the 
 confidence of the business community, as well as that of his 
 professional brethren, may, in some measure, be discovered 
 by an examination of the reported decisions of the Supreme 
 Court of the State, of the Supreme Court of the United 
 States, and of the Circuit Court of the United States for this 
 district. His work appears in Binney's reports, in those of 
 Sergeant and Rawle, Rawle, Penrose and Watts, in Wash- 
 ington's Circuit Court reports, and in those of Cranch, 
 Wheaton, and Howard. His engagements in the local courts, 
 and in his office were correspondingly large. 
 
 He was favored by the privilege of conducting most of 
 his cases, and making most of his arguments in the Supreme 
 Court of the State before a Chief Justice who presided there 
 more than twenty years while he was in full practice, and for 
 whose abilities and personal character he had unbounded ven- 
 eration, and even affectionate regard. He knew also that he in 
 turn enjoyed the fullest confidence of that most excellent 
 magistrate. The advantage of such relations between an 
 advocate and the court he addresses can hardly be over- 
 estimated. In the Federal Circuit Court for this district, 
 where Judge Washington presided, about thirty years, and in 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 217 
 
 the Supreme Court of the United States under Chief Justice 
 Marshall he enjoyed similar advantages. 
 
 I do not propose to call your attention to any of the cases 
 in which he was engaged, though many of them were of much 
 interest. Grateful as the work would be, I have not time for 
 its performance. 
 
 In reference to his arguments, however, I make a single 
 remark. Some of them have been preserved by the reporters 
 in a condensed form. To estimate them justly they should be 
 compared with the condition of legal knowledge and legal 
 reasoning when they were made. And when thus compared, 
 many of them, I think, will be found to have been, in exact 
 exhibition of legal principles, and of the reasons upon which 
 those principles rest, much in advance of what was generally 
 known, and in advance even of what had been expressed in 
 judicial decision. 
 
 The war of 181 2 brought with it the usual fruits of war : 
 destruction to commerce, embarrassment to trade, rash specu- 
 lation, and consequent profit to the members of the bar. 
 Unhappily their direct interests are rarely injured by national 
 adversity. This, perhaps, is one of the "principal deductions 
 from the general popularity of the profession, and one of the 
 reasons why it receives more respect than love," without 
 fault of its own. Mr. Binney shared largely in that profit, 
 and the close of the war in 181 5 found him in possession of 
 all that the profession of law could give to its professor, 
 whether of reputation or emolument. The eminent leaders 
 of the bar, whom he encountered at his entrance into the pro- 
 fession, had, in a great degree, retired from active business, 
 and, soon after, most of them departed from life. The field 
 was clear, and, with the exception of Mr. Sergeant and Mr. 
 Chauncey, his constant friends, he was almost without a 
 rival. But this caused no relaxation of his energy. The 
 habits he had formed in college, his love of study for study's 
 sake, and his deep-seated convictions of duty to his clients, 
 with an ever-abiding sense of obligation to them, overcame all 
 tendency to inertness, if any ever approached him, and he 
 
2i8 Law Association Centennial 
 
 continued till the close of his professional life as heartily 
 devoted to it, and as mindful of its claims, as he was in the 
 first flush of his manhood. 
 
 He had one cardinal principle upon which he always 
 acted, and which he regarded as the secret of his success. It 
 was to attend to no calling but his profession, knowing that if 
 that were attended to, it would do all for his family and 
 enough for himself. He listened, no, not for a moment, to 
 any invitations (and many were given him), to speculate in 
 stocks, or in real estate, or to take part in any kind of 
 trade. He felt it impossible for him to do so without neglect- 
 ing the practice of the law, which if faithfully pursued he was 
 assured would be better than any, or all things else. Guided 
 by this principle he resisted calls to public life. Before he 
 was fifty years old, he had been twice offered a seat on the 
 bench of the Supreme Court of the State, and once, at least, 
 if not twice, he was tendered a commission to be a judge of 
 the Supreme Court of the United States. All these offers he 
 promptly declined. It was not because he did not value dis- 
 tinction, and not because he did not know his own superior 
 fitness for the posts offered, but he valued excellence above 
 place, and his chosen road to excellence was the path he had 
 marked out for himself at the commencement of his career. 
 
 Yet, though he would not suffer himself to be diverted 
 from entire devotion to his profession by office, or by seduc- 
 tive hope of gain in other directions, he did not decline calls 
 that he thought consistent with that devotion. In 1808, when 
 only twenty-eight years of age, he was chosen a director of 
 the first Bank of the United States. This appointment he 
 accepted, and he continued to act as a director and a trustee 
 very many years. It was in the service of the bank he 
 argued his first case in the Supreme Court of the United 
 States. The case was The Bank vs. Deveaux, et al., reported 
 in 5 Cranch, page 61. No one can read his argument, con- 
 densed as it is in tht report, without admiring its orderly 
 arrangement, its reach and its logical power. It was the 
 effort of a lawyer well trained and well furnished. 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 219 
 
 In 1827, Chief Justice Tilghman died. He had in 1806, 
 succeeded Chief Justice Shippen in the headship of the 
 Supreme Court of the State, and he remained its head during 
 the long period of twenty-one years. It was under his admin- 
 istration that the law of the State had grown into an orderly 
 and well adjusted system, that the common law of England 
 had been accommodated to the novel circumstances of our 
 people, that the land laws of the State had been reduced to 
 an intelligible code, that our mingled system of law and 
 equity had been developed, and that many of the most impor- 
 tant rules of property had been established. To the work of 
 educing such results he was admirably adapted by the struc- 
 ture of his mind and its high culture, by his wise and broad 
 common sense, by the comprehensiveness of his views, by his 
 conscientious devotion to his official duties, and by a purity 
 of character that never bore a spot. He was a man after 
 Mr. Binney's own heart. They were kindred spirits. Under 
 his administration of the law, Mr. Binney had grown into 
 all his greatness and fame, and he felt, as few could feel 
 how great a debt of gratitude the bar and the state owed to 
 the memory of the deceased magistrate. No wonder then, 
 that, when invited by the bar to pronounce an eulogium of 
 the Chief Justice, he poured out from a full heart, and from 
 the stores of an accurate and discriminating observation, the 
 remarkable discourse contained in the sixteenth volume of 
 Sergeant & Rawle's Reports. It was not the utterance of 
 respect and affection alone. The discourse exhibits a careful 
 analysis of intellect and character, a just appreciation of what 
 gave to the Chief Justice his power and his usefulness, and an 
 admiring estimate of his moral worth. It is a photograph of 
 that great and good man so life-like that it cannot deceive, so 
 deeply wrought that it cannot fade, and rendered doubly 
 attractive by the inimitable style in which it was executed. 
 
 About the year 1830, after severer exertions than were 
 usual, Mr. Binney's health began to be impaired, and he de- 
 sired to withdraw gradually from the courts, and throw off, 
 in considerable measure, the load of business with which he 
 
220 Law Association Centennial 
 
 was oppressed. It was this, in part, which made him wilHng 
 to accept a nomination for Congress. There were doubtless 
 other reasons that influenced him. Principal among these 
 was the hostility of President Jackson to the Bank of the 
 United States. His veto of the bill for its recharter in 1832, 
 aroused the deepest feeling of its friends, who then consti- 
 tuted most of the business community of this city. Mr. 
 Binney was one of the number, and his transcendent ability, 
 together with his well-known knowledge of the condition and 
 operations of the bank, pointed him out as the best man to 
 defend the institution in Congress. All eyes turned to him, 
 and his services were at once demanded. Believing as he 
 did in the great usefulness of the bank, and in its necessity 
 for the public welfare, he did not feel at liberty to decline the 
 call. He was elected, and he took his seat as a member of the 
 twenty-third Congress on the second of December, 1832. 
 That Congress was filled with distinguished men, many of 
 them long trained in the public service. Mr. Binney took 
 into it a great reputation, such as few lawyers ever brought 
 into Congressional life. Much was expected from him, and 
 all that was expected was realized. If he found any equal, 
 he found no superior. He never stooped to the arena of par- 
 tisan discussions, but in the consideration of important sub- 
 jects, especially that of the removal of the public deposits 
 from the Bank of the United States, he proved himself to be 
 a statesman of high rank, and a most accomplished debater. 
 Though but two years a member, he has left at Washington a 
 most enviable reputation. The old men who naturally recur 
 to olden times, speak of him as one of the giants of the past, 
 and worthy to be associated as a statesman and an orator with 
 the triumvirate that so long adorned the American name. 
 
 But public life was extremely distasteful to him. He 
 turned his back upon it with gladness. "Public reputation," 
 said he, "is generally empty, and oftentimes false, but the 
 respect and affection of one's own kindred and personal 
 friends, ah! that is delightful." Declining a re-election, he 
 returned to Philadelphia, and retired from all professional 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 221 
 
 practice in the courts. In the year 1836 he went to Europe 
 because of the ill health of a member of his family, and only 
 once thereafter did he ever appear in any court as an advocate 
 or a counsellor. He continued, however, to give opinions in 
 his office until 1850. Many of these opinions, written by him, 
 are still in the hands of members of the bar, and they are pre- 
 served with almost religious care. They relate to titles to 
 real estate, to trusts and uses, to commercial questions, and 
 to all questions in every department of the law, that are 
 most intricate and difficult of solution. They are model 
 exhibitions of profound and accurate knowledge, of extensive 
 research, of nice discrimination, and of wise conclusion. 
 They have been generally accepted, as of almost equal author- 
 ity with judicial decision, and not unfrequently, a claim set 
 up with confidence has been abandoned when it became 
 known Mr. Binney had given an opinion adverse to it. 
 
 In the year 1835 he was invited by the Select and Com- 
 mon Councils of the city, to deliver a discourse on the life and 
 character of Chief Justice Marshall. That distinguished 
 magistrate had shortly before gone down to his grave, full of 
 years and of honor, and had left behind him a nation of 
 mourners. He was appointed Chief Justice of the Supreme 
 Court of the United States, by President Adams, in January, 
 1801, and he continued to preside in that court during the 
 long period of thirty-four years. 
 
 Providence smiled upon our infant nation when he was 
 appointed. The Constitution was then an untried experi- 
 ment. It had no precedent. It remained to be interpreted, 
 and what principles of interpretation ought to be applied to it, 
 whether a strict or a liberal construction should be adopted, 
 or whether a more rational view should be taken of it, one 
 neither strict nor liberal, but consonant with the paramount 
 intent of those who framed it, and necessary to secure the 
 objects for which it was designed, remained to be determined. 
 It was quite possible to make a mistake, and mistake might 
 have brought early shipwreck to our institutions. Happily, 
 Chief Justice Marshall proved himself equal to the demands 
 
222 Law Association Centennial 
 
 of the time. Aided by associates, themselves able, but who 
 deferred much to his judgment, he laid down principles for 
 constitutional construction which have made our government 
 what it is; which have been accepted since his death without 
 question, and which have given stability and efficiency to the 
 Federal Union. With sufficient knowledge to meet the neces- 
 sities of his position, with powers of reasoning of the highest 
 order, with a comprehensiveness of view rarely equalled, and 
 with a patriotism that never faltered, he met the questions 
 presented, and did his great work. To use the words of Mr. 
 Binney, "He looked through the Constitution with the glance 
 of intuition. He had been with it at its creation, and had 
 been in communion with it from that hour. * * * Both 
 his judgment and affections bound him to it, as a government 
 supreme in its delegated powers, and supreme in the author- 
 ity to expound and enforce them, proceeding from the people, 
 designed for their welfare, possessing their confidence, repre- 
 senting their sovereignty, and no more to be restrained in the 
 spirit of jealousy within less than the fair dimensions of its 
 authority, than to be extended beyond them in the spirit of 
 usurpation. These were his constitutional principles, and he 
 interpreted the Constitution by their light." The life and 
 services of such a man were a theme worthy of Mr. Binney's 
 powers. How well he performed the duty assigned to him, 
 I need not say to the bar of this city who heard him, or who 
 have read his discourse. He performed it "con amore." He 
 knew the Chief Justice well. He accorded with him in his 
 principles, admired his private character, and reverenced his 
 judgments. In him he found powers and principles like his 
 own, and by his eulogy he spread, in clearest light, before 
 those who heard him, the qualities of mind and heart that 
 made the Chief Justice both great and good. He depicted in 
 unfading colors what the great magistrate had done, and held 
 him up to that age and to all future time as an immeasurable 
 benefactor to the country. 
 
 In 1844, by appointment of the City Councils, Mr. 
 Binney argued in the Supreme Court of the United States, 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 223 
 
 the case of Vidal et al. vs. Girard's executors (reported in 2 
 Howard, p. 127), in which was involved the vahdity of the 
 trust created by Mr. Girard's will for the establishment and 
 maintenance of a college for orphans. The case had been 
 argued at a previous term, by Mr. Sergeant, and it is said 
 that, discouraged by the apparent uncertainty remaining in 
 the minds of the judges, he asked for a re-argument. 
 Whether this was so, or not, a re-argument was ordered, and 
 Mr. Binney, though years before he had withdrawn from the 
 state courts, accepted the appointment of the City Councils, 
 and argued the case anew. Of his argument I have no space or 
 time to speak as it deserves. The remembrance of it lingers 
 around the court room until this day. It is in print, and it has 
 ever been the wonder and the admiration of the legal profes- 
 sion in this country, and almost equally of the profession in 
 Great Britain. It lifted the law of charities out of the depths 
 of obscurity and confusion that covered it before, and while 
 the fullness of its research and the strength of its reasoning 
 were masterly, it was clothed with a precision and beauty of 
 language never surpassed. No wonder it was successful. It 
 was a fitting close to a long and pre-eminent professional life. 
 Mr. Binney never afterwards appeared in court, though he 
 continued for some years to examine legal questions sub- 
 mitted to him, and to give written opinions. At length the 
 calls upon his attention became so numerous as to be oppres- 
 sive. The examinations they required were trying to his 
 eyes, which, after 1832, frequently suffered from inflamma- 
 tion. For these reasons, in 1850, he withdrew entirely from 
 all professional labor. Thus relieved, his eyes recovered their 
 strength, in good measure, and they continued to be of service 
 to him ever after. 
 
 But, with leaving the profession, he did not abandon his 
 habits of study. Released from the demands of a jealous 
 and laborious pursuit, he turned with new zest to what had 
 ever been to him a delight. He always had a vigorous appe- 
 tite for the best literature, especially for that which was moral 
 and religious, and this appetite increased as he grew older. 
 
224 Law Association Centennial 
 
 He was a good Spanish scholar, and proficient also in the 
 French language. Books in both French and Spanish he was 
 fond of reading, as also history, metaphysics, poetry (es- 
 pecially dramatic poetry), and theology. Of the latter 
 subject he was a close student. He was a firm believer in the 
 truths of divine revelation and an habitual reader of the 
 Bible. He carefully read also many of the most important 
 opinions of the Supreme Courts of the State and of the 
 United States, and some English decisions. He kept him- 
 self well informed of the current events of the day, and in 
 regard to all public questions that agitated the city, the state, 
 or the country, he not only sought information, but he ma- 
 tured settled opinions. To such employments he devoted 
 mainly his time and attention after his complete retirement 
 from professional life. Many years afterwards, when speak- 
 ing of this period of retiracy, he said : "his objects had been, 
 first, to keep himself from rusting out by such occupations 
 intellectual and bodily as would keep him in reasonable tune, 
 while the decays of age were gradually impairing the old 
 sounding board, second, to continue useful to his family, as 
 it was arriving at years of maturity, and would look for 
 settlement in the world, third, to be useful to the world, so 
 far as should be in his power, without becoming denatured, 
 by a public part in the various avocations, religious, literary, 
 social, political, philanthropical, national and municipal which 
 distinguished the times from those which preceded them, and, 
 fourth, to prepare for the final event, by availing himself of 
 all the means which God had graciously vouchsafed to him." 
 "Progress in this sense," he added, "is private, public, tem- 
 poral, eternal ;" "spreads undivided, operates unspent," "com- 
 prehends the performance of all duties in such measure as is 
 consistent with all, and ends in that perfect stature which all 
 should endeavor to obtain, though so few attain to it." 
 
 The activity of his mind remained undiminished until 
 his death. He was constantly occupied, though not always, 
 in the indulgence of his fondness for reading and study. 
 Occasionally he made a rich contribution to the enjoyment 
 
Frum I, Fain 
 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 225 
 
 and instruction of the public. In 1849, ^t ^ meeting of the 
 members of the bar, convened after the death of Mr. Chaun- 
 cey, and at a similar meeting in 1852, soon after the decease 
 of Mr. Sergeant, he gave utterance to his estimate of those 
 distinguished men, with remarkable analyzation of their 
 mental and moral characteristics, and in words all aglow with 
 the warmest friendship. The meeting in reference to Mr. 
 Sergeant's death was the last occasion of his distinctive asso- 
 ciation with his professional brethren. He never again ap- 
 peared at a bar assemblage. Once only afterwards (so far as 
 I have learned), did he allow himself to be prominent on an 
 entirely public occasion. It was on the twenty-second day of 
 February, i860, when in response to an invitation of the City 
 Councils, he read before those bodies assembled in joint 
 meeting, Washington's Farewell Address, In addition to 
 the members of the Councils, a few invited friends were 
 present. Mr. Binney, then eighty years of age, stood on the 
 platform in the Common Council chamber, and read the 
 entire address, with a firm voice, and with expressive 
 emphasis. When he had concluded, silence ensued in the 
 chamber, the audience evidently expecting some remarks 
 from him. He was much affected, and after pausing awhile 
 he said, "and thus closes the noblest compendium of fatherly 
 affection, patriotism and political wisdom the world has ever 
 seen. No words of mine are fit to stand beside it." In the 
 year 1852, at the one hundredth anniversary of The Phila- 
 delphia Contributionship for the Insurance of Houses from 
 Losses by Fire, he delivered an address on the history of fire 
 insurance, and upon the principles adopted by that associa- 
 tion. Like everything which came from him, the address 
 exhibited the completest understanding of his subject, great 
 felicity in its mode of presentation, and a vigor and beauty of 
 expression unsurpassable. It is read with pleasure and with 
 profit even now. In the following year he published a valu- 
 able and suggestive article on the naturalization laws. In 
 1858 he gave to the public a sketch of the life and character 
 of Bushrod Washington, a Judge of the Supreme Court of 
 IS 
 
226 Law Association Centennial 
 
 the United States, who for many years presided in this circuit 
 with great honor to himself, and usefulness to the country. 
 In his court, Mr. Binney had very constantly appeared, in the 
 conduct of most important causes, and there had grown up 
 between the Judge and the lawyer mutual regard, and even 
 affectionate admiration. These feelings and sentiments found 
 unrestrained expression in the sketch, and therein also, he 
 delineated, with his wonted acuteness, the qualities which 
 make up a perfect nisi prius judge, nowhere else better, if as 
 well, described. 
 
 In the same year (1858) he published those exquisite 
 descriptions of three leaders of the old bar of Philadelphia, 
 which are still read in this community with intense interest, 
 though the men described belonged to a generation long gone 
 past. The freedom of the writer from all envy or jealousy; 
 the generous appreciation and acknowledgment of true and 
 varied excellence; the searching analysis of intellect and 
 character, and the graceful presentation of each subject's indi- 
 viduality which the descriptions exhibit, have compelled ad- 
 miration alike in this country and in England, where they 
 were reviewed by Sir John Coleridge, with expression of 
 warm admiration alike of the sketches, and of the author. 
 
 In 1858, also, he gave to the press a more extended dis- 
 cussion, entitled "An inquiry into the formation of Washing- 
 ton's farewell address," which is not only curious and 
 interesting, but strikingly illustrative of the character of his 
 mind, and of his habits of thorough investigation, and of 
 reasoning. It is mainly a treatment of evidence, coupled with 
 a description of conflicting probabilities. From it one who 
 never knew him in the exercise of his profession, may learn 
 how careful and minute was his search after facts, how 
 calmly and wisely he arranged every fact discovered in its 
 proper relation to all others, giving to each its due weight, 
 how inevitably his deductions seemed to flow from his prem- 
 ises, and how precise and perspicuous was the language he 
 employed. No one, I think, can rise from its perusal with- 
 out a thorough conviction that its conclusions are absolutely 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 227 
 
 correct, and that the opinions that prevailed before its publi- 
 cation were, all of them, more or less erroneous. 
 
 One other product of his thoughts he gave to the public. 
 During the progress of the civil war, the President of the 
 United States, under the presstire of what seemed a real 
 necessity, suspended the privilege of the writ of habeas 
 corpus, without any authority given by Congress, claiming 
 that by the Constitution, and from the nature of his executive 
 office he was invested with the power to suspend the privi- 
 lege, in cases of rebellion or invasion. As might have been 
 expected, his act immediately called forth much unfavorable 
 criticism, and his power to do what he did, in the absence of 
 Congressional authority, was in many quarters strenuously 
 denied — in all quarters, perhaps, at least doubted. It was 
 then (in 1862) that Mr. Binney turned to the consideration 
 of the subject, and gave to the public an argument in support 
 of the power claimed by the President, not less remarkable 
 than the best of his earlier efforts. This is not a proper 
 occasion to pronounce judgment upon the correctness of his 
 conclusions. Of the argument itself, however, I may speak. It 
 was thoroughly original, and it was constructed with a force 
 and elegance that won admiration, even where it did not 
 command assent. It is contained in three pamphlets pub- 
 lished successively in 1862, and 1863. They will never cease 
 to be regarded as models of acute reasoning applied to con- 
 stitutional law. 
 
 To such labors and employments Mr. Binney devoted the 
 later years of his life. They were happy years, crowned with 
 habitual cheerfulness, though not unmingled with sorrow. 
 In 1865 Mrs. Binney, his companion through all his early 
 struggles at the bar, and through the period of his highest 
 success, was removed by death. And in 1870 he suffered 
 another severe affliction in the death of his oldest son, Horace 
 Binney, Jr. That son was himself pre-eminent in mental and 
 moral culture, in soundness of judgment, in refinement of 
 taste, in goodness of heart, in true piety, and in all that adorns 
 and ennobles human nature. The father and the son were 
 
228 Law Association Centennial 
 
 companions to each other, kindred in spirit as well as in blood. 
 Their mutual confidence was perfect, and consequently their 
 intercourse with each other was a source of intense happiness 
 to both. This was but a natural result of the attention the 
 father had given to the son's training. During the four years 
 the latter was in college, the closest intimacy was kept up 
 between them by a weekly, and at times, a semi-weekly cor- 
 respondence, in which the father encouraged the son to 
 perfect confidence in him, and in return gave the benefit of his 
 counsel with a loving interest. The correspondence was 
 never permitted to flag, though Mr. Binney was then at the 
 height of his professional practice, bearing a heavy pressure 
 of business both in and out of court, and superintending a 
 large class of law students, whose examinations he always 
 conducted with regularity and strictness. It was guided by 
 his advice, and in the light of his example and character that 
 the son grew into full manhood, and in the later years of his 
 life the relations between him and his father became more 
 than filial and paternal. They were almost fraternal. The 
 father leaned upon the son, reposed full confidence in him, 
 regarded him as his strongest earthly prop, and looked to him 
 as the one to fill his place after his own last summons should 
 come. How great the sorrow which the son's unlocked for 
 removal, in the fullness of his usefulness, and of the high 
 estimation in which he was held by the community, must have 
 brought to the father's heart cannot be told. Mr. Binney was 
 then more than ninety years old. The shock of such a 
 bereavement might well have been fatal. But the blow did 
 not crush him. He felt it most keenly, but with submission 
 to the will of Divine Providence, he resolutely addressed 
 himself to the new and unexpected duties cast upon him. 
 These having been performed, with his attention more and 
 more turned toward the final event that awaited him, and 
 with a cheerfulness of disposition that knew no abatement, he 
 continued to live in the midst of his books and his thoughts, 
 the delight of his family, and the charm of all those who 
 enjoyed intercourse with him until the twelfth day of August, 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 229 
 
 1875, when he peacefully passed from this life into a world 
 where his splendid intellectual powers will forever expand, 
 and where his moral excellence will never cease to grow. 
 
 His death occurred forty years after the age when most 
 men are at the zenith of their reputation ; forty years after he 
 had substantially withdrawn from public view and from 
 active participation in all matters that attract general notice, 
 and at the end of a period when public recollection of most 
 lawyers has faded into indistinctness, yet it would be diffi- 
 cult to mention a death that caused a sensation more wide 
 spread and profound than his. Not alone in this city, or in 
 this State was it felt that a great luminary had been extin- 
 guished, but the legal profession of the whole country ac- 
 knowledged the bereavement, and many unprofessionals 
 hastened to declare their loss. 
 
 I have thus given an outline of the life and labors of 
 this remarkable man. In looking over it I see there is much 
 that ought to be filled in, and some things that deserve par- 
 ticular notice. 
 
 He was a most accomplished lawyer. This, perhaps, 
 might have been expected from his mental endowments, and 
 from the habits of study that he acquired in early life. But 
 he surpassed expectation. I know of no language which so 
 aptly describes him as that which he applied to Mr. Edward 
 Tilghman, the friend of his youth : "He was an advocate of 
 great power ; a master of every question in his causes ; a wary 
 tactician in the management of them ; highly accomplished in 
 language ; a faultless logician ; a man of the purest integrity 
 and the brightest honor; fluent without the least volubility; 
 concise to a degree that left every one's patience and atten- 
 tion unimpaired, and perspicuous to almost the lowest order of 
 understanding, while he was dealing with almost the highest 
 topics." 
 
 He had great advantages, none of which were neglected. 
 Besides the opportunities his collegiate course afforded him, 
 and which he improved to the uttermost, besides the art and 
 habit of study he early acquired, he had examples of excel- 
 
230 Law Association Centennial 
 
 lence before him which it was not in his nature to disregard. 
 He was trained to be a legal tactician by his constant attend- 
 ance in the courts before he was called to assume the manage- 
 ment of causes. He thought logically and spoke and wrote 
 the purest of English before he came to the bar. He had a 
 fine commanding person, an uncommonly handsome face, a 
 dignified and graceful manner of address, and a most melo- 
 dious voice, perfectly under his control, and modulated with 
 unusual skill. He was constitutionally an earnest man, yet 
 while earnest, he had a calm, self-possession, the fruit of 
 consciousness that he fully understood his subject, and of 
 confidence that he could make others understand it, and he 
 entered upon the trial of his causes with a sure conviction, 
 confirmed by his previous study, that he was advocating the 
 right. No unjust or dishonest case would he willingly under- 
 take, and he was able to say after his career at the bar had 
 closed, that "he had never knowingly committed an injustice 
 toward a client, or the opposite party, or prosecuted a cause 
 that he thought a dishonest one, and that he had washed his 
 hands of more than one that he had discovered to be such 
 after he had undertaken it, as well as declined many which 
 he perceived to be such when first presented to him." Add to 
 this the power of a mind equal to the comprehension of any 
 legal subject; a mode of presentation the best possible; a 
 rhetoric that was faultless; an aptness of illustration that 
 illuminated the most abstruse matters; a personal character 
 without a visible flaw, and it is easy to see he must have been, 
 as he was, a most persuasive and convincing advocate. 
 
 He won the confidence of courts and juries by his entire 
 freedom from trick, or any of the low arts of cunning. He 
 disdained to practice any stratagem or artifice for the purpose 
 of obtaining an advantage over an adversary. His nature 
 was true, and his life was truth unfolded. He was always 
 candid, giving full consideration to whatever made against 
 him. He appealed to no prejudices, but rather boldly met, 
 and endeavored to dissipate them. He was ever courteous in 
 his demeanor towards the court, and towards his opponents. 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 231 
 
 Thus every element of power, in mind, in culture, in habit, in 
 physical endowment, in taste, in demeanor, and in character, 
 was his. All united in giving to his forensic efforts an effi- 
 ciency, and a success inferior to those of no other. Our 
 brethren that remain, who saw him at the bar, speak of him 
 as ever maintaining a dignified decorum, and a manner not 
 reserved or cold (though perhaps apparently such at times), 
 but genial and good humored toward his professional breth- 
 ren, and respectful to the bench. They speak of him as above 
 the suspicion of rhetorical arts, or partisan strategy. They 
 say his appeals were to the judgment rather than to the pas- 
 sions ; that his action was graceful ; that he never sought to 
 make a display of oratory though he was always eloquent in 
 thought, and winning in diction. He was never heard with- 
 out instruction, never without pleasure. 
 
 He had some other characteristics that deserve special 
 mention. In everything he undertook he was thorough to 
 the highest degree. Thoroughness was a habit of his life. 
 He brought it to all his investigations, and he regarded it as 
 a duty never to be slighted. In his view it was criminal to 
 neglect the fullest possible preparation for the trial of every 
 cause commmitted to his care, or for any opinion he was 
 called upon to give. One of his maxims, often commended 
 to others, and always acted upon by himself was "Work up 
 to power." Whatever came from him was, therefore, the best 
 he could produce, and those who followed him rarely found 
 any thing that had escaped his notice, or his thought. What 
 he did not make use of was, in his judgment, of no impor- 
 tance, and therefore entitled to no consideration. It was not 
 unnoticed because unknown. And it was never safe to treat 
 as of little worth any position he took. His mind at once 
 seized all the facts and the principles applicable to them, and 
 discarded all that, after careful thought, he deemed imma- 
 terial, or inapposite. He was never surprised by any thing 
 against which the extremest vigilance could guard. Hence 
 nothing immature, nothing unfinished ever came from him in 
 argument, or in essay. Nor was he thorough only in his pro- 
 
^32 Law Association Centennial 
 
 fession. He carried the habit into his general reading, both 
 hterary and scientific. Whatever he knew, he knew through- 
 out. No chamber of it, however remote, escaped his explor- 
 ation. He gathered from every book he read all the thoughts 
 worthy of being preserved, and made them subjects for his 
 own reflection, recurring to them from time to time for 
 renewed consideration. 
 
 His reading was so extensive that he made constant use 
 of help to return to passages which had most interested him. 
 He was therefore a great admirer of a good index. I say 
 index, not digest. His estimate of such an index was ex- 
 pressed in a letter to a friend, written when he had passed 
 his eighty-sixth year, wherein he said : "I must say in refer- 
 ence to indexes generally, that I have come to regard a good 
 book as curtailed of half its value, if it has not a pretty full 
 index. It is almost impossible without such a guide, to 
 reproduce on demand the most striking thoughts or facts 
 the book may contain, whether for citation, or further con- 
 sideration. If I had my own way in the modification of the 
 copyright law, I think I would make the duration of the privi- 
 lege depend materially on its having such a directory. One 
 may recollect generally that certain thoughts or facts are to be 
 found in a certain book ; but without a good index such recol- 
 lection may be hardly more available than that of the cabin 
 boy, who knew where the ship's tea kettle was, because he 
 saw it fall overboard. In truth a very large part of every 
 man's good reading falls overboard, and unless he has good 
 indexes, he will never find it. I have three books," said he, 
 "in my library which I value more than any other three, 
 except the very books of which they are a verbal index; 
 Cruden's Concordance of the Bible, Mrs. Cowden Qark's 
 Concordance of Shakespeare, and Prendergast's Concordance 
 of Milton." The estimate of good indexes thus expressed 
 illustrates how earnest was his search for truth and knowl- 
 edge, and how reluctantly he let go any of his acquisitions. 
 
 Mr. Binney's thoroughness was accompanied by strictly 
 methodical habits. He had a place for ever}d;hing and every- 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 233 
 
 thing had its place. The arrangement of his briefs, of his 
 papers and books, and equally of his stores of knowledge and 
 thought was perfectly systematic. It was this that enabled 
 him ever to produce on call, the facts of which he had ac- 
 quired knowledge, and the thoughts he had matured, together 
 with the illustrations needed, and to fortify what he produced 
 by apt quotation of authorities. 
 
 Of his judgment, I find it difficult to speak in fitting 
 terms. It seemed to be intuitive, yet its conclusions were 
 cautious deductions of sound reason from a most compre- 
 hensive and accurate view of the facts, alike in detail, and as a 
 whole, and from a wise selection of the principles properly 
 applicable to the state of the facts as he found them. He 
 brought to every subject submitted to him the calmest con- 
 sideration, unbiased by prejudice or pre-conceived opinions, 
 and he gave true weight to whatever bore upon it. Hence 
 the decisions of his judgment were never narrow, and almost 
 never wrong. He was a most wise and safe counsellor at the 
 bar, and in every circle where his counsel was sought. 
 
 He was a man of great moral courage. When he had 
 matured his convictions of the right, he was not to be driven 
 from their avowal by any fear of consequences. He was a 
 resolute and fearless supporter of law and order in the com- 
 munity. When the Kensington riots threatened to uproot 
 the foundations of society in the northern part of the city; 
 when the law was temporarily 'overthrown, and its officers 
 were powerless to resist the outbreak; when "men's hearts 
 failed them for fear," and many thought only of submission 
 or compromise, he stood firm. He bent not before the storm. 
 It was he more than any other who inspired confidence. It 
 was he that restored courage to many who were faint-hearted ; 
 that gathered around him the virtue and intelligence of the 
 city, and led in bringing back the supremacy of the law. And 
 when, in later years the foundations of our government 
 seemed crumbling away ; when civil war threatened the sub- 
 version of our cherished institutions; when attachment to 
 party, with very many, prevailed over love of country, Mr. 
 
234 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Binney, an old man of more than four-score, stepped for- 
 ward, and placed all his influence and the weight of his great 
 name in the scale of a tottering government. Nor was there 
 ever an occasion when high moral courage was demanded, 
 when the city was in trouble and needed a leader and adviser, 
 that he was called upon and failed efficiently to respond. He 
 was often resorted to in seasons of perplexity, and never was 
 application made in vain. Even when not consulted, the 
 friends of good order, and of the right were encouraged by 
 the fact, of which they needed no other evidence than his 
 life, that he would always be found on the side of the just, 
 the orderly, and the true. 
 
 Though he was not long in official life, he gave the 
 fullest proofs that he was both a patriot, and a statesman 
 of high order. The evidence is to be found in the opinions he 
 expressed in Congress, and in those which from time to time 
 he gave to the public while he was in private life. He under- 
 stood thoroughly the organization and action of both the 
 State and General Governments, and he was familiar with 
 the whole science of constitutional law. He was in the main 
 a conservative, though not averse to healthy progress. Ac- 
 cording to the division of parties existing soon after the adop- 
 tion of the Federal constitution, he was ranked as a Fed- 
 eralist. He adopted the views of the constitution held by 
 Washington, Hamilton and Marshall. To these he adhered 
 during his life, and he made no secret of them when they 
 became unpopular. On the fourteenth of January, 1872, 
 when writing to a friend, he said : "You know I am the resid- 
 uary legatee of Washington Federalism. I am not, however, 
 without a great many younger men who are haeredes instituti, 
 though post nati." But, though a conservative, he approved 
 of changes that he thought improvements. He did not think 
 all changes progress, though he recognized that progress 
 means change. He conceded that the advance of civilization 
 demanded a change of laws in many particulars, and of 
 organic law in some. Still he was not a friend to any changes 
 hastily made; changes that might bring evils in their train 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 235 
 
 not less than those they were intended to cure. Not lacking 
 confidence in the masses of the people, he yet thought it a 
 great mistake to subject the judiciary to dependence on a 
 popular vote. With a high estimate of its importance to the 
 stability of our institutions, and to the correct administration 
 of law between man and man, he deprecated every scheme 
 that threatened diminution to its independence, and tended to 
 drag it down into the mire of party politics. He favored the 
 consolidation of the City of Philadelphia, as tending, in his 
 judgment, to the promotion of good order, and to the general 
 reform of subsisting abuses, and he lent his influence to send 
 to the Legislature the men of "experience in civil affairs, of 
 general knowledge, talents, integrity, moral courage and con- 
 scientiousness" through whose agency consolidation was 
 effected. 
 
 Immersed as he was all his life in a flood of occupations, 
 and unwilling, while he was engaged in the practice of the 
 law, to be diverted from it by any hope of gain to himself, he 
 felt a deep interest in many institutions cherished by the com- 
 munity, and in many of our noblest charities. He was one 
 of the originators of the Academy of the Fine Arts, and with 
 forty other members of the bar he signed the articles of 
 association. William Lewis and Judge Tilghman were also 
 among the signers. Mr. Binney was the youngest. He was 
 present at the first meeting in the Hall of Independence, to 
 choose officers, and to launch the constitution of the society, 
 and there he made an address. He was early connected with 
 the Horticultural Society, and he was a member of the 
 Franklin Institute and of the American Philosophical Society. 
 He presided many years over the Apprentices' Library Com- 
 pany. He was long a director of the Pennsylvania Institu- 
 tion for the Deaf and Dumb, and he was a contributor to the 
 House of Refuge. He felt great interest in savings institu- 
 tions, and in all agencies adapted to promote the thrift and 
 comfort of persons in humble life, and he was associated with 
 other public charities. He was also deeply interested in the 
 benevolent institutions of the Church, to which he belonged, 
 
236 Law Association Centennial 
 
 giving to them much of his time, his matured wisdom, and 
 his pecuniary support. The most delicate, refined, and unos- 
 tentatious charities seemed most to enlist his sympathies. He 
 was a member of the corporation for the relief of the widows 
 and children of clergymen in the communion of the Protest- 
 ant Episcopal Church from 1831, until his death, and much 
 of the time its President. To it, and to all other associations 
 with which he suffered himself to be connected, he gave niuch 
 more than his name. He gave his sound judgment, his wise 
 counsels, and, whenever needed, his labor and his money. 
 Their records are full of the evidences of his efficient services, 
 and the touching minutes adopted by them after his decease, 
 attest the value of his co-operation, and the strong hold he 
 had upon the reverence and affection of his associates. 
 
 Mr. Binney's friendships were warm, and they were 
 lasting. No envy or jealousy interfered to disturb their 
 harmony. If ever broken, it was because his confidence was 
 necessarily withdrawn. His addresses after the death of Mr. 
 Chauncey, and Mr. Sergeant bear witness to the intensity 
 of his affection for these friends, though more than all 
 others, they had been his rivals, and often opposed to him in 
 the strife of the bar. In the last year of his life he said in a 
 letter to a life-long friend, "my wishes for your happiness are 
 as constant as the return of my days." The tenderness of 
 his love for children was remarkable, and it was often demon- 
 strated. His affections never ceased to flow in warm cur- 
 rents towards the descendants of the friends of his youth, and 
 he found some of his choicest pleasures in contributing to 
 their happiness. His letters abound in outgushing sympathy 
 with the joys and sorrows of the young, as well as with those 
 of his older friends. 
 
 Of the light he was in his own dwelling, of the wealth 
 of affection he exhibited there, and of his devotion to the 
 happiness and to the mental and moral culture of his chil- 
 dren, I will not speak. 
 
 He was an admirable conversationalist and correspond- 
 ent. His mind and his memory were so full of the richest 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 237 
 
 thoughts that they overflowed into his conversation and into 
 his letters of friendship, and his power of expression was so 
 ready and so chaste, his pleasantry was so genial, and his 
 moral sentiments were so pure, that those who enjoyed corre- 
 spondence with him will ever preserve his letters among their 
 treasures. 
 
 It would be interesting to speak of the stores of observa- 
 tion gathered into his memory during his long life, and ready 
 for his recall. He lived more than ninety-five years and a 
 half, longer than any celebrated lawyer of whom I have 
 knowledge, either in this country, in Great Britain, or on the 
 continent of Europe. He lived with unimpaired mental 
 faculties, and generally in the enjoyment of good health, pre- 
 served and confirmed by temperate habits and regular bodily 
 exercise. His adult life extended over the first three quar- 
 ters of the present century, a period of advance, not of retro- 
 gradation. In it the world saw most remarkable changes. 
 Empires rose and fell. Many new kingdoms and govern- 
 ments were established. Constitutional law made wonderful 
 advances, and municipal law was accommodated to an altered 
 condition of human afifairs. The mechanical arts made un- 
 precedented progress. New powers and agencies were dis- 
 covered, more potent than any before known, and applied to 
 daily use. Religious toleration advanced to be an accepted 
 doctrine, and popular education came to be regarded as of 
 inestimable importance. Society in very many particulars, 
 was revolutionized, and civilization achieved greater tri- 
 umphs than in any former equal period of the world's 
 history. Of all these changes Mr. Binney was an attentive 
 observer. It was not in his nature to be indifferent to them. 
 He not only noticed the progressive changes, but he must 
 have considered their causes, and their probable consequences. 
 He was himself a link that connected the men of the revolu- 
 tion with the present generation. What an ocean of thought 
 the events and changes of his life-time spread out before his 
 declining years! And how suggestive the memories must 
 have been. But I may not pursue this speculation. 
 
 One other and the crowning glory of his life and char- 
 
238 Law Association Centennial 
 
 acter remains to be mentioned. He was an earnest Christian. 
 I have already said he was a close student of Theology, a 
 firm believer in the truths of Divine Revelation and an 
 habitual reader of the Bible. His confidence in the Divine 
 inspiration of the Bible began in his youth, and gathered 
 strength with his increasing knowledge of what it contains. 
 He was a consistent member of the Protestant Episcopal 
 Church, and he carefully trained his children to the reverence 
 and love he had for its liturgy. For many years he was a 
 leading member of Episcopal Conventions, and he made 
 himself greatly useful in them. He was more than a Church 
 member and a Church officer. He carried his religion into 
 his daily life. It was a controlling power in his business, in 
 the formation of his judgments, and in his intercourse with 
 others. It was the basis of his fidelity to his clients, and of 
 his unwillingness to do injustice to opponents. It led to the 
 courtesy of his demeanor, and to his habitual candor. It 
 contributed also to his personal enjoyments. He found great 
 satisfaction in the study of religious books, especially those 
 relating to doctrinal theology. "He loved to bring his reason 
 to the support of his faith and he delighted in the most cogent 
 arguments in support of Christianity." His mind was at all 
 times a reverent one. He discountenanced, systematically, in 
 his household, all conversation and every allusion that looked 
 like irreverence on sacred subjects. More than once he 
 brought the fine powers of his mind to the elucidation of 
 Gospel narrative, and on one occasion he charmed his family 
 and near friends by an essay written in his leisure moments, 
 in support of his own view of a much debated religious ques- 
 tion. There dwelt within him habitually a serious conviction 
 of personal responsibility, that led to a high estimate of the 
 value of time, and he was rigid in his self-examination. At 
 one time, near the close of his life, when speaking of his 
 debility, he said, "but I do not think that I have gone back, 
 and I am very thankful for it, because a single step backward 
 would, I think, have finished my sum and it must have been 
 shown as it stood on the slate, right or wrong, to the Great 
 
Strong's Eulogy of Binney 239 
 
 Master. I hope that what is wrong in the sum may prove to 
 be written on slate, that Mercy may pass her soft and gentle 
 hand over it. But there is something which no touch will 
 remove, because it is not there — ^the good i have not 
 
 DONE." 
 
 His faith was a support and consolation to him in the 
 times of his great sorrow. It gave him infinite comfort when 
 his son Horace was removed by death. Indeed the strongest 
 bond of union between the father and the son was, at all 
 times, the assurance they felt of their common confidence and 
 trust in the Triune God, and that trust was the father's 
 anchor when the waves of sorrow went over him. It never 
 failed him. His last days were illumined by a calm reliance 
 upon his Redeemer, and by a perfect willingness to meet the 
 final summons whenever it might come. Doubtless he was 
 found watching. The books which he read and actually 
 studied during the months of June and July immediately 
 preceding his death were "The Philosophy of Natural Theol- 
 ogy," an Oxford Prize Essay, written by the Rev. William 
 Jackson, in confutation of the scepticism of the present day, 
 and "The Unseen Universe," or "physical speculations on a 
 future state," both of them works of deep-toned piety, as well 
 as of great research. They cannot be read without close 
 attention, and intense thought. 
 
 I feel that I ought not to detain you longer, though very 
 much of great interest remains unsaid, After all, Mr. Bin- 
 ney's powers and character are best illustrated by his life. 
 That was singularly consistent and complete. It is safe to 
 say that rarely if ever, has a man lived who had fewer appar- 
 ent defects. From whatever point of human view he was 
 observed, no flaw or imperfection was visible. In every 
 aspect, he was symmetrical, with no faculty undeveloped or 
 distorted, with not even an excellence overgrown at the 
 expense of any other — throughout both great and good. 
 
 Such was Mr. Binney. So during three generations he 
 stood erect and conspicuous among his brethren of the bar, 
 and in this community, a light and an ornament — a strong 
 tower and a ground of trust — a leader and a guide. 
 
A MEMOIR 
 
 of 
 
 WILLIAM RAWLE, LL.D. 
 
 by 
 
 T. I. WHARTON 
 
 WITH A LETTER FROM 
 
 PETER STEPHEN DV PONCEAU 
 
 To the Author, containing his recollections of Mr. Rawle's 
 life and character. 
 
 The ancestors of William Rawle came from the county 
 of Cornwall in England. 
 
 A manuscript found among his papers contains some ac- 
 count of his progenitors, and some recollections of his own 
 times, which he appears to have written in the year 1824, 
 
 The following Memoir was prepared at the request of the Council of the 
 Pennsylvania Historical Society, and was read at a meeting held on the 22d 
 day of February, 1837. 
 
 I am abundantly sensible of its deficiencies and defects both in sub- 
 stance and manner, and have only to state, in apology, that it was hastily 
 prepared in the scanty intervals of leisure, which the cares and duties of my 
 profession allowed. I should hesitate much about allowing it to go to the 
 press, if it were not for the circumstance of its having been the means of 
 awakening the delightful recollections of my venerable friend, Mr. du Ponceau, 
 which he has favored me with, and which I am authorized to give to the 
 public in company with my own memoir. 
 
 T. I. W. 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 241 
 
 at the suggestion of Mr. Watson, the author of the Annals 
 of Philadelphia; but, unfortunately, the design was soon 
 abandoned, and a few pages of detached memoranda alone 
 remain. From this and other sources the facts contained 
 in the following memoir have been derived. 
 
 Francis Rawle, the first of the race who came to 
 America, arrived at Philadelphia in the ship Desire, from 
 Plymouth, on the 23rd of June, 1686, accompanied by his son 
 Francis, and bringing with him five "servants," (so called 
 in a document of the time,) who, I presume, were agricul- 
 tural laborers. He died on the 23rd of December, 1697. 
 
 Of his only son Francis, the second, I find the following 
 account in the MS., of which I have spoken. "He was a 
 man of education, though I believe of moderate property. 
 He married the daughter of Robert Turner, a wealthy linen 
 draper from Dublin, who took up the whole lot from Second 
 Street to the Delaware, between Arch Street and McComb's 
 Alley. * * * William Penn had that confidence in 
 Robert Turner, that he sent him from England a blank com- 
 mission for the office of Register General for the probate of 
 Wills, etc., with power, if he did not choose to exercise the 
 office himself, to fill the blank with any other name he 
 pleased. * * * Robert Turner accepted the office, and 
 appointed his son-in-law his deputy. Francis Rawle pub- 
 lished a book which, as far as I know, was the first original 
 treatise on any general subject that appeared in this province. 
 Religious and political controversy had before this time, 
 alone appeared from the press. The title of this work (I 
 have unfortunately lost the book itself) was, I believe, 
 "Ways and means for the inhabitants on the Delaware to 
 become rich." One day at Dr. Franklin's table at Passy, 
 he asked me if I had a copy of the work; observing that it 
 was the first book that he had ever printed. The greatness 
 of Franklin's mind did not disdain to refer to his early occu- 
 pations, in the presence of some men of the first rank of that 
 country with whom his table was crowded. 
 
 16 
 
242 Law Association Centennial 
 
 To this account of Francis Rawle it may be added that 
 he was elected a member of assembly for the city of Phila- 
 delphia, in the years 1707, 1708 and 17 10, and again in 1724, 
 1725 and 1726. It appears, from the journals, that he took 
 an active part in the business of the house, and was fre- 
 quently at the head of the most important committees. He 
 died on the sth of January,^ 1727. I have before me a letter 
 from Thomas Chalkley, an eminent minister among the So- 
 ciety of Friends, addressed to his son William Rawle, dated 
 "Frankfort J 6th of the ist mo.^ 1726," in answer to a letter 
 communicating the information of his father's death, in 
 which he bears the strongest testimony to the worth of his 
 friend, in the expressive simplicity of the good old English. 
 "The loss of so good and valuable a neighbor," he writes, 
 "causes our hearts to affect our eyes. I never was in his 
 company but I learned something instructing of him, and 
 was always the better for it. So that I lament my single 
 loss of him as well as the general one. The Almighty 
 Lord sanctify such a great loss to your family (I humbly 
 pray) and bless you his children." 
 
 Martha, the wife of Francis Rawle, survived him eight- 
 een years; dying on the i8th day of July, 1745. They had a 
 numerous family, of whom six sons and four daughters sur- 
 vived her. 
 
 William, the third son of Francis and Martha Rawle, 
 was the grandfather of our late President. He married on 
 the 29th of August, 1728, Margaret, daughter of Henry 
 Hodge, of Philadelphia, merchant, who died shortly after 
 the birth of their only child. He was a man of parts and 
 education. His library was extensive for those days, espe- 
 cially in classical literature. Many of his Greek and Latin 
 books were in the possession of his grandson. He died on 
 the 1 6th of December, 1741. 
 
 Francis, the only child of William Rawle, was bom on 
 the loth of July, 1729. He received a liberal education, 
 
 sth of March, 1727 (N. S.) 
 
 O. S. The year was 1727. Frankfort is Frankford, Philadelphia. 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 243 
 
 possessed a robust and active mind, and is said to have been 
 a person of very attractive manners and conversation. He 
 was a contributor to a literary journal of the time, as I gather 
 from some MSS. in my possession. I have also a consider- 
 able number of letters written by him in a very easy and 
 agreeable manner. In the year 1755 he sailed from Phila- 
 delphia for Europe, and arrived at Cork after a short but 
 rough passage. 
 
 Shortly after his return home, Francis Rawle was mar- 
 ried to Rebecca, daughter of Edward Warner. * * * 
 
 Francis Rawle died at the early age of 32, on the 7th of 
 June, 1 76 1, in consequence of a wound received from the 
 accidental discharge of his fowling piece, while shooting on 
 his grounds near the city. He was carried into his own 
 house; and a surgical operation having been performed, he 
 appeared to have a fair prospect of recovery, but a lockjaw 
 took place and he died after a week's confinement. 
 
 William Rawle, his only son, the subject of this memoir, 
 was bom on the 28th of April, 1759. He was, therefore, 
 little more than two years old at the time of his father's 
 death. On a manuscript in his father's handwriting, I find 
 the following endorsement by him: "I believe that the 
 within was the composition of my revered father. It never 
 was my lot risu cognoscere patrem. I was too young to 
 recognize him by anything." 
 
 He was left, however, under the care of a mother, who 
 with an intellect of no common strength and cultivation 
 possessed every virtue that befits and adorns a Christian 
 woman; and whose tenderness and solicitude for her 
 offspring, swelled beyond the ordinary stream of maternal 
 love. Subjected to early and continued trials and adver- 
 sities; deprived of husband and children; exiled during the 
 war of the revolution, and plundered of property ; this excel- 
 lent woman displayed a fortitude and energy of character, 
 
244 Law Association Centennial 
 
 which contrasted remarkably with her serene and gentle dis- 
 position. She survived to an advanced life; but the progress 
 of years and infirmities made no impression on her warm and 
 kindly heart. Her attachment to her children and tfieir 
 descendants, was repaid by all that affection and duty could 
 offer. In her son, William Rawle, she found ample solace 
 for her cares and calamities. A more affectionate and 
 devoted son never existed. His letters to her during all 
 periods of his life, and his private diaries give constant 
 proofs how deeply the sentiment of filial love was implanted 
 in his heart, and remind one of those better days, in which 
 reverence for parents was felt to be a duty next to that which 
 belongs to the great Father of all. 
 
 At the period of the commencement of hostilities 
 between Great Britain and her colonies, Mr. Rawle was 
 about the age of seventeen years, and, I presume, was yet a 
 student at the Friends' Academy in Fourth Street, where he 
 received his collegiate education. His immediate relations 
 and connections were all adherents of the royal government. 
 His step-father, Mr. Shoemaker, one of the old school of 
 gentlemen, a man of extensive reading and cultivated taste, 
 held the ofifice of mayor of Philadelphia during the period 
 that it was under the control of the British army. When it 
 was resolved to evacuate this city, it became necessary for 
 Mr. Shoemaker to retire to New York. In conformity with 
 the wishes of his mother, and from his own personal attach- 
 ment to Mr. Shoemaker, whom he always regarded with 
 filial affection and respect, Mr. Rawle accompanied him to 
 New York in the month of June, 1778. 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 245 
 
 In New York Mr. Rawle commenced the study of the 
 law, under the direction of Mr. Kempe, who, I beheve, had 
 held the office of attorney general, and of whom he thus 
 speaks in one of his letters. "I have begun to read law with 
 Mr. Kempe — a man whom I admire more and more every 
 day. Understanding, learning, generosity, sensibility and 
 courage, distinguish him. He is the tenderest of brothers, 
 the most affectionate husband and father. As a lawyer, 
 distinguished equally for skill and integrity ; as a gentleman, 
 remarkable for his politeness; as a friend, beloved for his 
 sincerity ; and my heartiest wish for my own peculiar interest 
 is that I may become like him." If the description of the 
 teacher was accurate, certainly the wish of the pupil was 
 realized ; for the portrait here drawn might in all its features 
 be taken for one of Mr. Rawle. 
 
 New York, however, in its then condition, did not afford 
 sufficient opportunities and inducements for the study of a 
 peaceful science. "There is something," he says, in another 
 letter, "in the air of a military government extremely dis- 
 agreeable to those who have experienced another; though, 
 perhaps, this is one of the best administered. It makes 
 people in civil life feel interrupted in business, and cramped 
 in pleasures. In short, with all its advantages of strict 
 subordination and sudden obedience, none but those who are 
 paid for liking it, can cheerfully endure it." * * * "j^ 
 the profession which I have chosen, it is impossible to obtain 
 even a slender knowledge of essentials in the situation of 
 things here. This everybody agrees to; and the reason is, 
 the military government which prevails; in consequence of 
 which the still small voice of the law is seldom heard and 
 never attended to." 
 
 Under these circumstances, and being precluded from 
 returning to his native city at that time, by the political out- 
 lawry of his parents, Mr. Rawle determined to visit England, 
 and pursue the study of the common law at its ancient foun- 
 tain. "The pursuit of pleasure," he remarked, in the letter 
 from which the last extract was taken, "is the farthest thing 
 
246 Law Association Centennial 
 
 from my thoughts in going to England. But the pursuit of 
 knowledge I am ardent in. Two or three years' study in the 
 Temple will qualify me for the bar; and if at the expiration 
 of that time, things should not be settled in Arperica (which, 
 however, is an improbable thought), I can then by engaging 
 a little in practice, prevent myself from forgetting what I 
 have already acquired, and perhaps obtain a moderate income 
 during the time I should stay. This it would be impossible 
 to do here, where I can neither learn, nor derive advantage 
 from what I have learned." Having obtained the consent 
 of his mother he embarked on the 13th of June, 1781, on 
 board one of the vessels of a numerous British fleet, destined 
 in the first instance to Ireland, and arrived at Cork on the 
 1 8th of July, after a short and agreeable passage. From 
 Cork he proceeded to Dublin, over the same road that had 
 been traveled by his father twenty-five years before. * * * 
 Mr. Rawle arrived in London in August, 1781, and 
 inunediately entered himself a student in the Middle Temple ; 
 to which he was recommended by Mr. Eden, who had been 
 in America as one of the commissioners in the abortive 
 attempt to bring about a settlement of the dispute between 
 the two countries. I have before me the certificate which 
 he received on his admission to the Temple, and which 
 runs thus : 
 
 "Die 17 Augusti, 1781. 
 
 Ma^. Gulielnuts Rawle ffilius unitus ifrancisci Rawle 
 nuper de civitate Philadelphise in America mercatoris, 
 defuncti, admissus est in societatem Medij Templi Londini, 
 specialiter. 
 
 £ s d 
 Et dat pro ffine -400 
 
 Pro ffeodo & impressionibus 6 14 6 
 
 £ 10 14 6 
 
 John Manley, Tr. 
 Cop. exam. 
 
 /. Horsfall Sub. Thes." 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 247 
 
 It appears from this document that the initiation fees 
 into the society, in those days, were equal to about $50 of our 
 money. I find also that his "rooms" cost him £30 sterling 
 per annum. 
 
 It is to be regretted that Mr. Rawle's journals of his 
 residence and studies in England, have not been preserved. 
 Judging from what I have read of his letters and narratives 
 on other occasions, I have no doubt that they contained a 
 great deal of what would be read now with pleasure and 
 advantage. From his letter to his mother and sisters writ- 
 ten during that period, I may be allowed to make a few 
 extracts, illustrative of his pursuits and opinions, or interest- 
 ing from the persons to whom they relate. 
 
 "At present," he says in another letter, "there is an abso- 
 lute dearth of political publications ; and no one thing worth 
 sending out has been published since I have been here : per- 
 haps the meeting of Parliament may produce something. 
 The long vacation is at length over, and Westminster Hall 
 was yesterday opened in the usual form. I had the first 
 opportunity of gratifying myself with the sight of Lord 
 Mansfield. It is very common to form ideas of persons' 
 figures from their characters, and equally common to be 
 disappointed : my expectation of majestic dignity dwindled 
 away at the sight of a decrepit man of seventy-eight, with no 
 other expression in his face than good-nature, hobbling with 
 difficulty under the weight of a trailing gown. But after he 
 was seated on the bench, when he came to deliver his senti- 
 ments on an argument between those two celebrated orators, 
 Dunning and Erskine, a fire and animation took place in his 
 countenance, that did full justice to the genius and judgment 
 he displayed in his speech. I have absented myself from 
 the Hall to-day on account of writing letters, but I shall 
 return there to-morrow. On Friday the Lord Mayor 
 engrosses all the business, to see whose procession and spend 
 the day I have two invitations." 
 
 He did not form a very high opinion of the eloquence of 
 
248 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Parliament. "I must confess," he says in another letter, 
 "that I have heard nearly as much eloquence and oratory 
 in a sixpenny place called Coachmakers' Hall, as ever I did 
 within the walls of St. Stephen's ; so true it is that eloquence 
 is not to be purchased by wealth, nor obtained by mere 
 study." 
 
 Mr. Rawle's residence in England was shorter than he 
 contemplated when he left New York. The war in America 
 was drawing to a close, and he saw the necessity and pro- 
 priety of returning to Philadelphia, as his place of residence 
 and the scene of his future professional employment. In a 
 letter to his mother, dated on New Year's day, 1782, he thus 
 expresses his views : 
 
 "When I see the numerous Americans that are to be 
 found in this city; many of them once lords of thousands, 
 now torturing themselves to subsist upon the scanty stipends 
 allowed them in compensation for the loss of their estates, 
 I must confess it fills me with compassion. Hitherto I have 
 in some measure escaped the general wreck of fortunes that 
 so many have undergone. At least something, though small, 
 remains secure; and I think myself obliged to risk it no 
 longer, and not to involve myself in that want which would 
 throw me into an unwilling and burdensome dependence on 
 my step-father, for whose virtues I have too much regard 
 to wish to add to his sufferings. I doubt not, you will 
 approve of my intention of returning to Philadelphia, and 
 submitting to that authority which is there established. 
 Though the step may be in some degree humiliating, yet I 
 have nothing to fear, as I have nothing to charge myself 
 with. I have in no one instance taken a decisive part on 
 either side ; unless that voyage to New York, which was the 
 effect of filial duty, should be urged as a crime." 
 
 "It is true that this is the most eligible place for every 
 kind of improvement ; but it is a melancholy farce to improve 
 myself for situations I should never attain to — for even if I 
 should be obliged to give up the thoughts of returning to 
 America, I should never expect to rise in this country — ^the 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 249 
 
 many hundreds of competitors that are to be met with in 
 almost every line, render it almost impossible for a stranger 
 to succeed — and in the law particularly they are too numer- 
 ous to leave a shadow of hope, to one so unknown and unsup- 
 ported as I should be. Besides which, the country itself is 
 not by any means as agreeable to me as America once was, 
 and probably will be again, when the present turbulence has 
 subsided. The disparity of ranks is here so great and the 
 destructive emulation of appearance and expense in the 
 middle line so prevailing, that a fortune of £500 currency, 
 a year, is in fact, more valuable in America than treble 
 that sum sterling in England: I mean with respect to the 
 weight and influence it would give, and the happiness and 
 content it would afford. To return to my former situation at 
 New York, and continue to waste my youth in absolute use- 
 lessness and inactivity, would be folly in the extreme." 
 
 He was advised by Mr. Eden to apply to the British 
 Government for a pension, as a compensation for the loss of 
 his paternal property which had been confiscated; and he 
 was assured by many other friends that his application 
 would be successful ; but he declined at once, and positively, 
 to allow any step to be taken for the purpose. "Besides," 
 he said, "that the measure would tie me down in a manner 
 that I do not approve of, I do not think myself entitled by 
 anything I have done to ask for and receive that allowance 
 from the government, which ought only to be extended to 
 the loyalist, who has sacrificed his fortune in support of his 
 sovereign, and who is therefore entitled on the plainest prin- 
 ciples of reason to a recompense for it." 
 
 Mr. Rawle left England in pursuance of his intention to 
 return to America by way of France, and arrived at Ostend 
 on the 26th of April, 1782, whence he proceeded to Paris. 
 Here he stayed eight days only, "a time," he says with truth, 
 "infinitely too short to gratify curiosity in a place so 
 abundantly supplied with everything wonderful in art; but 
 I had the pleasure of meeting or making many friends. Dr. 
 Franklin and his grandson are in perfect health : they live at 
 
^So Law Association Centennial 
 
 an elegant villa three miles from Paris, and are exceedingly- 
 caressed, and visited by people of fashion. Temple Franklin 
 is a very sensible and accomplished young man," etc. I have 
 before me the passport granted to him by Dr. Franklin, dated 
 the 8th of May, 1782, and subscribed in his well-known 
 hand. 
 
 Mr. Rawle's journals and letters, written in France, are 
 equally entertaining and agreeable, with those relating to 
 Ireland and England. Besides an easy and attractive style 
 of writing, he possessed a remarkable talent for drawing, 
 which enabled him to illustrate his journals with sketches of 
 scenery and figures, very naturally delineated. He was 
 detained at Ostend and Boulogne a much longer time than he 
 expected, principally in consequence of the difficulty of 
 obtaining a passage in a suitable vessel. He finally left 
 France on the 20th of November, and arrived in Philadelphia 
 on the 17th of January, 1783; having been absent from his 
 native place four years and a half. 
 
 Immediately upon his return, he resumed the study of 
 the law, and was admitted to practice in the Court of Com- 
 mon Pleas, for the City and County of Philadelphia, on the 
 15th day of September, 1783. 
 
 On the 13th of November following, he was married to 
 Sarah Coates Burge, a lady whose virtues and accomplish- 
 ments gladdened nearly forty years of his life ; and whom he 
 had the misfortune to survive. 
 
 Mr. Rawle's professional career was not distinguished 
 by early success. Like many others, who have reached the 
 loftiest eminence at the bar, he found the first steps of the 
 journey beset with difficulties and surrounded with discour- 
 agements. His progress was slow, and sometimes almost 
 imperceptible, and he has told me more than once, that such 
 were the obstacles he met with, and so strong his fears of 
 being unable to derive enough from his profession to support 
 his family that he had determined at one time to abandon it, 
 and retire into the country to an agricultural life, to which 
 he was always warmly attached. He was induced to perse- 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 251 
 
 vere, however; and by employing his hours of leisure, which 
 were numerous, in study, and by careful attention to, as well 
 as attendance upon the practice of the courts, he was enabled 
 to lay that solid foundation, without which all professional 
 success must be insecure and ephemeral. It was not, how- 
 ever, until ten tedious years had gone by, that he felt himself 
 rooted in his position, and assured of success. 
 
 He was not slow, however, in acquiring the confidence 
 and regard of his fellow citizens. On the 25th of July, 1786, 
 he was elected a member of the American Philosophical 
 Society; and at the general election in October, 1789, he was 
 chosen a member of the assembly for the City of Philadel- 
 phia. This was his first and last appearance on the stage of 
 political life. Although repeatedly urged at subsequent 
 periods to accept of public appointments, and to take part in 
 political operations, he uniformly and steadily declined. 
 Neither his tastes, nor his views of duty, led him into the 
 arena of party warfare. Content with the distinctions of 
 professional life, and holding, with the great masters of his 
 science, that there can be no divided worship, he was willing 
 to leave to others whose leisure or temperament adapted 
 them to it, the anxious struggle for party triumphs. Not 
 that his opinions were doubtful or unsettled, or that he looked 
 with indifference upon public questions. The circumstances 
 by which Mr. Rawle's early life and character were influ- 
 enced, or colored, have already been adverted to. A deep 
 and abiding sense of filial duty estranged him for a time 
 from the government of his native country ; but when he was 
 enabled consistently with that (to him) paramount senti- 
 ment, to return and take his place as a member of the new 
 community, he became with sincerity and earnestness, in 
 heart as well as in fact, a republican citizen. He gave in his 
 adhesion (to use a modem phrase) to the existing govern- 
 ment, from a sincere opinion of its superiority over those 
 founded upon the monarchical principle; an opinion derived 
 from a thorough and careful examination of the subject, as 
 the writings which he has left behind him exhibit. In the 
 
252 Law Association Centennial 
 
 introduction to his View of the Constitution of the United 
 States, he remarks that "the history of man does not present 
 a more illustrious monument of htmian invention, sound 
 political principles, and judicious combinations, than the 
 Constitution of the United States." To the principles of 
 that class of public men, by whom this admirable instrument 
 was mainly established, and under whose government it was 
 administered for twelve years, he was firmly though not 
 blindly attached. Holding generally the same doctrines, 
 though not approving, as I have reason to believe, of some 
 of the later measures of their political life, he declined the 
 character and pursuits of a party man. The only public 
 office which he ever held was that of Attorney of the United 
 States, for the District of Pennsylvania, which was conferred 
 upon him without solicitation, and voluntarily resigned by 
 him. The commission, dated the i8th day of July, 1791, 
 and signed with the venerated name of him who never con- 
 ferred an office from an unworthy motive, is now before me. 
 The appointment was made on that day to supply a vacancy, 
 and was confirmed by the Senate on the 7th of November 
 following. He resigned the office on the 6th of May, 1800, 
 in the administration of Mr. John Adams. During the 
 period in which Mr. Rawle held the post of District Attor- 
 ney, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania was disgraced by 
 two insurrections against the authority of the general gov- 
 ernment ; both of them as vulgar and sordid in their motives, 
 as they were weak and disjointed in their operations. By 
 direction of the President, he accompanied the district judge 
 and the military on the western expedition in 1794; and it 
 became his duty to prosecute the ofifenders after the insur- 
 rections in that year, and in 1798, had been put down. In 
 one instance (the case of Fries), the prisoner was capitally 
 convicted; a new trial was granted on account of some 
 informality in the proceedings; he was again convicted and 
 sentenced to death, but afterwards pardoned. Mr. Rawle 
 was also called upon to prosecute for other political ofifences. 
 In the performance of these painful duties I believe that he 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 253 
 
 lost none of the respect of his fellow citizens of any political 
 denomination. Firm in the execution of his office, he was, 
 as I have reason to know from his papers, far from making 
 any unbecoming sacrifice of opinion to those from whom he 
 derived it ; and his deportment to those against whom he was 
 required to appear was always characterized by mildness and 
 forbearance. 
 
 "Dr. Franklin, towards the close of his life, formed a 
 society to meet at his house once a week. Its appellation was 
 'The Society for Political Inquiries' — but general politics 
 only were intended to be the subject of discussion — Gen- 
 eral Washington was one of the members; Robert Morris, 
 Gouverneur Morris, Dr. Rush, George Qymer, Mr. Bing- 
 ham, Mr. Wilson, Mr. Bradford, Robert Hare (an accom- 
 plished classical scholar), and others to the number of 42 
 belonged to it. Thomas Paine (not then a wretched apos- 
 tate) was also a member. Questions for consideration 
 were sometimes proposed at a previous meeting — sometimes 
 suggested on the same evening — chiefly by our venerable 
 president. There was no formality of discussion. Dr. Rush, 
 who had great powers of conversation, commonly took the 
 lead. Gouverneur Morris was intelligent, sarcastic and 
 abrupt. Dr. Franklin, though very attentive, said but little 
 after the subject was broached. Paine never opened his 
 mouth; but he furnished one of the few essays which the 
 members of the society were expected to produce. It was a 
 well written dissertation on the inexpediency of incorporating 
 towns. We used to assemble in the doctor's library, at the 
 house he then inhabited, standing back from Market Street, 
 between Third and Fourth Streets. It has since been taken 
 down, and a street now passes over its site. His collection of 
 books was extensive, principally, however, in the French and 
 English languages. They were not, in general, expensively 
 bound. The outside of a book was evidently not regardeo 
 by him. The society terminated at his decease. Its minutes 
 are now in my possession, and are intended to be deposited in 
 the Philadelphia Library." 
 
254 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Although resolved from the outset to devote himself to 
 his profession and to allow no other employment to disturb 
 his attention to it, a determination to which he strictly 
 adhered during his continuance at the bar, Mr. Rawle yet 
 readily lent his services and means to purposes of public 
 good, and was always ready to unite in all reasonable 
 schemes for the advancement of science, letters and taste. 
 He was a member of most of the public institutions of his 
 time, and to some contributed a valuable aid. 
 *********** 
 
 In the same year ( 1822) , on the decease of the venerable 
 Jared IngersoU, Mr. Rawle was unanimously chosen to suc- 
 ceed him in the office of Chancellor of the society of Asso- 
 ciated Members of the Bar. Shortly after his appointment 
 he delivered an address before the society, which was pub- 
 lished at their request. In this discourse he reviewed the 
 early Constitution and Laws of Pennsylvania, particularly 
 "the Great Law," as it was called; treated of the equity juris- 
 prudence of Pennsylvania, and the method of administering 
 it; and suggested the expediency of granting additional 
 powers to the courts to do justice, according to the mode of 
 proceeding in chancery. "It is time," he concludes, "to 
 reduce the uncertain coruscations of Pennsylvania equity to 
 the safe and steady light of chancery. Some may, perhaps, 
 dread the danger of innovation on a practice, which has con- 
 tinued for near a century and a half. Others may think that 
 error can receive no sanction from time, and that while the 
 genius of our countrymen has, at least since the commence- 
 ment of the revolution, been so active in almost every sort of 
 political reformation, we ought not to decline the perform- 
 ance of a duty because of its toil, nor the improvement of a 
 system on account of its antiquity." 
 
 At the next annual meeting of the society he delivered a 
 second discourse, which also has been published. The sub- 
 jects of this address are the character of the bar and the 
 method of practice. After adverting to the general com- 
 plaint of the law's delay, he inquires into "the influence of 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 255 
 
 our peculiar modes of practice on the promotion of profes- 
 sional knowledge, the formation of professional character, 
 and the progress of forensic proceedings." The difference 
 between the subdivision of labor in England and the uni- 
 versality of our practice is, in course, adverted to. "With 
 us," he says, "the term lawyer means a genus not a species. 
 Liable to be called on in every branch of business connected 
 with the profession, it is necessary that the American lawyer 
 should be qualified for all : he is not merely a chancery law- 
 yer, nor a civilian, nor a special pleader, nor a nisi prius 
 lawyer. He forms a living, and a daily refutation of the 
 opinion, that the science is too comprehensive to be all under- 
 taken by one man." 
 
 He then proceeds to give some interesting recollections 
 of the worthies of the olden time — of Mr. Chew, Mr. Wilson, 
 Mr. Sergeant, Mr. Lewis, Mr. Ingersoll, Mr. Edward Biddle 
 and Mr. George Ross ; and discusses the question of the cause 
 of the slow progress made in our judicial proceedings. "I 
 incline to think," he says, "that it is to be found in the 
 length, or rather, the manner of our speeches. On the trial of 
 issues in fact, the examination of witnesses does not gen- 
 erally consume more time with us than in England. Indeed 
 their cross-examinations are commonly more dilated than 
 ours. But speeches of the great length to which we are 
 accustomed are there unknown. An hour is deemed a large 
 space of time for an address to a jury. The same modera- 
 tion is carried into the discussion of arguments in banc. 
 Nine eminent counsel were engaged in the celebrated case of 
 Lindo against Rodney, which I had the pleasure of hearing. 
 It occupied but two mornings. With us it would probably 
 have employed as many weeks. The great cause of delay 
 with us is the introduction of books, reading entire cases 
 and discussing every case that is read; a practice entirely 
 unknown there." Then on the question how may this evil, 
 which certainly has not diminished since the date of his dis- 
 course, be corrected — he tells us that in Athens the duration 
 of a speech was regulated by the clepsydra (or hour-glass), 
 
256 Law Association Centennial 
 
 under the direction of the court, and that from some of the 
 epistles of Pliny it may be inferred that after the reign of the 
 emperors commenced, the Athenian practice was occasionally 
 adopted at Rome. He concludes, however, that such a 
 power could not safely be lodged in the bench here, consist- 
 ently with our ideas of "Virtue, Liberty, and Independence," 
 and that, after all, the best hour-glass is public opinion. 
 
 About the period of these addresses, Mr. Rawle was 
 twice offered by Governor Hiester the situation of Presiding 
 Judge of the District Court of the City and County of Phila- 
 delphia. In both instances he respectfully declined the office. 
 Not that he was averse to a judicial station, for which his 
 intellect, acquirements, and temperament well adapted him, 
 but at that time, I believe, his practice yielded him consider- 
 ably more than the compensation allowed to a judge by our 
 ingenious system ; and he considered himself under an obli- 
 gation of duty to persevere in the toilsome and arduous occu- 
 pation from which he had hoped long before to have been 
 permitted to retire. Domestic circumstances, however, into 
 which it is not requisite for me to enter, made it necessary for 
 him to continue his professional labors, far beyond the period 
 at which they are usually suspended, and prevented his 
 acceptance of an office, which, there is every reason to think, 
 he would have filled in a manner worthy of its importance 
 and dignity. 
 
 In 1825, Mr. Rawle published his "View of the Consti- 
 tution of the United States." This is a plain, practical and 
 intelligent description, and explanation of the theory and 
 operation of our political system. The introduction con- 
 tains an historical account of the Colonial Governments of 
 the several States, and of the federative system under which 
 these States were nominally held together, for general pur- 
 poses, previously to the year 1787. The author then pro- 
 ceeds to consider the several branches of the government of 
 the United States, legislative, executive, and judicial; speci- 
 fying the several provisions of the Constitution in regard to 
 each; explaining their import and bearing; and applying to 
 
Iron, a P l.ulogra fl, hy <,„l,-k,nn. 
 
 :o=nE w'. l:';:jDle, ll.d. ( : 
 
 ,". .-; I p. Q7 
 
 J I 1,1 ' I C 
 
 °.57) 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 257 
 
 them the various decisions that have taken place in the 
 Supreme Court and other tribunals. Mr. Rawle's general 
 views on political subjects led him to concur in the construc- 
 tion which has been given to the powers of the Federal Gov- 
 ernment by the Supreme Court ; but he has not adopted those 
 opinions blindly, and in some instances has expressed his dis- 
 sent from^ the judgments of that court. The volume con- 
 cludes with a chapter on the blessings and benefits of the 
 union, and of that invaluable constitution by which those 
 blessings and benefits are secured, and it is to be hoped per- 
 petuated : and the author finishes his work with a quotation 
 from the farewell address of that illustrious man, "whose 
 character," he remarks, "stamps inestimable value on all that 
 he has uttered, and whose exhortations on this subject, 
 springing from the purest patriotism, and the soundest wis- 
 dom, ought never to be forgotten or neglected." 
 
 The opinion entertained by the public of the value of 
 this treatise is shown by the circumstance of its having gone 
 through three editions, and having been adopted as a text 
 book of instruction in several of our literary institutions. 
 
 In the month of June, of the same year ( 1825), the His- 
 torical Society was established. Mr. Rawle took an active 
 part in its formation, and was unanimously chosen presi- 
 dent; an office which he held with, I am sure, the equally 
 unanimous respect and affection of the members until his 
 death. On the 5th of November following his election, he 
 delivered an inaugural discourse before the members of the 
 society, which forms the first Article of the transactions, and 
 serves as a suitable introduction to the many valuable com- 
 munications which have been published. 
 
 In this discourse, after explaining the objects of the 
 society, and the method in which they proposed to accom- 
 plish them, Mr. Rawle, as an illustration of the importance 
 of historical inquiries, reviewed certain theories on the sub- 
 ject of the origin of the Indians of this continent, and dis- 
 cussed the question of the right of the European race to 
 dispossess them, with great force of argument, and with his 
 
 17 
 
258 Law Association Centennial 
 
 characteristic kindliness of disposition and Christian temper. 
 In conclusion, he expressed a hope that the Historical 
 Society would not, like too many others, be characterized by 
 "vivacity of inception, apathy of progress, and premature 
 decay." "The treasury of literature," he adds, "is grateful 
 for the widow's mite. Let all contribute what they can, 
 and they will contribute what they ought ; let no opportunity 
 be lost in throwing into the common stock not only what may 
 be collected of times that are past, but whatever may be of 
 interest in relation to time that is present." 
 
 Mr. Rawle did not confine himself to a preliminary 
 effort. He took an active part in the business of the institu- 
 tion, and a warm interest in its success; and he punctually 
 attended the meetings of the council until disabled by bodily 
 infirmity. 
 
 In February, 1826, he made a communication to the 
 society touching the valedictory address of President Wash- 
 ington; which was referred to a committee consisting of 
 himself, Mr. Morgan, and Mr. Ingersoll. Those gentlemen, 
 it is known, addressed letters to several distinguished friends 
 of Washington, who yet survived, and obtained from them 
 information exceedingly interesting in a literary point of 
 view; but far more important from the conclusive proof it 
 afforded that the Farewell Address was throughout written 
 by the venerable patriot, whose signature is affixed to it. 
 About the same time Mr. Rawle communicated to the society 
 a "Vindication of the Rev. Mr. Heckewelder's History of the 
 Indian Nations." He also furnished a "Biographical Sketch 
 of Sir William Keith," one of the Governors of the Province 
 of Pennsylvania, though his name is not given to this article, 
 and "A Sketch of the Life of Thomas Mifflin," the first 
 Governor of Pennsylvania after the Revolution. These, I 
 believe, are all his contributions to the stock of the society; 
 and they certainly prove not merely his regard to his duties 
 as a member, but the activity of his mind and the variety of 
 lais knowledge. 
 
 The opinion entertained by a distinguished literary insti- 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 259 
 
 tution of his learning and worth was manifested by the 
 degre:e of LL.D., conferred upon him in September, 1827, by 
 the College of New Jersey. The distinction is believed to 
 have been entirely spontaneous on their part, and was cer- 
 tainly unexpected by him. 
 
 In the year 1830, Mr. Rawle was appointed, by Gover- 
 nor Wolf, one of the three commissioners, whose duty it 
 was to "to revise, collate, and digest all such public acts and 
 statutes of the civil code of this State, and all such British 
 statutes in force in this State as are general, and permanent 
 in their nature," and to consider, and report, what alteration 
 and improvements were required therein. Mr. Rawle was 
 the first named in the commission, and his appointment was 
 universally approved. He brought to the important and 
 difficult task, which at the age of seventy he thus undertook, 
 an ample stock of legal and general knowledge, great per- 
 sonal experience of the operation and practice of the laws, 
 and withal an activity of mind, and earnestness of purpose, 
 which are seldom displayed at that time of life. During the 
 four years of employment under this commission, his col- 
 leagues found him always ready for business, always pre- 
 pared with his quota of work, always prompt in communicat- 
 ing his abundant knowledge, and equally disposed to receive 
 the suggestions of others, and remarkably free from preju- 
 dice or tenacity of opinion ; and they have the satisfaction of 
 reflecting that although in the course of their arduous labors 
 they occasionally differed from him in views of subordinate 
 matters, yet that in all important questions their conclusions 
 were as unanimous as their intercourse was harmonious. 
 
 Mr. Rawle joined in all the reports made by the com- 
 missioners to the Legislature, excepting the last ; which was 
 prepared and transmitted in March, 1836, a few weeks only 
 before his decease. 
 
 In the year 1830, Mr. Rawle presided at a town meeting 
 held in consequence of the then recent revolution in France, 
 and was placed at the head of a committee appointed to 
 convey the resolutions adopted by the meeting, to General 
 
26o Law Association Centennial 
 
 La Fayette. I have before me a copy of the letter, in the 
 handwriting of Mr. Rawle, addressed to General La Fayette, 
 and the original of the answer in the handwriting of that 
 eminent person. 
 
 In 1 83 1, Mr. Rawle received an unexpected and gratify- 
 ing evidence of the affection and respect with which he was 
 regarded by his professional associates. At a meeting of the 
 members of the bar of Philadelphia, held on the 20th of 
 December, it was unanimously resolved that they were 
 "desirous to express their respect and regard for their vener- 
 able associate, and to preserve a likeness of one who has con- 
 tributed to do honor to his profession ;" and they accordingly 
 solicited him to sit for his portrait, to be painted at their 
 expense, and to be placed in the room of the Law Library. 
 The request was complied with : a very striking likeness was 
 produced by Mr. Inman, and now occupies its destined posi- 
 tion alongside of the portrait of Chief Justice Marshall, 
 painted at the request of the same bar, and not far from that 
 of his old friend, William Lewis, whose very striking por- 
 trait, painted by Stewart, was within a few years found 
 among the lumber of an auctioneer's store room, and pre- 
 sented to the bar by Mr. Head. 
 
 Shortly after this Mr. Rawle delivered, by request, an 
 address before the Law Academy. The subjects which he 
 chose were the importance of adequate preparation of 
 knowledge for the study of the law ; which he explained and 
 enforced with great earnestness and emphasis. In conclud- 
 ing this discourse, he paid a merited tribute to the eminent 
 and distinguished individual who presides over the Philo- 
 sophical Society, and who now so worthily fills the situation 
 which he at that time held, of president of this society. "It is 
 almost half a century," he said, "since the commencement of 
 an acquaintance, and the formation of a friendship with your 
 learned and amiable Provost, who, after fighting the battles 
 of his adopted country, immediately turned his attention to 
 the study of her laws. Neither the variety of his literary 
 pursuits and accomplishments, nor the pressure of age, have 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 261 
 
 interrupted the continuance of his devotion to this exact 
 and interesting science. May you, my young friends, imi- 
 tate his example. May you all be convinced that those who, 
 unlike him, relinquish the improvement of the mind before 
 its faculties have failed, will find in the torpor of age neither 
 dignity nor happiness." 
 
 In 1 83 1, at the request of the Philosophical Society, Mr. 
 Rawle prepared a short biographical account of his early 
 friend, Zaccheus Collins, who had died a short time previ- 
 ously. This memoir was, I believe, the last of his merely 
 literary compositions. His time during this, and the two 
 succeeding years, was mainly employed in the revision of 
 the laws; and h^ had little leisure, if he had the desire, to 
 appear again as an author. 
 
 His constitution, too, began to give way. For sixty 
 years he enjoyed almost uninterrupted health. About ten 
 years before his death he was attacked by a distressing com- 
 plaint, which required all the skill of his eminent physicians 
 to subdue; and to prevent the recurrence of which he was 
 kept under a rigid and particular diet ; abstaining almost alto- 
 gether from vegetable food. 
 
 During the year 1835 his bodily infirmities increased 
 rapidly, and he was seldom able to leave his house; but his 
 mental vigor and activity were unabated. He read a great 
 deal; and few men have found greater enjoyment in books, 
 or more fully verified and realized Cicero's description of 
 them. Literature was in truth the delight and ornament of 
 his youth, the relaxation of his manhood, and the solace and 
 comfort of his declining years. He was, during a great 
 part of his life, unfortunately subject to inflammation of his 
 eyes, which disabled him from reading at times, and espe- 
 cially at night; but he was never without those who were 
 happy to be the means of imparting gratification to him, and 
 whose filial piety doubtless finds in the recollections of duty 
 well performed some alleviation of the loss they have experi- 
 enced. 
 
 After a confinement of several weeks to his sofa, or bed. 
 
262 Law Association Centennial 
 
 during which the decay of nature was gradually taking 
 place, not unaccompanied with painful and distressing ail- 
 ments, which he endured with great fortitude and composure, 
 our venerable friend and associate departed this life on the 
 1 2th day of April, 1836. 
 
 In the preceding pages I have endeavored to comply 
 with the request of the society, by submitting to them a 
 memoir of the life of their deceased President. I have not 
 written his eulogy. Neither their wishes, nor my disposition 
 tend that way. The language of overstrained praise would 
 be unsuitable to the simplicity of his character. 
 
 It is proper, however, before closing this paper, that I 
 should mention some of the principal features of a character, 
 which, in childhood, I learned to regard with a respect and 
 affection, which the almost daily intercourse of after life in 
 no wise lessened. 
 
 Mr. Rawle was an accomplished jurist, a good scholar, 
 and a person of great taste and great general acquirements. 
 His reading in early life had been extensive ; and he brought 
 to his professional studies a discriminating and healthy mind, 
 which enabled him to make the best use of what he read. 
 His learning was not confined to the jurisprudence of Eng- 
 land and America, but extended much deeper into that of 
 the ancient and modem law of the continent of Europe than 
 was usual in the last century. His professional business 
 for the twenty years between about 1793 and 181 3, was 
 very great, and his income large. His name appears in most 
 of the important causes of that period, and his arguments 
 always commanded the attention and respect of the court. 
 His address to a jury was simple in diction, always free 
 from unnecessary ornament, but earnest and impressive. I 
 have already said that his deportment was conciliating to his 
 adversaries ; and I believe that it may be said with truth, that 
 he never made an enemy at the bar. 
 
 His classical knowledge was more extensive and accu- 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 263 
 
 rate than that of most men in this country, not scholars by 
 profession. He read a great deal, and to a late period of 
 his life, in the Roman authors. Many of his editions 
 belonged to his grandfather, William Rawle. With the 
 Greek writers, he was not so familiar; though he made the 
 Greek Testament a frequent study. He was fond of poetry ; 
 and at one period of his life, wrote a great deal of it and very 
 agreeably; but, I believe, few of his verses are left. I have 
 mentioned in another place that he drew and painted well. 
 I have seen sketches of his that would do credit to- artists of 
 reputation. 
 
 These, however, were the mere ornaments or externals 
 of a character, the fabric or substance of which was great 
 moral worth, founded upon and sustained by religion. Mr. 
 Rawle was at all periods of his life a devout man. He had 
 thought, read, and written much on the subject of religion. 
 I have perused many MS. volumes, written by him, on the 
 evidences, doctrines, and working of our Christian faith ; and 
 have found reason to admire the extent of his research, the 
 wisdom of his remarks, and the gentle and catholic spirit 
 by which they were dictated. He was a sincere believer 
 in the fundamental doctrines of the Christian religion. He 
 admired its beautiful morality, and was deeply sensible of 
 its adaptation to the wants of society. In the latest years of 
 his life religion occupied a large portion of his thoughts. 
 As the shadows of evening gathered round him, he seemed 
 desirous to close the shutters upon all mere human specula- 
 tion, and enlightened and warmed by the faith of the Gospel, 
 to commune with his own heart, and prepare himself for the 
 great event that was drawing nigh. This is not the time 
 for the publication of any of his devotional writings or spec- 
 ulative opinions. Hereafter, possibly, they rhay see the 
 light. I will only add, that by birth a member of the Society 
 of Friends, Mr. Rawle never ceased to entertain the highest 
 respect for that excellent body, and generally attended their 
 place of worship when his health permitted, although he 
 differed from them in some points of opinion respecting 
 
264 Law Association Centennial 
 
 language and attire. Mr. Rawle's religion, as I have inti- 
 mated, was not an abstract or inanimate speculation. It 
 governed and influenced his whole life. It controlled and 
 tempered him during many years of prosperity, and sustained 
 and comforted him in later days of distress, and misfortune. 
 With qualities of mind and heart, such as I have men- 
 tioned, Mr. Rawle passed a life of seventy-six years without 
 stain or reproach. Popularity, perhaps, in the prevailing 
 acceptation of the word, he did not seek to possess. That 
 "habitation giddy and unsure," which, in the words of the 
 poet, he hath "who buildeth on the vulgar heart," it was 
 not his ambition to possess. He sought and acquired that 
 enduring reputation which is founded on the good opinion 
 of the wise and virtuous of this world ; and may we not hope 
 that at the close of that venerable life 
 
 " the Eternal Master found 
 The talents lent him well employed." 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 265 
 
 LETTER OF 
 
 PETER S. DU PONCEAU 
 
 to 
 
 THOMAS I. WHARTON 
 
 Philadelphia, 3d June, 1837. 
 
 Thomas I. Wharton, Esq. 
 
 My Dear Sir : I sit down with pleasure to comply with 
 your request, by committing to writing my recollections of 
 our lamented friend, William Rawle, during an acquaintance 
 of more than fifty years. Unfortunately, I cannot add much 
 to what you have related in your interesting biographical 
 notice, presented to the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, 
 which is to be published in the forthcoming volume of their 
 Memoirs. During the greatest part, I may say, almost the 
 whole time of our acquaintance, Mr. Rawle and I were 
 engaged in a laborious profession, which affords little leisure 
 for social intercourse ; and though our literary tastes were in 
 most things similar, such was the nature and urgency of our 
 daily occupations, that we were seldom allowed to indulge 
 our inclination, to wander into more flowery paths; for the 
 law, as you well know, is a jealous mistress, and requires 
 undivided attentions from her votaries. The life of a lawyer 
 in the full practice of his profession, offers very little but the 
 dull and dismal round of attendance upon courts, hard 
 studies at night, and in the day fatiguing exertions, which, 
 however brilliant, are confined to a narrow theatre, and leave 
 nothing behind but a blaze of reputation, and the echo of a 
 name. Had Mr. Rawle had leisure to pursue the scientific 
 labors, which he so successfully began in his View of the Con- 
 stitution of the United States, a full-length picture of his 
 mind would have been found in the various works which his 
 genius and immense fund of knowledge enabled him to 
 produce. An author's life, it is said, is found in his works ; 
 but where is the life of an eminent lawyer or physician, whose 
 
266 Law Association Centennial 
 
 days and nights have been devoted to the exercise of their pro- 
 fessions. The names of Lewis and of Kuhn are dear to their 
 contemporaries ; but the next generation will probably forget 
 them! It will not be so, however, with William Rawle; 
 though he has left little behind him, that little is of such 
 sterling weight and value, as will transmit his name with 
 honor to posterity. 
 
 You will now easily understand, why I can add but little 
 to the stock of information which you have collected of the 
 life of our excellent friend. A few occasional anecdotes are 
 all that I can contribute, as they occur to my memory. After 
 the first pangs of separation such recollections are pleasing 
 to the mind. I dwell upon them with pleasure, while I 
 commit them to paper, and leave it to you to make such use 
 of them as you will think proper. 
 
 Mr. Rawle could not boast of an Anglo-Saxon descent. 
 His origin must be traced to the conquerors of the Anglo- 
 Saxons — the Normans. His name is evidently (with a little 
 variation in the orthography) the same as that of Raoul, 
 the first Duke of Normandy, who, in the year 912, obtained 
 the sovereignty of that province fromi Charles the Simple, 
 King of France, who also gave him his daughter, Giselle, in 
 marriage. He was an ancestor to William the Conqueror. 
 The monkish annalists, in their bad Latin, called him RoUo, 
 but it is an ascertained fact that his name was Raoul, which 
 afterwards became very common in France, particularly in 
 Normandy, whence it passed over into England, where the 
 English w was substituted for the French diphthong ou. 
 This etymology was often talked over between Mr. Rawle 
 and me; he freely admitted it, and though a Quaker, did not 
 seem displeased to bear the same name as the conqueror. 
 
 My acquaintance with Mr. Rawle began in the year 
 1784, when I was studying law under WiUiam Lewis, at that 
 time the most celebrated lawyer in Philadelphia, and, per- 
 haps, in the United States. Lewis was the son of a plain 
 farmer in Chester County, who sent him twice a week with 
 his truck to the market in this city, which he carried in a 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 267 
 
 little cart with one horse. The courts of justice then sat 
 in the Court House, lately pulled down, at the intersection 
 of Market and Second Streets. After disposing of his vege- 
 table store the lad hitched his horse to a post, and went into 
 the Court House to hear the lawyers plead. After attending 
 there for some time, during repeated visits, he was at once 
 struck with the idea that he also could speak, if he had only 
 the requisite knowledge. Nature had endowed him with a 
 clear, discriminating mind, a retentive memory, a powerful 
 vocal organ, and an admirable fluency of speech. Nature 
 had designed him for the legal profession. He felt the 
 impulse; it was irresistible. Like Corregio, he exclaimed, 
 Son pittore anch'io; "I also am an orator, and why should 
 not I be a lawyer as well as those whom I hear prattling 
 around me?" Full of this idea, he went to his father, and 
 told him he was determined to study the law, and adopt it 
 as his profession. His father laughed at him; and well he 
 might, for his education had not extended farther than read- 
 ing, writing, and common arithmetic. He was not, how- 
 ever, discouraged : he did not give his father a moment's 
 rest, until he put him apprentice to George Ross, then the 
 most eminent lawyer in this city; under whom his progress 
 was rapid. A few years after his admission he was found 
 at the head of the legal profession. 
 
 I was studying, then, under this able master, when I first 
 became acquainted with Mr. Rawle. I had gone through 
 Blackstone's Commentaries, and Wood's Institutes, and was 
 advised to enter upon the study of Coke upon Littleton. I 
 wanted to have a copy of the work all to myself, to read it 
 at my ease ; but it was not easy to be procured. After many 
 fruitless applications I bethought myself of putting an adver- 
 tisement in the newspapers, in which I offered to give a set 
 of Valin's Commentary on the French Marine Ordinances 
 in exchange for the book I so much desired to have. To my 
 great astonishment and delight I received a note from. Mr. 
 Rawle (then unknown to me), accepting of the offer. I 
 went immediately to his house, where the bargain was con- 
 
^^ Law Association Centennial 
 
 eluded, and an acquaintance began between us which after- 
 wards ripened into friendship. 
 
 I took home the longed-for volume, and immediately 
 entered upon its study. I had then no time to lose, for I had 
 also to perform the duties of my office of notary public and 
 sworn interpreter of foreign languages, to which I had been 
 appointed by the Executive Council, in the preceding year. 
 It is not to be wondered at, therefore, if there was at that 
 period no communication between Mr. Rawle and myself, 
 while I was so actively and incessantly engaged. At last, 
 at June Term, 1785, my good master, Mr. Lewis, who had 
 followed my progress, and had always been ready to assist 
 me with his lessons and his advice, which I found of immense 
 use and advantage to me, after a long and strict examination, 
 thought he might venture to move for my admission as an 
 attorney of the Court of Common Pleas for the City and 
 County of Philadelphia. Mr. Rawle and Mr. Sergeant (the 
 father of our distinguished fellow-citizen) were appointed 
 my examiners. 
 
 I met them with a trembling heart. The examination 
 was begun by Mr. Rawle. To my utter astonishment and 
 dismay he proceeded to examine me on the civil and maritime 
 law, and on the jus postliminii. I learned afterwards, that 
 he did so out of kindness to me. I had exchanged with him 
 Valin's Commentaries for Coke upon Littleton. He thought 
 I must be more familiar with the former books than with the 
 latter; but it was quite the reverse. Mr. Sergeant relieved 
 me by asking me questions out of the books that I had 
 studied. Mr. Rawle fell in, and pursued the same course; 
 after which I had the satisfaction to be distinguished with a 
 
 Benfe, ben6 respondere, 
 Dignus, dignus es entrare 
 In nostro docto corpore. 
 
 On the favorable report of these gentlemen, I was 
 admitted. From that moment Mr. Rawle showed me marks 
 of particular friendship. I visited him frequently, and was 
 always kindly received. I was in a manner domesticated 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 269 
 
 in his family. For some time we engaged together in the 
 study of the German language, of which I had gained some 
 slight knowledge in the family of Baron Steuben. We did 
 not pursue it long together ; the interruptions of business did 
 not permit it. However, I know that he continued after- 
 wards the study of that language; but to what extent he 
 acquired it I cannot exactly tell. I remember that one day 
 we were sitting together in the court room, at a meeting of 
 the bar, for what was called Settling the Dockets* In the 
 intervals of business the lawyers would converse with each 
 other; and a great deal of mirth and good humor generally 
 prevailed. On that occasion the conversation turned upon 
 ignorant judges, who were not a rarity at that time; when 
 the President of the Court of Common Pleas was an honest 
 justice of the peace, who kept a little shop somewhere in 
 Chestnut Street, and knew no more of law than he did of 
 Greek. Many hackneyed stories, well known among the 
 profession, were related upon the subject. While this was 
 going on I wrote on a small slip of paper the following 
 German epigram, which I had read somewhere, and handed 
 it across the table to Mr. Rawle : 
 
 Mein Sohn ! weist du was, 
 Bist ein advokat ; 
 Mein Sohn ! weist du nichts, 
 Bist ein Geheimer Roth. 
 
 Mr. Rawle immediately wrote, and sent to me the fol- 
 lowing poetical translation. 
 
 Our Tom is a wit, at the bar he will drudge ; 
 Our Will is a fool, and we'll make him a judge. 
 
 * I do not believe that there is a gentleman at our bar, myself excepted 
 who knows the meaning of the expression, Settling the Docket ; as it has long 
 since fallen into disuse. The lawyers used to meet at the beginning of every 
 term at the Prothonotary's Office, or in the Court Room, where all the actions 
 on that docket were successively called over by the Clerk, and were put at, 
 issue, marked for trial, or continued. Rules to declare, or plead were taken, 
 pleas and replications were given, and judgments confessed ; and causes 
 were marked for trial, or argument. All this was done viva voce, and short 
 entries were made by the Prothonotary, from which the lists of trials and 
 arguments were made out at each term. The dockets of the Supreme Court, 
 and of the Common Pleas, were settled in the same manner. I am told that 
 the practice is still followed in some of the County towns of this State. 
 
^7° Law Association Centennial 
 
 This shows that he was not unacquainted with the lan- 
 guage of Schiller and Goethe. 
 
 Among the marks of friendship which I received from 
 Mr. Rawle at that period, I shall never forget that he was 
 the first who took me in as assistant counsel in a cause of 
 some importance. It was a Quaker cause, of a mercantile 
 character. More I do not recollect, except the name of 
 our client, which is here of no consequence. To me, a 
 stranger in the land without connections, and at the begin- 
 ning of his career, it was rendering a great and an essential 
 service. It was also a mark of confidence, for which I felt 
 grateful ever after; and I often took occasion to remind Mr. 
 Rawle of it, and express to him again and again the senti- 
 ment of gratitude with which it had inspired me. I am 
 happy in this opportunity of recording it. 
 
 It was not, however, that I wanted business. My 
 notary's office kept me much employed. On looking at my 
 docket for September Term, 1785, the first after my admis- 
 sion, I find I was then concerned in twenty-one suits, either 
 for plaintiff or defendant. It was a pretty good beginning. 
 Indeed, I had begun to practice since the year 1783, in the 
 name of a young attorney called William Murray, Jr., who 
 soon after I was admitted, left this for the western country, 
 where he died. Thus I became acquainted with the forms 
 of proceeding. But I was not the less obliged to Mr. Rawle, 
 for distinguishing me as he did ; which gave me a standing 
 at the bar, which I could not have expected for many years 
 to come. I am happy in this opportunity to pay a grateful 
 tribute to his memory. 
 
 I was not the only young man whom Mr. Rawle thus 
 patronized; for benevolence was a strong trait in his char- 
 acter. I particularly remember a foreigner whom he gen- 
 erously took by the hand, and by his recommendations intro- 
 duced into business in the line that he professed, and who 
 afterwards repaid him with the blackest ingratitude. I for- 
 bear saying more upon this subject. I must not disturb the 
 ashes of the dead. The ungrateful man gradually lost by 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 271 
 
 his conduct the esteem which Mr. Rawle's friendship, and 
 some talents that he possessed, had obtained for him. He 
 left this coimtry, and went to Ejigland, where he died. 
 There are, probably, persons yet living who will know to 
 whom I allude. 
 
 I married in the year 1788, and from that time I began 
 to lead a very retired life, attending only to the duties of 
 my profession. My intercourse, therefore, with Mr. Rawle 
 was not so frequent as it used to be. We met in courts of 
 justice; in a friendly, but not so intimate a manner as there- 
 tofore. In the same year the Federal Constitution was pro- 
 mulgated. We took different sides. I regret to say that 
 I belonged to what was called the anti-federal party. I 
 thought I was right: subsequent events have proved that I 
 was in the wrong. The French revolution followed; and 
 parties became still more exasperated. Under the admin- 
 istration of the elder Adams, Mr. Rawle was made District 
 Attorney. This brought us still more in opposition to each 
 other; for in the great political causes, and in the prize 
 causes, which at that time were so numerous, we were almost 
 always engaged on opposite sides. Notwithstanding all 
 this, I can say with truth that our mutual esteem never suf- 
 fered any diminution. We met as antagonists, but always 
 parted as friends. In all our forensic debates, and they 
 were numerous, I do not remember a single harsh expres- 
 sion, or even a word that could inflict a wound on one or 
 the other of the combatants. Mr. Rawle was sometimes 
 satirical : he never suffered an unguarded expression of mine 
 to escape, without some good stroke of wit, that was any- 
 thing but amusing to me; but it was always done in such a 
 delicate good humored way that it was impossible for me 
 to take offence; and I well remember that once when I had 
 in an address to a jury fairly laid myself open to his shafts, 
 I begged of him to spare me in his reply, which he was kind 
 enough to promise, and he kept his word. 
 
 In the beginning of the present century, during the reign 
 of the embargo, non-intercourse, and other restrictive meas- 
 
^72 Law Association Centennial 
 
 ures, produced by the British orders in Council, and the 
 Berlin and Milan decrees, a great number of causes were 
 carried up from this city to the Supreme Court of the United 
 States. The counsel engaged in those causes were in the 
 habit of going together to Washington, to argue their cases 
 before that tribunal. These were Mr. Ingersoll, Mr. Dallas, 
 Mr. Lewis, Mr. Edward Tilghman, Mr. Rawle and myself, 
 who am, alas ! the only survivor of that joyous band. We 
 hired a stage to ourselves, in which we proceeded by easy 
 journeys. The court sat then, as it does at present, or did 
 until lately, in the month of February; so that we had to 
 travel in the depth of winter, through bad roads, in the 
 midst of rain, hail and snow, in no very comfortable way. 
 Nevertheless, as soon as we were out of the city, and felt 
 the flush of air, we were like school boys on the play ground 
 on a holiday; and we began to kill time by all the means 
 that our imagination could suggest. Flashes of wit shot 
 their coruscations on all sides; puns of the genuine Phila- 
 delphia stamp were handed about; old college stories were 
 revived; macaronic Latin was spoken with great purity; 
 songs were sung, even classical songs, among which I recol- 
 lect the famous Bacchanalian of the arch-deacon of Oxford, 
 "Mihi est propositum in tabemd mori;" in short, we might 
 have been taken for an5rthing but the grave counsellors of 
 the celebrated bar of Philadelphia. 
 
 The Emperor Napoleon was right, when he told the 
 great actor Talma that he did not know how to act the part 
 of kings, when conversing with their confidential friends. 
 "You make us speak," says he, "as if we were in a public 
 audience in the full display of majesty. You should, on 
 the contrary, make us speak exactly like other men; when 
 in the bosom of our families, and with our intimate friends, 
 we take off with great pleasure, the mask that we have been 
 obliged to wear in public; and freed from that troublesome 
 constraint, we sometimes say and do more foolish things 
 than those who are always at liberty to do as they please." 
 So did the Philadelphia lawyers, when they had left the bar 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 273 
 
 and the judges many miles behind them. Mr. Rawle was 
 not so excited as some of us were : he was always mild and 
 placid, but his strokes of wit produced the greater effect, as 
 they came from him naturally and without study or pre- 
 tensions. Mr. Ingersoll sat serious and composed, thinking 
 of his causes, and little inclined to mirth. I sometimes 
 thought of addressing him with Cur in theatnmu, Cato severe 
 venisti? I shall always remember with pleasure those 
 delightful journeys, in which we all became intimately 
 acquainted with each other ; for on such occasions, when free 
 scope is given to the imagination, men appear in their true 
 characters, and no art can prevent them from showing therat- 
 selves as they really are. 
 
 Our appearance at the bar of the Supreme Court was 
 always a scene of triumph. We entered the hall together, 
 and Judge Washington was heard to say, "This is my bar." 
 Our causes had a preference over all others, in consideration 
 of the distance we had to travel. The greatest liberality 
 was shown to us by the members of the profession, who 
 usually attended that court. It was really a proud thing at 
 that time to be a Philadelphia lawyer. 
 
 We returned home, of course, in the same manner that 
 we had proceeded to the capitol. We occasionally met 
 with accidents in going or returning, but none that is worth 
 relating, except the one that I am about to mention. It 
 was in \ht year 1808. I had argued, against Mr. Rawle, 
 the cause of MTlvaine vs. Coxe (4 Cranch, 209). The 
 main question in this case was whether a native of New 
 Jersey, who had left this country shortly after the Declara- 
 tion of Independence, and had ever since resided abroad and 
 always adhered to his first allegiance, was to be considered 
 as a citizen or an alien. I contended that he was born a 
 British subject, and remained such through life. On the 
 other side it was argued that the revolution was a new birth, 
 and that on Independence being declared he was made a 
 citizen against his mil. On this I observed that I had never 
 heard of a surgical operation, by which the subject was 
 
 18 
 
274 Law Association Centennial 
 
 extracted from the womb, with the revolutionary forceps. 
 This produced much mirth on the bench and at the bar, as did 
 the strokes of keen wit which Mr. Rawle, who was a counsel 
 on the other side, shot at me in reply. On the whole, how- 
 ever, I lost my cause; and the obstetrical operation was 
 decreed to have been secundum- artem. 
 
 This little incident would not be worth relating, if it were 
 not for the comico-serious accident that it produced. The 
 cause that I have mentioned, being- the last we had to argue, 
 we immediately afterwards set out on our return home. The 
 argument of that cause was yet fresh upon our minds, and 
 became the subject of conversation, on our way to Baltimore. 
 We were all in very high spirits ; and the forceps was found a 
 very good subject for raillery. Mr. Rawle had said some- 
 thing about a poker, which hit the fancy of our colleagues, 
 and which I cannot now remember. When the spirits are 
 high anj^hing will do to found a jest- upon. So that the 
 poker and the forceps became the common topics of our 
 conversation. Every one cracked his joke upon one or the 
 other. Fingers were pointed at us, in imitation of those 
 instruments. To such a degree was our mirth carried, that 
 our Irish driver, listening to us, did not perceive a stump 
 that was before him; the carriage made a terrible jolt, our 
 Phaeton was thrown from his seat, the horses took fright 
 and ran away with us at a dreadful rate. A river or creek 
 was before us, and the bridge was not very safe. It was 
 determined to jump out of the carriage. I was pressed to 
 show the example, but I did not choose to do it, intending to 
 take my own course. I have heard it related, that at that 
 moment, I took a pinch of snuff very leisurely ; but that I do 
 not remember, and I very much doubt the truth of the fact. 
 Be that as it may, all except myself jumped out of the car- 
 riage. Being then left alone, I collected all my presence of 
 mind, looked about me, chose my position, and jumped out 
 so fortunately, that I fell upon my feet without the least 
 injury. Turning back to look behind me, the first thing I 
 saw was my friend Lewis, sprawling upon the ground, and 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 275 
 
 not able to rise alone. I raised him on his feet, and presently 
 came our companions, who all complained of being more or 
 less bruised. The driver alone, by a kind of miracle, had 
 suffered nothing from his fall. We all determined to walk 
 to Baltimore as well as we could ; there was, indeed, nothing 
 else for us to do; when to our great comfort we saw our 
 stage returning, under safe guidance. The horses had been 
 stopped in their mad career, and an honest countryman was 
 bringing them back to us, with the vehicle. We joyfully 
 resumed our places, and on our arrival at Baltimore at the 
 Fountain Inn, a surgeon was immediately sent for, who bled 
 all my companions. Feeling perfectly well, I did not choose 
 to submit to the operation. We spent the afternoon at 
 Baltimore, and the next day resumed our route towards Phil- 
 adelphia. We had a narrow escape. I am now left alone 
 on the stage of life, which they were doomed also to leave 
 before me. I hope I shall meet them safe again in a better 
 place. 
 
 In the year 181 5, was received the joyful news of the 
 peace with Great Britain. Until that period, a colonial 
 spirit had prevailed throughout this country, that had 
 checked all efforts at literary enterprise. The successful 
 issue of the war raised our spirits; and our minds took a 
 direction towards literature and science. The news was 
 received about the middle of February. On the 17th of 
 March, the American Philosophical Society, which had been 
 long slumbering, resolved "That a committee of their body 
 should be added to those before existing ; to be denominated 
 'The Committee of History, Moral Science, and General 
 Literature.' " This name was adopted on the suggestion of 
 Mr. Rawle, who immediately inscribed his name among the 
 members of the new association. 
 
 The business of the committee (as is usual in such 
 cases), was carried on by a few. The active members were 
 Chief Justice Tilghman (the chairman). Dr. Wister, Mr. 
 John Vaughan, Mr. Correa de Serra, Mr. Rawle, and myself, 
 who was the corresponding secretary. Our meetings were 
 
27^ 'LP'-^ Association Centennial 
 
 frequent, and Mr. Rawle seldom failed to attend. His 
 advice was followed in many instances. ' The report on the 
 structure of Indian langxiages, which the committee presented 
 to the society in 1819, when read at our small meeting, 
 received from him several valuable corrections. He felt so 
 interested in the subject that he entered into a correspond- 
 ence with me upon it, which the pressure of his professional 
 business did not permit him to continue. He questioned the 
 polysyllabic characters ascribed by us to those languages, on 
 the ground that, as they are not written, it is impossible to 
 know whether what was called one long word, was not in 
 fact, several words combined or joined together. His argu- 
 ments were ingenious, and in some instances conclusive. 
 Other questions were in this manner amicably discussed 
 between us. I regret that this correspondence was not 
 allowed to proceed farther. 
 
 In the year 1820, a society was formed among the judges 
 and members of the bar, called "The Society for the Pro- 
 motion of Legal Knowledge, and Forensic Eloquence." 
 The Law Academy, still existing, was instituted as a 
 branch of it, and under its patronage. The president of 
 this association was Chief Justice Tilghman ; and Mr. Rawle 
 was the vice-president.* That society was incorporated in 
 1821 ; and after continuing two or three years it fell through 
 by an accident; the room in which the election of officers 
 was to have been held, having been found locked, and no 
 election having taken place. It was not revived, and the 
 Law Academy has continued without it. 
 
 * I hope it will not be thought amiss to subjoin here a list of the officers 
 of that society, as first instituted. Those whose names are in italics are 
 deceased. 
 
 President — William Tilghman. 
 Vice-President — William Rawle. 
 Trustees : Charles Chauncey, Thomas Kittera, John M. Scott, Bloomfield 
 M' Evaine, John Keating, Jr. 
 
 Secretary — John K. Kane. 
 
 Treasurer — Benjamin Tilghman. 
 
 Provost of the Law Academy — Peter S. du Ponceau. 
 
 Vice-Provost — ^James Gibson. 
 
 See Hall's Journal of Jurisprudence, p. 222. 
 
Wharton's William Rawle 277 
 
 While that society remained in existence, Mr. Rawle 
 was one of its most active officers. It gave an impulse to 
 legal studies, and to the Law Academy, which has not ceased 
 to operate. As one of the founders and patrons of the latter 
 institution, Mr. Rawle always felt an interest in their pur- 
 suits; and as you have remarked, he favored them in 1832, 
 twelve years after their first establishment, with an interest- 
 ing and instructive address. He was the friend of youth, 
 and delighted in promoting the progress and advancement 
 of the rising generation. 
 
 I have thus, my dear sir, related to you all the circum- 
 stances of Mr. Rawle's life, within my present recollection, 
 which have come under my personal observation, and which 
 are not included in your biographical notice. There may be 
 other facts, which I might have mentioned, but which have 
 escaped my memory. I regret that I have been obliged to 
 speak of myself so frequently in this narrative ; but you will 
 easily perceive that I could not avoid it ; and, indeed, I feel no 
 small degree of pride, in finding my name, on this occasion, 
 necessarily connected with that of one whose friendship sheds 
 lustre on all who have had the good fortune to enjoy it. 
 
 I am, very sincerely, 
 
 Your friend and humble servant, 
 
 Peter S. du Ponceau. 
 
WILLIAM MORRIS MEREDITH* 
 
 by 
 R. L. ASHHURST 
 
 In looking backward to our earlier years and comparing 
 the older men we knew in those days either with our contem- 
 poraries, or the new generation we see growing up to suc- 
 ceed us, we are apt to think that there were giants in those 
 days, and the men of the present often seem dwarfed in com- 
 parison. I do not think, however, that it is this natural pro- 
 pensity which makes me feel that the character and per- 
 sonality of William Morris Meredith, for so many years 
 the leader of the bar, not only of Philadelphia, but of the 
 State, contained elements of greatness transcending those 
 found iti other men, whom we recognize as able and bril- 
 liant lawyers; and which deserve at the hands of his 
 brethren of the bar, which he honored and illumined for 
 more than half a century, special commemoration. I think 
 those of my fellows who were engaged in the practice of 
 our profession during the first two decades of the half cen- 
 tury which has just closed, will agree with me that Mr. 
 Meredith impressed us, as a man not only of vast intel- 
 lectual powers and capacities, but as one of so marked and 
 striking a personality, that he looms up in our memories as 
 the most commanding and distinctive figure, in our mental 
 picture of those bygone days; and that comparison with 
 other great men we have since known, tends to confirm 
 our conviction that in William M. Meredith the bar pos- 
 sessed a leader, with the unmistakable characteristics of true 
 greatness, which the vanished years cannot dim. He had 
 practiced law with Binney, Chauncey, Sergeant, and other 
 great lawyers of the first half of the nineteenth century, 
 who had died or retired from active practice before my legal 
 memories begin; but Meredith, probably greater than any 
 
 * Address delivered before the Pennsylvania Bar Association June i, 
 1901, and reprinted by permission. 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 279 
 
 of them, remained with us a conspicuous and brilliant link 
 uniting the past and the future. We possess, however, none 
 but the most fugitive and imperfect sketches of his life and 
 public services. I think I am violating no confidence in men- 
 tioning the unfortunate occurrence, which has deprived the 
 bar of a Memoir by abler hands than mine, and has also 
 made the task I have undertaken doubly difficult. 
 
 A former president of this association undertook the 
 task of preparing a biographical sketch of Mr. Meredith, 
 soon after his death, and his family had gathered with care a 
 mass of letters and papers to furnish the material for the 
 Memoir, which were placed upon the table in the back office 
 in Fourth street, which some of us remember so well. 
 Unhappily, at that very time, from some inadequately ex- 
 plained cause, a fire took place in this back office, and the 
 materials for the biography, as well as many of his books, 
 were consumed. It seems, as if like Don Quixote's books 
 of chivalry, all had been swept away, by a malignant touch 
 of the wand of an envious enchanter. More than a quarter 
 of a century has since passed, and no subsequent attempt has 
 been made to supply the gap in our legal history. All that 
 remains now of material, is what is embodied in books and 
 records, more or less public, some private letters, which, 
 because of their personal nature, had been left out of those 
 previously collected, and what may be gleaned from personal 
 memories. A few years more and all hopes of supply from 
 the last source will have failed. It seems, therefore, as we 
 open a new century that an efifort should be made to per- 
 petuate, as far as possible, what is known and remembered 
 of one, who for nearly half a century was the most conspicu- 
 ous ornament of the bar of our State, and whose life and 
 public services, including the first seventy years of the nine- 
 teenth century, and embracing service in both of our Con- 
 stitutional Conventions, of the latter of which he was presi- 
 dent, membership in the Cabinet of President Taylor in 
 1849, and the Attorney Generalship of the State during the 
 Civil War, seem to form a link between the early days of 
 
28o Law Association Centennial 
 
 our Commonwealth and the State as we now know it, which 
 no other life furnishes. 
 
 William Morris Meredith was born June 8, 1799, at the 
 house of his father, William Meredith, in Philadelphia. 
 Law had already taken a strong hold on the Meredith family. 
 William Meredith was a lawyer of some eminence in his 
 day, though better known in later years as the president 
 of the Schuylkill Bank; and his younger brother, .Jona- 
 than, born in 1782, was for many years a leader of the 
 bar of Baltimore. Jonathan Meredith lived until 1872, 
 only predeceasing his greater nephew, the subject of our 
 sketch, by a year. They were both sons of Jonathan Mere- 
 dith, the elder, who came to America from Herefordshire 
 about 1750, and settled in Philadelphia, where he accu- 
 mulated a considerable fortune for those days. Hereford- 
 shire is a hilly western county on the border of North Wales, 
 and the name, Meredith, is distinctly Welsh. So far as is 
 known, there was no connection between these Merediths 
 and the family of Samuel Meredith, who was Treasurer of 
 the United States about the close of the last century. Wil- 
 liam Morris Meredith's mother was Miss Gertrude Gou- 
 vemeur Ogden. She was a niece of Gouverneur Morris and 
 of Lewis Morris, a signer of the Declaration of Independ- 
 ence, and at one time Governor of New Jersey, who were her 
 mother's brothers. Mrs. William Meredith was distin- 
 guished for her literary taste and poetic abilities, as well as 
 for her personal characteristics. Both were commemorated 
 by as distinguished a critic and observer as Robert Walsh, 
 perhaps most prominent of Philadelphia's authors during 
 the first half of the nineteenth century, in his well-known 
 work, "Didactics," published in Philadelphia in 1836. He 
 spoke of Mrs. Meredith, in his article on "Female Train- 
 ing," Vol. I, p. 26: 
 
 "As a mother, capable of fully educating her children 
 of both sexes ; a wife, serving as the efficient counsellor and 
 partner of her husband in all his studies and cares ; a friend, 
 anxiously reflecting, judging, feeling, acting for those whom 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 281 
 
 she honored with her regard; a member of the fashionable 
 world, who assembled around her the gayest circles and 
 enlivened external entertainments, without ever losing an 
 hour, or omitting an effort material for the minute adminis- 
 tration of a large family; a writer, who displayed a mascu- 
 line vigor of thought and expression, and literary powers 
 and acquisitions of uncommon value and variety, who 
 wielded her pen without the least ambition or pride of 
 authorship, yet with the utmost intentness and any sacrifice 
 of self, when instruction or comfort could be conveyed, how- 
 ever privately or remotely. She made upon us, in the whole 
 tenor of her arduous way and the noble aim of her exertions, 
 an impression like that which we received, when following 
 the sisters of the Order of Charity through some of the 
 European hospitals; but even the angelic aspect and course 
 of their vocation do not raise so high an idea of excellence 
 as we derive from the picture of a matron who has fulfilled 
 all the destinies, and energies, and consummated the proba- 
 tion of the sex." 
 
 Mrs. William Meredith was a woman of deep religious 
 feeling, and a little volume is extant, written in her hand- 
 writing and presented to her eldest son when he was fifteen 
 years old, containing a number of prayers prepared by her 
 for his use, some selected from the Episcopal Liturgy, and 
 some original, and also a long letter of religious advice as 
 to his conduct and course in life. 
 
 Mrs. William Meredith died October 9, 1828. It is 
 related that her loss so prostrated her husband that he never 
 recovered his mental tone, although he survived her many 
 years. He had a slight attack of paralysis in 1827, before 
 her death, and a second, which wholly shattered his powers, 
 in 1839. He died in 1844. He is said, in the "Lives of 
 Eminent Philadelphians," to have been noted for the con- 
 ciliating courtesy of his deportment, for his refined and 
 gracious hospitality, and as a speaker, for the elegance, 
 grace and finish of his diction. Both Mr. and Mrs. William 
 Meredith were contributors to Dennie's Portfolio, and 
 
282 Law Association Centennial 
 
 formed part of the literary circle of which Dennie was the 
 centre. 
 
 William Morris Meredith was the eldest of a family 
 of eleven children, and after his mother's death and the 
 breaking down of his father's health, assumed in large meas- 
 ure, as I have been told, the parental responsibility towards 
 his younger brothers and sisters, which duty he performed 
 as he did all the duties of life — simply, naturally and faith- 
 fully. In 1806, when seven years old, he was entered in the 
 old Grammar School connected with the University, from 
 which he early proceeded into the collegiate department of 
 the University of Pennsylvania, from which he graduated 
 June 12, 1812, at the early, but not then exceptional, age of 
 thirteen, with second honor. I may remark that George 
 M. Wharton, who was only a few years younger than 
 Mr. Meredith, graduated from the University at about the 
 same age. Mr. Meredith's preparation for the bar was 
 more deliberate, as he appears to have given five years to 
 study before he was admitted to the bar in 1817. Mr. James 
 J. Barclay, who was an intimate friend of Mr. Meredith and 
 his senior by some years, in a short memoir inserted in the 
 Report of the House of Refuge for 1874, says that for some 
 time after graduating, Mr.. Meredith continued to study 
 belles lettres and the Greek and Latin classics, before he 
 commenced the study of law in his father's office. He was 
 but eighteen years old when admitted to practice at the bar 
 as an attorney. Practice, however, did not come quickly 
 to him. He often related that he had been ten years at the 
 bar before he earned enough to pay for his coats, or office 
 rent, and it was still longer before his success became 
 marked.. Therefore, one of the first lessons we can derive 
 from the study of Mr. Meredith's life is patience. Mr. Mere- 
 dith himself did not always find this lesson an easy one. 
 At one time — how far back during the waiting period I do 
 not know — he seriously contemplated giving up both the law, 
 and his native Commonwealth, and going to New Orleans 
 to engage in mercantile pursuits. How different would be 
 
Ash hurst's William M. Meredith 283 
 
 the history of the bar of the Commonwealth if he had 
 carried out his intent, and what a gap in our annals would 
 appear if his striking figure were absent from the picture. 
 Fortunately for the State and for the bar he persevered. 
 The enforced leisure of his patient waiting, was given mainly 
 to profound and incessant study. There was probably no 
 part of the common law as set forth in the Reports or the 
 Statutes which he did not explore, and for him, with his 
 phenomenal memory, to examine and study was to remem- 
 ber. Except for a few, and those mainly the older treatises, 
 he cared not greatly for text-books. He read the Reports — 
 the whole body of the English Reports — from the Year 
 Books down to the days of Mansfield and Blackstone from 
 end to end. With the reports of our own State he was as 
 familiar as with the State Trials, which he knew almost by 
 heart. I do not think he cared much for the study of civil 
 law; it was the common law which was the chosen object 
 of his affectionate study. He was very fond of the quaint 
 old book of "Doctor and Student," in which, as you will 
 remember, a doctor of civil law discusses with a student 
 of common law the comparative merits of the respective sys- 
 tems, and in which the student uniformly triumphs over his 
 learned antagonist. He recommended it to me for light 
 reading after I had given the due number of hours to serious 
 work. His conviction seemed to be that the further one 
 went back in the old digests, and in the Year Books, the 
 nearer he would get to the true source of the common law, 
 undefiled by extraneous admixture. I remember his telling 
 me I would find in the old black-letter volumes, that the 
 first difficulty, that of mastering the crabbed lettering and 
 abbreviations, would be the greatest; that the Norman 
 French of the old reports was simpler in words as well as 
 construction, than modem French, while the thought I would 
 find lucidly, simply and clearly expressed, so that the diffi- 
 culty was principally on the surface. He was very fond 
 of Brooke's Digest of the Year Books, which is certainly 
 an admirable guide, particularly on questions of pleading. 
 
284 Law Association Centennial 
 
 He delighted in Littleton on Tenures, which, he said, was 
 the only law-book ever written which contained not a single 
 erroneous statement or proposition, and deserved also the 
 highest commendation for its lucidity : I am sure he knew it 
 by heart. For Coke's Commentary on Littleton he cared 
 much less. He found Lord Coke obscure, discursive, un- 
 systematic and sometimes mistaken. He said to me more 
 than once, that down to the time of Queen Elizabeth, 
 lawyers and judges wrote and spoke clearly and lucidly, 
 and the study and ascertainment of what the law was, was 
 therefore comparatively easy and simple; but that with the 
 increase of learning as well as the complication of human 
 affairs, it appeared that the English jurists became dissatis- 
 fied with the simplicity and clearness of their law as it stood ; 
 and imported into their treatment of legal questions a com- 
 plication and obscurity, which did not really belong to the 
 subject-matter, and for an affectation of learning often made 
 that doubtful which had been clear. So that he thought 
 the difficulty and obscurity of English law books took its 
 rise from the days of Coke and Bacon. 
 
 During this period, like many other great lawyers, he 
 tried his hand in the defense of prisoners in the criminal 
 courts, and one of these cases led to an important episode in 
 his life, as well as to his first appearance in the Supreme 
 Court of Pennsylvania. 
 
 This was in the case of Commonwealth vs. Cook and 
 others, decided at Philadelphia, Monday, December 2, 1822, 
 and reported in 6 S. & R., 577. The case had consider- 
 able importance in itself, and has a special interest as mark- 
 ing an important epoch in Mr. Meredith's professional life. 
 
 Allusions to these proceedings may be found in several 
 contemporary and later records, but the only accurate and 
 complete history of the facts, is contained in a small pam- 
 phlet entitled "Statement of James C. Biddle and William M. 
 Meredith." Mr. Biddle was Mr. Meredith's colleague and 
 underwent with him imprisonment in the old Debtors' prison 
 at Sixth and Locust Streets, for contempt of court. 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 285 
 
 Mr. Meredith, as we knew him in later Hfe, while duly 
 respectful, was never subservient to the courts, and always 
 maintained the independence and dignity of the bar. It is 
 possible that the absolute fearlessness and indifference to 
 consequences which always characterized him, and the ardent 
 temper and burning hatred of oppression, which even in 
 his later years he had sometimes difficulty in controlling, 
 carried him too far on this occasion; but I think that the 
 feeling of the bar and the community was on the whole with 
 him at the time, and the belief general that his outbreak of 
 feeling was at least excusable under the circumstances, and 
 that the severity of the action of the judge indicated a con- 
 science not free from self-accusation. 
 
 The case was this : Three colored men. Cook, Caldwell 
 and Ross were indicted on a charge of murder, growing out 
 of the following circumstances : Three negroes had broken 
 into a house in the late afternoon or early evening, and 
 beaten and abused some of the inmates and stolen some 
 articles from the house. From the effects of the injuries re- 
 ceived, a boy, Samuel Alwyne, died. The prisoners were 
 brought up for trial in the end of April before a Court of 
 Oyer and Terminer held by the judges of the Court of Com- 
 mon Pleas of Philadelphia, the prosecution being conducted 
 by the Attorney-General, Mr. Kittera, and the defense by 
 Mr. Meredith, Mr. J. C. Biddle and Mr. Dunlap. Mr. Mere- 
 dith was at that time twenty-three years old, and had been 
 admitted to the bar for about five years. Mr. Biddle was 
 somewhat older, an intimate friend and companion of Mr. 
 Meredith's and afterwards his brother-in-law, both of them 
 having married daughters of Michael Keppele. Mr. Dtmlap 
 was the brother-in-law of Mr. Biddle, having married his 
 sister, and was considerably older than either of the other 
 lawyers. 
 
 There was a serious question as to the identity of two 
 of the prisoners, Caldwell and Ross : as to Cook there seems 
 to have been less doubt of his identity and as it appeared that 
 he struck the blow which ultimately proved fatal to the boy, 
 
286 Law Association Centennial 
 
 the question in his case was principally with regard to the 
 grade of the offence, whether murder in the first or second 
 degree. It does not appear whether the counsel for the 
 defendants had been engaged by the defendants themselves, 
 or whether they had been appointed by the court to conduct 
 the case. The trial of the case was conducted by the defend- 
 ants' counsel apparently with great ability and vigor, and 
 considerable friction was developed during the trial between 
 Judge Hallowell, who presided, and the younger counsel 
 for the prisoners, Messrs. Biddle and Meredith, especially 
 on the question of the right of the jury to determine for 
 themselves whether or not the grade of the offence was 
 murder in the first or second degree, or whether they were 
 bound to take the instructions of the court on this point. 
 The judge in his original charge told the jury that they 
 had the physical power to render a general verdict as to the 
 grade of the offence, intimating that they had not the right 
 to do so. The counsel for the prisoners insisted that the 
 jury had the legal right to settle the grade of the offence, 
 and the judge finally modified his charge so as to tell the 
 jury simply that they had a right to settle the grade of the 
 offence, without saying whether a legal or merely a physical 
 right. 
 
 The jury went out in the evening of the second of May ; 
 they came in several times with the report that they were 
 unable to agree as to all the prisoners, but stated that as to 
 two of the prisoners they had agreed upon a verdict, while as 
 to the third they had not agreed, nor was there the least 
 probability of their agreeing. It afterwards became known 
 that the two as to whom they had agreed were Caldwell and 
 Ross, whom they proposed to acquit, while as to Cook eight 
 of them desired to find a verdict of murder in the second 
 degree, and four, following the views of the court, in the 
 first degree. 
 
 Finally, after the jury, as above mentioned, had come 
 in several times, and after they had been out fifteen hours, 
 they were discharged by the decision of a majority of the 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 287 
 
 court, without the consent and against the protest of the 
 prisoners' cotuisel. This was on the morning of Friday, the 
 third of May. The outside feehng against the prisoners was 
 strong, and the public mind much excited. 
 
 On Monday, May 6th, an indictment against the same 
 defendants for assault and battery on one of the other in- 
 mates with intent to murder, was called up. Mr. Biddle 
 asked a postponement on account of the excitement existing 
 against the defendants. The court denied the motion and the 
 calling of the jury was begun, but was not concluded when 
 the court changed its view, and on Mr. Dunlap's renewing 
 the motion of postponement because of the excitement against 
 the prisoners, granted a continuance. The Attorney-General 
 then announced that he would try the defendants on the fol- 
 lowing day on an indictment for burglary, which had also 
 been found against them. 
 
 On the following day, Tuesday, May 7th, there appeared 
 in a paper published by Mr. Zachariah Poulson, known as 
 the American Daily Advertiser, a long sketch of the trial, 
 which the prisoners' counsel considered reflected unfairly 
 upon both the prisoners and their counsel, and unfavorably 
 affected the prisoners' prospects in the event of any future 
 trial. This article Messrs. Meredith and Biddle attributed, 
 and subsequent events seem to show, with justice, to Judge 
 Hallowell, the President Judge. 
 
 When the court opened that day Mr. Meredith called 
 attention to the publication in The Advertiser, which he char- 
 acterized as a gross offence against public justice, and a 
 serious injury to the prisoners' rights, and asked the court 
 to grant an attachment against the printer; and this being 
 refused, to instruct the Attorney-General to indict him. Judge 
 Hallowell was much incensed at the application and the dis- 
 cussion of the matter between the court and counsel was 
 quite acrid. The court refused to make any order and 
 Judge Hallowell vindicated the publication, saying there 
 was no reason why what had been done publicly should not 
 be published. The counsel for the prisoners urged the pub- 
 
288 Law Association Centennial 
 
 lication and the prejudice of the public mind, as a ground 
 for the continuance of the indictment for burglary, but in 
 vain. 
 
 The case then being put on trial the selection of a jury 
 began. The jurors were examined with vigor and some 
 acerbity by the prisoners' counsel on the question of their 
 having read the publication, its effect on their mind, and its 
 effect on their probable verdict. The court refused to sus- 
 tain any of their objections, driving them in each case to the 
 use of peremptory challenge. Finally one of the jurors, 
 probably encouraged by the language of the judge, replied 
 to Mr. Meredith when asked whether he had a bias against 
 the prisoners, "I have more against you." 
 
 Mr. Meredith called the attention of the court to this 
 insolence of the juror and demanded his punishment and 
 exclusion from the jury. The judge affected not to have 
 heard the remark, but when it was repeated to him, refused 
 to consider it as a ground for challenge. 
 
 Mr. Meredith then said, "I thank my God that we can 
 challenge peremptorily, and do ourselves that justice which 
 the court deny us. I have never known any court of justice 
 guilty of such gross violation of its duty, in refusing to pun- 
 ish the insolence of a juror to counsel in the discharge of 
 their duty." 
 
 Judge Hallowell said, "Take care, sir, we will punish 
 you." Mr. Meredith replied that he was prepared to meet 
 the consequence, and if he had been guilty of any offence the 
 court might punish him. 
 
 Subsequently there was a further angry collision be- 
 tween the court and Mr. Biddle. 
 
 The case proceeded and was concluded, and when the 
 court met on the afternoon of the next day. Judge Hallowell 
 said the court had received the day before from two gentle- 
 men, members of the bar, a high affront, and after refusing 
 to hear any explanation or argument, adjudged that William 
 M. Meredith and James C. Biddle should be committed to 
 prison, in the debtors' department, until the first day of June 
 
Frrun a Photop:raf'b by C ulekuns 
 
 Ct1/>NCELLOr. I as I - I 6.&1- 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 289 
 
 for a high contempt of court in the presence of this court, 
 obstructing the administration of justice. Again refusing 
 to hear either Mr. Meredith or Mr. Biddle, and threatening 
 to increase their sentence if more was said, Judge Hallowell 
 ordered the sheriff to carry the sentence into immediate 
 execution and take the gentlemen into custody, which was 
 done. They remained in prison until June ist, the expiration 
 of their sentence, when they were discharged. While in 
 prison they were as I have been told in receipt of constant 
 manifestations of public sympathy, the excitement against 
 the prisoners which had existed at the time of the trial, 
 having given place to admiration for the bold and manly 
 stand taken by their counsel, in the maintenance of the pris- 
 oners' rights and their own dignity. 
 
 The prisoners were again called for trial on a new 
 indictment for murder at the fall term of the court of Oyer 
 and Terminer. It was, however, on this occasion held by 
 two judges of the Supreme Court according to the then 
 frequent practice, Chief Justice Tilghman and Judge Dun- 
 can being upon the bench. Mr. Meredith for the prisoners 
 filed a special plea in bar, reciting the proceedings at the 
 former trial, and insisting that they were in law equivalent 
 to an acquittal and entitled them tO' a discharge, and that it 
 was contrary to the Constitution of the United States, the 
 liberty of the citizen and the laws of this Commonwealth 
 that they should again be put in jeopardy of their life for 
 the same offence. To this plea the Attorney-General de- 
 murred. 
 
 The demurrer was argued November 22d and 23rd. 
 The judges concurred in holding that the action of the court 
 of Common Pleas at the May term was absolutely invalid, 
 that the court had no right to refuse to receive the verdict 
 the jury was ready to render as to two of the prisoners, and 
 that that verdict must be presumed to have been a verdict of 
 acquittal, and that they were entitled to the same benefit 
 as if they had been once acquitted : and with regard to the 
 third prisoner, as to whom the jury had not agreed upon a 
 
 iq 
 
290 Law Association Centennial 
 
 verdict, they held the court had no authority to discharge 
 the jury without and against the consent of the prisoners, 
 unless in a case of absolute necessity, which was not shown 
 to have existed. The judges were careful to spare the feel- 
 ings of the court below as far as possible, Chief Justice 
 Tilghman saying : "I think it proper to declare that I have 
 no doubt of the integrity of the court by which this jury 
 was discharged ;" and Judge Duncan saying, "When I speak 
 of the abuse of their power I am very far from supposing 
 the court intended to oppress the prisoners." The result of 
 the case, however, could not but be regarded as a signal 
 triumph for the counsel for the defendants, and a vindica- 
 tion of their course. 
 
 Not long after this occurrence Mr. Meredith made his 
 first entrance into political life. From his early days a con- 
 vinced Federalist and Whig, as he was in his later career a 
 steadfast Republican, he always took a warm interest and 
 active part in politics, and a part of his preparation for his 
 subsequent career was his service for five years from 1824 
 to 1828 inclusive in the lower house of the Pennsylvania 
 Legislature. 
 
 Judge Sharswood says that though so young a man and 
 the head of a small Federalist minority, he was virtually the 
 leader of the House during the years he was a member of it. 
 Judge Cadwalader, his life-long political opponent, paid a 
 high tribute to Mr. Meredith's political career, and attrib- 
 uted much of his success to his practical familiarity with 
 politics in his youth. He said in his speech at the bar meet- 
 ing, after Mr. Meredith's death : "He should be recollected 
 in the relation not merely of an educated but a practical 
 statesman. He came into life inheriting the principles of 
 the old Federalist party, and cherishing a sincere love for 
 those principles, and he adhered to them with a consist- 
 ency worthy of imitation by all who in their public relations 
 claim to act upon well regulated principles. He was what 
 would be vulgarly called a politician; but with him it was 
 the conduct of a dutiful citizen ; and in all his political rela- 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 291 
 
 tions he served his country; and this he thought he did 
 most effectually by serving his party. He was the truest 
 man to party organization I ever knew, and I believe the 
 sincerest; but no man ever saw any political subject belittled 
 by his view of it. Mr. Meredith did not believe that the 
 government of a free country could be administered without 
 strict adherence — close, obedient adherence — to party organ- 
 ization. Upon this depends the liberty of a free country." 
 "Through his primary training as a statesman instead of 
 working from below upward to the principles of jurispru- 
 dence and of legislation he was able to look from above 
 downward. Hence, the remarkable example was seen in 
 him, of a man who dealt with the greatest facility with those 
 subjects which to others, less experienced, were proportion- 
 ately of the greatest difficulty. With every question of pub- 
 lic law, of statesmanship, of general jurisprudence when- 
 ever it arose, he was at once familiar. For that reason I 
 think that all efforts to exemplify the professional course of 
 Mr. Meredith by reference to particular cases exhibit his 
 character imperfectly, because it was the general, uniform, 
 complete organization of everything which was useful in its 
 elements, combination and effects, both in jurisprudence and 
 in the practice of his profession, which was his most promi- 
 nent characteristic." These characteristic remarks of Judge 
 Cadwalader, while few of us can perhaps accept them in 
 their entirety, contain certainly valuable truth, and I think 
 them helpful in viewing Mr. Meredith's career. 
 
 Among other valuable legislation which I believe we 
 owe to Mr. Meredith's early service in the legislature was the 
 incorporation of the House of Refuge, which, I learn from 
 Mr. Barclay's little sketch above referred to, was due to his 
 efforts. This was a very advanced step in penology for 
 1828, and one which has been prolific of good for three- 
 quarters of a century. He became a manager of the House 
 of Refuge, when he declined re-election to the legislature 
 in 1829, and in the same year became a director of the Penn- 
 sylvania Institution for the Deaf and Dumb. His connec- 
 
292 Law Association Centennial 
 
 tion with and active interest in both these great charities 
 continued until his death. 
 
 In 1830, a number of the younger members of the Phila- 
 delphia Bar commenced the publication of a legal maga- 
 zine, the Journal of Law. It was issued once a fortnight, 
 and its publication continued for about a year. Its form was 
 a rather small octavo. Among the association of members 
 of the bar who conducted this magazine and contributed to 
 its pages were Mr. Meredith, his friend, Mr. James C. Biddle, 
 whom I have had occasion heretofore to allude to, Mr. 
 George M. Wharton, Judge Hopkinson, of the United States 
 Court, Wm. T. Dwight, James S. Smith, John M. Scott and 
 Joseph R. IngersoU. The articles are unsigned, and my 
 knowledge of their authorship is derived from the manu- 
 script notes of the late Edward Hopper, of our bar, in a copy 
 presented by him to one of Mr. Meredith's daughters. I fear 
 very few copies of the magazine are extant. Mr. Meredith 
 wrote the introductory article in the first number, from 
 which I venture to read an extract. It is remarkable, I think, 
 as showing a recognition at that early day, of the evils arising 
 from the varying systems of jurisprudence of the different 
 states, and the importance of that effort at uniformity which, 
 after so many years, has enlisted the deep interest of this 
 association. 
 
 "In presenting to our fellow citizens the first number 
 of a new work, it is proper tO' state the views and purposes 
 with which it has been undertaken. 
 
 "It is always important that the inhabitants of a country 
 should possess a general knowledge of the laws by which 
 they are governed, and especially of those regulations which 
 affect them in the pursuit and transaction of their ordinary 
 business. In the United States where the people exercise 
 so controlling an influence on legislation, it is emphatically 
 necessary that they should be, to the greatest attainable 
 extent, instructed in the philosophy of general jurisprudence, 
 and in the state and leading principles of our own. Unless 
 such instruction be widely diffused, what is good in our 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 293 
 
 system cannot be secure from innovation ; what is evil cannot 
 be properly amended. 
 
 "It is believed, too, that any effort must be deserving of 
 encouragement which may tend to produce a greater degree 
 of uniformity in the regulations of the different states, on 
 those subjects which are not of merely local interest. In our 
 private intercourse and relations of business, or otherwise, 
 we are one people, while as far as regards the laws by which 
 our conduct and contracts are for the most part regulated, 
 we form twenty-four distinct communities, in each of which 
 a rule of action is prescribed, differing more or less from that 
 which prevails in any of the others. Inconvenience from 
 this source, to a certain extent, is already felt ; and unless the 
 dissimilarities and contradictions of our respective codes be 
 prevented from increasing, inconvenience to a much greater 
 extent must be expected." 
 
 Among the numerous other articles due to his pen in 
 the Journal one which seems to me to deserve special atten- 
 tion is on the "Uncertainty of the Law," which is as interest- 
 ing now as when written, and from which I beg leave to read 
 you an extract : 
 
 "At the present day every man has a fling at the uncer- 
 tainty of the law. Yet upon investigation it would appear 
 that in at least nine cases out of ten, the uncertainty com- 
 plained of is not in the law, but in the facts to which it is to 
 be applied. The law has sins enough of its own to answer 
 for ; — defects sufficiently abundant — contradictions — doubts 
 — even absurdities, which ought to be removed or amended, 
 — but, with all these, we repeat that, in proportion to the 
 number of disputes which arise between man and man, there 
 are very few cases in which, if the facts were clearly ascer- 
 tained, any respectable member of the profession could not, 
 without hesitation, say what would be the law. 
 
 "The event of litigation is indeed almost always un- 
 certain ; the LAW rarely so. Nor could any plan be devised 
 for destroying this quality of litigation. If the most minute, 
 distinct and intelligible rule were laid down for every 
 
294 Law Association Centennial 
 
 variety of possible circumstances (which, by the by, never 
 has been or can be done), there would remain sources of 
 uncertainty almost as fruitful as those which now exist. 
 For after all, what would be the rule of law proper to be 
 applied in any case would depend entirely upon the facts; and 
 those facts must be proved by human testimony, and to the 
 satisfaction of a human tribunal; the testimony and the 
 tribunal being both human, therefore both fallible; — ^the 
 former liable to incorrectness or incompleteness occasioned 
 by intentional falsehood, imperceptible bias, or defect of 
 memory — the latter (throwing out of view wilful error as 
 of rare occurrence) equally liable to misdecision from preju- 
 dice, misapprehension or defect of judgment. 
 
 "These are faults not of this or that particular system, 
 but of human nature. They will be entirely cured, when- 
 ever mankind shall be rendered perfect in honesty, memory, 
 apprehension and judgment, but not till then. Meanwhile, 
 can human wisdom afiford no alleviation of the evils actually 
 arising from this source? Yes — a great deal, by so shaping 
 the law of evidence as to facilitate, as much as possible, the 
 investigation and discovery of the truth. The law cannot 
 compel a liar to tell the truth, nor a weak man to tell it cor- 
 rectly, but it may provide such a mode of extracting the 
 testimony as shall be best suited for the detection of the 
 first, and the correction of the second, and it may at all 
 events take care that the natural and necessary difficulties 
 of the inquiry shall not be increased by arbitrary and absurd 
 rules for the exclusion of any light which might have been 
 useful. This is a vast and most interesting subject, — one 
 which we have merely hinted at now, but intend to consider 
 at large hereafter. It is in this branch of the law, if in any, 
 that reform, radical reform, is wanted." 
 
 This seems to me interesting both as an excellent speci- 
 men of Mr. Meredith's already matured style, and for its 
 advanced views for those days on the subject of the Law of 
 Evidence, for this was written, you will remember, in 1830. 
 
 One of the latest numbers of the Journal contains an 
 
Ash hurst's William M. Meredith 295 
 
 exceedingly amusing sketch by Mr. Meredith called "Dies 
 Juridici," giving a supposed verbatim account of a day's 
 proceedings in a court consisting of "Judges Buzz, Burly 
 and Pallet" held at "Vandalia." I wish it were not too long 
 for me to read it to you, as it is an excellent specimen of 
 Mr. Meredith's humor; but it is too long to be read in its 
 entirety and would be spoilt by abridgment. 
 
 During the years preceding 1834 Mr. Meredith's office 
 had been at the same place as his father's, viz., at No. i 
 South Sixth, in the bank building of the Schuylkill Bank, and 
 he lived with his father at the southwest corner of Chestnut 
 and Tenth, where afterwards the Assembly Buildings were 
 erected. 
 
 He was married June 17, 1834, to Catherine, daughter 
 of Michael Keppele, of Philadelphia, to whom he had been 
 engaged for some ten years, and soon afterwards removed 
 both his office and his residence to 9 York Row, on the south 
 side of Walnut, below Eighth. In the previous year, 1833, he 
 had been elected a member of Select Council, and in 1834 
 was chosen President of that body, which position he con- 
 tinued to hold by successive re-election until he accepted 
 the Secretaryship of the Treasury in 1849. Select Council 
 being then elected by general ticket, and from the old city 
 proper, was composed of the leading citizens of Philadelphia, 
 and to be President of that body was a great distinction. 
 Mr. Meredith's success at the bar, as has been mentioned, 
 was slowly won, and it was not until after he had been many 
 years at the bar, that his practice became large and lucrative. 
 I have referred to his early triumph in the case of Com- 
 monwealth vs. Cook in 1822, but success in the defence of 
 prisoners brings more fame than emolument, to a conscien- 
 tious and tender-hearted lawyer. His years of service in the 
 legislature also of necessity delayed growth of his prac- 
 tice. There has been a tradition for many years at the 
 bar that Mr. Meredith's success began with the celebrated 
 case of Commonwealth vs. Alburger, reported i Wharton, 
 470, the case which established the rights of the State and 
 
296 Law Association Centennial 
 
 City in Franklin Square, against the German Lutheran 
 Church, which claimed a portion of that square for interment, 
 under a grant from Thomas Penn. According to this tradi- 
 tion his success dating from that case was sudden and 
 immediate, and he sprang at once from a very limited to an 
 enormous and most lucrative practice, so that he was from 
 that time until he went to Washington in 1849 counsel for 
 one side or the other in every important case. Mr. George 
 W. Biddle referred to this tradition as a well established fact 
 in his speech in the Constitutional Convention on Mr. Mere- 
 dith's career. He did not give the name of the case but quite 
 fully described it, fixing the date of the decision as in 1837. 
 Mr. Henry J. Williams, seven years Mr. Meredith's senior, 
 in his speech at the bar meeting held after Mr. Meredith's 
 death, reported in the Legal Intelligencer of August 29, 
 1873, refers to this case as establishing Mr. Meredith's repu- 
 tation as a lawyer, and placing him in the front rank of the 
 junior bar. He also alluded to Mn Meredith's frequent 
 despondency and apprehension owing to the slowness of his 
 professional progress, and yet speaks of his having been a 
 very young man when he tried Commonwealth vs. Alburger, 
 so young that surprise was felt at the audacity of so young a 
 man assailing a title thought so well established. The Phila- 
 delphia Press of August 10, 1873, i" ^^ obituary article on 
 Mr. Meredith, gives an account of the case of Common- 
 wealth vs. Alburger, full of inaccuracies, in which also that 
 case is spoken of as the first which brought him prominently 
 before the public. 
 
 There is no question of the importance of the case, nor 
 of the striking ability with which it was prepared and argued 
 by Mr. Meredith ; and it is equally clear that the conception 
 of the course of proceeding adopted was brilliant — but it 
 is not the case, I think, that it marked the turning point of 
 his career, nor that his professional success took its begin- 
 ning from that case. Being of a public nature and one of 
 importance to all citizens it drew more attention than his 
 other successes; but at the time it was tried he had already 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 297 
 
 emerged from the ranks and his successful career had mark- 
 edly begnn a year or two previously. Commonwealth vs. 
 Alburger, reported, as I have mentioned, in i Wharton, 470, 
 took its beginning in the Mayor's Court of Philadelphia in 
 June Sessions, 1834, when an indictment was found against 
 Alburger and fourteen others for maintaining a nuisance in 
 the erection of a fence and wooden building in the northern 
 part of Franklin Square. This indictment was, according 
 to a not unusual practice in those days, removed by certiorari 
 to the Supreme Court, where the indictment was tried before 
 the Chief Justice March 14, 1836; and the motion for new 
 trial was refused by the Court in Banc April 20, 1836, which 
 ended the case. Now, Mr. Meredith was at this time in his 
 thirty-seventh year — hardly, therefore, a very young man, 
 and had been at the bar nineteen years — fourteen years 
 earlier he had shown his courage as well as his learning and 
 skill in Commonwealth vs. Cook. In the interval he had 
 been for five years a leading member of the legislature. 
 After his declining re-election to that body in 1829 his prac- 
 tice had been gradually increasing, and for the last two years 
 with great rapidity. In i Rawle, covering 1829 and in 2 
 Rawle, containing cases decided in 1830, Mr. Meredith's 
 name appears once as counsel in each volume ; so also once in 
 3 Rawle, containing cases of 1831-2, and in 4 Rawle, con- 
 taining cases of the years 1832-1833. In 5 Rawle, however, 
 containing cases argued in 1834-5, Mr. Meredith's name 
 appears as having argued five cases — some of them quite 
 important, and in i Wharton containing cases disposed of in 
 December term, 1835, and March term, 1836, Mr. Mere- 
 dith's name appears as having argued fifteen out of a total of 
 120 cases reported (including cases from the eastern coun- 
 ties). Of these Commonwealth vs. Alburger is the last 
 decided, and it appears as far as I can judge to have been 
 among the last in its origination, except, perhaps, the case 
 of the Philadelphia Savings Association, which was de- 
 cided on the same day also in Mr. Meredith's favor — 
 he representing the depositors in their claim for member- 
 
298 Law Association Centennial 
 
 ship against the stockholders. Of these earlier cases reported 
 in I Wharton several were of considerable importance, and 
 Mr. Meredith represented important clients. I may men- 
 tion the cases of the Union Canal Co. vs. Young, tried 
 March i, 1836, and decided April 14, 1836, and the case 
 of Spring Garden vs. The Northern Liberties, decided Jan- 
 uary 5, 1836, but in which suit was begun certainly as 
 early as 1833, and in which Mr. Meredith represented the 
 township of the Northern Liberties, in a contest as to the 
 ownership of the wharves and landings on the Delaware, 
 near Callowhill street. It is therefore apparent that Mr. 
 Meredith's industry, learning and ability had already brought 
 him into the front rank of the younger bar, when the Frank- 
 lin Square proceeding was begun. In fact, we have seen that 
 in 1833 he represented the Township of the Northern Liber- 
 ties, which is contiguous to Franklin Square on the north, 
 and that in the same year he was elected to Select Council 
 in the old city proper, and in 1834, the same year in which 
 the proceeding was brought, and long before it was tried, he 
 was elected President of that body. Early in the same year, 
 1834, he married and set up his own house and office in 
 York Row (Walnut, below Eighth). These circumstances, 
 viewed in connection with what we find in the reports, would 
 seem to show that his practice in the years preceding 1834 
 must have become sufficiently lucrative to enable him to 
 support a household, and that his success, legal and political, 
 had brought him well into the public view by this year, when 
 he became President of Select Council. His position in 
 Councils as well as his representation of the Northern Lib- 
 erties, made his selection to conduct the case for the deliver- 
 ance of Franklin Square from the occupation of the German 
 Lutheran congregation a natural one. Mr. Joseph R. Inger- 
 soll took part in the case as senior counsel, and Mr. Edward 
 Olmstead assisted as junior, but seems not to have par- 
 ticipated in the argument. Tradition gives Mr. Meredith 
 the whole credit of the victory, as tradition gives to Mr. 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 299 
 
 Birmey the whole praise for the city's triumph in the Girard 
 will case, which we will mention later. 
 
 This case, as to Franklin Square, however, is of so 
 great importance and Mr. Meredith's success in it so striking 
 that it is worth while to give a brief account of it, correcting 
 some common errors. The ground of the proceeding was the 
 dedication of the five great squares of Philadelphia to public 
 use by William Penn as shown by Holmes' map and fortified 
 by other documents, collected with great industry and mar- 
 shaled with the greatest skill. The German Lutheran con- 
 gregation, of which the defendants were officers, claimed 
 under a deed from Thomas Penn made in 1741. The 
 managers, however, had not accepted the grant at that time, 
 nor until twenty-two years later, viz., December 9, 1763, 
 when they paid the balance of the consideration money and 
 received a warrant; from that time the possession of this 
 northern part of the square as a place of interment had been 
 without interruption in the congregation. They had in fact 
 extended their interments beyond the limit of the Penn war- 
 rant. In March, 1800, the city had brought an ejectment. 
 In 1801 it was marked settled and discontinued, on the con- 
 gregation giving up the region beyond their warrant, the 
 agreement and discontinuance to be without prejudice to the 
 city's right. It is not therefore correct tO' say that the city 
 had been previously defeated in the litigation. The litiga- 
 tion had been suspended with a view to negotiation and with 
 a stipulation that the delay should not be taken advantage of 
 by the congregation. And the negotiation had been spas- 
 modically renewed during the interval of thirty years. It 
 was, however, the case that the lapse of time, between say 
 1763 and 1 80 1, during which the congregation had been in 
 peaceable possession, constituted a formidable obstacle in the 
 city's path, and but for the thought of proceeding in the 
 Commonwealth's name, so as to take advantage of the rule 
 "Nullum tempus occurrit regi," it is very doubtful if a suc- 
 cessful issue could have been hoped for. 
 
 The indictment came up March 14, 1836, for trial 
 
3CX) Law Association Centennial 
 
 before Chief Justice Gibson in the Supreme Court, to which 
 it had been removed by certiorari. After the evidence was 
 closed the defendants submitted to a verdict being taken 
 against them, on the charge of the Chief Justice in favor 
 of the prosecution on all points, in order to have the full 
 benefit of their defence in bam:, when the case was to be 
 considered on the whole evidence. There was, therefore, 
 really no appeal to the jury, and Mr. Meredith's wonderful 
 powers over a jury were not brought into requisition. Nor 
 was there any writ of error. The real argument was before 
 the Supreme Court in banc on the motion for a new trial, 
 when the case was elaborately argued by Mr. Meredith and 
 Mr. IngersoU for the Commonwealth, and by Mr. Randall 
 and Mr. Sergeant for the defendants. Judge Sergeant deliv- 
 ered the opinion of the court refusing a new trial, and sustain- 
 ing the Chief Justice's charge — holding Thomas Penn's 
 grant void, as inconsistent with the original dedication, and 
 that lapse of time furnished no defence for an encroachment 
 on a public right. This decision was final, ending the con- 
 troversy. The square has remained public ever since, and 
 there is no doubt or question that from 1836 until he ac- 
 cepted the position of Secretary of the Treasury, in March, 
 1849, Mr. Meredith was a leader of the bar of Philadelphia. 
 In the earlier portion of the period he had still to compete 
 with such men as Binney, Chauncey and Sergeant, but in 
 the later years of this period his leadership was undisputed, 
 although he had as competitors such men as Henry J. Wil- 
 liams, John Cadwalader, Thos. I. Wharton, Ferdinand 
 Hubbell, David Paul Brown, George M. Wharton, Wil- 
 liam W. Haly, some his contemporaries and some his seniors ; 
 and such younger men as Peter McCall, George W. Biddle 
 and St. George Tucker Campbell, were beginning to come to 
 the front. It is appropriate to pause at this point and 
 consider for a moment what manner of man as a lawyer 
 and advocate he was — and what were the elements of his 
 marvelous strength. Judge Cadwalader, in his address at 
 the bar meeting held upon Mr. Meredith's death, told us that 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 301 
 
 when Mr. Meredith came to the front of the profession, it 
 had become the habit of the bar to speak from very copious 
 briefs, and in many cases they read their speeches. Judge 
 Cadwalader said the restoration of true extemporaneous 
 speaking was due to Mr. Meredith, who, depending upon 
 his extraordinary memory, was able to make his most im- 
 portant arguments either without notes or with the aid of 
 a few points only jotted on a slip of note paper. Certainly 
 none of us who had the privilege of hearing his wonderful 
 oratory ever saw him use much more than a half sheet 
 of note paper, and often not that. Yet he spoke abso- 
 lutely extemporaneously, and without any verbal prepara- 
 tion. The substance of his argument on the questions 
 involved had of course been considered, and his memory 
 furnished him with the needed references, but for all else 
 he depended on the inspiration of the moment. Mr. McCall, 
 at the same meeting, with entire justice and in the pol- 
 ished language which we were accustomed to hear from 
 his lips, said : "Mr. Meredith's was a master mind — a mind 
 that reached by intuition what ordinary men attain by tedious 
 process. There was in him a combination of faculties and 
 powers such as is rarely found united in one man. Sound 
 judgment with wonderful memory, and marvelous almost 
 lightning-like rapidity of perception, a subtle and discrimi- 
 nating genius, a faculty of logical deduction, a faculty of 
 speech which could persuade a jury or command a Senate 
 — all this he possessed. Saturated with the principles of 
 the law, when new cases arose on which precedent shed little 
 if any light, when reasoning from analogy became import- 
 ant — or in any emergency or difficulty — such were his readi- 
 ness and fertility of resources that his services were inval- 
 uable. His eloquence was of the Demosthenian order. He 
 did not stoop to gather the flowers of rhetoric, but in terse 
 and vigorous Saxon English, without verbiage or repetition, 
 he addressed himself to the understanding of his audience. 
 He was capable of pathos and had the weapons of wit and 
 ridicule at command. Seizing at a glance the strong points 
 
302 Law Association Centennial 
 
 of his own case and the weak points of his adversary, he did 
 not dissipate his strength by skirmishing on minor points, but 
 concentrating his forces on the strong point of his case 
 marched on to victory." 
 
 Theodore Cuyler, himself a great advocate, said of Mr. 
 Meredith that in him were garnered up the rarest gifts of 
 advocacy he had ever known. "Vast learning, wonderful 
 logical power of mind, skillful analysis, powerful sarcasm, 
 a fund of humor that moved your heart and your feelings 
 so that you scarce knew whether to laugh or to cry ; a power 
 to mold other men's minds into sympathy with his own, and 
 to work out the persuasive results of the great advocate, 
 surpassing those that I had ever known to exist in any one 
 individual., He played upon the heart strings of a jury as 
 some skillful player upon an instrument sweeps its chords 
 and renders them vocal with the sympathies which for the 
 time move his own heart." 
 
 It is not surprising that he became fcKile princeps at the 
 bar, and that, as Mr. Biddle says was the case, for a 
 number of years preceding his call to Washington, no im- 
 portant cause was argued in the state in which he was 
 not retained on one side or on the other. His large and 
 increasing practice did not, however, stifle his interest in 
 politics, or divert his mind from public life or prevent his 
 giving his best services to the Commonwealth. He was a 
 member of the Constitutional Convention of 1837 which 
 framed the Constitution under which we lived until 1874 
 and took an active and leading part in its deliberations. Mr. 
 Darlington, who served with him in that convention as well 
 as in the more recent one of 1873, related that during the 
 whole period of its sessions, covering many months., he was 
 constant in attendance and earnest in its work. He opposed 
 many of the changes made by that instrument, clinging with 
 affection to the Constitution of 1789. 
 
 I have been told, however, that he supported the inser- 
 tion of the word "white" as a qualification of suffrage. While 
 this may be a surprise to some, it was consistent with his 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 303 
 
 later opinions. Strongly hostile to slavery as were his feel- 
 ings and convictions, he was always opposed to an exten- 
 sion of the suffrage to voters who would, he believed, be 
 ignorant and readily influenced. But of this more when we 
 come to the period of reconstruction after the Civil War. 
 Mr. IMeredith had been a Federalist and was a convinced 
 Whig and Protectionist, but he was unaffected by the Anti- 
 Masonic movement then at its height, and had no sympathy 
 with it. In the Constitutional Convention, therefore, he 
 came into frequent collision with Thaddeus Stevens, the 
 leader of the Anti-Masonic party, and the debates of the 
 convention contain many passages between them, in which 
 Thaddeus Stevens certainly did not come off first, even in 
 the play of wit and sarcasm. The debates between Meredith 
 and Stevens have been by some wrongly attributed to the 
 time of Mr. Meredith's membership in the legislature, but 
 Thaddeus Stevens had not, in 1828, yet descended from the 
 green hills of Vermont upon the fertile plains of Lancaster 
 county, and it was in the convention of 1837 that they so 
 often crossed swords in debate. Chief Justice Woodward, 
 himself a member of that convention, said he never witnessed 
 a debate which could compare with one he described be- 
 tween Meredith and Stevens : and said that on that day 
 Thaddeus Stevens' batteries were silenced utterly. It is 
 gratifying to know that the personal relations of Mr. Mere- 
 dith and Mr. Stevens were never affected by their contro- 
 versies, but were always of the friendliest character. With 
 the triumph of the Whig Party in 1840, when General 
 William Harrison was elected President by so large a ma- 
 jority, Mr. Meredith's devotion to its principles and services 
 to its cause, as well as his professional skill, were recognized 
 by his appointment as United States District Attorney at 
 Philadelphia. He took the office March 25, 1841, but was 
 not destined to hold it long. It seemed fated that Mr. 
 Meredith's public service under Whig Presidents should 
 be determined by their death, and the accession of Vice- 
 Presidents with whom he had little sympathy. He continued 
 
304 Law Association Centennial 
 
 to serve for a time under Tyler, but sent in his resignation 
 in April, 1842; no action being taken on it, he wrote to 
 Washington in the May following, requesting the immediate 
 acceptance of his resignation, which was accepted accord- 
 ingly and a successor appointed May 13, 1842. His great 
 and steadily increasing practice does not seem to have inter- 
 fered with his duties as United States District Attorney or 
 President of Select Council, or to have affected his perform- 
 ance of his public functions. During this period Mr. Mere- 
 dith accumulated from his practice a handsome competence, 
 despite his absolute disinterestedness and indifference to pe- 
 cuniary gain. Mr. McCall well said of him : "He set his 
 face like a flint against the practice of taking contingent fees 
 — insisting that it tended to degrade the profession — and 
 never took one. He was a man of scrupulous integrity — nay, 
 even of extreme sensitiveness — in money matters. I have 
 known him on more than one occasion to return a consider- 
 able fee which he might with perfect propriety have re- 
 tained." A conspicuous instance of this occurred in the cele- 
 brated case as to the validity of the will of Stephen Girard, 
 argued in 1844 before the Supreme Court of the United 
 States. Mr. Meredith was engaged with Mr. Binney and 
 Mr. Sergeant to argue the case in Washington, and their fee 
 was fixed (by Councils, I believe) at $10,000 each. When 
 the case came up for argument before the Supreme Court, 
 application was made in view of its importance to hear all 
 three counsel, but the Supreme Court refused to vary its 
 usual practice and the case was therefore argued for the city 
 by the two seniors, Messrs. Binney and Sergeant, who natu- 
 rally claimed the right, and Mr. Meredith could only sit by. 
 He had taken his full share doubtless in the preparation of 
 the case, but notwithstanding, he returned the fee of $io,coo 
 when sent him, saying he preferred not to take it, as the court 
 did not give him the opportunity of earning it. This action 
 at first sight seems almost Quixotic, but when we remember 
 that he was at the time President of Select Council, we can 
 understand the delicacy of feeling which prompted it. 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 305 
 
 During this period of his successful practice, Mr. Mere- 
 dith purchased in August, 1845, a small country seat near 
 Lancaster known as Wheatland, which he and his family 
 occupied for some four summers as a country residence. In 
 November, 1848, he sold it to Mr. Buchanan for the same 
 price which he had paid for it some years previously. As he 
 had purchased it without view of pecuniary advantage, 
 Mr. Meredith did not desire to profit by the enhancement 
 of its value during the period of his ownership. In Mr. 
 Buchanan's ownership its name seems to have assumed a 
 plural "s" and Wheatlands became a familiar sound in the 
 public ear as Mr. Buchanan's abode. Curtis' Life of Buchanan 
 contains some pleasant correspondence between Messrs. 
 Buchanan and Meredith on the subject, full of kindly regard 
 and mutual considerateness. 
 
 It would be impossible within the limits of this sketch 
 to allude to even a few of Mr. Meredith's forensic triumphs 
 during this period of his greatest activity at the bar. It 
 came to a close when, upon the return of the Whig Party to 
 power by the election of Taylor and Fillmore in 1848, Gen- 
 eral Taylor invited Mr. Meredith to take the position of 
 Secretary of the Treasury in his cabinet. John M. Clayton, 
 of Delaware, was Secretary of State, and Reverdy Johnson, 
 of Maryland, Attorney-General. It might at first excite 
 surprise that Mr. Meredith did not occupy this position rather 
 than the higher one of Secretary of the Treasury. It would 
 seem, however, that his consistent and successful champion- 
 ship of Protection, made him the logical Secretary of the 
 Treasury. He accepted the position and abandoned his splen- 
 didly successful practice at its height, at the call of public 
 duty. He committed the charge of his practice to his friend, 
 Mr. George W. Biddle, and removed with his family to 
 Washington, where he occupied the house just below St. 
 John's Church, opposite Lafayette Square, since known as 
 the Coleman House. It is the only dwelling house still re- 
 maining between St. John's and the Arlington, separated 
 from the White House by Lafayette Square only. The rela- 
 
3o6 Law Association Centennial 
 
 tions between the President and his Secretary of the Treasury 
 and between their families became very close and intimate, 
 so much so that on General Taylor's unhappy demise Mrs. 
 Taylor and her daughter at once accepted Mrs. Meredith's 
 hospitality and remained at the Meredith house until they 
 quitted Washington. 
 
 The most important matters which arose in the cabinet 
 during the brief period of General Taylor's administration 
 were the Qayton-Bulwer treaty with Great Britain and the 
 question of the admission of California to the Union as a 
 free state. The responsibility for the Qayton-Bulwer treaty 
 and the honor or censure due for its negotiation must, of 
 course, belong to the Secretary of State. Mr. Meredith 
 opposed the treaty in the cabinet, deeming it deceptive and 
 its benefits illusory, and its submission was delayed for some 
 time by his opposition. Sir Henry Bulwer sought, as I have 
 been informed, an interview with Mr. Meredith for the pur- 
 pose of removing his objection, and a conference ensued, 
 which did not, however, result in getting rid of Mr. Mere- 
 dith's difficulties. 
 
 During his official term, retaining the disapproval he 
 had so strongly evinced in 1822 of the growing passion for 
 newspaper notoriety, he endeavored to check the habit of 
 persons holding official positions writing for the newspapers, 
 and issued an order prohibiting the clerks in his department 
 doing so. A Mr. Robinson had acquired so considerable a 
 reputation as correspondent of a New York paper that he 
 persisted in keeping up his relations with it. Mr. Meredith 
 accordingly removed him, to his great surprise and indigna- 
 tion. 
 
 With regard to California, Mr. Meredith strenuously 
 and persistently contended for the right to admission of 
 California as a free state, untrammeled by any conditions or 
 compromises, and succeeded in impressing his views on the 
 President, and a majority of his colleagues in the cabinet. 
 General Taylor, though a southerner and a slave-holder, 
 was, like Mr. Meredith, an anti-slavery man in feeling and 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 307 
 
 judgment, and from his southern birth was able, probably, 
 to stand out the more steadfastly for what he thought right, 
 against both the blandishments and the threats of the Pro- 
 Slavery party in Congress. I believe there is no doubt of 
 the fact that when the question of slavery extension became 
 a burning one in Congress, Henry Qay, then the Whig Sena- 
 tor from Kentucky, waited upon the President and on behalf 
 of the southern Whigs asked and almost demanded, that W. 
 M. Meredith should retire from the cabinet, as being obnox- 
 ious to their unanimous sentiment. The President, however, 
 was firm in his refusal, saying the cabinet could not exist 
 without Meredith, whom he regarded as its balance-wheel. 
 The relations of Mr. Webster and Mr. Meredith, before 
 cordial, became estranged during this period; Meredith con- 
 sidering Webster's desertion of the anti-slavery cause and 
 support of the so-called compromise measure, as an unpar- 
 donable defection, and an abandonment of principle. 
 
 I have been told, on what I deem excellent authority, 
 the following incident which has never been published, but 
 is, I believe, strictly true. Mr. Webster called on Mr. Mere- 
 dith the day before his famous speech of March 7, 1850, 
 which marked his adhesion to the compromise measures ad- 
 vocated by Henry Clay, and his separation from his former 
 friends. He expressed his opposition to General Taylor's 
 administration and his determination to attack it, but said 
 he would not include the Treasury Department in his denun- 
 ciation, but would express approval of Mr. Meredith's con- 
 duct of it. Mr. Meredith replied that he was part of the 
 administration and so long as he remained in the cabinet 
 he was responsible for its acts and desired no separate sup- 
 port. Mr. Webster then asked Mr. Meredith's opinion as to 
 what position he ought to take in his speech. Mr. Meredith 
 replied that there was but one line he could take and outlined 
 what he thought that stand ought to be consistently with the 
 principles of the party, and with his own past record. While 
 Mr. Meredith was speaking, Mr. Webster nervously paced 
 the floor and left without announcing his final conclusion. 
 
3o8 Law Association Centennial 
 
 After the speech had been delivered, Mr. Webster sent Mr. 
 Gushing to Mr. Meredith to learn what he thought of the 
 speech. Mr. Meredith merely replied, "Mr. Webster knows 
 what I think of his speech," and declined to discuss it. 
 
 Mr. Meredith's was a mind constitutionally opposed to 
 compromise when principle was involved. As shown by 
 his beautiful eulogium of John Sergeant delivered a year or 
 two later, he had been opposed to the compromise of 1820, 
 known as the Missouri compromise, and praised Mr. Ser- 
 geant's consistent opposition to that measure or to any per- 
 mission of slavery extension. This eulogium is important as 
 emphasizing the three great articles of the Whig faith as Mr. 
 Meredith understood it, — protection to American industry, 
 the fostering of internal improvements and hostility to any 
 extension of slavery. 
 
 It goes without saying that Mr. Meredith was strongly 
 hostile to the Fugitive Slave Law which was a leading fea- 
 ture of the compromise legislation of 1850. He never ac- 
 cepted it as a constitutional enactment. A few years later, 
 when I was studying law in his office, and public sentiment 
 in the north was much wrought up over the frequent pro- 
 ceedings for the return of alleged fugitives from slavery 
 under this statute, I asked Mr. Meredith what he thought of 
 the constitutionality of the statute. He said in reply he had 
 once seen a poor ragged negro bound and haled by a rope by 
 several men through the streets, and followed by a crowd of 
 hooting men and boys. The negro had fallen or thrown him^ 
 self down and been dragged over the stony street and was 
 covered with blood and dirt; the ropes, tightened by his 
 struggles, cut his hands and wrists, which were also bleeding. 
 His screams and prayers for release rent the air. On inquiry 
 he heard the unhappy black had been ordered by an United 
 States Commissioner to be returned to a master in Virginia. 
 From that time, Mr. Meredith said he had felt no doubt that 
 the law was unconstitutional ! At other times, however, he 
 explained to me his view in different language. He never 
 accepted the case of Prigg vs. The State of Pennsylvania as 
 
Ash hurst's William M. Meredith 309 
 
 good law. While he recognized the constitutional duty of 
 returning fugitives from labor under the Constitution, he 
 maintained the States had the right of determining for them- 
 selves the facts and allegations on which the claim for the 
 extradition of one of their residents was based, and that the 
 summary provisions of the Fugitive Slave Law were in vio- 
 lation of the Bill of Rights and the Reserved Rights of the 
 States. Mr. Meredith, while he was a Federalist in the days 
 when there were Federalists, held constitutional views quite 
 different from those of some supporters of Federal power, 
 and in many ways his opinions were strongly tinctured with 
 State Rights, as pointed out by Mr. Biddle in his remarks 
 in the Constitutional Convention. 
 
 There could therefore be no hesitation in Mr. Meredith's 
 mind as to the questions of 1850. Nor did he then believe 
 in the existence of real danger to the Union, but maintained 
 that if northern statesmen would stand firm to their convic- 
 tions of duty, the south would recede from its threatening 
 attitude in which it was encouraged, he thought, by the weak- 
 ness of northern politicians. I am informed that on one oc- 
 casion during this period, when Mr. Toombs was indulging 
 in loud-mouthed threats as to what the south would do, 
 Mr. Meredith replied he wished they would leave off their 
 damnable grimacing and begin. It was Mr. Meredith's con- 
 viction that had a firm policy been then pursued, the party 
 of secession would have been easily repressed, not having 
 then gathered the strength it subsequently acquired througTi 
 two pro-southern administrations. He succeeded in hold- 
 ing the President and a majority of his colleagues up to 
 the measure of his convictions, and had it not been for Gen- 
 eral Taylor's lamented death in July, 1850, after a brief ill- 
 ness, the course of American history might have been widely 
 different. Mr. Meredith had prepared, during the spring 
 or early summer, a message for the President to Congress, 
 urging the passage of the appropriation bills then pending, 
 and the immediate admission of California to the Union. 
 The President intended to send it in immediately after July 
 
3IO Law Association Centennial 
 
 4th, but his fatal illness prevented his doing so. Shortly after 
 his death the members of the cabinet, with the exception of 
 Mr. Clayton, who was abroad, waited on President Fillmore 
 in a body and tendered their resignations. The President 
 asked them to retain their portfolios. Mr. Meredith, who 
 in Mr. Qayton's absence was their official spokesman, asked 
 Mr. Fillmore if it was the intention to pursue the policy 
 of the late administration. Mr. Fillmore replied that it was, 
 with certain modifications. Mr. Meredith understood what 
 that meant and insisted on his resignation, as did the rest of 
 the cabinet, and they left office July 20th. 
 
 The Merediths remained a short time in Washington, 
 having, as I mentioned. General Taylor's widow and daugh- 
 ter as their guests until their return to their home in the far 
 southwest. Mr. Meredith returned with his family to Phila- 
 delphia, and resumed in the fall of 1850 the practice of our 
 profession at his old residence, 9 York Row. Many changes 
 however, had occurred in his short absence. Of his seniors, 
 such as Sergeant, Chauncey, Binney, Joseph R. Ingersoll, 
 some were deceased and others retired from practice, and he 
 found the active work of the bar largely in the hands of his 
 juniors. From that time, though but little over fifty, Mr. 
 Meredith, while recognized as the head of the bar, prac- 
 ticed almost entirely as senior counsel, and rarely appeared in 
 court without a junior, and increasingly the resort to his 
 office was by the junior members of our calling, some not 
 much younger in years, it is true, than himself, to obtain his 
 powerful aid as senior. Certainly from the time I entered 
 his office, in 1856, there was hardly any of the business of an 
 attorney carried on there, and his practice was almost entirely 
 as counsel and barrister, the whole of the solicitor's part 
 of the work being done elsewhere by his juniors. He was 
 the senior selected by his fellow lawyers in almost every 
 case in which they could have their choice. And many 
 clients, remembering his former triumphs, were anxious his 
 services should be secured in all important cases, so that it 
 may well be that in its new form, his practice was as lucra- 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 311 
 
 tive as well as conspicuous as formerly, while it was much 
 less laborious, and gave him an opportunity for relaxation 
 and a return to literature and general reading, in which he de- 
 lighted. Soon after his return to Philadelphia, in 185 1 I 
 think, Mr. Meredith was nominated for the Supreme Court 
 by the party of his tried affection, the old Whigs. The polit- 
 ical tide was, however, then running strongly Democratic 
 and Mr. Meredith was carried down with his party to defeat. 
 He therefore never held judicial office, and what would have 
 been his success or achievement on the bench must remain 
 a matter of conjecture. Pennsylvania certainly lost by his 
 defeat a judge of profound learning, great power of expres- 
 sion and the loftiest and most delicate sense of right and jus- 
 tice ; but his mind may not have possessed so much the judi- 
 cial character as that of the supreme advocate. We cannot, 
 therefore, feel as much regret for this defeat, as for his defeat 
 by James W. Cooper when a candidate for the United States 
 Senate in 1845, when, by a singular chance, for those days, 
 the Whigs were in the ascendency in the legislature. His 
 mastery in politics as well as law, and marvelous skill and 
 readiness in debate, his eloquence and humor would have 
 made him an ideal Senator, and easily the greatest represent- 
 ative Pennsylvania has ever had on the floor of the Senate. 
 In 1852, Mr. Meredith warmly supported General Scott for 
 the Presidency, and it seems to have been the public expecta- 
 tion that if General Scott had been elected, Mr. Meredith 
 would have again been a member of the cabinet. A caricature 
 in the Democratic Review for August, 1852, represents Mr. 
 Ewing, of Ohio, Mr. Meredith and Horace Greeley as the 
 three witches preparing General Scott's hasty soup in the 
 charmed cauldron, while Mr. Seward hovers over them as 
 Hecate. In the year 1854 Mr. Meredith lost his wife, to 
 whom he had been united for twenty years of happy wedded 
 life. She left him five children, a son and four daughters, to 
 whom he was tenderly attached and to whom he fulfilled most 
 devotedly every parental duty. 
 
 Soon after his wife's death Mr. Meredith gave up the 
 
312 Law Association Centennial 
 
 home on York Row, where his wedded life had been spent, 
 and moved both his office and dwelHng to the old house in 
 Fourth street, which many of my hearers will so well remem- 
 ber. Here he kept his home until his death in 1873. It 
 would take far more time than the association can afford me 
 to allude to even a few of the more important cases in which 
 Mr. Meredith took part and in which he scored repeated 
 triumphs in the ten years which elapsed between his return 
 from Washington in 1850 and the time when the stirring 
 events of 1861 recalled him to political life. I may mention 
 that he was during this period as always senior counsel for 
 the Reading Railroad, and argued many cases for that great 
 corporation with brilliant success. He was the recognized 
 head of the anti-slavery men of Philadelphia, and appeared in 
 several cases on behalf of those active in that cause; notably 
 in the Passmore Williamson matters, in which he was less 
 successful so far as winning his cases was concerned, but in 
 which his splendid powers as an orator and lawyer shone 
 with unexcelled power. 
 
 It was a time in which he was able to enjoy more leisure 
 and give himself more to private and family life than in any 
 other period of his career. It was not the day of extended 
 briefs, and he had little need for them. Oral conference with 
 his juniors, often prolonged, it is true, into the night, gave 
 him the facts of the case, which his wonderful memory- 
 enabled him to retain almost without a note, and the same 
 memory kept ready for his immediate use the vast stores of 
 learning accumulated during his earlier years; so that little 
 preparation beyond this conference with his juniors was 
 needed. Sometimes, indeed, he knew little about a case be- 
 fore he went into court, and all his preparation was made 
 while listening to his colleagues and his adversary, sometimes 
 sitting, but often pacing round the court room outside the 
 rail, or bringing himself to a halt by the bar, with one foot on 
 the steps leading to the bench. Of course, he read the vol- 
 umes of Pennsylvania Reports as they came out, but he did 
 not, I think, do much other legal reading. He had not the 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 313 
 
 passion for modern and contemporaneous English Decisions 
 that some of our Philadelphia brethren had and have, but for 
 the most part seemed to think that the old English decisions 
 before the Revolution and our own Pennsylvania cases sup- 
 plemented by some of the reports of the decisions of great 
 jurists in our sister states, and the federal tribunals, furnished 
 a sufficient source from which to draw the legal principles he 
 sought to enforce. He therefore was able to give much time 
 to general reading. He bought a complete set of the bound 
 volumes of Blackwood' s Magazine from its earliest days, and 
 read them through with unflagging interest. He had, I 
 suppose, in his youth read many of its numbers which directed 
 his attention particularly to it. He delighted in Christopher 
 North and the Nodes Ambrosianae, as well as in its vigor- 
 ous and acrid political discussions. He took the Atlantic 
 from its inception, but did not like it very much. In Oliver 
 Wendell Holmes he could see neither wit nor humor, when 
 the rest of us were enthusiastic over the "Autocrat of the 
 Breakfast Table." I do not think in fact Mr. Meredith was 
 very much in sympathy with the New England mind or 
 habit of thought. He was a Pennsylvanian of Pennsylva- 
 nians, and represented a different intellectual development 
 and history. 
 
 He was fond of both chess and cards. Often when the 
 door was shut between the front and back offices he would 
 be found in the semi-octagonal back office playing a game 
 of chess with his brother, afterwards General Sullivan Mere- 
 dith. I first learned to play boston in his family circle of an 
 evening, and learned there much of the little I know of 
 whist. He did not care much for society out of his home, 
 but his house was always a cheerful one; besides his imme- 
 diate family it was constantly full of his nephews and nieces, 
 and was most gay when he was persuaded to come up from 
 the office and be the centre of the circle. His house was 
 the constant resort of his brethren of the bar and the bench, 
 particularly of lawyers and judges from the interior of the 
 state. 
 
314 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Always strongly opposed to the extension of slavery 
 to the territories, he affiliated himself with the Republican 
 party after the breaking up of the Whigs and supported 
 Fremont in 1856, and Lincoln in i860. When the mutter- 
 ings of rebellion were heard after Lincoln's election and 
 so many in the north were carried away with a passionate 
 anxiety to save the Union, at any sacrifice. Governor Curtin, 
 in compliance with popular desire, appointed a delegation 
 from' Pennsylvania to take part in the so-called Peace Con- 
 gress which met in Washington in the early months of 186 1. 
 William M. Meredith was naturally selected as one of this 
 delegation and went to WasHington and participated in its 
 deliberations, though without much confidence or expecta- 
 tion of any favorable result from any action it might take. 
 It goes without saying that, incapable of being influenced by 
 fear or favor, he stood with David Wilmot like adamant 
 against any compromise of principle or surrender of what he 
 thought right, and as Judge Cadwalader justly said at the 
 bar meeting held after his death : 
 
 "As a member of the body called the Pfeace Congress, 
 convened at Washington for that unsuccessful effort, he 
 secured the respect of those who differed from him by his 
 manly adherence to views which were ultimately carried out 
 to a successful termination." 
 
 The inevitable happened, the war broke out, and Mr. 
 Meredith, back in his home in Philadelphia, worked and 
 hoped and feared, like his fellow-citizens, through the 
 anxious spring of 1861, before the new call of public duty 
 came to him. His health had become impaired, as we all knew, 
 though few of us knew how much. But he and his beloved 
 physician. Dr. Caspar Morris, knew well how serious, nay, 
 critical, his condition was. His robust and stalwart appear- 
 ance in those days, however, and his hearty and cheerful 
 demeanor misled most of his friends and acquaintances. As 
 early as the first days of that momentous summer, besides 
 the national danger, a great peril menaced the Common- 
 wealth of Pennsylvania. A cloud of scandal threatened 
 
AsHHURST-'s William M. Meredith 315 
 
 to overwhelm the state administration, and destroy its use- 
 fulness at the time when it was most important that the 
 Governor's hands should be upheld in the common effort to 
 sustain the cause of Freedom and the Union. 
 
 The Governor had called a special session of the legisla- 
 ture to meet on May ist and the legislature had passed among 
 other war measures a bill to raise a loan of three milions 
 of dollars, a large sum in the early days of the war, and to 
 raise and equip a division of troops in advance of the call of 
 the National Gk)vernment. Meanwhile, the state had been 
 supplying to the soldiers raised in compliance with earlier 
 calls clothing and equipment in advance of the same being 
 supplied by the Government at Washington. It was as to 
 this clothing and equipment that the scandal and excitement 
 arose. It probably was the case that some contractors 
 behaved fraudulently. Other deficiencies may have arisen 
 only from the haste and inexperience of those in charge of 
 matters; but there was enough apparently wrong to cause 
 a great public outcry and a demand for investigation. The 
 Inquirer, a steady republican paper, joined the opposition 
 journals in violent attack on the Governor and his administra- 
 tion. At this critical moment, on the twenty-fourth day of 
 May, Mr. Samuel N. Purviance, the Attorney-General ap- 
 pointed at the opening of Governor Curtin's term in Janu- 
 ary, 1861, suddenly resigned his position in this brief note 
 to the Governor: "For reasons which appeal to my self- 
 respect I cannot consent to continue any longer in connec- 
 tion with your administration. I therefore hand you my 
 resignation of the office of Attorney-General of the State." 
 It is not important for the purpose of this paper to examine 
 the motives or reasons which prompted this hasty action. 
 But it fell like a thunder-bolt on the people of Pennsylvania. 
 Mr. Purviance, while not a man of transcendent ability, was 
 thought to be a man of character and judgment, and pos- 
 sessed the confidence of the public. And when at such a time 
 this resignation came in the midst of the scandalous rumors 
 and whisperings of which the air was full, public confidence 
 
3i6 Law Association Centennial 
 
 was paralyzed. Recruitjng was checked, but still more 
 dangerous was the effect on capital. The plans which were 
 under way to supply funds to raise and equip Pennsylvania's 
 soldiers and to put the Commonwealth in the position she 
 ought to occupy in the national crisis were blighted as by 
 a sudden frost. Governor Curtin and the friends of his 
 administration were told by the best financial authorities 
 that unless something could be done to restore public confi- 
 dence by the assurance that the honor of the administration 
 was under the guardianship of one whose character was such 
 that scandal and suspicion must shrink away from his very 
 name, it would be vain to seek to raise the necessary loans, 
 and the administration must hopelessly collapse. The Phila- 
 delphia Inquirer said on May 30th, "Honest men cannot stand 
 the pestilential atmosphere of Harrisburg, they must abandon 
 their integrity or follow Mr. Purviance." In this crisis 
 Gkjvernor Curtin's mind turned to Mr. Meredith as the 
 head of the Republican party in Philadelphia, as well as the 
 leader of the bar, and a man whose character not merely 
 for integrity, but for abhorrence of the slightest hint of 
 dishonesty, was so universally recognized, that if he could 
 be persuaded to take the vacant Attorney-Generalship the 
 situation could be saved. Could he be induced to make the 
 sacrifice? At his age and in his condition of health to 
 exchange his comfortable and happy home in the midst of 
 his loving family in Philadelphia, with a practice more than 
 ample for his wishes and yet such as he could manage with- 
 out too much strain, for the arduous duties of the Attorney- 
 General in war time; necessarily to be kept at Harrisburg 
 with its limited accommodations and comforts amid the 
 Sturm und drang of the creation of an army, with every kind 
 of new question and responsibility thrust upon him, and 
 with the limited salary given by the state in place of the 
 lucrative remuneration of his practice in Philadelphia. It 
 was late on a warm May evening, when Mr. Meredith's 
 family were already in bed, that Governor Curtin and some 
 other friends, among whom' was Mr. Morton McMichael, 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 317 
 
 found Mr. Meredith reading in his back office, and told him 
 of the situation and their errand. Mr. McMichael said it 
 was one of the most impressive scenes he ever saw. Mr. 
 Meredith at first decHned. The Governor threw up his 
 hands, and said, "Then the State administration is gone." 
 Their conference lasted late into the night. The following 
 day, a meeting with the leading bankers of Philadelphia fol- 
 lowed. Dr. Morris protested against Mr. Meredith's accept- 
 ance of the position, expressing the belief he could not live a 
 year, probably not six months, if he went to Harrisburg. 
 Mr. Meredith, however, saw the path of duty, as he believed 
 it, and did not long hesitate. To the surprise and delight of 
 the people of Pennsylvania, he accepted the position, which 
 fact was announced on June ist, and he qualified as Attorney- 
 General June 3, 1861. It was none too soon. A public 
 meeting of citizens to denounce the so-called clothing frauds 
 had already been held in the District Court Room. But 
 the situation cleared as if by magic. Confidence was restored 
 forthwith, and the loan was taken at once. Recruiting went 
 on with renewed vigor, and besides filling every call, Penn- 
 sylvania raised and equipped that splendid body of troops 
 known as the Pennsylvania Reserves, in advance of National 
 requisition. Mr. Meredith, I should mention, had satisfied 
 himself of the purity of the administration, and that the 
 graver charges were without substantial foundation, as in 
 fact subsequent investigation proved ; but the people took his 
 acceptance of the position of Attorney-General as in itself 
 a refutation of the charges, and did not ask further reasons 
 for a renewal of their confidence in the administration. Of 
 the importance of Mr. Meredith's unselfish and patriotic 
 action at this crisis, no one certainly was more qualified to 
 speak than Governor Curtin himself. In his speech in the 
 Constitutional Convention, he said that it was true that Mr. 
 Meredith had accepted with reluctance the office of Attorney- 
 General, "and the Executive from whom he received that 
 office is not ashamed to say to-day and in this distinguished 
 presence that he did earnestly solicit Mr. Meredith to take a 
 
3i8 Law Association Centennial 
 
 place near him as his chief adviser, and that his acceptance of 
 the office of Attorney-General dissipated a cloud which hung 
 over the administration, and gave new vigor to executive 
 power. For his services then, if for no other act of his 
 life, the people of the state are under grateful obligation 
 to him, and the Executive he served under a lasting debt of 
 gratitude which he will ever feel and acknowledge." Mr. 
 Meredith went to Harrisburg in June, 1861, expecting at first 
 to remain but a short time, but remained, as it turned out, 
 during both Governor Curtin's administrations, so that he 
 did not return to Philadelphia until the termination of the 
 Governor's second term in January, 1867. During all that 
 time he lived in a room in Mrs. Espy's boarding-house, look- 
 ing out upon the Susquehanna, and except during occasional 
 visits to his home in Philadelphia, and except when, as too 
 often, laid up by illness, spent his days in the Attorney-Gen- 
 eral's office in the capitol. His work during the greater part 
 of this time was very arduous. In an early letter to one of 
 his daughters (written June 19, 1861) he wrote: "I was up 
 on the Hill, as they call it here, by half-past seven, and I am 
 writing to you at about eight o'clock. So you see what an 
 improvement has taken place in my habits." A week later 
 he wrote: "Breakfasting at seven, working hard all day, 
 and going to bed at nine or half-past, as I am generally glad 
 to do, makes altogether rather a hard day." Certainly a 
 contrast to the comparatively leisurely manner in which he 
 was able to attend to his practice at home. Besides the 
 ordinary work of the office, a vast deal of labor and responsi- 
 bility in war matters came naturally into his hands. He 
 was intensely interested both that Pennsylvania should do 
 her full share in the war, and that her contributions and 
 sacrifices should be recognized and appreciated, and his cor- 
 respondence shows his close and minute knowledge of the 
 raising, organization and officering of Pennsylvania's quota 
 of troops, his pride in their number and efficiency, and his 
 earnest efforts that they should receive just treatment at 
 Washington. I may refer particularly to a letter of October 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 319 
 
 25, 1861, when he wrote: "Pennsylvania at this time has 
 actually in the field 69,980 men, and within ten days will 
 have 12,837 more, making 82,817 ™^"- I" addition she is 
 preparing and will soon send 18,253 more men, which will 
 make her total, exclusive of the three-months' service, 
 101,070 men. This is greatly more than any other state 
 has done. She has now actually in the field at least one- 
 fourth of the whole army." His brother, Sullivan Meredith, 
 afterwards Brigadier-General, was in those early days rais- 
 ing his regiment, and his nephew, soon afterwards his son- 
 in-law, James C. Biddle, son and namesake of his old friend 
 and colleague, was in the field. For them and many other 
 Pennsylvanians in the army, some of them relatives, he 
 cared like a father. The relations, never too friendly, between 
 Governor Curtin and Secretary Cameron, had become 
 severely strained, and Mr. Meredith naturally took up the 
 important task of conducting the more important correspond- 
 ence with the War Department at Washington. Although 
 his relations with Secretary Cameron were never intimate, 
 they were not unfriendly, and Mr. Cameron had, like all the 
 people of Pennsylvania, the highest admiration for Mr. Mere- 
 dith. Thus Pennsylvania's relations with the National Ad- 
 ministration were much improved by Mr. Meredith's inter- 
 vention. With Mr. Seward, the Secretary of State, relations 
 of friendship and cordiality had subsisted since old Whig 
 days. As showing Mr. Cameron's high appreciation of Mr. 
 Meredith, it seems not inappropriate to introduce an incident 
 here, although in time it belongs a little later. Mr. Meredith 
 never accepted the view taken by many lawyers at that time, 
 that the President possessed the right to suspend the writ 
 of habeas corpus, and dissented entirely from Mr. Binney's 
 opinion as expressed in his pamphlet. He agreed that the 
 Secretary of State and Secretary of War were entirely right 
 in making the arrests they did, during the early period of the 
 war, being justified by military necessity. But he insisted 
 that their action must be regarded as extra-legal, and that 
 Congress alone had the right to suspend the writ. Some- 
 
320 Law Association Centennial 
 
 what later in the war, I think after Mr. Cameron's resigna- 
 tion of the War Office, civil actions for heavy damages were 
 brought by some of those arrested in the incipient days of 
 the rebellion, against him and Mr. Seward. They were much 
 disturbed by these actions and asked Mr. Meredith to under- 
 take their defence. He frankly told them he did not regard 
 them as having any available legal defence, unless, following 
 English precedent. Congress should pass an Act of In- 
 demnity, ratifying and approving their course. Following 
 his advice, such an Act of Indemnity was obtained from Con- 
 gress and the actions were abandoned. 
 
 In the summer of 1861, Mr. Meredith was nominated 
 for Congress to fill the vacancy caused, I think, by Charles 
 J. Biddle having accepted the Colonelcy of one of the reserve 
 regiments, but declined the nomination, which would doubt- 
 less have meant an election. We cannot help feeling a wish 
 Philadelphia could have been represented in Congress by 
 William Morris Meredith during those momentous days, but 
 he rightly felt Pennsylvania could not spare him from Har- 
 risburg. His ease of composition and his direct and forcible 
 style naturally led to a majority of the important state papers 
 of the period being prepared by him. although not bearing his 
 name. Among others, I may mention that most of the 
 Thanksgiving proclamations of the period, whose beauty 
 attracted so much attention, were due to his pen. One of 
 them, that of November, 1865, was set to music and sung 
 in the churches as an anthem, a circumstance which interested 
 Mr. Meredith very much. It need not be said that these state 
 papers were of great strength and force, and produced great 
 effect at Washington, where Mr. Meredith's power and 
 insight were soon recognized. 
 
 When his friend, Edwin M. Stanton, became Secretary 
 of War, Mr. Meredith's opportunities for usefulness to the 
 state were much augmented, and besides what he effected 
 by public and official communication, he was able by reason 
 of his personal relations to Mr. Stanton and the latter's con- 
 fidence in him, to accomplish much for Pennsylvania and her 
 

 61361 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 321 
 
 sons, on whose behalf he was indefatigable. Mr. Meredith 
 was warmly attached to General Meade, and I have reason to 
 believe that the selection of the victor of Gettysburg to com- 
 mand the Army of the Potomac, was in great measure due 
 to Mr. Meredith's advice and influence with Mr. Stanton. 
 
 It was Mr. Stanton's wish that Mr. Meredith should 
 succeed Mr. Bates, of Missouri, as Attorney-General of the 
 United States. I do not think the position was ever formally 
 tendered to him, but at Mr. Stanton's request he visited 
 Washington for a conference with Mr. Lincoln. Mr. Mere- 
 dith's conclusion, however, was not to leave the service of his 
 native state, but to give Harrisburg the preference over 
 Washington. 
 
 Mr. Meredith had, of course, the ordinary routine of 
 his office to attend to, and with less assistance than Attorney- 
 Generals have nowadays. In a later letter to one of his 
 daughters he wrote: "I have just come from court, where I 
 have been since nine o'clock this morning. I was there 
 yesterday morning and afternoon. They adjourned at one 
 and met again at two and in the interval I had to dine. 
 To-morrow morning I must be there again at nine. Is not 
 this a hard and laborious sort of life?" He suffered greatly 
 from pain and illness and was often confined to his room for 
 weeks at a time, but endured the labor and suffering and 
 persevered in his patriotic duty. He received skillful medical 
 advice from Dr. Rutherford and faithful kindness and atten- 
 tion from Mrs. Espy. It is probable, I think, that in the 
 beginning he thought his detention at Harrisburg would be 
 short, and afterwards, when Pennsylvania was invaded each 
 summer, thought Harrisburg too near the seat of war, often 
 resembling as it did more a camp than a capitol, to bring his 
 daughters thither. 
 
 He still, in those troubled days, found time for litera- 
 ture. He wrote to his daughters about Shakespeare, Don 
 Quixote, Gil Bias, Horace Walpole, Isaak Walton, Froude 
 and Dean Stanley ; the latter two were new authors whom he 
 read first at Harrisburg. Froude he liked much, notwith- 
 
322 Law Association Centennial 
 
 standing what he thought his rough and rather uncouth 
 style. Stanley he thought guilty of fine writing, which he 
 detested. One day he wrote: "I have been reading the 
 'Pilgrims' Progress' again. It is the only allegory that I 
 could ever read at all, and it is quite as interesting and lively 
 as the best novels, and as Bunyan had a clear head and 
 knew no language but the common, vulgar English, the Eng- 
 lish of our Bible, the story is a model. The persons are all 
 real persons. The grave, kind old gentleman, Mr. Interpre- 
 ter at the Beautiful House, is such a contrast to the lively 
 young ladies at the palace near the Valley of Humiliation, 
 Discretion, Piety, Faith and Charity. The cautious inquiries 
 before admitting Christian — the old porter after satisfying 
 himself must ask the young ladies. Discretion comes out — 
 and makes her own inquiries — then goes in to consult. It 
 is Cranford over again, only the maids are not old. Then 
 the cheerful talk they keep up, the reluctance to let their only 
 beau depart — keeping him from day to day to show him new 
 scenery, and at last when he goes, they must just throw on 
 their bonnets and walk with him to the foot of the Hill, and 
 then bidding him good b'w'ye, they produce a small package 
 of refreshments that he may want on his journey. 
 
 "Then there is such a vein of apparently unconscious 
 humor running thro, here and there. You see Adam the 
 first trying to hire Faithful as a servant, and poor Faithful, 
 though half tempted, finally refuses. Then old Adam gets 
 furious and gives Faithful a tremendous pinch, so that he 
 thinks part of his flesh must be torn out. 
 
 "After he leaves Adam, Moses comes up, and without 
 a word knocks Faithful down — when he gets up knocks him 
 down again, and when the unhappy Faithful asks him what 
 it is for, Moses tells him because he, Faithful, had been half 
 inclined to go with the old Adam. Faithful then begs for 
 mercy, but Moses tells him that he can show no mercy — and 
 knocks him down again worse than ever, and Faithful says 
 he certainly would have been killed if One passing by had 
 not told Moses to forbear. 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 323 
 
 "It is odd that two of the greatest writers of fiction or 
 poetry should have been Dr. Fox, a linen draper, and Bunyan, 
 a tinker. Neither of them was admitted by his contem- 
 poraries to belong to literature at all — in fact they were too 
 thoroughly despised to be even mentioned by any other 
 writers of the day, and yet after two hundred years they are 
 read with passionate admiration while their supercilious con- 
 temporaries are scarcely read at all. With all its charm of 
 a lighter character, the 'Pilgrims' Progress' is the most 
 tender and touching scheme of Christianity that human hands 
 ever constructed." 
 
 This letter I have given almost in its entirety because 
 of the glimpse it gives of Mr. Meredith's characteristic 
 humor, not exempt from the paradox in which he took 
 pleasure. 
 
 In this connection it may be appropriate to refer to the 
 fact that, educated by his deeply religious mother, Mr. Mere- 
 dith always retained a profound reverence and respect for 
 sincere religion. He was for many years a vestryman of 
 old Christ Church, of which he was a regular attendant, 
 and which he frequently represented in the General Conven- 
 tion. For demonstrative and ostentatious professions of 
 piety, however, he entertained a great aversion and deep 
 distrust. It is this fact which explains an anecdote not 
 unfamiliar in Philadelphia, and which I believe entirely well 
 founded. Mr. Meredith was induced in his later years by a 
 person having a high reputation at the time for integrity as 
 well as sagacity, and closely connected with one of our great 
 railroad companies, to purchase a large amount of the stock 
 of a corporation in the interior of the state, with which he 
 knew this person was familiar, and in which he was known 
 to be largely interested. The corporation came to grief 
 shortly afterwards, and the investment proved an almost 
 total loss, and Mr. Meredith found that not only had his 
 informant and adviser sold out his own stock, but that he 
 had sold it practically to Mr. Meredith himself through a 
 third party. He also learned what he had not previously 
 
324 Law Association Centennial 
 
 known, that his vendor was a man loud in his religious pro- 
 fessions. The amount was more than Mr. Meredith could 
 afford to lose, and he felt more bitterly about it than he 
 usually did about pecuniary matters, as to which he was, for 
 the most part, singularly indifferent. In speaking of the 
 matter to a friend and brother lawyer, now deceased, he 
 said : "Confound the fellow, why did he not tell me he was 
 pious, then I would have been on my guard." 
 
 Towards the end of his service as Attorney-General 
 occurred the argument before the Supreme Court at Wilkes- 
 barre of the case of Commonwealth vs. The Atlantic and 
 Great Western Railroad, which is described by Mr. Cuyler 
 and by the late Chief Justice Woodward as the greatest pro- 
 fessional struggle ever witnessed. Mr. Meredith, of course, 
 represented the Commonwealth, and is said to have surpassed 
 himself, while Judge Black shone with his usual brilliancy 
 on the other side. 
 
 It was the first and last time the Supreme Court ever 
 sat at Wilkesbarre, and it produced a great sensation. Chief 
 Justice Woodward related, as showing the impression pro- 
 duced by this struggle, that a lawyer of respectable practice 
 and position in Wilkesbarre came to him after hearing the 
 argument and told him he was going to take down his sign 
 as an attorney and close his ofifice, that if it was this to 
 be a lawyer he had been practicing for years without being 
 one and felt hopeless of ever becoming one. The Chief Jus- 
 tice told him if he would go home and study the old entries, 
 the statutes, and the common law in its history, as Mr. Mere- 
 dith had for twelve years before getting into active practice, 
 he might hope to break a lance in such a contest as he had 
 witnessed, Omnia- vincit Labor Improbus. 
 
 This incident leads me to recall that Judge Black was 
 on intimate terms of friendship with Mr. Meredith, though 
 they were politically so far apart, and a frequent guest at his 
 house in Philadelphia. I am informed that Judge Black 
 had formed the intention of writing a life of Mr. Meredith, 
 but alas, left it unaccomplished. 
 
Ashhurst's William M. Meredith 325 
 
 Mr. Meredith saw the war end during his term of office 
 and the process of Reconstruction begin. He was strongly- 
 opposed to much of what was done in the way of Recon- 
 struction, both what Mr. Lincoln began and what Andrew 
 Johnson went on with. He deemed the terms granted to the 
 South far too mild, and the restoration of political rights, 
 particularly to the leaders, far too early. 
 
 Consistent in his opinions, however, he was equally op- 
 posed to the amendment granting suffrage to the negro. In 
 his judgment the negro was certain to fall soon under the 
 dominating influence of his former master, so that the result, 
 he thought, would be to increase the power of the South. In 
 fact, Mr. Meredith approved neither of universal amnesty nor 
 universal suffrage. The ultimate result of the latter seems 
 to tend to confirm Mr. Meredith's expectations, though 
 brought about in a way he was far from anticipating. In 
 the early period of his Attorney-Generalship he took part in 
 organizing the Union League, a body which did incalculable 
 good in those stormy days in organizing and uniting patri- 
 otic sentiment and action, and was the first president of that 
 great association. 
 
 When Mr. Meredith returned to his home in 1867 his 
 health was much broken and I think his vitality decidedly 
 impaired. His practice was of course lost by six years' 
 absence during this period of rapid change and development. 
 He was, however, still retained as senior in many cases, 
 quite as many, in fact, as his failing strength would allow 
 him to take part in. We could not but recognize that his 
 physical vigor, formerly so remarkable, had departed. He 
 moved slowly and feebly, and his voice had lost much of its 
 resonance and power, and would only hold out for a brief 
 half hour or so. Indeed, during the remaining period of his 
 life his arguments for the most part occupied but fifteen or 
 twenty minutes. They were still models of their kind. The 
 one or at most two leading points in the case would be 
 selected, and the argument in the most condensed language 
 and irresistible logic concentrated upon them, and they re- 
 
326 Law Association Centennial 
 
 tained their old efifectiveness, but it was most apparent that 
 he had given to the Commonwealth he so dearly loved the 
 vigorous autumn of his powers, and that the chill of winter 
 was coming over that marvelous eloquence. 
 
 It was after his return from Harrisburg that he under- 
 went a severe attack of rheumatic iritis. Dr. Harlan, who 
 attended him, was obliged to prohibit all use of his eyes, and 
 to interdict books and reading absolutely for a considerable 
 time. He asked Mr. Meredith a little later whether he did 
 not find the privation severe, and whether time did not hang 
 heavily on his hands. Mr. Meredith answered, "No." He 
 could occupy his mind by taking up a train of thought and 
 following it through books he had read until he was tired of 
 it, when he could take up another in like manner. The anec- 
 dote is interesting both as showing Mr. Meredith's patience, 
 and his complete command of his wonderful memory, which 
 could produce to him on his mental summons, book after 
 book which he had read, almost in their entirety. 
 
 But it was written that the last of his strength and the 
 remaining years of his life should be given to his state and to 
 his country. Mr. Meredith was selected by General Grant 
 as one of the counsel to present and argue the case of the 
 United States before the Geneva Tribunal. He accepted the 
 duty and took an active and efficient part in the preparation of 
 the case, and of the briefs presented. I have been told that 
 the ultimate decision of the case in favor of the United 
 States, was essentially upon the lines of the argument Mr. 
 Meredith prepared. It is certain he strongly dissented from 
 the portion of the case and argument which was overruled 
 by the Tribunal. It would have been almost too much to 
 hope that he could in the condition of his health have been 
 able to make the voyage and conduct the argument, and his 
 relinquishment of the journey to Geneva was undoubtedly 
 wise, though a great disappointment to Pennsylvania. It 
 may be mentioned that with his usual magnanimity in finan- 
 cial matters Mr. Meredith refused to accept any compensa- 
 tion from the United States for his advice and services in 
 
Ash hurst's William M. Meredith 327 
 
 the preparation of the case. Equally honorable and laborious 
 duty, however, occupied him at home. He was elected in 
 1 87 1 at the head of the Republican ticket as a member of the 
 Constitutional Convention of 1872-3, and was elected, by the 
 unanimous vote of the Convention when they assembled, 
 their President. He gave himself unreservedly to the great 
 work committed to this body, and worked assiduously with it 
 until his last illness in June, 1873, when he appointed Mr. 
 Walker President pro tern in his place, expecting to be 
 able ere long to resume the chair. His expectation was 
 not realized, however. The potent poison of his disease 
 at last o'ercrowded his spirit and he passed away August 
 17, 1873. His indomitable will, in fact, had sustained him 
 for years past against the pressure of illness and infirmity, 
 that would have held almost any one else a prisoner in 
 his room. I have heard of his being met by acquaintances 
 on his way from his Fourth street house to the Convention, 
 so exhausted he could hardly put one foot before another, 
 leaning against a lamp-post to recover strength and save 
 himself from falling, but he went on to the Convention hall, 
 and did not relinquish the gavel until it fell from his hand. 
 The records of the last as of the earlier Convention are 
 full of the service which, with his last failing powers, he 
 did the state. Pennsylvania has had to mourn no greater 
 son nor is there any whose memory and example should 
 be more precious to her people. 
 
SOME RECOLLECTIONS OF THE BAR OF 
 FIFTY YEARS AGO 
 
 by 
 
 JOHN C. BULLITT 
 
 When I was admitted to the bar in June, 1849, 1 saw an 
 array of solid, substantial and able lawyers, who had already 
 control of the valuable and important business of the city. 
 They commanded the confidence of the community and were 
 fully equal to all professional requirements. It was a sub- 
 ject of deep interest to note the characteristics of the men 
 who were then in the foremost ranks. It was somewhat 
 disturbing to contemplate the attempt to achieve position 
 among those who had already attained to such eminence. 
 With no claim for recognition and without the benefit of 
 special relations or influences upon which reliance could be 
 placed, it was not a promising outlook for a stranger. In 
 time, however, intercourse proved to be easy and pleasant, 
 not only with the younger men, but also with many of those 
 whose age and assured position gave more than ordinary 
 interest to such intercourse, as opportunity offered for its 
 cultivation. 
 
 Among those with whom I was thrown into contact at 
 this period there is no one whom I remember with more 
 grateful pleasure than Mr. Joseph G. Qarkson. He was 
 a fine-looking man ; full and round in form ; kind and gen- 
 erous in natural warmth and ready to extend a genial wel- 
 come to one whom he knew to be a stranger. One of the 
 earlier cases with which I became familiar, by reason of its 
 importance and the questions which it involved, was that of 
 Derby vs. The Philadelphia & Reading Railroad. It was 
 tried in the United States Circuit Court in April, 185 1. 
 The suit was brought to recover damages sustained by the 
 plaintiff in a collision on the defendant's railroad, caused by 
 negligence of its employees. The chief defence relied upon 
 
Bullitt's Recollections of Fifty Years Ago 329 
 
 was, that the plaintiff was a stockholder and a guest of the 
 company, and that he had not paid any fare. The Court 
 held that these facts did not constitute a good defence, and 
 that the right to recover did not depend upon any con- 
 tractual relations, but upon the broad rule of negligence of 
 the servant for which the master was responsible. Mr. 
 Clarkson's argument, as senior counsel, was a masterly dis- 
 cussion of the law as well as the facts. He did not live to 
 take part in the hearing before the United States Supreme 
 Court in 1852. But the judgment in the Circuit Court was 
 affirmed in an opinion by Mr. Justice Grier (Howard's 
 Reports, vol. 14, p. 468), which has since been an author- 
 ity in this class of cases. 
 
 Mr. Qarkson's life was too short to enable him to 
 attain the full measure of success and reputation to which 
 his ability and noble qualities entitled him to aspire. But 
 he did achieve high rank, and his comparatively brief career 
 gave promise of a brilliant future. He was, as far as I was 
 able to form an opinion, one of the best types of the lawyers 
 of his day. 
 
 At the time referred to, the lawyers' offices were largely 
 on Fourth Street from Chestnut to Spruce ; on Walnut from 
 Fourth to Eighth Streets; and on Sixth Street from Chest- 
 nut to Locust. As a rule they had their offices and dwell- 
 ings in the same building — the two lower rooms in the front 
 being used as offices, and the remainder of the house for the 
 dwelling. They were in such close proximity to the courts, 
 and to each other, as to render intercourse easy and fre- 
 quent. They were a genial, pleasant-tempered, and liberal- 
 minded set of men. In those days typewriters and tele- 
 phones were unknown. Stenographers were not used, and 
 the telegraph was sparingly employed. Most offices had one 
 or more students who performed clerical duties. But the 
 real work devolved upon the head of the office. There were 
 no partnerships. A lawyer was obliged to prepare all his 
 
330 Law Association Centennial 
 
 own contracts, wills, and other documents of that character; 
 draw his own declarations, pleas and bills and answers in 
 equity proceedings; try his cases and practically to do the 
 work of the office himself, the clerks only relieving him 
 to some extent by copying and acting as messengers. Meet- 
 ings with clients, conferences with other lawyers, and the 
 examination and coaching of witnesses were, to a consider- 
 able extent, done in the evening. It was seldom that a 
 lawyer could get through and throw off his business before 
 lo or 12 o'clock at night. They were hard working and 
 frugal. Their charges were reasonable, and they did not 
 often acquire what, even in those moderate days, could be 
 called a fortune. 
 
 The District Court sat in banc on Saturday morning, 
 in the second story back room at Sixth and Chestnut Streets. 
 This was a sort of legal exchange. There the lawyers 
 assembled. Some to argue cases, and some for the purpose 
 of talking and laughing and having a good time. One was 
 sure to meet pretty much everybody who was worth seeing. 
 Agreements for trials, settlements of litigated cases and 
 arrangements of every imaginable kind of controversies, 
 were discussed and considered. Often large transactions 
 were originated and others consummated. Here wits and 
 humorists, such as George Northrop, Edward Hopper and 
 John T. Montgomery, found a fitting place to get off their 
 last good things. Oftentimes the noisy din of half sup- 
 pressed voices and stifled laughter was such as to reduce the 
 Court to a sort of side show, and when the presiding judge 
 would come down with his gavel and call for order and 
 silence, it was felt that he was rudely interrupting the busi- 
 ness of the day. There was a wide and diversified range in 
 subject and line of thought. History, biography, politics, 
 finances, anecdotes and incidents of the past and present, 
 contributed each their share to the conversation that flowed 
 in an easy and spontaneous stream. It was in itself lib- 
 eral education; knowledge was expanded; thought was 
 strengthened and developed; the wits were quickened and 
 
Bullitt's Recollections of Fifty Years Ago 331 
 
 the whole mental and moral nature was enlivened and invig- 
 orated by the process. It conduced to unity of feeling and 
 to the cultivation of frank and unrestrained intercourse and 
 friendship. The harmony and good fellowship which pre- 
 vailed were not even seriously disturbed by the asperities 
 incident to the Civil War. They continued down to the 
 time of the adoption of the Constitution in 1874, when the 
 District Court was abolished. While the changes which 
 were then made may have been expedient, it was a source of 
 deep regret with myself as well as many others that it also 
 had the effect of abolishing these meetings. These Satur- 
 days in the Old District Court are among the most pleasant 
 reminiscences of that long ago past. 
 
 Mr. Binney in 1859 made a most interesting and valu- 
 able contribution to the literature of the bar, in his work 
 entitled "The Leaders of the Old Bar of Philadelphia." Its 
 purpose was to^ rescue from oblivion the memories of some 
 of the distinguished lawyers of the period beginning with 
 the close of the Revolution and coming down through the 
 first quarter of the nineteenth century. The cities of the 
 country were then few, and the population limited. To this 
 he attributes the fact that the reputations of leading lawyers 
 were then more national than was possible at the time when 
 he prepared his work. Then cities had multiplied. The 
 increase of population had been by leaps and bounds. Phila- 
 delphia had become metropolitan in numbers and wealth. 
 There was ample scope within our own city and State for 
 the highest ambitions and most strenuous efforts of those 
 who were seeking to attain to professional rank and emi- 
 nence. They need not and did not look to other cities or 
 States as their fields of enterprise. Nor does it appear to 
 me as being in anywise disparaging to the dignity of the 
 bar to recognize the fact that its sphere of active influence 
 and operation was limited to the city of Philadelphia and 
 
332 Law Association Centennial 
 
 State of Pennsylvania, and that reputations beyond these 
 limits were but little thought of or contemplated. 
 
 In giving recollections of a few only of the active lead- 
 ers, I have endeavored to select those who would be fairly 
 representative types of their profession, without meaning to 
 depreciate the merits of others who held places in the line, 
 very nearly, if not quite equal, to those who have been thus 
 selected. The estimates of others who were familiar with 
 the men of that day may differ materially from mine. I 
 only undertake to speak as I saw them. 
 
 One of the conspicuous lawyers in the early fifties was 
 Mr. St. George Tucker Campbell. He was then in his 
 prime. He was of slight build, rather below, than above 
 medium height, with blue eyes and light hair which lay in 
 sticks over his head. He was full of energy and profes- 
 sional vigor. The ambition of his life seemed to be to build 
 up and maintain a large law business, — not apparently for 
 the purpose of acquiring wealth. It seemed as if he must 
 have been somewhat indifferent to this, as his charges for 
 professional services were so low as to provoke frequent 
 criticism from other members of the bar. His seemed to 
 be rather a hunger for business, than a desire for money. 
 
 His office was a veritable workshop, every individual 
 in it seeming to be bent upon accomplishing the largest 
 amount of work within business hours that any human being 
 was capable of. The atmosphere of his office was always a 
 serious one, and never broken by anything except the neces- 
 sary communications about the business of the ofifice itself. 
 On only one occasion did I ever hear of its having been the 
 subject of anything that could be said to be frivolous. A 
 society swell from New York, Mr. C, had somehow or other 
 dropped into the position of student. It proved to be in 
 every respect a misfit. On one occasion Mr. Campbell 
 returned from court rather earlier than was usual. Upon 
 
Bullitt's Recollections of Fifty Years Ago 333 
 
 entering his vestibule he heard a great tramping of feet in his 
 front office, and when he opened the door, to his consterna- 
 tion, he found the whole office force up in twos and twos, 
 while Mr. C. was teaching them the polka waltz. Needless 
 to say that Mr. C. did not remain a member of that official 
 family very long. 
 
 Taking him all in all I have thought that Mr. Camp- 
 bell was the most efficient practitioner of the law I have ever 
 met with. He was able, untiring and most laborious. He 
 seemed to be adapted to all classes of business and never 
 more in his element than when he was engaged in some 
 important and difficult trial, either at nisi prius, or before 
 the Court in banc. For years his practice was so large as 
 to put a most severe strain upon his physical and mental 
 powers. 
 
 He was decidedly nervous and timid in the anticipa- 
 tion of any important trial; so much so, that at times it 
 would appear as if it would be impossible for him either to 
 have or to manifest the confidence and self-possession which 
 are essential to a successful practitioner. He never wished 
 to try any case unless he was sure of success. But when he 
 came into actual contact with the case itself in Court every 
 sign of timidity or nervousness disappeared. He was then 
 bold, defiant and aggressive, and, without pretending to 
 much that would ordinarily be called rhetorical, he was 
 decidedly vigorous and effective. In manner and style of 
 speech he was earnest and oftentimes fervid. I have seen 
 him, when delivering a speech either before the Court or a 
 jury, move upon his adversary with a sort of tumultuous 
 rush that was always more or less telling and at times over- 
 whelming by its logical vehemence. 
 
 In his office he was essentially autocratic, all the sub- 
 ordinates seeming to feel that it would not do for them even 
 to breathe too loudly; and with his clients there was at 
 times an austerity of manner and severity of speech which 
 with a nervous or timid person was calculated to produce a 
 shaking ague. I have heard him abuse some of his clients 
 
334 Law Association Centennial 
 
 in the most unmeasured terms because they did something 
 which he did not approve, or proposed something that he 
 regarded as being tmwise or improper. When I first became 
 aware of this method of dealing with his clients I supposed 
 it would have such a deterrent effect upon them that they 
 would not return to him. But I came afterwards to under- 
 stand that with his permanent clients this was looked upon 
 as being, to a certain extent, Pickwickian in its character, 
 and they did not take it very much to heart. It is due to 
 Mr. Campbell, however, to say that when he was away from 
 his office and out of the absorbing influence of his law busi- 
 ness, he could be as playful and agreeable a companion as I 
 ever met; and it was very difficult for those who were 
 familiar with him in the different aspects in which I have 
 endeavored to present him, to realize how a man so childlike 
 and simple in his playfulness at times, could settle down 
 into so serious and awe-inspiring a character the moment 
 he came within the walls of his office. 
 
 Striking in contrast with his personality in every 
 respect was his near neighbor on Fourth Street, Mr. George 
 M. Wharton. He was below the ordinary stature. His 
 head was small, but perfectly formed. He had a pleasing 
 address and gentle expression, and everything about him 
 indicated a most refined and delicate make-up. His voice 
 was rather a tenor, and in speaking or in conversation he 
 seldom raised it above an ordinary colloquial tone. Thor- 
 oughly versed in the law and most accurate in his knowl- 
 edge; in method, clearness and force of statement he had 
 no equal. He was precise, clear and clean-cut in the process 
 of elimination, including what he intended to convey and 
 excluding what he did not think was pertinent. The points 
 which he would make either in fact or in law were sound 
 and characterized by candor and frankness. No one wha 
 listened to him could have any doubt as to the position he 
 
BuLLiTT^s Recollections of Fifty Years Ago 335 
 
 was assuming, or as to the sincerity of his purpose in urging 
 that which he beheved to be true. There was nothing 
 either sophistical or disingenuous in that which he main- 
 tained, or in the reasons or authorities upon which he relied 
 to sustain the points which he was endeavoring to enforce. 
 His arguments were always strong and vigorous and car- 
 ried the utmost weight from their strength and the recog- 
 nized sincerity that pervaded his whole character. 
 
 The faculty of intellectual self-detachment is not found 
 to be very prevalent in human nature. Partiality, prejudice 
 and preconceived opinion are apt to color the medium 
 through which we view the subjects that engage our con- 
 sideration. It is difficult, also, to divest ourself of the per- 
 sonal or selfish reflections which are liable to intrude them- 
 selves upon our thoughts to a greater or less degree, when- 
 ever the necessity for mental action arises. It is manifest 
 that as these influences operate they must obscure and impair 
 the power of mental vision. The clearer the atmosphere the 
 more accurate must be the perception of an object. The 
 power to separate a proposition from what is extraneous, to 
 discard self and selfish influences and to relegate partialities, 
 prejudices and preconceived opinions to the domain of indif- 
 ference and non-influence, promotes the tendency to sound 
 and wise judgment and determination. This appeared to 
 me to be strikingly illustrated throughout Mr. Wharton's 
 career. 
 
 To me he was the most satisfactory colleague with 
 whom I came in contact as a junior; and whenever I wished 
 the advice or assistance of a senior member of the bar, unless 
 there was some reason to the contrary, I always went to him 
 as the one man upon whom I could rely for the most valu- 
 able counsel and aid in any matter, however important it 
 might be and whatever its character. 
 
 He was kind and courteous in his manners, both with 
 the Court and his antagonists. I never knew him to be 
 engaged in what might be called an unseemly controversy, 
 
336 Law Association Centennial 
 
 such as sometimes arises between members of the bar in the 
 heat and excitement of a trial. 
 
 His office was the perfection of neatness. His table 
 might be covered with bundles of papers, but they would be 
 arranged in the most perfect order, tied with red tape with 
 a neatness which could do credit to a lady's dressing table. 
 
 Any impressions as to his physique, his voice, and his 
 manner indicating weakness or effeminacy, would soon be 
 dispelled by familiar contact with him. He was cour- 
 ageous, self-possessed and decided when his convictions or 
 the subject matter required. No personal considerations 
 could swerve him from taking such position or asserting 
 such convictions as he believed to be right, just and honest. 
 
 His practice was neither so general nor so large as 
 that of Mr. Campbell. But from the time I first knew him 
 he was actively engaged in the practice of his profession, 
 and taking very distinguished part in most of the important 
 causes which were tried during the period which elapsed 
 from 1849 down to the time of his death in 1870. 
 
 A noted figure at the bar at this time was Mr. EU Kirk 
 Price. He was not a robust man, nor was he conspicuous 
 in his earlier years, either in appearance or manner or any- 
 thing that would have marked him as pre-eminent. His 
 dress was always plain and showed to some extent his 
 Quaker origin. In the latter part of his life his benignant 
 expression and long white hair gave him a most venerable 
 appearance. He was deliberate in speech, his voice being 
 rather low. He was always kindly, and abounding in that 
 which is a most valuable quality in any man, — strong com- 
 mon sense. He was essentially what might be called a good 
 business lawyer. Prudent, thoughtful and wise in confer- 
 ence or in counsel. His thoroughly good habits of business 
 attracted to him the sober and solid men of affairs who had 
 property interests to conserve, and who wished to be guided 
 
Bullitt's Recollections of Fifty Years Ago 337 
 
 by the best advice and services they could obtain. His 
 habits, and his peculiar administrative fitness, gathered to 
 him many very large estates and trusts. In these he was 
 always faithful and managed them with a degree of intelli- 
 gence and sagacity that gave him an unrivaled reputation 
 for that class of legal practice. His opinion was sought for 
 and implicitly relied upon in matters of title; in the con- 
 struction of wills; in the adjustment of complicated trusts, 
 and all that class of interests which grow up in a frugal and 
 money-saving population, such as always distinguished 
 Philadelphia. Mr. Price was known to be one of the best 
 judges of real estate in the community, and his family are 
 now reaping the benefit of his sagacious intelligence in 
 acquiring vacant lots which were bound to enhance in value 
 as the increasing population created the demand for desir- 
 able locations. 
 
 Mr. Meredith, however, did not attribute to Mr. Price 
 the merit of having made such selections on his own judg- 
 ment. I remember once hearing him twit Mr. Price with 
 the gross injustice he charged upon him in taking it to him- 
 self instead of giving proper credit to one of his faithful 
 servants. He said that in point of fact it was due to a 
 famous white horse which Mr. Price rode when he was 
 looking about for good properties. That when this horse 
 came to one he would stop and point to it with his nose and 
 his ears, and Mr. Price never made a mistake when he acted 
 under the advice of this famous old animal. When Mr. 
 Meredith was thus chaffing Mr. Price I could not help 
 thinking how fortunate Mr. Meredith would have been if he 
 could have had the benefit of some of this horse sense. He 
 said himself he never bought anything in his life, no matter 
 how much he paid for it, that he did not find it at once 
 crumble away and lose all its value. 
 
 Mr. Price was a public-spirited man. He was one of 
 the most active and valuable promoters of the Consolidation 
 Act of 1854, by which the confusion of the district system 
 was abolished and the whole of the separate political organ- 
 
338 Law Association Centennial 
 
 izations were united in one corporation as the "City of 
 Philadelphia." The value of this change could only be 
 appreciated by those who witnessed the evils arising from 
 the old district system, and the benefits derived from the 
 consolidation, as compared therewith. 
 
 Mr. Price was also an active promoter of the Cen- 
 tennial Exposition of 1876, and he rendered most valuable 
 services in the acquisition and foundation of Fairmount 
 Park. 
 
 The legal work, however, which perhaps remains as 
 the most enduring monument of his public service, was the 
 act approved April the i8th, 1853, providing for the sale 
 and conveyance of real estate. Up to that time most serious 
 difficulties and embarrassments had been experienced in 
 regard to titles to real estate; to the trusts in reference 
 thereto; and the absence of provisions for the sale and con- 
 version of the real property of decedent's estates, owing to 
 the inadequate provisions of the law in many cases which 
 necessarily arose as the community became larger and inter- 
 ests became more involved. Probably no one act of the 
 Legislature is more frequently invoked or acted upon in the 
 ordinary business affairs of life than this "Price Act." No 
 man at the bar was more capable of appreciating the difficul- 
 ties involved or of providing the remedies which were appro- 
 priate. I think it may be fairly said that this was one of 
 the most useful and beneficial acts of legislation which is to 
 be found upon the records of our statutes. This act, together 
 with other valuable services rendered by Mr. Price, to which 
 I have referred, are monuments to mark alike his public- 
 spirited character and the intelligence and sagacious wisdom 
 which he displayed. 
 
 His life was characterized by an earnest effort to per- 
 form the duties which devolved upon him, with fidelity and 
 in a manner to accomplish the best results, and such as 
 would be most beneficial to those who specially relied upon 
 him, and to the community in which he lived. 
 
Bullitt's Recollections of Fifty Years Ago 339 
 
 Of a totally different type from any one of those to 
 whom I have referred was Mr. Constant Guillou. Of quick 
 and versatile mind and attainments, with pleasing good 
 humor and untiring industry, he went through life working 
 hard and taking enjoyment as he went along, alike in his legal 
 pursuits and such other employments as seemed to come to 
 his hand. It was difficult to determine whether he was most 
 in earnest in the performance of his legal duties or in the 
 efforts which he made to give pleasure and gratification to 
 others in matters entirely outside of his profession. 
 
 He was able, adroit and skillful in the trial of a cause. 
 He exhausted the authorities which might bear upon any 
 question of law with which he had to deal. At nisi prius he 
 was full of tact and skill, in fact, I should say that his 
 speeches to a jury were most captivating. 
 
 I recollect one instance of this, which was somewhat 
 amusing in its determination. He had obtained a judgment 
 of about $80,000 in favor of a man named Osborn against 
 the Camden and Atlantic Railroad Company. The com- 
 pany at that time was practically insolvent. Mr. Guillou 
 directed the Sheriff to levy this execution upon a steam 
 ferryboat which plied between Vine Street Wharf and 
 Cooper's Point, and upon which all the passengers and 
 freight of the railroad company were transported across the 
 river. Upon the levy being made notice was given by sev- 
 eral of the directors of the railroad company that they were 
 the personal owners of this ferryboat. The Sheriff took a 
 rule for an interpleader between the plaintiff in the execu- 
 tion and the claimants. Upon the trial of the feigned issue, 
 the claimants being plaintiffs, their counsel entered into a 
 most elaborate history and proof of their title, beginning 
 with the laying of the keel and following on down with 
 careful evidence of the various transmissions of title, end- 
 ing with the acquisition by the claimants. When the proof 
 for the claimants had thus been placed before the Court and 
 jury, Mr. Guillou stated that he had no evidence to offer, 
 and claimed the right to open and conclude. He made a 
 
340 Law Association Centennial 
 
 most ingenious presentation, basing his claim that the prop- 
 erty did not belong to the claimants but did belong to the 
 railroad company upon the elaborate proof offered by the 
 claimants' counsel and argued so successfully to the jury 
 that this was evidence of fraud and of the fact that the title 
 was really vested in the railroad company, that he succeeded 
 in obtaining a verdict. After this I was asked to take part 
 with the counsel for the claimants in obtaining a new trial, 
 and subsequently trying the case. Upon hearing what had 
 occurred, I stated to my colleague that his trouble was too 
 much labor, too much anxiety and too much proof; that 
 if he had been satisfied to offer his evidence of possession by 
 the claimants and there stopped it was manifest that Mr. 
 Guillou had no evidence to overthrow that position and 
 would have been compelled to abandon the effort to subject 
 the property to the execution. There was no difficulty in 
 obtaining a new trial. But when it came on the next time 
 for trial, I did have very great difificulty in satisfying my 
 colleague that he should limit his proof simply to the fact 
 of possession, and it was with the most nervous apprehen- 
 sion upon his part that he finally yielded to my judgment in 
 this respect. I sat by taking no actual part in the trial. He 
 called witnesses to prove claimants' possession and then 
 rested. Mr. Guillou, with his usual blandness, said to the 
 Court that as proof of possession was all which was required 
 on the part of the claimants, and he had no evidence to con- 
 trovert it, he would save the Court any further trouble by 
 agreeing that a verdict should be rendered for the claimants. 
 
 Taking him all in all, I think Mr. Guillou was one of 
 the most charming and interesting characters I ever knew. 
 He possessed the qualities that go to make up a companion 
 of unrivaled attractiveness. Full of animal spirits; with 
 a memory charged with agreeable incidents; with a mind 
 capable of dealing either seriously or playfully with any 
 and every subject matter, his conversation was an unceasing 
 stream of most agreeable and fascinating outgivings. 
 
 I have referred to his untiring industry in pursuits 
 
Bullitt's Recollections of Fifty Years Ago 341 
 
 other than those of his profession. He was the founder of 
 what was known as the Amateur Theatre on Seventeenth 
 Street, above Chestnut, and for a number of years he was 
 floor manager, scene shifter, carpenter, and filled every other 
 position which was required in connection with the perform- 
 ances given there. This amateur theatre was the means 
 of giving very great pleasure to the social element of Phila- 
 delphia while it lasted. While the capacity of the building 
 was not large, those who attended it found themselves sur- 
 rounded by their friends and social acquaintances. The 
 intercourse there was very much that of what might be 
 called a fashionable drawing-room. Mr. Guillou worked 
 with untiring industry in the making and preparation of 
 everything which was needed for fitting it up and making 
 it suitable for such performances as were given. Some of 
 these performances were notable for the very perfect manner 
 in which they were presented. Among others which I 
 remember was the play of Garrick in which Mr. J. Inman 
 Riche presented the character of Garrick quite as well as I 
 have ever witnessed on the part of Edwin Booth, the 
 younger Sothern, or any one else. I have often heard the 
 deepest regrets expressed by those who were attendants at 
 the amateur theatre that an institution which gave so 
 much pleasure and had so much that was attractive about 
 it should have finally been allowed to fall into disuse. But 
 perhaps no one could have given it the character which it 
 obtained, or continued its usefulness save Mr. Guillou or 
 someone like himself. 
 
 At the bar meeting which was held after his death. 
 Judge William A. Porter made an address which, while 
 it was in many respects laudatory, paid a tribute to Mr. 
 Guillou which all who knew him recognized as having been 
 in nowise an overdrawn picture, and which was, we all felt, 
 well merited by one of the most charming characters who 
 had adorned the Philadelphia Bar. 
 
342 Law Association Centennial 
 
 One of the men who was decidedly interesting to me 
 when I first saw him was Mr. Henry M. PhilUps. I had 
 heard of him as having a very large practice and being one 
 of the successful men, especially in the trial of jury causes. 
 He was so small that I looked at him with some degree of 
 surprise and amazement, but his face indicated a degree of 
 quick intelligence that soon reconciled my impressions to the 
 general reputation which he enjoyed. It was said of him 
 that he knew more men in the city of Philadelphia who were 
 likely to be called on the juries than any other lawyer, and 
 I believe that this was true. His manners were so kindly 
 and cordial that he always made a friend of anybody with 
 whom he came in contact. His mind was one of those 
 bright and flashing kinds which lighted up any subject 
 which he had to consider, almost instinctively. In this 
 respect he possessed most extraordinary facility and quick- 
 ness. For this reason he did not have to labor at his cases 
 as many lawyers do, and it is by no means certain that his 
 power was improved by this wonderful quickness of percep- 
 tion. Many men who were very much slower in mastering 
 facts and details could certainly be his equal, if not his 
 superior, when they came to deal with a case of complication 
 and difficulty. However this might be, Mr. Phillips 
 deserved the eminence he attained as a general practitioner. 
 He was ready at all times, and under all circumstances, and 
 seemed to be almost as much so when a matter was first 
 presented to him as he ever became afterwards. 
 
 He had the faculty of cultivating very close relations 
 of friendship with judges, mayors and all other public 
 officials, and when any official found himself involved in 
 any difficulty of any kind Mr. Phillips was almost sure to 
 be consulted by him. While no one had more facility in 
 collecting fees, and more respect for the duty he owed to his 
 profession of making charges that were respectable in their 
 character, yet he was always ready to render whatever serv- 
 ice or assistance he could give to any official in any matter 
 that concerned or interested him. I can go further than 
 
Bullitt's Recollections of Fifty Years Ago 343 
 
 this, however, and say that his kindly disposition led him 
 to render these services not only to officials, but to any 
 friend who had any reason to call upon him for assistance 
 or kindness. 
 
 He was fond of being considered, and being, in fact, a 
 man of affairs, and would give any amount of time and 
 attention that was required to anything that concerned the 
 public. He was uniformly a man of good temper and good 
 manners. But when aroused by what he deemed to be any 
 personal disrespect, or any action which demanded that he 
 should assert his own dignity and self-respect, he was 
 ready and apt in the language which he would use, as well 
 as the manner which he would assume, in resenting and 
 rebuking that which he thought demanded it of him. He 
 was one of the men who filled a conspicuous place in all that 
 transpired in connection with the public affairs of the city 
 for a considerable period. And while he held no city office, 
 there was probably no one who wielded a more potent influ- 
 ence with the office-holding portion of the community than 
 he did. 
 
 I should say of Mr. Phillips that he was one of the 
 factors that went to make up not only the volume but decid- 
 edly the strength of the Philadelphia Bar. 
 
 The men whom I have endeavored to sketch had 
 already settled in the niches for which they were adapted 
 in the structure of professional life. Behind them were a 
 sturdy and ambitious body of younger men who were feeling 
 about for the rank and places which they aspired to fill. 
 
 Of these no one was more in evidence than Mr. Theo- 
 dore Cuyler. Gifted personally and intellectually, he was 
 emerging from the trying stage of the junior and acquiring 
 the reputation he so ardently coveted. He was of medium 
 height and possessed of a fine and graceful figure. His hair 
 was light, his eyes blue and his complexion so fair and clear 
 
344 Law Association Centennial 
 
 that a woman might well have craved its possession. His 
 features were of the best Saxon type. 
 
 He was a well-read lawyer and cultivated in literary 
 attainment. His diction was pure and classic. His style 
 of speaking was easy, full and flowing and somewhat more 
 ornate than that which was usually heard. It was argu- 
 mentative and appealing by turns — as the occasion made the 
 one or the other expedient. He was a past master in the 
 use alike of weapons of ofifence or defence. Invective, 
 pathos, humor and wit were ready at his command. Pos- 
 sessed of fine imagination he held it well under control and 
 did not permit it to betray him into unbecoming extrava- 
 gance. Thoroughly equipped, and versed as he was, in the 
 art of convincing and persuading, it may well be assumed 
 that he was formidable as an adversary. This was attested 
 by the ability he displayed in the numerous and important 
 cases in which he was concerned. 
 
 He became counsel of the Pennsylvania Railroad Com- 
 pany, and as such participated in its affairs for a period of 
 over twenty years. His value in this position can be 
 appreciated when it is borne in mind what trials and 
 struggles were encountered in the transition of the company 
 from its comparatively feeble condition, when he became its 
 counsel, to its vast strength and importance at the present 
 time. This consummation is but the outgrowth and natural 
 sequence of the wise and sagacious policy inaugurated and 
 developed under his advice and with his co-operation, as 
 far as the legal aspects of the questions involved required or 
 demanded. Those who were brought into contact with him 
 in this relation can well understand how marked and impor- 
 tant was his impress upon the affairs and career of the com- 
 pany throughout the period referred to. 
 
 Owing either to a natural lack of method or to the 
 heavy pressure of his engagements he was known to be given 
 somewhat to procrastination. His experiences from this 
 cause were at times embarrassing. But woe betide the man 
 who presumed too much upon his unpreparedness. On one 
 
Bullitt's Recollections of Fifty Years Ago 345 
 
 occasion a case was called in the District Court in which he 
 represented the defendant. He asked for a continuance. 
 He had neither client nor witnesses in court. He appealed 
 earnestly to plaintiff's counsel and to the Court to have it go 
 over. The Court held that no legal ground had been shown, 
 and plaintiff's counsel was inexorable. His position 
 attracted my interest, and I watched the case to see what he 
 would do. It was probable that he had never looked at the 
 declaration, and doubtful whether he had made the least 
 preparation for the trial. 
 
 When the effort for a continuance proved vain, he took 
 off his overcoat and threw that with his green bag down on 
 the table with a sort of snap movement, his eyes flashing, 
 his brow knitted and his lips drawn sharply together. He 
 was full of fiery resentment. He took up the declaration 
 and as he read it a relaxing smile passed over his face. It 
 was plain he had found there some reason for relief. Plaint- 
 iff's counsel stated his case and called his witnesses. Mr. 
 Cuyler objected to the testimony, on the ground that under 
 the allegation of the narr it was not relevant. The Court 
 admitted it; however, under exception. After a somewhat 
 protracted hearing of plaintiff's witnesses, Mr. Cuyler 
 moved for a non-suit. His argument on this motion was 
 clear and vigorous. The non-suit was granted. As he 
 passed me, he remarked in an undertone, "Well, I taught 
 him a lesson." 
 
 The power to please in social intercourse is one of the 
 most valuable qualities with which any one can be endowed. 
 The combination of a cheerful temper, vivacity, quick wit, 
 culture, refinement, and a well-stored memory are essential 
 incidents to such power. In the case of Mr. Cuyler they 
 were inborn and inseparable from his mental and moral 
 organization. His pleasantry was spontaneous, without 
 effort, and came as if from an unfailing source of supply. 
 He was a most agreeable companion — kindly and genial 
 with his friends, abounding in good humor and full of the 
 
346 Law Association Centennial 
 
 magnetism which attracts and binds together members of 
 the human family. 
 
 I met him at the Profile House in the White Moun- 
 tains in 1875. He was then in declining health. He was 
 pallid. His figure had lost somewhat of that roundness 
 and elasticity for which it was noted. His features were 
 becoming more or less relaxed and angular. His voice, 
 however, preserved its beautiful tones. He was bright 
 and cheerful and save some unsteadiness in his gait, a slight 
 stoop in his shoulders and a pained expression which at 
 times came over his features, he was very much the same 
 charming companion as in his day of health. His death 
 occurred in 1876, thus bringing to a close a most brilliant 
 and successful career. 
 
 I have previously referred to the fact that the reputa- 
 tions of the leading members of the bar at about the middle 
 of the last century extended but little, if at all, beyond the 
 limits of their own city and State. In this I did not mean 
 to include Mr. Binney, Mr. John Sergeant and Mr. Joseph 
 R. Ingersoll. They had lived and acted when the condi- 
 tions of the country were such that men of their kind could 
 and did acquire national reputations. But they retired from 
 professional life about 1850, and hence my remarks had no 
 reference to them. 
 
 Doubts have arisen in my mind as to what should be 
 said in reference to Mr. William M. Meredith in this respect. 
 It is immaterial, however, except as a mere matter of specu- 
 lation. Whether the horizon which bounded his reputation 
 may have been more or less extended, that can in nowise 
 lessen or detract from the estimate in which he was held by 
 those who came within the influence of his marvelous abil- 
 ity and power. 
 
 My acquaintance with him began in 1850. He became 
 a member of President Taylor's Cabinet in 1849. He 
 resumed his practice shortly after the death of President 
 
Bullitt's Recollections of Fifty Years Ago 347 
 
 Taylor in 1850. He was unique and commanding in 
 appearance. He was large in frame and somewhat awk- 
 ward in movement. He was at that time recognized as the 
 leader of the bar and appeared only as senior in cases which 
 were of importance as to the amounts involved, or the ques- 
 tions upon which they depended for their solution. He was 
 in his true element when dealing with some great case, and 
 discussing principles of law upon a broad and original plat- 
 form. His handling of cases was appropriate and effective. 
 But his greatest strength was in presenting the original 
 principles upon which a proposition rested for its force, and 
 then he was most happy in his arguments and illustrations. 
 His style of speaking may be termed as one peculiarly his 
 own. His gestures would have been uncouth m any other 
 person. They were appropriate rather than graceful — 
 forceful rather than elegant. He usually remained stand- 
 ing where he arose. There was no distorted or violent 
 movement or action of his person. When warmed up with 
 his subject he lost all thought of what he was doing with 
 his arms or his hands. His gestures became more impres- 
 sive. His voice, his manner and his expression indicated 
 the mental excitement which had taken possession of him. 
 Then his powers took their free course and his hearers were 
 borne along by an irresistible sway. 
 
 The case of Mott vs. Pennsylvania Railroad Company 
 (Pa. State Reps., vol. 30, p. 9), was a bill in equity for 
 the purpose of enjoining the Pennsylvania Railroad from 
 the purchase of the State works under an Act of Assembly 
 passed May 16, 1857 (P. L. 519). By the terms of the 
 act if the Pennsylvania Railroad became the purchaser and 
 paid $1,500,000 in addition to the purchase money, it was 
 to be free forever from taxation. 
 
 No one who was present at the argument can ever for- 
 get the marvelous effort made by him at that time. The 
 case involved the application of original principles of law 
 as to corporations and their franchises, and the vested rights 
 which appertained to and grew out of legislative grants 
 
34^ Law Association Centennial 
 
 made to them. Still more> it involved the right of the Leg- 
 islature to legalize the barter and sale of sovereign powers 
 of the State for a money consideration. It was, upon Mr. 
 Meredith's part, a philosophical and statesman-like discus- 
 sion upon these subjects, with a degree of earnestness, force 
 and fervor, which, as he swept along, rose to the highest 
 point of eloquence. It was a great case and a great occa- 
 sion. 
 
 The Pennsylvania Railroad had been constructed under 
 an act approved the thirteenth day of April, 1846. Its object 
 was to enable the city of Philadelphia to reach the fast- 
 growing business of the West. New York and Baltimore 
 were extending lines in the same direction. Philadelphia 
 could only hope to maintain her commercial position by a 
 rival line such as was proposed. By stupendous efforts on 
 the part of the merchants and with the help of the city, the 
 means were provided and the road was constructed from 
 Harrisburg to the foot of the Alleghany Mountains, and 
 from the west side of the mountains to Pittsburgh. Being 
 thus fragmentary, it had to use the State works to complete 
 the connection. Its far-seeing directors and officers real- 
 ized that in order to work out its true mission it was essen- 
 tial to acquire the State works, thereby securing an unbroken 
 line to Pittsburgh, and thereafter proceeding to reach and 
 control, through other connections, the vast and rapidly 
 growing trade of the middle West. In the light of the 
 present day, we can realize how wise and far-seeing were 
 these men in the adoption of this policy. The case to which 
 I have referred raised a crucial point in its institution of a 
 policy which has since developed into the grandest railroad 
 enterprise of the world. Under the act and the purchase of 
 the State works, the company could proceed boldly and con- 
 fidently to work out its great purposes and destiny. If 
 balked or thwarted it might prove, but a feeble competitor 
 for its rivals in the struggle for the rich harvest of Western 
 trade which was then impending. It was this vastly 
 important outcome that stimulated and deepened the inter- 
 
Bullitt's Recollections of Fifty Years Ago 349 
 
 est that gathered around and centered in the issues involved 
 in the case. 
 
 It was heard on a motion for a prehminary injunction 
 by the Judges of the Supreme Court, sitting in banc in their 
 room in the second story of the building west of Independ- 
 ence Hall. The court room was crowded. The Governor 
 was represented by Attorney-General Franklin; the plain- 
 tiffs by Mr. Buckalew, Mr. William L. Hirst, and Mr. 
 Meredith; the Pennsylvania Railroad by Mr. St. George 
 Tucker Campbell, Mr. Edwin M. Stanton and Mr. Theo- 
 dore Cuyler. The atmosphere was laden with profound 
 and interested expectancy. It was to be a Titanic struggle 
 and such it surely was. All the arguments were character- 
 ized by signal ability. But Mr. Meredith rose to a point 
 which I never heard him attain before or after that time. 
 
 He was what might be termed an ingrained Pennsyl- 
 vanian. He utterly disdained the doctrine of State Rights, 
 as commonly understood by its advocates. But he was 
 sensitively jealous as to the rights, dignity and honor of 
 his own State, and was always ready to defend them as an 
 earnest and loyal champion. In this case he was battling, 
 as he believed, for her rights against a powerful corpora- 
 tion. He saw in the future the vast strides of expansion 
 and absorption that would be made, and in which were 
 involved the subordination of the State to a power which 
 she could not resist or overthrow. His whole nature was 
 aroused and his voice was raised in tones of warning and 
 deprecation of this first step in a line of encroachment upon 
 the sovereignty of the State, and its subjection to the dom- 
 inating influences of corporate power. He showed why it 
 did not consist with the law of the land, and adjured the 
 Court not to sanction a departure from well-established 
 principles of jurisprudence or to be swerved from uphold- 
 ing the law, however much the commercial exigencies might 
 seem to appeal to them. He maintained and enforced his 
 propositions with convincing logic and impassioned elo- 
 quence. Moved as it were by a mighty impulse, he put forth 
 
350 Law Association Centennial 
 
 all the vast power of his nature in defence of the Common- 
 wealth and of her rights and dignity and honor against 
 unmitigated evils, as he depicted them, in words that seemed 
 to glow with the light of prophetic inspiration. His con- 
 tention was sustained. The injunction was granted. Sub- 
 sequently the railroad acquired the public works, but with- 
 out the benefit of the act as to exemption from taxation. 
 
 It is deeply to be regretted that no report has been pre- 
 served of any of the speeches made by him. Stenographic 
 reports were, in those days, very few, and I suppose that no 
 one of his arguments could have been preserved unless from 
 the memory of some of his hearers. Mr. Cuyler stated to 
 me that he remembered distinctly the words of his speech in 
 the case of Mott vs. Pennsylvania Railroad Company, and 
 that he would sometime or other write them out, but I do 
 not think he ever did so. It would have been one of the 
 most valuable traditions of the Philadelphia Bar. 
 
 Mr. Meredith was ambitious of political office, and 
 this was somewhat of a surprise to me when I observed its 
 manifestations. 
 
 He spoke to me once, in a pleasant walk I had with 
 him on the banks of the Susquehanna at Harrisburg, of the 
 great pleasure he had derived from the membership of a 
 legislative body. He referred to his life when a member of 
 the Legislature at Harrisburg many years previously, and 
 said that he looked back upon that experience as being about 
 the most agreeable one in his retrospect. He undoubtedly 
 had hopes at different times of occupying a seat in the 
 United States Senate, but strange to say the people of 
 Pennsylvania were insensible to the credit which they would 
 have reflected upon themselves, and to the advantages to be 
 derived by them from having their ablest statesman selected 
 for that office. He had too much pride and self-respect to 
 solicit that or any other position. I do not believe any- 
 thing would have induced him to seek it, and I never heard 
 of his having made the slightest effort to secure the favor of 
 those who had it in their power to confer the seat upon him. 
 
Bullitt's Recollections of Fifty Years Ago 351 
 
 Nevertheless, those who knew him best well understood how 
 profound would have been the gratification if it had been 
 tendered to him. 
 
 I should say from my knowledge of him and of his 
 intellectual power and force that had he been a member of 
 the Senate, he would there have distinguished himself quite 
 up to the best standard in its history. In my earlier days, I 
 was somewhat familiar with the efforts of such men as Mr. 
 Webster, Mr. Calhoun, Mr. Clay and other distinguished 
 men of fifty or sixty years ago. My estimate of Mr. Mere- 
 dith would place him upon a par with these, and in fact with 
 any other of the members of that body who had preceded 
 them. I think he would have been a peer of the strongest 
 and the ablest, and for forensic ability and power would have 
 left behind him a national reputation equaled by few, and 
 not surpassed by any of his contemporaries or his prede- 
 cessors. 
 
 He was gratified by being selected as the presiding 
 officer of the Constitutional Convention of 1873. No one 
 could have filled the position more fitly and in a more dig- 
 nified manner than he did. His death occurred before the 
 labors of the convention closed. His career as the presiding 
 officer produced a profound impression upon his fellow- 
 members in regard to the courtesy, the dignity and ability 
 manifested by him throughout its deliberations. 
 
 There were a number of other men of that day of 
 whom interesting reminiscences could be recorded. But it 
 would protract this paper to an unreasonable length to 
 attempt a more extended outline than I have presented. 
 
 It can be said of the bar of that day that it was com- 
 posed of unusually able men. Its tone was high and hon- 
 orable. Contingent fees and hard bargains with clients 
 were unknown among the higher ranks. All such practices 
 were frowned upon. Pledges, promises and agreements 
 
352 Law Association Centennial 
 
 were kept with strict and scrupulous observance. Cases 
 were well prepared and tried with skill and earnestness. But 
 courtesy and decorum prevailed even in the most heated and 
 exciting controversies. Rude expressions and overbearing 
 or offensive manners were almost unknown, and the inter- 
 ruptions of friendly relations from such causes were very 
 rare. 
 
 Mr. Beaman, an eminent member of the New York 
 Bar, attended an argument of a case which involved several 
 hundred thousand dollars. The hearing lasted for the 
 larger part of a week. There were two counsel on each 
 side. Every point was most earnestly contested on each 
 side. Mr. Beaman remarked as he left the court room at 
 the close, that he had been deeply impressed with the cour- 
 tesy and respectful consideration which had prevailed dur- 
 ing the argfument — that not a word had fallen or an incident 
 occurred to ruffle or mar the relations of counsel. I do not 
 mean to say that the members of the bar were all angels, or 
 that frictions and unpleasantness did not sometimes occur. 
 But such occurrences were infrequent. 
 
 The influence of the professional atmosphere was such 
 as to chill and repress overheated and indiscreet zeal. Such 
 indulgence was bad form. Tendency in that direction was 
 restrained and harmony and good-fellowship were cultivated 
 and promoted. Excesses were eschewed and avoided. 
 Temperance and moderation were the order of the day. It 
 would be difficult to find in any other walk of life so large 
 a body of men of such estimable character and so deserving 
 of the respect and confidence of their fellow-citizens. 
 
 The bar of to-day may well look back to them as hav- 
 ing fully upheld the dignity and honor of the profession and 
 as having left an example well worthy to be admired and 
 emulated. 
 
 It may be observed that I have omitted any sketch of 
 the judiciary or of the individual members who composed it. 
 This is not due in anywise to indifference or lack of appre- 
 
from a Ph',logr^plt by <,„hlen<k 
 
 
Bullitt's Recollections of Fifty Years Ago 353 
 
 ciation. On the contrary, a large part of my life was spent 
 with them and before them. Their memories are inter- 
 woven with incidents and events of the deepest and most 
 interesting importance in my career. The relations between 
 the court and counsel should be kind and cordial. And 
 with a judge of fair abilities seeking to arrive at truth and 
 work out the ends of justice, no lawyer, who is competent 
 for his profession, can fail in time to find himself imbued 
 with a warm and sincere regard for the occupant of the 
 bench. Mutual confidence naturally springs up between 
 them, and this often ripens into sympathetic iriendship that 
 lasts for a lifetime. My experience in this respect led me to 
 form and retain the utmost respect and regard for the judges 
 before whom I was in the habit of appearing. Their learn- 
 ing, their ability, their love of truth and justice and their 
 fidelity in fulfilling the grave and important duties of the 
 judicial office entitled them to preservation among the cher- 
 ished traditions of the bar. 
 
 Impressed as I am with what is due to them, it would 
 be grateful to me to set forth in such terms as I could my 
 appreciation of their services and of the high and noble char- 
 acteristics that pervaded their lives and rendered their 
 judicial careers illustrious. 
 
 But here again I find myself restricted by the limits I 
 have set for myself in this paper and must leave what would 
 be a most pleasant and gratifying work to other and more 
 fitting hands. 
 
 23 
 
SOME RECOLLECTIONS 
 
 by 
 
 WM. ROTCH WISTER 
 
 In October, 1846, 1 was entered as a student in the office 
 of Benjamin Gerhard, Esq., South Fourth Street, below 
 Walnut, and remained there for three years. 
 
 Mr. Gerhard was an industrious and very capable law- 
 yer, who had made himself a prominent position and who had 
 shortly before married a daughter of John Sergeant. Among 
 others in the office I found Morton P. Henry and soon after 
 Thomas Stewardson, with whom I formed a close intimacy 
 which only ended with their lives. 
 
 Lawyers usually had their offices in their houses and on 
 the first floor. Opposite to Mr. Gerhard were the large 
 houses of Mr. Binney, of Mr. Sergeant, with double offices 
 at the sides of the houses, and Mr. Joseph R. Ingersoll's 
 house and offices at the comer of Willing's Alley, with 
 entrance to his offices from the alley. These three houses were 
 among the best in the city. Mr. Ingersoll was a member 
 of Congress and not practicing law, nor was Mr. Binney, 
 except in giving opinions. Mr. Sergeant was still practicing, 
 but not actively in the profession. 
 
 Mr. Binney was the Nestor of the profession and in vig- 
 orous old age. Daily at about eleven o'clock he issued from 
 his office for his morning walk, and Mr. Ingersoll and Mr. 
 Sergeant were frequently seen. Mr. Gerhard was associated 
 with the latter in important matters, and he frequently passed 
 through our outer office to confer with Mr. Gerhard. 
 
 The lawyers were then all down town, Messrs. H. 
 J. Williams, Meredith, Randall, Ingraham, Benjamin H. 
 Brewster, on Walnut, below Eighth; Thomas I. Wharton, 
 C. J. Ingersoll, C. & G. Fallon, Isaac Hazlehurst, Charles 
 Ingersoll, William Henry Rawle, Richard C. McMurtrie and 
 M. P. Henry, lower down on the same street. 
 
Wister's Recollections 355 
 
 Jno. M. Read, Ex-Judge Mallory, William L. Hirst, 
 Horace Binney, Jr., J. I. C. Hare, Altamont & H. M. Phil- 
 lips and Francis E. Brewster, on Sixth Street; on Fifth 
 Street, George W. Biddle, Chapman Biddle, Joseph A. Clay, 
 E. Spencer Miller and Edward Ingersoll. 
 
 But Fourth Street, below Walnut, was the favorite 
 locality, and there, in addition to those I have named, were 
 Ferdinand W. Hubbell, St. George Tucker Campbell and his 
 partner or assistant, James F. Johnson, always called Jim 
 Johnson; George Emien, Peter McCall, James W. Paul, 
 Jno. Cadwalader, Charles J. and Craig Biddle and others. 
 
 On Locust Street, above Fourth, George M. Wharton. 
 Partnership or associate lawyers were very unusual, and I 
 remember but two or three firms, viz : C. & G. Fallon, Clay 
 & Hor. G. Jones and Charles J. and Craig Biddle. 
 
 Law firms were then common in Boston, New York, 
 Chicago and elsewhere. 
 
 Christopher Fallon was a very able lawyer, and the firm 
 was reputed to be the agent of the Queen of Spain, and cer- 
 tainly had a very strong financial backing. 
 
 The lawyers' offices were usually a front room, which 
 was a reception and students' room, and an inner or back 
 room for the lawyer himself; bookcases and paper cases or 
 boxes in both rooms. There were no large offices, with 
 sundry rooms and a library accessible to all of them, such as 
 now exist in many offices here and elsewhere. 
 
 The bar was small in numbers and the members called 
 upon each other frequently for business and for social inter- 
 course. The judges also called upon the members of the bar. 
 Judge King was frequently at Mr. Gerhard's office. 
 
 On one occasion a gentleman called at Mr. McCall's and 
 found a student sitting in the back office with feet on the 
 window sill ; he heard someone enter whom he took for a fel- 
 low student; he neither rose nor looked to see who had 
 entered, when the gentleman, in a very sharp voice, cried out : 
 "Say to Mr. McCall that Mr. Joseph R. Ingersoll called, and 
 that it was the first time he had called here without having 
 
356 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Mr. McCall or some gentleman get up to receive him." So 
 says Governor Pennypacker. 
 
 These back offices were resorted to by the female mem- 
 bers of the family, and when a stranger entered they might 
 be seen flitting away to avoid recognition or observation. 
 They were also used as dressing rooms, where clothes to go 
 out with were hung up in a closet, and I have frequently seen, 
 at about nine o'clock in the morning, gentlemen shaving 
 themselves there. 
 
 The business of the day began at nine o'clock and contin- 
 ued until five or six o'clock. Students were expected to report 
 at nine o'clock and be ready to copy papers, for then there 
 were no stenographers or copying presses, and quill pens were 
 still in use. All the lawyers dined at three o'clock, and busi- 
 ness was suspended from three to four o'clock. At the latter 
 hour auditors' meetings in Orphans' Court or other matters 
 were held. 
 
 Judges were then appointed by the Governor. The city 
 was then small, containing in 1850 less than 410,000 inhab- 
 itants. In Front Street were the large wholesale dry goods 
 houses, and other large business places; in Second Street, 
 Sharpless' and most of the other retail stores ; in North Third 
 Street and in Market Street, the jobbing houses; in South 
 Third Street were some forwarding houses and some brokers 
 and money changers, among the latter F. W. Drexel, father 
 of Francis A. and Anthony J.; in Chestnut Street, below 
 Third, Brown Bros. & Co., with sundry banks above Third 
 Street and some large retail stores, notably Levy & Co.'s and 
 Caldwell's & Bailey's, below Fifth Street. 
 
 In Walnut Street, the insurance companies. Nearly all 
 the business of the city was carried on below Fifth Street. 
 The consolidation of the city and outlying districts took 
 place in 1854, and until that time there were clashings of the 
 volunteer firemen, which resulted in some of the companies 
 appearing in the criminal courts. 
 
 William B. Reed was the Prosecuting Attorney, then 
 called the Deputy Attorney General. A more accomplished 
 
Wister's Recollections 357 
 
 prosecutor has not occupied the position, and as a young 
 lawyer I had much pleasure and profit in frequent attendance 
 at the Criminal Court. The defendants were usually repre- 
 sented by Henry M. Phillips, Jonas B. Fairlamb, William B. 
 Mann, Joseph Doran, Francis E. Brewster and ex-Judge 
 Barton. 
 
 There I saw John Roberts, a stylish-looking English- 
 man, known as the old Duke, and John Thompson, known as 
 Tobacco Jack, convicted of the robbery of $51,000 which Dr. 
 William Darlington, President of the Bank of Chester 
 County, was carrying to West Chester in a butter kettle. One 
 Williams, known as Slappy, pleaded guilty. Dr. Darlington 
 frequently carried money to and fro in a butter kettle, which 
 became known to the old Duke. The steam cars for West 
 Chester started from Broad and Race Streets, and by the 
 time Dr. Darlington arrived at the foot of the inclined plane 
 his butter kettle had disappeared. The trial excited almost 
 national interest. 
 
 The old Duke was represented by Joseph G. Clarkson, 
 then a leading member of the bar. Ex- Judge Barton. H. 
 M. Phillips and Jonas P. Fairlamb also defended one or both 
 defendants. The evidence was circumstantial, but the Com- 
 monwealth was so well represented by Mr. Reed that the 
 defendants were found guilty, sentenced by Judge Parsons to 
 pay a fine of $10,000 each and undergo an imprisonment of 
 two years and eleven months. The trial occurred, I think, in 
 1849. 
 
 I remember another interesting criminal trial. Broad 
 Street, above Girard, was unpaved, and in the summer time 
 there were frequent trials of speed there by the drivers of 
 trotting horses. On one occasion a well-known merchant, 
 John M. Kennedy, was driving there in a wagon with his 
 wife. It was towards evening and the street, then unpaved, 
 was very dusty. A cloud of dust arose and several buggies 
 drove down the street at a rapid rate, and one of them, driven 
 by Mr. Way, drove into Kennedy's wagon, upset it and threw 
 Mrs. Kennedy into the street and broke Mr. Kennedy's 
 
358 Law Association Centennial 
 
 wagon. Way was tried for assault and battery and was 
 defended by Francis E. Brewster, the father of the late Ben- 
 jamin Harris and Fred. Carroll Brewster. Mr. Reed was 
 prosecuting. Mr. Brewster, in his last speech, made the unfor- 
 tunate remark that Broad Street belonged to the trotting gen- 
 try and that Mr. Kennedy should not have been there, and 
 being there he took the risk of the collision. The remark 
 brought a sardonic smile to Mr. Reed's face, and in his last 
 speech he destroyed any hope of Mr. Way's acquittal. He 
 related the circumstances as they happened and said to the 
 jury "But, gentlemen of the jury, Mr. Brewster tells you that 
 Broad Street belongs to the trotting gentry and that Mr. 
 Kennedy had no business there." He then went on, and again 
 and again he brought in Mr. Brewster's refrain that Broad 
 Street belonged to the trotting gentry. At last Mr. Brewster, 
 irritated beyond control, rose and said that he had not made 
 the remark. Mr. Reed replied that he thought he had heard 
 Mr. B. make the remark, but he left what he had said to the 
 jury's remembrance, and he was glad to learn 'that Mr. 
 Brewster did not think Broad Street belonged exclusively to 
 the trotting gentry, and, as it did not, there was nothing for 
 the jury to do but to convict Mr. Way. The defendant was 
 found guilty and Judge Parsons sentenced him to a fine 
 of $ I GO. 
 
 This collision was also the occasion for a suit for dam- 
 ages for Mr. and Mrs. Kennedy in the nisi prius court before 
 Judge Rogers, and is an interesting case. H. M. Phillips and 
 W. B. Reed for the plaintiffs. The defendant was repre- 
 sented by ex-Judge Barton and Joseph G. Clarkson, who 
 avoided Brewster's blunder of stating that Broad Street 
 belonged to the trotting gentry, and the verdict was for $75. 
 Judge Rogers regretted the insufficiency of the verdict, but 
 refused a new trial. The civil case of Kennedy vs. Way is 
 reported in Brightly's Rep., p. 186. 
 
 I knew Mr. Meredith before he went to Washington as 
 Secretary of the Treasury in 1849. He was then at the 
 height of his fame and reputation and at the height of his 
 
Wister's Recollections 359 
 
 practice, and was by far the ablest leader in my recollection, 
 and was reputed to be making about $20,000 a year, say four 
 times less than some of our leading lawyers are now making. 
 Mr. R. L. Ashhurst has written an interesting memoir of 
 him for the Pennsylvania Bar Association, which every mem- 
 ber of this Association should read, and has referred to his 
 phenomenal memory, of which I will give an instance or two. 
 
 The divorce case of Butler vs. Butler was argued before 
 the Common Pleas of this community in 1849, ^^^ i^ ^ lead- 
 ing case reported in ist Parsons Rep., p. 329. 
 
 I knew both Mr. and Mrs. Butler, and therefore took 
 great interest in the argument. The libellant claimed a 
 desertion, which was denied. Mr. Butler was represented by 
 Mr. Cadwalader, the late Judge of the United States District 
 Court, and Hon. George M. Dallas; Mrs. Butler by Rufus 
 Choate, of Boston, Mr. Meredith and Mr. Gerhard. Mr. 
 Cadwalader was learned and accomplished; Mr. Dallas, 
 dressed after the older fashion in a full dress suit and a white 
 cravat, was a graceful and accomplished speaker ; Mr. Choate 
 was brilliant and learned as to divorce in England, on the 
 continent of Europe and in all civilized countries. Mr. 
 Meredith followed Mr. Choate with a thorough and close 
 argument upon divorce in the United States and in Penn- 
 sylvania. I was struck by his wonderful memory. He quoted 
 letters without looking at them and law books, giving volume 
 and page, without referring to the books. 
 
 Judge King, in his opinion, which was written wSth his 
 usual clearness and force, followed Mr. Meredith's argument, 
 and decided for the defendant. 
 
 I remember an action for damages against the City 
 of Philadelphia, caused by its alleged negligence in not hav- 
 ing water plugs in proper order. In a fire which occurred 
 December 27, 1851, at the comer of Sixth and Chestnut 
 Streets, William W. Haly, a prominent member of the bar 
 and the chief author of Troubat & Haly's Practice, a book 
 then very frequently cited, lost his life, and the city was sued 
 for its negligence. 
 
360 Law Association Centennial 
 
 The cause excited much interest. Mr. Meredith, with 
 City Solicitor Edw. Olmstead, represented the city. 
 
 I think thirty-two witnesses were examined as to the 
 time of the fire, their arrival at the water plugs, etc. 
 
 Mr. Meredith, as was his custom, walked up and down 
 outside of the lawyer's bar, chatting with his acquaintances, 
 young and old, chewing tobacco and sometimes spitting out 
 tobacco juice, occasionally appearing to stop and listen to the 
 witnesses, but not taking a note, and conducting himself as 
 though he was an ordinary spectator, but in his closing speech 
 he recited the testimony of each witness with extraordinary 
 accuracy, telling when each witness arrived and what he 
 said. 
 
 From time to time counsel for the plaintiffs interrupted 
 him by reading from the notes of testimony. To these inter- 
 ruptions he listened with deference and then usually replied : 
 "Very true, the witness did say what you have written, but 
 he also said what you have not written ; I repeat it, and the 
 jury no doubt remember the exact expressions that I have 
 given them." 
 
 About the same time I was much interested in the trial 
 of Castner Hanway for high treason, in the United States 
 Circuit Court, before Judges Grier and Kane, in 1851. 
 
 The cause excited great attention. A Maryland slave- 
 holder named Gorsuch followed two runaway slaves to 
 Christiana, in Lancaster County, found the slaves, and, with 
 a Deputy United States Marshal, attempted to secure them 
 at the house of one Parker. Horns were blown and the 
 neighbors hurried to the scene, and among them a Quaker 
 named Castner Hanway. The Marshal demanded Hanway's 
 assistance, which was refused, and he and his party retreated, 
 and, while falling back, were fired on, and Gorsuch, the 
 owner of the slaves, was killed and a son wounded, and the 
 slaves escaped. Indictments were found charging a levying 
 war against the United States, against Hanway and thirty- 
 seven others. 
 
 The prosecution was conducted by United States Di&- 
 
Wister's Recollections 361 
 
 trict Attorney John W. Ashmead, James R. Ludlow, later 
 Judge Ludlow, Mr. Brent, Attorney General of Maryland, 
 and Senator Cooper and Robert M. Lee. 
 
 The defendant was represented by Joseph J. Lewis, of 
 West Chester; John M. Read, later Chief Justice of Penn- 
 sylvania; Thaddeus Stevens, Theodore Cuyler and W. 
 Arthur Jackson. 
 
 I remember a scathing speech of Thaddeus Stevens upon 
 a question of admission of evidence, which caused a modifica- 
 tion of the ruling, but I was much struck by the opening 
 speech of Mr. Cuyler for the defence. The whole speech is 
 replete with ability and patriotism and is well worth a study. 
 It is too long to quote, but I give a short extract from it 
 which then struck me as full of merit and of horse sense : 
 
 "Treason shall consist in levying war against the United 
 States ! Do the facts sustain the charge ? Sir, did you hear 
 it? That three harmless, non-resistant Quakers and thirty- 
 eight wretched, miserable, pennyless negroes, armed with 
 corn-cutters, clubs and a few muskets, and headed by a miller 
 in a felt hat, without a coat, without arms, and mounted on a 
 sorrel nag, levied war against the United States ? Blessed be 
 God, that our Union has survived the shock. 
 
 "Sir, it is for a charge of high treason, based upon such 
 levying of war as this, that we are here to-day. It was for 
 this that the State of Maryland forsook her high position 
 and entered this court as a private prosecutor, thirsting for 
 blood — the blood of this obscure and humble man. It was 
 for this that a grave Senator forsook his accustomed paths, 
 and is here to-day asking for blood — the blood of one of his 
 constituents. It was for this that the Recorder of the City 
 of Philadelphia, self-persuaded that high talent and great 
 moral weight were needed to sustain such a persecution — I 
 beg pardon, prosecution — volunteered his services. But, sir, 
 the subject is too grave for irony ; strange though it may be, 
 and absurd as it seems to me, yet to this man it may be 
 death." 
 
 Mr. Cuyler's courage and pluck were conspicuously 
 
362 Law Association Centennial 
 
 shown in Penna. R. R. Co.'s Appeal, known as the Junction 
 Railroad Case, 30 P. F. Smith, 265. 
 
 It was an appeal from an adverse decision at nisi prius 
 by Judge Sharswood, following the adverse decision of two 
 Masters in Chancery, the present Judge Willson and Samuel 
 Robb. The decision was reversed and the Pennsylvania Rail- 
 road won upon the forcible argument of Mr. Cuyler, not- 
 withstanding the able argument of James Gowen. 
 
 In McGee vs. Willing, 31 Legal Intelligencer, 37, an 
 action at nisi prius before Judge Sharswood and a jury, 
 brought by a servant for the loss of an eye caused by an acci- 
 dental blow from a child of tender years, where a juryman 
 shook his head in dissent of what he said, Mr. Cuyler walked 
 up to the juryman, face to face, and said : "When you came 
 into this jury box, sir, you took an oath to decide this cause 
 according to the evidence and to give a true verdict. You 
 have no right to determine the cause until the last word falls 
 from his Honor the Judge." 
 
 This caused a sensation in the court room, which was 
 crowded with people, attracted by the importance of the 
 cause and the prominence of the counsel, Daniel Dougherty, 
 representing the plaintiff, and it seemed to all that Mr. Cuyler 
 had ruined his chances of a favorable verdict. Nevertheless 
 the jury found for the defendant, after an elaborate, learned 
 and impartial charge from Judge Sharswood. 
 
 I have mentioned Mr. Binney and Mr. Sergeant, and the 
 latter I heard speak on a number of occasions, particularly 
 in the Pea Patch case, involving the title to that island in the 
 Delaware, and in which he was opposed by James M. Bayard, 
 United States Senator from Delaware. Mr. Sergeant was 
 always perfectly prepared both as to facts and authorities; 
 his manner at this time was serious, almost solemn. 
 
 I attended the meeting of the Bar held at his death on 
 November 26, 1852, reported in 2 Wallace, Jr., XVIII, 
 which was held in the United States Circuit Court 
 room, in the second story of the State House. The 
 large room was crowded to overflowing with mem- 
 
Wister's Recollections 363 
 
 bers of the bar and prominent citizens. After the reading of 
 the resolutions, Mr. Binney rose and delivered an elaborate 
 sketch of Mr. Sergeant's life and character which every 
 law student and every lawyer should read. It is not generally 
 known that Mr. Binney's relations with Mr. Sergeant had 
 been strained for a number of years, and that there had been 
 no intercourse between them, and I extract from his speech 
 a passage or two which, if carefully read, discloses the fact. 
 
 "No trivial incongruities of feeling or opinion, no mis- 
 interpretation, however arising, no petty gust, no cloud of a 
 hand's breadth, which may and will chill or overcast the 
 common sky of the truest friends in a life of fifty-five years, 
 ever for a single instant disturbed the foundations of my 
 regard for him or even reached the depths in which they were 
 laid. These foundations were laid upon his principles as I 
 well knew them fifty years ago. They were laid deep upon 
 that sure basis and they were beyond the reach of change or 
 chance, as his principles were." 
 
 The day after Mr. Sergeant's death Mr. Binney called 
 at his house, inquired for the family and left his card. Under 
 the circumstances it seems to me that Mr. Binney's speech, 
 which he said would be, and which was, his last, and his 
 action at that time, showed an extraordinary instance of mag- 
 nanimity and power to overlook trivial matters. 
 
 The speech was admirably delivered and is a splendid 
 eulogy upon Mr. Sergeant's life and character. 
 
 An instance of the close intimacy of Mr. Binney and 
 Mr. Sergeant in their student days is to be seen at the 
 Library of the Law Association, and deserves to have a 
 more permanent form. It is as follows : 
 
 "I, Horace Binney, of the City of Philadelphia, do 
 hereby promise to pay to John Sergeant one-half of the first 
 fee I shall receive as attorney in any Court of the State of 
 Pennsylvania or any other State, as witness my hand and 
 seal this 30 May, 1799. 
 
 "HORACE BINNEY. [seal] 
 
 Attest : 
 
 "J. B. Wallace." 
 
364 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Mr. Binney's seal establishes consideration, and as he 
 was as unlikely to make promises to pay without considera- 
 tion as Mr. Sergeant was to receive money without giving 
 value for it, it is a nice speculation as to what value Mr. 
 Sergeant gave for it, as it would also be interesting to know 
 what the fee in question amounted to. 
 
 No recollection of fifty years can be allowed to pass 
 without a reference to George Sharswood, who became a 
 Judge of the Philadelphia District Court in 1845, ^"d 
 remained on that bench until 1868, when he became a mem- 
 ber of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania by election, over- 
 coming a hostile majority. 
 
 He remained there until 1883, the last four years of 
 which he was Chief Justice. At a meeting of the bar on 
 December 20, 1882, Henry M. Phillips well said that Judge 
 Sharswood in closing his judicial career does it "with honor 
 to himself, with honor to us, with honor to the State. He 
 leaves behind him monuments of his works which will long 
 be remembered. 
 
 "Our honored guest has long been in the public service, 
 before the public eye between forty and fifty years, and 
 during all that time he has never been the object of suspicion 
 or of calumny." 
 
 He was a wonderful nisi prius Judge, far surpassing any 
 one that I have seen anywhere ; he had had little bar experi- 
 ence, but had been a member of City Councils and of the State 
 Legislature, and had a great knowledge of human nature, 
 particularly of Philadelphia human nature. Without taking 
 from the jury any of its rights, he usually so marshaled the 
 facts as to lead the jury insensibly to his view of the cause. 
 
 He was astute to see the right. In a cause where the 
 liability of a defendant depended upon the existence of a 
 seal to an instrument he asked to see it and found a flourish at 
 the end of the signature and said, "I think I see a scroll or 
 seal at the end of the signature." And, in deciding the ques- 
 tion, the jury also saw it. 
 
 His court was the favorite resort of young members of 
 
Wister's Recollections 365 
 
 the profession who wished to hear his charges to the jury or 
 his opinions, which were then always read. 
 
 When in health he was an admirable and a jovial com- 
 panion and loved to hear a story or to repeat one ; at a dinner 
 or a supper party he was the centre of attraction, but not a 
 monopolizer of conversation. He told many a good story, 
 and I cannot refrain from telling one of his jokes. Many 
 will remember George Von Neida, a tipstaff of the Dis- 
 trict Court, a dressy bachelor, proud of his black moustache. 
 Judge Sharswood, stepping from the bench, said to him: 
 "They say that our officers never die, but, George, I think 
 you dye daily." 
 
 I commend to your attention Judge Sharswood's address 
 at a dinner from the bar to the bench. Misc. Pamphlets, Law 
 Association, and George W. Biddle's address before the Law 
 Association, November 20, 1883, 102 Penna. State Rep., 601. 
 
JOHN CADWALADER'S OFFICE 
 
 by 
 
 JOHN SAMUEL 
 
 On the 8th of September, 1847, I made my first appear- 
 ance as a student of law at the office of John Cadwalader. 
 Mr. Cadwalader's office was, as was the custom of the pro- 
 fession at that time, in his dwelling house, situated at the 
 present No. 240 South Fourth Street. It was a large, roomy 
 house, on the west side of the way, fronting eastward. On 
 the ground floor were two entries or hallways, the northern- 
 most one admitting to the dwelling portion of the house, the 
 one to the south giving on the offices, which consisted of two 
 rooms; the front room on Fourth Street and a rear or back 
 room connected by a door with the front room, and the hall 
 on the south side running past the front room into the back 
 room, so that a person could enter or leave the back room 
 without being obliged to go through the front room. In 
 the back room, which was surrounded by bookcases, all with 
 doors, were a bricked-up fire-proof vault for deeds, etc., and 
 a large table covered with a cloth — no desk. On the table 
 generally stood a pair of silver candlesticks with candles in 
 them, which were lighted at dark though gas was in both the 
 office rooms. The walls of the front office, where the stu- 
 dents sat and worked, were covered from the floor to the 
 ceiling with paper and bookcases, all having doors. The 
 furniture of the room consisted of an anthracite stove with a 
 long pipe, a large table, about which the students sat, on 
 which were writing pads, paper and ink, and a number of 
 hard wooden- or straw-seated chairs. If I remember aright, 
 blotting paper had not as yet entirely supplied the place of 
 sand, or, as it was called, "pounce," for drying the wetted 
 page, of which several boxes like pepper casters were on the 
 table. Steel pens had at that time arrived, but were not 
 universally accepted. Some of the students thought that "no 
 gentlemen could use a steel pen," so that on the table were 
 
Samuel's John Cadwalader's Office 367 
 
 numbers of quill pens, together with the "new-fangled abom- 
 ination." I am not sure, but I do not think there was a carpet 
 on the floor of the front office,— but there was a Venetian 
 blind on the window between the two front doors. There 
 might have been a map, but I do not think there was a por- 
 trait or picture in either of the rooms. I have thus described 
 the appearance of the office to emphasize the different condi- 
 tions of to-day — for Mr. Cadwalader's office was looked upon 
 by the young men of that day as what would now be called 
 an "up-to-date" office. 
 
 Fourth Street at that day was a great habitat for law- 
 yers. Adjoining Mr. Cadwalader's house to the north was 
 the office and house of Job R. Tyson, a well-known lawyer 
 of his time, afterwards Member of Congress from the Second 
 District. Around the comer in Locust Street was the office 
 of P. Pemberton Morris, afterwards professor at the Uni- 
 versity of Pennsylvania. Further on, having crossed Locust 
 Street, were the dwellings and offices of Benjamin Gerhard, 
 Peter McCall, Caleb Ash, St. George Tucker Campbell, Wil- 
 liam M. Meredith, Ferdinand Hubbell, and, later on, of 
 George M. Wharton, William H. Drayton and James W. 
 Paul. On the east side of Fourth Street, opposite to Mr. 
 Cadwalader's house, commencing at Willing's Alley and 
 going towards the south, were the spacious mansions of 
 Joseph R. Ingersoll, Horace Binney and John Sergeant; 
 Charles Chauncey had his office and house on the north side 
 of Walnut Street, a few doors above Third Street. These 
 last four-named gentlemen had at that time retired from 
 active practice, and almost fi^om office business. The social 
 relations of Mr. Binney with his neighbors, Mr. Ingersoll on 
 the north and Mr. Sergeant on the south, were at that time 
 understood to be somewhat strained. It was students' gos- 
 sip that an ivy growing on the party wall between Mr. Inger- 
 soll and Mr. Binney was the cause of their difference. I 
 never knew the occasion of the falling out between Mr. Bin- 
 ney and Mr. Sergeant, but I well recall the interest and 
 curiosity of the bar as to the remarks which Mr. Binney was 
 
368 Law Association Centennial 
 
 to make at the bar meeting on the occasion of Mr. Sergeant's 
 death in 1852. 
 
 When I first came to Mr. Cadwalader's office I found as 
 companion students Charles Lincoln, the late Clerk of the 
 United States Courts for this District, an industrious worker, 
 always at his work and thinking of little else, but social, 
 friendly and ready to smile at the antics played by some of 
 the others ; George Harding, who, during the late years of 
 his studentship displayed great mechanical abilities and 
 developed into one of the greatest patent lawyers in the 
 United States. He was engaged with Mr. Cadwalader in 
 the celebrated Parker Turbine Wheel cases, and in them dis- 
 played those qualities which instantaneously placed him in the 
 highest rank of that branch of the profession. Hamilton 
 Beckett, the son of Henry Beckett, an Englishman, and 
 at that time, by reason of his marriage with a daughter 
 of Mrs. Lyle, formerly Ann Hamilton, the owner or 
 occupier of the Woodlands and other Hamilton estates. 
 He went to England during his time of studentship and 
 I do not think finished his course. Afterwards came 
 Charles G. Leland, just back from Germany, full of German 
 university life and German mysticism and European ideas of 
 life. He was not cut out for a lawyer, but he is well known 
 in literature by his translations of Heine (probably the best 
 made), his Gypsy books and the immortal Hans Breitman 
 and his ballads. It was Mr. Leland who first introduced to 
 his fellow-students, and I think I may say to the Philadelphia 
 public, the use of lager beer in place of the strong malt pota- 
 tions to which we had been accustomed. Gideon Scull, a 
 tall, handsome man, with a fine intellect, was also a student. 
 Had not his eyes failed him he undoubtedly would have 
 achieved fame as a lawyer. He afterwards left this city, 
 went into business of insurance at Boston, where he became 
 wealthy and died a few years ago. Brinton Coxe came to the 
 office after I left, a worker and thinker. He is known in legal 
 literature by his translation of Bracton, and his Treatise on 
 Judicial Power and Unconstitutional Legislation, a work 
 which has received the highest praise from all constitutional 
 
Samuel's John Cadwalader's Office 369 
 
 students, and by one of his ablest critics he is said to have 
 "said the last word on the subject"— nothing more could be 
 added to it. Judge Craig Biddle and John T. Montgomery 
 had been students with Mr. Cadwalader and had left before I 
 entered. David W. Sellers came shortly after I left. 
 
 There were no rules or regulations about attendance or 
 hours of reading. We were expected to be at the office at 
 about nine o'clock. If there were any messages or notes to 
 be carried it was our duty to do so, but Mr. Cadwalader 
 always hesitated about requiring from his students services 
 which, though common in the other offices, were not directly 
 in the line of legal education. We students were always 
 making co mparisons with those in other offices, and bragging 
 
 The following is a list of Mr. Cadwalader's students, with the dates of their 
 registration. Some of them were finishing their legal education in his office, hav- 
 ing been previously registered as students in another office. This list, copied 
 from the dockets of Mr. Cadwalader, has been kindly furnished to me by his son, 
 John Cadwalader : 
 
 Joseph Reese Fry, October 9, 1830 ; William H. Harford, of Georgia, April 
 9, 1832 ; William Fisher, October 8, 1832 ; Frederick William Mayer, July 3, 
 1833; Evert John Bancker, October 15, 1834; James Arrott, Jr., April 29, 
 1837 ; Stocker Lewis, October 2, 1837 ; Mark A. Earl, October 16, 1837 
 Charles J. Biddle, November 22, 1837; Yardley Warner, January i, 1838 (pre- 
 viously entered with William F. Smith, November 15, 1835) ; William Cadwal- 
 ader, March 6, 1838 ; George W. Biddle, August 11, 1838 (had previously been 
 with James C. Biddle, September 2, 1835) ; Charles Gordon Clarke, November 16, 
 1840; Benjamin Brannan Reath, August 27, 1841 ; Elhcott Evans, October 29, 
 1841; J. Craig Biddle, December 1, 1841 ; John T. Montgomery, March 7, 
 1842; Frederick W. S. Grayson, May 4, 1843 C^ad previously been with J. 
 Hall Bready) ; Philip Physick Randolph, December 5, 1843 ; Cadwalader Morris 
 Wickersham, January 2, 1844; John Kennedy, Jr., January 10, 1844; Charles 
 Shippen Lincoln, February 6, 1845 > George Harding, September 2, 1846 ; 
 Charles Carroll Tucker, October 26, 1846; Francis Ingraham, January 4, 1847 ; 
 Walter R. McDonald, February 24, 1847 ; Hamilton Beckett, May 4, 1847 ; 
 John Samuel, September 9, 1847; Sidney Tennent, September 22, 1847; Charles 
 G. Leland, October 23, 1848; Robert M. Richardson, February 8, 1850; Peter 
 Bowdoin Smith, November 5, 1850; David W. Sellers, April 22, 1851 ; George 
 W. Poulterer, September 2, 185 1 ; Clement Tingley, January 24, 1852 ; Brinton 
 Coxe, May 31, 1852 ; Gideon Scull, Jr., June 6, 1852 ; James Buchanan Henry, 
 July 5, 1853; Samuel Emlen Randolph, September 10, 1853 ; Robert Palethorp, 
 October 10, 1853; Samuel A. J. Salter, July 15, 1854; Henry Cochran, Novem- 
 ber 15, 1856 ; P. Arrell Browne, August 26, 1857 ; Samuel Griffith Davis, January 
 II, 1858; George Tucker Bispham, September 11, 1858 (afterwards registered in 
 office of William H. Rawle). 
 
 24 
 
370 Law Association Centennial 
 
 how much less was asked of us in this way than in the 
 others. A story is told of a young gentleman with a soul 
 above carrying notes who was requested by his preceptor to 
 deliver a certain letter. After grumbling to himself and 
 assuring his fellow-students that he didn't consider such 
 functions to be part of his legal education, he (as there was 
 no city delivery at the Post Office in those days) put it in 
 Blood's Dispatch, a private letter carrier in the city. On the 
 day following he was asked by his preceptor if he had 
 delivered "that letter;" when he confessed that he had 
 entrusted it to "Blood's," his preceptor, one of the politest 
 
 and most urbane of men, said to him : "Mr. , be 
 
 good enough to go at once to Mr. (the person to whom the 
 letter was addressed), and see if he received it." In those 
 days, there were some printed forms, but few of those 
 now so common could be bought. Everything was written 
 by hand — deeds, leases, declarations, pleas, precipes. We 
 students either (when we had got to know enough) 
 wrote the simplest of them or more frequently copied 
 them. The only machine copying was done with a 
 damped tissue paper and copying ink, which, when paper- 
 books on rules in court containing depositions were neces- 
 sary, made a voluminous, and, in many instances, illegible 
 sheaf of leaves. I consider the drafting, writing and copy- 
 ing of the papers in such an office to be one of the most 
 valuable portions of a student's labors. It was impossible 
 whilst toiling over the formal parts of these instruments not 
 to be impressed with their reiterated words, and to ask one- 
 self why this and that word was employed ; and the necessity 
 of every phrase, became a question, in the solving of which the 
 roots and bases of the law were struck. I recall that shortly 
 after I had entered the office, in one of the interminable suits 
 arising out of the failure of the Bank of the United States, 
 Mr. Cadwalader, who represented the assignees, filed fifty 
 special pleas. The gentleman on the other side, though one 
 of the most prominent counsel of his time, was not equal to 
 the technical knowledge necessary to reply to them. He went 
 
Samuel's John Cadwalader's Office 371 
 
 to Richard McMurtrie, at that time barely more than admit- 
 ted, and gave him $50 to draft the repHcation to those pleas. 
 I recollect copying those pleas, how insensible and mysterious 
 they were to me, and how I wondered why a difference of a 
 few words in each plea should make them all necessary. 
 When I now look back on what I then thought wasted 
 drudgery, I am forced to confess the lasting knowledge it 
 imparted to me ; how by it I was taught to think and express 
 myself logically ; and to ask. Is there any such training to be 
 had to-day, and what replaces it ? As noon arrived the natural 
 appetite of youth compelled refreshment, and most of the 
 students were away from the office an hour or more. After 
 that we were at work at our books at the large table till four 
 or five in the afternoon. Open air athletics had not yet been 
 accepted as part of education. There were few ball games, 
 no bicycle or cinder tracks. Barrett's gymnasium, on Market 
 Street, above Eighth, was the favorite resort of those inclined 
 to "muscular Christianity." Such of us as estabhshed in 1852 
 a cricket club (organized in 1854 as the Philadelphia Cricket 
 Club) and attended on one afternoon of the week on the ball 
 grounds at Camden, were looked on askance and with fore- 
 boding of no resulting good. 
 
 Mr. Cadwalader had prepared for his students a very 
 elaborate course of study, a copy of which is now before me. 
 In its early stages it is, of course, chiefly based on Black- 
 stone's Commentaries, which were required to be studied 
 without the notes, and not consecutively. Between certain 
 chapters were intercalated works, or parts of works, treating 
 on the same subject; as, for instance, between the first and 
 twenty-third pages of the second volume of Blackstone, pp. 
 I to 130, and pp. 150 to 164 of the first edition of Humphreys 
 on Real Property was inserted. In the body of the course 
 was a caution how this book was to be studied. Of course, 
 Coke on Littleton was a basic study, and I find this 
 memorandum: "The text and arrangement of Littleton 
 should be kept on the student's mind throughout. Such notes 
 as are methodically arranged in the form of distinct treatises 
 
2)J2 Law Association Centennial 
 
 on particular heads of the law, such as feudal system, — uses 
 — trusts, etc., should be studied with great care." The whole 
 prescribed course shows that Mr. Cadwalader was a believer 
 in the historical method. The third and fourth volumes of 
 Reeves' History of the Law was an early and prominent 
 book, and his students' first introduction to equity is the His- 
 tory of Equity in Pennsylvania as given by Horace Binney 
 in his Eulogium of Chief Justice Tilghman, in i6 S. & R. 
 After prolonged and thorough grounding in Blackstone, 
 Kent, and Coke, came Pleading, Practice and Pennsylvania 
 Statute Law, each subject carefully defined and connoted 
 with cognate subjects, and, finally, case law. When towards 
 the close of the course and the student had left the study of 
 principles for that of cases, he directs of Smith's Leading 
 Cases, "First, read the English notes on the case, then study 
 the case itself the English notes are not very valuable and 
 the American are too profound." Every Thursday evening of 
 each week was devoted to examination of our work. Eight 
 o'clock was the hour fixed, but although the students were 
 prompt enough to the hour, we generally found Mr. Cad- 
 walader at work in his back office, most frequently with 
 a client or in consultation with another lawyer. It was not 
 infrequently nine o'clock, and sometimes later, when he 
 appeared in the front office. Sometimes he sat down, but 
 generally he stood with his back to the anthracite stove. In 
 the first years of our course he examined us critically as to 
 the definition and exact meaning of phrases, and was par- 
 ticular that certain forms should be memorized word for 
 word and dissected ; but at the middle and towards the end of 
 
 our courses he would ask a question, "Mr. , give me your 
 
 idea of an Executory devise?" or, "What have you learned 
 from Cutter vs. Powell" or, "The Duchess of Kingston's 
 case ?" When the answers came he would say, "Yes, very ac- 
 curate," or, "I am not sure that you have grasped the entire 
 thought." And then no other question was asked, but for an 
 hour or more there flowed from Mr. Cadwalader's mouth such 
 a store of definitions, distinctions, illustrations, as illumined 
 
Samuel's John Cadwalader's Office 373 
 
 the darkest corners of our brains, and whilst we listened, the 
 most abstruse and recondite subject became so simple and 
 clear that it seemed strange that there could be any difficulty 
 in comprehending it. His erudition was so vast, his memory 
 so retentive, he had all the learning of his profession so ready, 
 that he never hesitated for a word or a phrase, and it seemed 
 (until we knew to the contrary) that he had previously pre- 
 pared the lecture, for such it was, to which we were listen- 
 ing. It was not merely law that we were listening to, but the 
 daily affairs of life, social, family and business occurrences, 
 and how they were managed and solved. He made us under- 
 stand that laws were not made to be fitted on people or 
 communities, but grew out of the relation of individuals with 
 each other. Such were our examinations at Mr. Cad- 
 walader's, and whilst I cannot say that I became so 
 enamoured of the law as, like Mr. Heep, to call Tidd's Prac- 
 tice a "lovely book," yet I always looked forward to the 
 Thursday evenings with pleasure, and at their conclusion felt 
 that I had really gained professional knowledge. 
 
 The relation of the preceptor in that office was more 
 than a mere formal prescribing of studies and examination. 
 That indescribable and imponderable thing called "tone" was, 
 not by precept but by continual example, impressed on all of 
 his students. The office was not a mere "legal junk shop." 
 There was no taint of "commercialism" there. In the con- 
 duct of the business, in his relation with his clients and stu- 
 dents and his professional brethren, mere money was not pro- 
 truded as the "end all and be all" of duty. At the close of 
 each student's career in his office it was Mr. Cadwalader's 
 custom to take him in some case then pending and return to 
 him as his fee, at least (if not more than) the honorarium paid 
 for his tuition. There was a personal interest manifested in 
 each one of us. Many of us were made acquainted with the 
 members of Mr. Cadwalader's family, and I feel sure that had 
 any of us got into any young man's trouble at that time we 
 should have gone first to Mr. Cadwalader for guidance. There 
 was a young fellow-student from Nova Scotia who was acci- 
 
374 Law Association Centennial 
 
 dentally drowned in the Delaware, near Torresdale. I can 
 never forget the almost parental trouble and expense that Mr. 
 Cadwalader took and incurred in this disaster ; how seriously 
 he was affected by it and the gloom it threw over the office. 
 
 A few words as to Mr. Cadwalader's personal appear- 
 ance may not be out of place. He was of medium stature, but 
 well proportioned and of good carriage, and very alert and 
 agile in his movements. He had an exceptionally handsome 
 countenance, with a slight Hebraic cast, dark brown and 
 piercing eyes, full nose and lips and curly, dark hair. His 
 portrait, hanging at the Law Association, was painted after 
 his death and does not do him justice. He was fond of 
 literature and had a great appreciation of forcible description. 
 In his eulogium at the bar meeting for Colonel Charles J. 
 Biddle he quoted with great effect Judge Conrad's dramatic 
 description of Colonel Biddle's brilliant behavior at the Battle 
 of Chapultepec. Walking one day with me at Atlantic City 
 on the beach, he broke forth with the first lines of Barry Corn- 
 wall's ode to the ocean, and, to my astonishment, repeated the 
 whole poem of thirty-six lines. His many-sided perspicacity 
 was wonderful. I will conclude these gossiping reminiscences 
 by relating an anecdote of him told to me by ex-President 
 Buchanan. Before the transcontinental railroads were built 
 they were for many years believed to be impossible. When 
 Mr. Cadwalader was in Congress, at a conference where the 
 question involved was as to establishing rapid communication 
 with the Western and Pacific slope, someone said, "Oh, but 
 the Rocky Mountains ! How are we to get over those impass- 
 able barriers?" "Gentlemen," said Mr. Cadwalader to his 
 astounded audience, "there are no Rocky Mountains." As 
 Mr. Buchanan told me, this was Mr. Cadwalader's way of 
 alleging that there were no such natural barriers as would 
 defeat the science of modem engineering; a fact not appre- 
 ciated until many years after. "He," said Mr. Buchanan, 
 "was right; all the rest of us were wrong." 
 
REMINISCENCES OF THE BAR 
 
 by 
 
 HON. CLEMENT B. PENROSE 
 
 Judge of the Orphans' Court 
 
 I am asked to write some reminiscences of the bar. I 
 fear my reminiscences are neither many nor interesting, — 
 though my recollection goes back a good many years, some 
 years, indeed, before admission to the bar or even entry as a 
 student in the department of arts of the University of Penn- 
 sylvania. It vi^as in the summer of 1847 that I was present 
 at the trial of Commonwealth v. McClintock, et al., in Car- 
 lisle. Some months before that, slaves who had escaped from 
 Maryland were traced to Carlisle, where they were arrested, 
 and, after a hearing, remanded to their master, a Mr. Ken- 
 nedy, of Hagerstown. A large number of blacks assembled 
 about the court house, and when the slaves were brought out, 
 attempted to rescue them. The result was a riot, in which 
 Mr. Kennedy was killed. At that date the feeling in favor 
 of the South against the aggressiveness of the abolitionists 
 was very strong, and this riot and murder caused great indig- 
 nation and excitement. There were many arrests of black 
 men, and with them was also arrested Mr. McClintock, pro- 
 fessor of English literature and helles lettres in Dickinson 
 College, an avowed abolitionist, who was charged with hav- 
 ing incited the rescue and participated in the riot. Mr. Biddle, 
 a prominent member of the Cumberland County bar, was 
 retained by Mr. McClintock, and at his suggestion Mr. Mere- 
 dith, with whom he had been intimate since their boyhood, 
 was retained also. There was a joint indictment against 
 the professor and some forty or fifty colored men. The trial 
 resulted in the conviction of most, if not all, of the colored 
 men, and the acquittal of Mr. McClintock, — to the intense 
 indignation of the Judge (Hepburn) before whom it took 
 place, who declared that if it had been a civil proceeding he 
 
376 Law Association Centennial 
 
 would have set the verdict aside. Perhaps what was said 
 by one of the chief witnesses for the Commonwealth, a 
 journeyman hatter, who testified in the strongest terms 
 against Mr. McClintock, may have had something to do with 
 this acquittal. After declaring that he had been near the 
 defendant during the riot and had heard him urging the 
 black men to seize the slaves and drag them from the officers 
 having them in custody, he was asked by Mr. Meredith, on 
 cross-examination, to state the very words used by Mr. 
 McClintock. "Well," said the witness, "I will. He says, says 
 he, 'You'uns go on, I'll see you through.' Them was his very 
 words." Mr. McClintock was an accomplished scholar, one 
 of the authors of "McClintock and Crooks's Latin Gram- 
 mar," etc., etc., so that there was not much difficulty in 
 persuading the jury that this witness might be mistaken in 
 his recollection of facts no less than of declarations. 
 
 Many years after this, I heard Mr. Meredith say to Chief 
 Justice Woodward : "Do you know that until a few months 
 ago I never tasted whisky in my life? It used to be thought 
 a vulgar drink, brandy being the only thing fit for a gentle- 
 man. Well, when I was in Carlisle, a long time ago, an old 
 friend of mine gave me a keg of what was called very fine 
 whisky. Of course, I accepted it, but when it reached Phila- 
 delphia, it was put in my garret where it lay until I came 
 across it recently while looking for a mislaid paper. I gave 
 the keg a kick, and the answering gurgle had a pleasant 
 sound. So I had it tapped, and tasted the contents. I am 
 afraid I like whisky." 
 
 No doubt this was some of the old "Showers" whisky, 
 given to Mr. Meredith by Mr. Biddle at the time of the 
 McClintock trial — a whisky well known to bar and bench in 
 the interior of the State, the admirable qualities of which 
 could have been testified to by Chief Justice Gibson if he had 
 been consulted on the subject. 
 
 Cumberland County produced many distinguished law- 
 yers, among whom were Judge Duncan, Chief Justice Gib- 
 son, Judge Grier, etc., etc. Judge John Reed, who preceded 
 
Judge Penrose's Reminiscences 377 
 
 Judge Hepburn on the bench of the Common Pleas of the 
 County, established a law school which was attended by 
 students from all over the State, as well as from Maryland, 
 Delaware, etc. Among his students were Governor Curtin 
 and the late John W. Brock, Henry Edgar Keene and others 
 of Philadelphia. He was the author of "Pennsylvania Black- 
 stone," an adaptation of Blackstone's Commentaries to the 
 laws of Pennsylvania, intended for the use of his students 
 but of value to the profession generally. In those days there 
 were two lay judges, usually farmers, who were allowed to 
 hold courts of quarter session in the absence of the pre- 
 sident judge. The trial of a man named Fagin, on the 
 charge of beating his wife, once came before the court as 
 thus constituted, and General Sam Alexander, one of the 
 wits of the bar, volunteered his services for the defence. The 
 Commonwealth proved beyond all question that the defend- 
 ant was guilty, and General Alexander, in opening to the 
 jury, after conceding this fact, said : "Gentlemen of the Jury, 
 I am going to show you that Fagin had a right to beat his 
 wife, and I am going to show it by a book written by our own 
 judge, Judge John Reed, who, I am sorry, is not here to tell 
 it to you himself." Then opening Reed's Pennsylvania 
 Blackstone, he read : " 'By the old law, the husband might 
 give his wife moderate correction.' 'By the old law' ; that is, 
 the 'common law.' What is the 'common law ?' It is the law 
 for common people; and where, gentlemen of the jury, I ask 
 you, where will you find two commoner people than Fagin 
 and his wife. " 'But,' " reading further, " 'in the politer reign 
 of Charles the Second, this power of correction began to be 
 doubted.' — Ah, now you get among the big bugs. What do 
 we care for 'Charles the Second?' We've thrown off the 
 British yoke. We've nothing to do with your kings and 
 lords. We're the sovereign people — the common people. The 
 "common law' is good enough for us, and it's good enough 
 for Fagin and his wife," and so on, and so on. The jury 
 acquitted Fagin without leaving the box. 
 
 A country lawyer, and a city lawyer, for that matter, 
 
378 Law Association Centennial 
 
 often has amusing experiences. A client called one evening 
 at the office of Mr. Miller, then Prothonotary of the Supreme 
 Court for the Middle Disti-ict, in Harrisburg. His father 
 had been killed on the Pennsylvania Railroad that morning, 
 and the son wanted instant suit brought for the recovery of 
 damages. Mr. Miller, after hearing the particulars of the 
 accident and being satisfied that it was the result of the 
 victim's own negligence, advised the client not to be too 
 hasty — to wait, at least, until after the funeral, if not until it 
 could be known how the father's affairs would turn out, etc., 
 etc., etc. "Now, General Miller," said the distressed son, 
 "there's no use talking to me that way. You know how that 
 road did when they killed my mules. They wouldn't pay me 
 a single cent. So I've made up my mind, as they behaved so 
 mean about them mules, by the Lord, I'll put 'em through 
 on the old man !" 
 
 Speaking of slaves, reminds me that I was in Lancaster, 
 in the office of Thaddeus Stevens, when the news came of 
 John Brown's raid and of his capture by the Virginia authori- 
 ties. There was of course great excitement throughout the 
 North, and the shock, in Pennsylvania, at least, was almost 
 as great as it could have been in the South. Someone said, 
 "Why, Mr. Stevens, they'll hang that man !" To which, to 
 my astonishment, for he was a bitter abolitionist, he replied, 
 "Damn him, he ought to be hung!" 
 
 When I came to the bar, and for a considerable time 
 afterwards, there were few lawyers whose offices were not in 
 their residences, — though among the exceptions were George 
 W. Biddle, Chapman Biddle, Mr. McMurtrie, and, possibly, 
 Mr. Olmstead. Fourth Street, below Walnut; Walnut 
 Street, from Fourth to Eighth; Fifth Street and Sixth 
 Street, from Chestnut Street to Spruce, were the chief locali- 
 ties. On Fourth Street, on the west side, were the residences 
 and offices of William M. Meredith, St. George Tucker 
 Campbell, George M. Wharton, Peter McCall, John Cad- 
 walader (afterwards Judge Cadwalader) , Benjamin Gerhard, 
 etc., etc., etc., and on the east side were John Sergeant and 
 
Judge Penrose's Reminiscences 379 
 
 Horace Binney, both of whom, however, had given up active 
 practice. On Walnut Street were Thomas I. Wharton, James 
 C. Vandyke, Theodore Cuyler, Murray Rush, Henry J. 
 Wilhams, Samuel H. Perkins, William A. Porter (after- 
 wards Judge Porter), etc., etc., etc. In later years, when the 
 fashion was growing common of having the office away from 
 the place of residence, Mr. Williams said to me that he did 
 not see how it was possible for a lawyer in active practice to 
 do this. "Why," said he, "when I was practicing I went to 
 my office as soon as I had finished my breakfast, and saw 
 clients until it was time to run over to the court. At three 
 o'clock I came home to dinner, going at four to an audit; 
 then, coming home, at seven we had tea, after which I spent 
 the evening in my office." When I expressed surprise at his 
 being able to get along with so little exercise, he said : "Oh, 
 I never required exercise. I have always been a moderate 
 eater. When I was married, Mrs. Williams and I concluded 
 that desserts were unwholesome, and we determined never to 
 have them, and we didn't. Men must exercise who overeat 
 themselves. Now, there was (referring to a well- 
 known lawyer who had died sometime before, when still 
 a young man), he was fond of good living. I met him 
 one day coming from market with a basket on his arm. He 
 opened it to show me the fine lobsters which he had just 
 bought, and said, 'Do you ever eat them? I do.' That is just 
 the kind of man to die young." Mr. Williams, who was then 
 an elderly man, lived for a good many years after this. It 
 was in his office that William F. Judson, one of the most 
 distinguished of the junior bar, was trained. He was some- 
 what the senior of John G. Johnson, who was intimately asso- 
 ciated with him. He died at an early age, though he had 
 already acquired a very high reputation. He was not only a 
 lawyer of great learning and accomplishment, but a most 
 charming man in every way — universally loved and 
 respected. His premature death was an irreparable loss to 
 the bar and to the community. 
 
 Judge Strong once told me that his own practice as to 
 
380 Law Association Centennial 
 
 the time spent in his office and in court, while at the bar, was 
 much the same as that of Mr. WiUiams, whom he esteemed 
 very highly. I am inclined to think that he, too, was a 
 moderate eater, though I know he did not always abstain 
 from desserts ; at least, when dining at a hotel in Harrisburg 
 on one occasion I saw him eating pie as if he enjoyed it. 
 This, perhaps, was due to his New England origin. And so 
 eminent an authority as Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, in his 
 life of Ralph Waldo Emerson (who was so great a pie eater 
 that he called for it at breakfast), assures us that "pie is a 
 good creature, often foolishly abused," and that at the right 
 time and in angles of thirty or forty degrees it is not at all 
 injurious. Certainly the lives of Emerson and of Judge 
 Strong were not shortened by it. 
 
 I once heard Judge Thomas Sergeant say that he 
 regarded St. George Tucker Campbell as having more 
 natural talent for the law than any man he had ever known. 
 Mr. Campbell, who was equally strong before court or jury, 
 was apt in his earnestness to speak in a loud tone of voice. 
 After the adjournment of court on one occasion, Judge 
 Lowrie, then Chief Justice, said to him as they were coming 
 downstairs together, "Mr. Campbell, I never was so much 
 pleased with your speaking as I have been to-day." Mr. 
 Campbell blushed with delight, until the Judge added : "You 
 didn't hollow as loud as you generally do." 
 
 In arguing a case before Joseph A. Clay, as auditor, I 
 heard Mr. Campbell state his proposition of law, ending it 
 with "etc." "For part of what I have stated," he said, "I cite 
 Judge Parsons, and for the rest, Lord Coke." Judge Par- 
 sons, who was no longer on the bench, was one of the oppos- 
 ing counsel, and was greatly flattered at having his name thus 
 coupled with Lord Coke's, — ^not being aware that the latter 
 was referred to only for the "etc.," the deep meaning of 
 which, as used by Littleton, he often dwells on in the Com- 
 mentary (Co. Litt., 17, b). 
 
 Theodore Cuyler was another man who was strong 
 before court and jury. He had a manner of great earnest- 
 
Judge Penrose's Reminiscences 381 
 
 ness, which the ordinary jury seemed to find irresistible. He 
 and Judge Black were members of the Constitutional Con- 
 vention of 1873, and, though both of the same political party, 
 were usually on opposite sides of every question that arose 
 in the convention. On one occasion, Mr. Cuyler was arguing 
 with his accustomed earnestness in support of some proposi- 
 tion then under discussion, which, as he asserted, was, to his 
 mind, "as clear as the sun in the heavens." Judge Black, 
 who followed him, said that for once he was glad to say that 
 while not precisely in accord with his learned brother, the 
 difiference was, perhaps, one of degree only. "While I can't 
 go so far," he said, "as to admit that the proposition which 
 he supports is 'as clear as the sun in the heavens,' I will say 
 that it is very respectable moonshine." 
 
 At a dinner given by a medical association, Mr. Cuyler, 
 being called on for a toast, gave "The allopath and the 
 homeopath; two paths of glory; the paths of glory lead but 
 to the grave." 
 
 Mr. Williams told me that just after his admission to 
 the bar, while traveling in England before the days of rail- 
 roads, he was riding one day on top of a stage. In answer to 
 a question to the driver the reply was, "Well, that would puz- 
 zle a Philadelphia lawyer." The man, who was not young 
 by any means, when asked where in the world he had heard 
 that expression, said that it had been in use in that part of 
 England as long as he could recollect. 
 
 Lest the younger members of the bar should be too much 
 elated by knowing how widespread their reputation had 
 become, even at that early day, it is proper to tell them that 
 John G. Miles, Esq., of the bar of Huntingdon County, who 
 made the famous onslaught on the rule in Shelly's Case, in 
 Hileman vs. Bouslaugh, I Harris, 344, once said to me in 
 perfect seriousness and good faith, in speaking of this old 
 adage, "Is that meant for irony?" 
 
 St. George Tucker Campbell used to tell of a conversa- 
 tion he had with a leading English lawyer in one of his early 
 visits to England, in which, referring to the then recent great 
 
382 Law Association Centennial 
 
 advances in the jurisprudence of that country, the English- 
 man said that by a statute enacted shortly before, dower 
 could be barred by "a simple deed by husband and wife, with 
 separate acknowledgment, without the necessity of the old 
 method of fine or common recovery!" "Why," said Mr. 
 Campbell in reply, "that has been allowed in Pennsylvania 
 ever since its earliest settlement." 
 
 It has been only for a comparatively short time that 
 courts of common law in England have been permitted to 
 administer equity in common law actions, though equity, in 
 Pennsylvania, has always been part of the common law. I was 
 once called upon by a young man to procure the release of his 
 father, who had been committed by an alderman for calling 
 a female neighbor "an old cat." I succeeded in convincing 
 the alderman that this was not a criminal offence, and, after 
 making out a discharge, he said by way of explanation for 
 what he had done : "Well, you know, we aldermen have to 
 administer equity with our law." This was not unlike Mr. 
 Sellers's experience before another alderman, who was about 
 to bind over the defendant, who had used scurrilous lan- 
 guage, in the sum of $500 "to answer the charge of libel." 
 "But," said Mr. Sellers, "there was no libel here ; a libel must 
 be in writing." "Well, I'll bind him over in the sum of $500 
 to answer the charge of slander." "Oh, but slander is not a 
 criminal offence. You surely will not do that." "Well," says 
 the alderman, "I'll bind him over in $500, any way, and 
 you come around to-morrow and I'll tell you what it is for." 
 
 It used to be said that an alderman was never known to 
 give judgment for the defendant. This may have been untrue, 
 though I never knew of its having been done when alder- 
 men were aldermen, and- before they became magistrates, 
 which doubtless has made a change in this respect. A client 
 of mine — a milk dealer — was sued at the instance of a quar- 
 relsome neighbor for breach of a Moyamensing ordinance 
 which imposed a fine for "driving along a paved footway," 
 — the driving having been simply a crossing of the footway 
 in going in and out of his own stable with his milk wagons. I 
 
Judge Penrose's Reminiscences 383 
 
 said to the alderman that it was not possible that the 
 ordinance was intended to interfere with the right of owners 
 of property to thus use it ; and besides, I said : "Your Honor 
 knows the rule that a penal statute is to be construed 
 strictly, and this ordinance forbids driving 'along' a paved 
 footway, not 'across' it, which is a very different thing." 
 "Oh," said he, "it does not do to quibble about words. We 
 must take a common sense view of things." And so judg- 
 ment was given against the defendant, which, it need scarcely 
 be said, was promptly set aside by Judge Oswald Thompson, 
 on certiorari. 
 
 The Board of Examiners in former days was a much 
 more ephemeral body than it now is. The term of service 
 was but three months, and as a rule reappointments were not 
 made. Examinations were always oral, and preliminary 
 examinations were unknown. No doubt the present system 
 has its advantages, but it is not certain that the bar was not 
 as learned, and its standards as high, then as now. Bin- 
 ney. Sergeant, Chauncey, Meredith, Williams, Sharswood, 
 Stroud, Hare, Thayer, Rawle, Miller, McCall, Cadwalader 
 and hosts of others were admitted in the old-fashioned way. 
 It is true, boards were inclined to be lenient, but a man who 
 was admitted without the requisite knowledge, soon found his 
 level, so that no harm was done to the profession or to the 
 community. Mr. Ingraham, who was one of the characters 
 of the bar, when complaint was made that the board of which 
 he was a member had passed several students who ought to 
 have been rejected, asked the question: "Isn't the board 
 appointed for the admission of students to the bar?" It was 
 not often that more than half an hour or three-quarters, were 
 given to the examination of a student. That was long enough 
 to determine the general fitness of the applicant, who, it was 
 supposed, would continue his studies after admission, it not 
 being expected that on coming to the bar he should possess 
 all the knowledge of a veteran, or be able to answer ques- 
 tions with regard to statutes, decisions, practice, etc., etc., 
 which not many lawyers of long standing could answer. The 
 
384 Law Association Centennial 
 
 examination, though short, was generally quite long enough 
 to satisfy the party examined, though one student who came 
 before a board of which I was a member was disposed to 
 have it prolonged. He had answered every question, with 
 parrot-like exactness, not missing a single one, and the board 
 had expressed themselves as satisfied. He had scarcely left 
 the room before he opened the door, and, putting his head in, 
 said: "I forgot to say I had read Fearne on Contingent 
 Remainders as far as the rule in Shelly's case. Maybe you 
 would like to tackle me in that." 
 
 A favorite story among law students used to be about 
 the candidate for admission, who, having answered that the 
 different kinds of rent were "rent service, rent charge and 
 rent seek," was astonished when John T. Montgomery, one 
 of the wits of the bar, said : "Go on ; you have omitted one 
 that we are most familiar with;" adding, when the other 
 members of the board looked up in surprise, " 'There's the 
 rent the envious Casca made.' " 
 
 Preliminary examinations were the first step taken in 
 the direction of greater stringency, and with these it was not 
 difficult to put questions which few could answer. Questions 
 in chronology were favorites, and the unhappy aspirant who 
 could not give the date of the Battle of Marathon, or of 
 some other battle equally important, as demonstrating the 
 possession, or want of possession, of an intellect fitted for 
 acquiring a knowledge of the law by subsequent study, was 
 often required to pursue his preliminary course for three, 
 six or more months longer. One young fellow who was thus 
 put back, though time with him was "of the essence," explain- 
 ing to me the cause of his failure, said : "I got through all 
 right on the Punic wars, but they stuck me on the Pelopon- 
 nesian." The late Daniel Dougherty, when on the board, was 
 greatly opposed to this method of conducting the examina- 
 tion, and, speaking of a student who had been put back for 
 want of knowledge of the date of the Battle of Marathon, 
 told me that after the student had left the room the question 
 arose among the members of the board as to which city was 
 
Frfjrn a Phntozra t'h hy fi utekimsl . 
 
 cti/.r^ct=:L: .or 
 
Judge Penrose's Reminiscences 385 
 
 the fourth largest in the United States. "And, do you know," 
 he said, "scarcely one of them could tell ! As if the battles 
 of dead Greece were of more importance than the cities of 
 living America !" 
 
 On the other hand, Mr. Asa I. Fish, to whom disap- 
 proval of this kind of examination was once expressed, 
 replied : "I don't at all agree with you. You would be aston- 
 ished at the ignorance displayed by some of these young 
 men. Why, the other day we asked one of them the date of 
 the Battle of Salamis, and actually he was unable to answer." 
 It is a fortunate thing that Coke lived before knowledge of 
 this kind was regarded as essential to a future mastery of 
 the law. He makes a sad blunder in speaking of Perkins's 
 Profitable Book as having been "learnedly and wittily com- 
 posed in the reign of Edward the Sixth," when, in point of 
 fact, it was in the reign of Henry the Eighth. Such igno- 
 rance on the part of one who lived so recently after this as in 
 the reign of Elizabeth and of James the First was inex- 
 cusable; and a preliminary examination would have pre- 
 vented the man from ever obtaining admission to the bar. 
 
 The lawyers of former days held Coke on Littleton in 
 the highest esteem. Judge Sharswood recommends it to the 
 student (but not until after his admission) in the strongest 
 terms. He tells us, in the Appendix to Professional Ethics, 
 of the eminent men who attributed their success to their fa- 
 miliarity with its pages. It was, he says, the favorite book of 
 Mr. Pinkney, as it was also of Chief Justice Parsons. Lord 
 Eldon read it over and over again, and Lord Campbell, in his 
 life of Eldon, deplores the fact that the reading of Coke on 
 Littleton was going out of fashion. He speaks of that great 
 lawyer. Sir Vicary Gibbs, who told a student, who asked 
 his advice on the subject, to read it three times over and then 
 sit down and make an abstract of it. He adds : "The book 
 contains much that is obsolete and much that is altered by 
 statutable enactment; but no man can thoroughly understand 
 the law as it is without knowing the changes it has under- 
 gone, and no man can be acquainted with its history without 
 
 25 
 
386 Law Association Centennial 
 
 being acquainted with the writings of Lord Coke. Nor is 
 he by any means so dry and forbidding as is generally sup- 
 posed. He is certainly immethodical, but he is singularly 
 perspicuous, he fixes the attention, his quaintness is often 
 amusing, and he excites the admiration by the inexhaustible 
 stores of erudition which, without any effort, he seems spon- 
 taneously to pour forth. Thus our genuine lawyers were 
 trained. Lord Eldon read Coke upon Littleton once, twice 
 and thrice, and made an abstract of the whole work as a use- 
 ful exercise, — obeying the wise injunction 'legere multum — 
 non multa,' " — an injunction, which, there is some reason to 
 fear, is now inverted, "multa" being regarded as of no less 
 importance than "multum." 
 
 If it were not that it would be entirely outside of any- 
 thing like "reminiscences," I would like extremely to refer 
 to passages from Coke, illustrating the truth of what Lord 
 Campbell says as to the attractiveness of the book ; but I have 
 already written too much, and so shall refrain. 
 
 Perhaps, after all, I may be excused for referring to two 
 passages from Coke which can scarcely fail to amuse. 
 Quoting from Littleton the words, "Because of his younger 
 age, he may, least of all his brethren, help himself, etc.," 
 spoken with regard to the custom of Borough English, he 
 says (140, b), "Here by 'etc' are implyed those causes 
 wherefore a 'youth is lesse able to ayd himselfe, &c.,' which 
 the poet briefely and pithily expresseth thus: "Imberbis 
 juvenis, tandem custode re^oto, Gaudet equis, cdnibusque, 
 et aprici gramine campi, Cereus in vitmm Aecti, monitoribus 
 asper" etc., etc., etc. 
 
 The Act of Assembly forbidding betting on elections in 
 Pennsylvania provides that the stakeholder shall not pay over 
 to the winning party, who, if it should be paid over, is made 
 liable to an action by the guardians of the poor for the whole 
 amount, the stakeholder being also made liable. A bet was 
 made on the result of the presidential election, Buchanan, 
 Fillmore and Fremont being candidates. There were four 
 
Judge Penrose's Reminiscences 387 
 
 points on which it was made, on each of which the bet was 
 $100, making the entire sum placed in the hands of the stake- 
 holder, $800. After the election it was clear that one party 
 had won on three of the points, and equally clear that he had 
 lost on the other. The party winning the greater sum was 
 a broken-down broker; the stakeholder was styled in the 
 directory "a gentleman," his means being ample, but his 
 business unknown, while the other party, who on the one 
 point was winner, was a retired tailor who had made what in 
 those times was considered a considerable fortune. The 
 latter admitted that he had lost his $300, but claimed the rest 
 of the money. The stakeholder, however, paid the whole 
 amount to the other party, and when suit was brought for the 
 $200, set up the illegality of the transaction as a defence, 
 which, of course, was a complete answer. Regarding him- 
 self as the victim of a conspiracy, the tailor determined that 
 at least he would not permit the retention of their ill-gotten 
 gains, and so, as he expressed it, he "washed his hands of the 
 whole matter and placed it in the hands of the solicitor for the 
 Guardians of the Poor." Suit was first brought against the 
 winning party, who, as he had no visible means, made a mere 
 show of defence. Then suit was brought against the stake- 
 holder, on whose behalf Mr. McMurtrie filed a number of 
 special pleas, setting up the former recovery against the win- 
 ning party, averring that a presidential election was not 
 within the meaning of the act, etc. etc., etc. These pleas were 
 demurred to, and the matter was argued before the old Dis- 
 trict Court, Judge Sharswood, Judge Stroud and Judge 
 Hare. Mr. McMurtrie, who was very confident of his case, 
 argued it with his usual ability, ingenuity and learning. Mr. 
 Greenbank, afterwards Judge. Greenbank, the solicitor for 
 the Guardians of the Poor, had associated me with himself, 
 and it fell to me to make the argument in support of the 
 demurrer. I have always believed that a passage from Coke, 
 which concluded my argument, had a good deal to do with 
 the decision in our favor. "Here," he says, commenting on 
 
388 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Littleton's reference to a "reading" which he had heard on 
 the statute of Westminster 2, 
 
 "it is to be observed of what authority antient lectures 
 or readings upon statutes were, for they had five excel- 
 lent qualities. First, they declared what the common 
 law was before the making of the statute as it here 
 appeareth. Secondly, they opened the true sense and 
 meaning of the statute. Thirdly, their cases were brief, 
 having, at the most, one point at the common law and 
 another upon the statute. Fourthly, plain and perspic- 
 uous, for then the honor of the reader was to excel 
 others in authorities, arguments and reasons for proofs 
 of his opinion, and for the confutation of the objections 
 against it. Fifthly, they read, to suppresse subtile inven- 
 tions to creepe out of the statute. But now readings 
 have lost their said former qualities, have lost also their 
 former authorities : for now the cases are long, obscure, 
 and intricate, full of new conceits, like rather to riddles 
 than lectures, which when they are opened they vanish 
 like smoke, and the readings are like lapwings, who 
 seeme to be nearest their nests when they are the farth- 
 est away from them, and all their studie is to find nice 
 evasions out of the statute." 
 
 We asked, of course, that the Court should give the ancient 
 reading to the statute, and it did. 
 
 McMurtrie told me a long time afterwards that he had 
 never had a doubt about the strength of his case before the 
 decision, but that he was convinced he was wrong. Candor 
 was one of his great characteristics. He was always 
 extremely positive at first, but when satisfied of his error he 
 did not hesitate to say so. He once told me that "there was 
 no man in the community who was more misunderstood" 
 than he; that the common idea that he was self-opinionated 
 and conceited was a very great mistake. "There is no one," 
 he said, "who has less confidence in himself than I have." It 
 was a surprise to me. 
 
 He had rather a poor opinion of the judiciary of this 
 country. Once in speaking of a recent decision of the 
 Supreme Court of the United States, upon some question of 
 
Judge Penrose's Reminiscences 389 
 
 equity jurisdiction, which he did not at all approve of, he 
 said : "None of these fellows know anything about equity. 
 Well, maybe Joe Bradley does, but—" He did not finish the 
 sentence, so it is impossible to know to what extent the 
 knowledge of Mr. Justice Bradley was qualified. 
 
 Judge Agnew, who succeeded Judge Lowrie in 1863, 
 was one of the judges who participated in the decision of 
 Shollenberger vs. Brinton, sustaining the constitutionality of 
 the act of Congress authorizing the issue of notes by the 
 United States and making them a legal tender. Each of the 
 five judges delivered an opinion, three being in favor of the 
 constitutionality of the act, and two holding the contrary 
 view. One of those constituting the majority was somewhat 
 noted for being able to reach conclusions by a process of 
 reasoning which, from the premises, the ordinary mind was 
 unable to follow. After the decision in Shollenberger vs. 
 Brinton, a young lawyer, now one of the most eminent mem- 
 bers of the bar, said to me : "Have you read the opinion of 
 
 Judge ? It is about this: 'By means of the issue 
 
 of these notes the Gk)vemment has been able to equip a large 
 army and suppress an inhuman rebellion; a rebellion which 
 produced a monster like Jefferson Davis ; which treated its 
 prisoners with the greatest cruelty, and which finally cul- 
 minated in the assassination of our late President, the 
 lamented Mr. Lincoln. For these reasons I am of opinion 
 that the act of Congress is constitutional.' There is but one 
 writer," he added, "who can equal this — Artemus Ward. In 
 his lecture on milk he says : 'There are four seasons — spring, 
 summer, fall and winter. Some prefer summer and some 
 prefer winter, but as for me— give me liberty or give me 
 death!'" 
 
 Perhaps the illustration was somewhat exaggerated. 
 The question was one upon which the profession, on and 
 off the bench, was much divided, and a decision not in 
 accordance with the views of the man who criticises it is apt 
 to be thought light of. For example, read what Mr. Binney 
 says in Leaders of the Old Bar upon Judge Gibson's opinion 
 in Lancaster z/.y. Dolan, i Rawle, 231. 
 
GEORGE M. WHARTON 
 
 by 
 HENRY E. BUSCH 
 
 Having been a student in the ofiEice of the late George M. 
 Wharton, I have been asked to write a brief "sketch of Mr. 
 Wharton's methods of teaching and give some account of 
 him as a man and lawyer." 
 
 George Mifflin Wharton, the son of William Fishboume 
 Wharton, was born in Philadelphia, December 20, 1806. He 
 was a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and 
 studied law with James C. Biddle. He was admitted to the 
 bar September 8, 1827. My acquaintance with Mr. Wharton 
 began upon my entering his office as a student, in November, 
 1855, and I remained with him as his assistant to the time 
 of his death, February 5, 1870. 
 
 During this period twenty-five young men entered as 
 students in his office. Among those who became prominent 
 in after life were Thomas Bradford Dwight, a Judge of the 
 Orphans' Court; George Inman Riche, President of the 
 Faculty of the Central High School ; Henry Morton, Presi- 
 dent of the Stevens Institute at Hoboken; L. C. Cleeman, 
 Assistant Trust Officer of the Pennsylvania Company for 
 Insurances on Lives, etc., and Sussex D. Davis, a Register in 
 Bankruptcy. 
 
 Mr. Wharton directed the course of law reading which 
 he wished the student to pursue, and also suggested and 
 advised such collateral reading and studies in connection 
 with the law course as he deemed requisite for each student. 
 He did not hold regular examinations, as was the cus- 
 tom of some preceptors, but he did have an occasional quiz 
 and frequently held evening meetings of the students, when 
 he would talk to them upon some subject in which they were 
 interested at the time, and especially upon matters of practice. 
 
Busch's George M. Wharton 39^ 
 
 There were no typewriters in those days and he disliked 
 press copies, so that all his professional correspondence of 
 which he thought it needful to preserve copies, he had copied 
 by his students. 
 
 As a rule, Mr. Wharton drafted his pleadings, paper- 
 books and other documents himself, occasionally dictating 
 a paper, and, after correcting and revising these drafts, if 
 they were not to be printed, he would require his students 
 to make fair copies of them for filing or serving upon oppo- 
 site counsel. There were times when a great deal of this 
 work was required of the office force, but Mr. Wharton 
 believed that it was of great practical value to the student in 
 teaching him the form, style and other requirements of such 
 papers. 
 
 Mr. Wharton's penmanship was exceedingly neat and 
 legible, and the papers prepared by him were indicative of 
 his quiet and careful manner and were models for the 
 scrivener. 
 
 Neatness and order were characteristic of Mr. Whar- 
 ton and his surroundings. There were no confused piles of 
 papers on his table to be turned and overturned in search- 
 ing for a needed document. The papers in each case were 
 carefully folded, endorsed, tied in bundles and so placed as 
 to be easily accessible at any time. Some of the modern office 
 appliances would have greatly delighted him. 
 
 So far as the force of example could go the student 
 could have had no better school. 
 
 Mr. Wharton possessed an agreeable manner, a good 
 temper and an unblemished personal character. He was a 
 thorough Christian gentleman, a devout member of the Epis- 
 copal Church, in which he was held in great respect, and in 
 the conventions of the Church his opinions and counsel had 
 much weight. He was for several years a Trustee of the 
 University of Pennsylvania. He was also greatly interested 
 in the Public School system, and was for a long time a mem- 
 ber of the Board of Controllers and of the High School Com- 
 mittee. He was for a time President of the Select Council 
 
392 Law Association Centennial 
 
 of the City of Philadelphia, and also served a term as United 
 States District Attorney for the Eastern District of Penn- 
 sylvania. 
 
 Mr. Wharton had a profound knowledge of the law ; he 
 possessed a cultivated mind and a sound judgment; he 
 acquired a large general practice, and was an acknowledged 
 leader of the bar. 
 
 As a counselor he was safe, prudent, wise and upright. 
 
 His literary work comprised annotations to an edition 
 of East's Reports and one or two pamphlets in the celebrated 
 Habeas Corpus series. 
 
 His courteous demeanor, his quiet manner and pleasant 
 voice, his clear and concise statement of the facts of a case, as 
 well as of the principles involved in it, gave to his arguments 
 great power. 
 
 Occasional interruptions whilst addressing the court 
 or a jury never seemed to ruffle his temper or confuse his 
 thoughts, but he would quietly resume the course of his argu- 
 ment as if nothing had occurred. 
 
 His industry was untiring, he worked without ceasing, 
 the business of his clients was ever upon his mind. He sel- 
 dom, if he ever, took a real vacation. He had a summer 
 residence a few miles from the city, whence he would make 
 almost daily visits to town. Sometimes he would go to the 
 seaside, but never too far away to prevent an occasional visit 
 to his office, and if he went with his family on a pleasure 
 trip, he insisted upon having frequent reports concerning his 
 office affairs, and was constantly giving instructions or 
 inquiring about some matter that had meanwhile occurred 
 to him. 
 
 Is it any wonder that under this strain he eventually 
 succumbed, and at last truly entered into rest at the age of 
 sixty-three ? 
 
 Feelingly, we can echo the remark of the late Chief Jus- 
 tice Thompson, who, in alluding to the death of Mr. Whar- 
 ton, exclaimed: "Alas! that such a man should die before 
 his day of usefulness was entirely over." 
 
ADDRESS 
 
 Delivered on the Opening of the Law Library of the Law Association 
 
 of Philadelphia, in the Public Buildings, at Philadelphia, 
 
 on March 30, 1898 
 
 by 
 
 JOHN SAMUEL 
 
 Mr. Chancellor, and Members of The Lam Association of 
 Philadelphia: 
 
 There occurs, in the lifetime of everybody, an occasion, 
 when it seems natural to call a halt in its career, to rest from 
 the urgent labors of the moment, to look back on the ground 
 it has traversed, and forward at the path to be afterwards 
 pursued. In this retrospection, it may regard the anxieties, 
 the discomfitures, of the past with complacent satisfaction, 
 may congratulate itself on its growth and real achievements, 
 and gain encouragement and lessons of experience for its 
 future conduct. 
 
 Such an occasion, in the lifetime of The Law Associa- 
 tion of Philadelphia, has occurred in its installation in the 
 appropriate apartments in this splendid pile, which have 
 been allotted to its use by the wise consideration of the Build- 
 ing Commissioners. And it is my good fortune that the 
 partiality of the Library Committee of The Law Association 
 has assigned to me the very agreeable duty, of endeavoring 
 to recall to you some features of its past, and to forecast, I 
 hope, something of its future destiny. 
 
 It is difficult for even the most vivid imagination of the 
 busy worker of to-day, surrounded as he is by the countless 
 aids to his industry, invented and manufactured, by modem 
 experience and intelligence, to conjure up from out of the 
 "corridors of time" the indistinct outlines of former condi- 
 tions of life and work. The modem accessories of all kinds 
 
394 Law Association Centennial 
 
 of toil, mental as well as manual, are so habitual, that they 
 seem to be its naturally attendant incidents. We are apt to 
 overlook the fact that they are of comparatively recent 
 creation, and that there existed, not so very long ago, a gener- 
 ation of workers, many of them great men, who attained an 
 eminence which overtops our puny endeavors, without the 
 assistance of those appliances and devices which modern life 
 considers so indispensable. This thought should give us 
 pause in our belief, as- to the undoubted superiority of our 
 later systems, and to question whether, however well adapted 
 the modern methods of study, and the acquisition of knowl- 
 edge may be, to the large majority of average intellects, there 
 may not be, in these very facilities the absence of that neces- 
 sity for mental exercise, by which alone the master-thinkers 
 of mankind have been created, and by which they flourished. 
 May it not be that, in losing arduous pursuit, we have lost 
 the strength that easy acquirement does not furnish? May 
 it not be, that men are now learning, less to reason, and more 
 merely to remember ? 
 
 In the year 1823, Charles J. Ingersoll, then District 
 Attorney of the United States for the District of Pennsyl- 
 vania, wrote from Washington, where at that time he was, 
 for the purpose of arguing before the Supreme Court of the 
 United States the cases which had come up from his district, 
 to his friend, the Honorable Richard Rush, then Minister 
 to Great Britain, as follows : 
 
 *"Friday evening 14th February. The Bar had a meet- 
 ing to-day, at which Mr. Wirt presided, and Messrs. Qay, 
 Harper and Winder were appointed a Committee to devise 
 means of procuring a Law Library, of which the want is 
 deplorable here, and also of obtaining, if practicable, an estab- 
 lishment in which all the lawyers attending the Supreme 
 Court may be accommodated with lodgings together, which 
 would be a convenience, I dare say." 
 
 *Life of Charles J. Ingersoll, by William M. Meigs. Lippincott : 1897, 
 pp. 124-130. 
 
Samuel's Library Installation at City Hall 395 
 And on the 19th February he writes : 
 
 "I disposed of two of my causes yesterday, and shall 
 return home to-morrow or next day, as a third is fixed for 
 to-day. A characteristic incident occurred to me in court 
 yesterday. I inquired of that disobliging, lazy, rapacious 
 fellow, the clerk, for the rules, which, after some of his 
 usual demurs, he at length produced in a manuscript book, 
 every word of it in your handwriting, with your name writ- 
 ten on the cover as a claim of ownership, thus disregarded 
 by this personage who has no copy of his own of the rules of 
 his own court. I have brought it home to my lodgings and 
 have it now on the table." 
 
 This was long after the time "when," according to a 
 writer of that period, "the politicians or statesmen of that day 
 bivouacked in the chief justiceship on their march from one 
 political position to another." John Marshall had been Chief 
 Justice for twenty-two years. McCullough vs. Maryland, 
 and the Dartmouth College case had been decided. And it 
 might well have been thought, that, even at that period, that 
 tribunal, now the most important factor in our modern civili- 
 zation, had acquired a dignity and importance which would 
 have ensured for it in the place of its labors the ordinary tools 
 of the lawyer's work. Can we now picture to ourselves such 
 a tribunal, deciding two such questions, laying down two rules 
 of conduct, which have influenced the destiny of this country, 
 for weal or woe, more than any other acts of any department 
 of our government, without convenient law books, or a 
 printed copy of its own rules ! 
 
 In striking contrast to the insignificance of that tribunal, 
 as measured by such appliances for the administration of its 
 justice, were the local courts of the several States. The year 
 1802 seems to have been one of peculiar activity of thought 
 in the city of Philadelphia. Apart from the formation of new 
 banking and transportation companies, the intellectual life of 
 this community seems to have extended itself in a marked 
 manner. In that year the public school system was first put 
 
396 Law Association Centennial 
 
 into operation in this city ; in that year Benjamin Henf ry first 
 proposed a system of lighting streets and houses with gas, 
 and Charles Wilson Peak first exhibited, in the State House, 
 his wonderful collection of curiosities, of works of nature and 
 art, among which was the skeleton of a mastodon he had dug 
 out from a marl-pit during the previous year ; and many so- 
 cieties for the encouragement of knowledge were formed. In 
 this busy time, twenty-one years before Mr. IngersoU's pic- 
 turesque diary, in March, 1802, the lawyers of the city of 
 Philadelphia formed an incorporated company, for the pur- 
 pose of establishing a law library in the city of Philadelphia. 
 Its name was "The Law Library Company of the city of 
 Philadelphia." The articles of incorporation were signed on 
 the thirteenth day of March, and the certificate was enrolled 
 on May 13th of that year. This was a stock company, the 
 par value of whose shares was twenty dollars, with an annual 
 subscription of two dollars. Although created by Philadel- 
 phia lawyers, any "gentleman of the Bar of Pennsylvania" 
 might become a member and a stockholder. The names of 
 seventy-two lawyers are signed to the application for a char- 
 ter. Considering the population of the city at that time — 
 about 40,000 white people — and what must have been the 
 comparatively small size of its bar, this list is a remarkable 
 testimony to its progressive character at that early date, and 
 to its desire to place the profession on a more scientific basis. 
 Among the most prominent of these names, are those which 
 have become household words in Philadelphia from that time 
 to the present whenever the honor, renown or fame of this 
 community and her citizens is invoked — Lewis, Ingersoll, 
 Rawle, Tilghman, McKean, Phillips, Franklin, Sergeant, 
 Meredith, Hazlehurst, Hopkinson, Chauncey, Hare, Reed, 
 Rush, Peters, Biddle, Brinton, Bradford. So far as I, after 
 some research, have been able to discover, this was the first 
 law library established in the United States, the Social Law 
 Library of Boston, the next oldest, not being formed until two 
 years later, in 1804. The oldest law library in New York is 
 that of the New York State Library at Albany, founded in 
 
Samuel's Library Installation at City Hall 397 
 
 1818. A claim was set up to the establishment of the Kenne- 
 bec Law Library in Augusta, Maine, as having been founded 
 in 1800, but, after inquiry, I am convinced that no evidence 
 can be adduced in support of this claim, and that our Law 
 Library is the one first established in any of the United 
 States. 
 
 In 1805 was published the first catalogue of the books of 
 the Law Library Company of the city of Philadelphia. It 
 was prepared by William Rawle, and I believe was the first 
 printed catalogue of a law library published in the United 
 States. It is a modest booklet of eleven duodecimo pages, 
 containing 249 titles of 375 volumes, whose character is cur- 
 iously suggestive. Nearly all the books are reports of cases, 
 and of the small remainder the large majority are books on 
 practice and, as anyone who was familiar with the business 
 of Philadelphia at that time might expect, treatises on com- 
 mercial law and maritime insurance ; but one digest, Comyn's, 
 and not over a dozen text-books. The practitioner of to-day 
 will be surprised to learn that no book on "Negligence" is 
 to be found there. Of the reports, all are English save three 
 — Dallas' Pennsylvania, Caines' New York and Taylor's 
 North Carolina Reports. In 1811, still a decade before Mr. 
 IngersoU's letter, a second catalogue was issued. By this 
 time, though the number of the books had somewhat in- 
 creased, by reason of the continuations of the reports, yet the 
 number of titles was but 262. Among them, however, is what 
 I believe is the first of American legal periodicals, "Hall's 
 American Law Journal," published in Philadelphia in 1808. 
 
 For some reason, which at this distance of time is not 
 apparent, this organization did not satisfy the needs of the 
 profession at that time, and in 1821 a new association was 
 formed, composed, strangely enough, chiefly of the same 
 gentlemen who were members of the Law Library Com- 
 pany, and styled "The Associated Members of the Bar of 
 Philadelphia." Membership in this was confined to mem- 
 bers of the Bar of Philadelphia practicing in the Supreme 
 Court of Pennsylvania. At once negotiations were com- 
 
398 Law Association Centennial 
 
 menced between the two organizations looking towards a 
 consolidation, but, as usual, the older organization declined 
 to yield up its existence to the younger, and the two Associ- 
 ations existed side by side until 1825, when efforts were 
 again renewed for a merger. After the usual delays incident 
 to such matters, the union of the two Associations was 
 effected, and became complete, on the twenty-ninth day of 
 March, 1827, by the formation of our present society, "The 
 Law Association of Philadelphia." Its first officers were 
 William Rawle, Chancellor; Horace Binney, Vice-Chancel- 
 lor; George M. Dallas, Secretary; and Thomas I. Wharton, 
 Treasurer. Since then the chancellorship of the Association 
 has been held successively by gentlemen who were not merely 
 leaders in practice at our bar, but who were noted for their 
 scholarship, their cultivation and their dignity of character, 
 and, as has been well said by a learned judge of this county, 
 this office has "come to be the official representative of the 
 Philadelphia Bar." Its collection of books, as you see about 
 you, has increased to over 32,000 volumes, comprising not 
 merely the ordinary reports, text-books, digests, etc., but in- 
 cluding the printed records of all the cases argued in the 
 Supreme Court of the United States since the year 1832, and 
 the records and briefs of argument of all cases in the same 
 court since 1861. These number 1020 volumes. There are 
 but three of these sets in existence ; one being owned by the 
 Supreme Court of the United States at Washington, and the 
 other by the Bar Association of the city of New York. 
 Besides these the library contains the paper-books of most of 
 the cases argued in the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania since 
 1879. What mountains of labor already performed, mostly 
 by first-class minds, on countless legal questions, all ready for 
 the lawyer's hand, are here ! Among those rarities which it 
 is the peculiar province of a public library to possess we own, 
 what in American printing might almost be styled incunabula, 
 the charters of the province of Pennsylvania and the city 
 of Philadelphia, printed by B. Franklin, Philadelphia, 1741; 
 the original laws of New Castle, Kent and Sussex upon Dela- 
 
Samuel's Library Installation at City Hall 399 
 
 ware, printed by B. Franklin & Hall, Philadelphia, 1752; the 
 laws of the province of Pennsylvania, 171 5-1 728, printed by 
 Andrew Bradford, and other books remarkable more for their 
 rarity than their usefulness. 
 
 It has always been recognized that a law library is part 
 of the machinery for the administration of justice. But 
 while of late years neither our State nor our municipality has 
 done its whole duty towards the courts and our profession 
 in Philadelphia, in this respect, as is the rule in many of the 
 other counties of our State and communities elsewhere, yet in 
 its first years, the public authorities were not unmindful of 
 these obligations, and for many years furnished our Associa- 
 tion with rooms in the Courthouse buildings convenient to the 
 court-rooms. From its foundation in 1802 to 1819 it was 
 housed in the main building — I am unable to say in what 
 room* — of the old State House. From 18 19 to 1872 it was 
 located on the second floor of what was called the old Con- 
 gress Hall, on the southeast corner of Sixth and Chestnut 
 Streets, in the two rooms between the late rooms of Common 
 Pleas No. 2, C and D. After 1872 it was obliged to shift 
 for itself in the matter of a home, and in that year was 
 removed to the third story of the building at the southeast 
 comer of Sixth and Walnut Streets. Here it remained until 
 May, 1876, when it was taken to the Athenaeum Building, on 
 Sixth Street below Walnut, where it has abided until the 
 present happy change to a more suitable place, and once 
 more its necessity as an indispensable adjunct to the adminis- 
 tration of justice in this community is established. 
 
 It must not be supposed that during its many years of 
 existence the Law Association has done nothing more than 
 collect books. During the whole of this time, true to its 
 declared purposes, "the advancement of the learning of the 
 law," and "to maintain the purity of professional practice," it 
 has always taken a lively interest, and an active part in all 
 
 * I have since discovered that it was in a small room built for library pur- 
 poses — adjoining the main building on the Southeast Corner— the room then 
 used by the Supreme Court. — J. S. 1903. 
 
4.00 Law Association Centennial 
 
 those public questions of legislation, and administration of 
 the law, in which its organized action could be properly and 
 beneficially used. On looking over its minutes, I find its 
 influence brought to bear, among other subjects, on the fol- 
 lowing : Attention of the proper authorities was at an early 
 date called to the inadequate accommodation for the courts, 
 and to the evil habit of suitors and counsel of speaking, when 
 out of court, to the judges about their cases. The gross 
 abuse, at one time so prevalent, of illegal and extortionate 
 fees exacted by county officers, was an object of the Associa- 
 tion's animadversion. Courts and the Legislature were mem- 
 orialized, members pledged themselves not to pay illegal fees. 
 A solicitor was employed to enforce the penalties provided 
 against their exaction, and finally the present salary system 
 was initiated and consummated under its influence and pres- 
 sure. The salutary rule adopted in 1872, requiring the 
 money paid into court, to be deposited with a trust company, 
 which broke up a long-standing abuse, was brought about by 
 the action of the Association. It considered the difficult 
 problem of whether a standard of professional compensation 
 was practicable, but I cannot find that it came to any definite 
 conclusion on this interesting question. It opposed the pro- 
 posed insolvency legislation of 1879. It recommended Outer- 
 bridge for State Reporter, and requested judicial conventions 
 to renominate Judges Hare and Thayer, Penrose and Ash- 
 man ; and on another occasion did much to prevent the nomi- 
 nation of unworthy men to judicial office. It took a prominent 
 and influential part in bringing about the Federal legislation 
 for the relief of the Supreme Court of the United States and 
 the establishment of the present system of United States Cir- 
 cuit Courts of Appeal. It drafted a proposed Act of Congress, 
 through its committee visited and addressed the Judiciary 
 Committee of the House of Representatives, and many of its 
 suggestions were incorporated in the Act of 1891 on this 
 subject. It addressed the Assembly of Pennsylvania on the 
 delays of suitors by reason of the excessive work before our 
 Supreme Court. It discussed, and in some instances opposed, 
 
Samuel's Library Installation at City Hall 401 
 
 intended legislation, and in more than one instance antago- 
 nized what it considered an erroneous decision of the Supreme 
 Court. On all questions of practice and procedure it made 
 itself heard ; on the administration of the sheriff's office, the 
 hour rule in the Supreme Court, modifications of rules in the 
 county courts, official stenographers, the wearing of robes by 
 the judges, legal advertisements, judgment for amounts ad- 
 mitted to be due, applications for issue devisavit vel non, and 
 other questions affecting the profession and practice of the 
 passing time. It considered the question, of late so promi- 
 nent, of international arbitration, but with a conservatism 
 bom of much learning, declined to advise or express a decided 
 opinion on so deep-reaching a question. It also endeavored 
 to establish a fund for the benefit of sick or disabled memr 
 bers of the bar called "The Philadelphia Bar Relief Fund." 
 For what seem to me obvious reasons, this movement was not 
 successful. I am not aware that it ever effected any prac- 
 tical result, and it soon died of inanition. Among the Asso- 
 ciation's less agreeable, but not less imperative functions, 
 and one, I think, not to be omitted in this review, is its action 
 on more than one occasion in procuring the suspension and 
 disbarment of members of our profession, who had unfor- 
 tunately forgotten their oaths of "all good fidelity as well to 
 the court as to the client." From the general high character 
 of our bar, its proceedings in these unpleasant paths have 
 been infrequent ; and while this painful and difficult duty has 
 always been accepted (as I trust, it always will be accepted) 
 by the Association without hesitation, whenever such action 
 has become imperative, yet I am confident that the honor and 
 tone of the profession has been more properly and efficiently 
 conserved by the exalted standard of personal and profes- 
 sional morality exhibited by the members of our Association, 
 and by that esprit de corps which is fostered and made vital 
 by it, than could have been effected by more notorious and 
 violent methods. 
 
 It also has not omitted to perpetuate by portraiture and 
 sculpture the memories of those eminent sages of the law 
 
 26 
 
402 Law Association Centennial 
 
 whose lives and work were worthy of such illustration. Its 
 members raised a fund for the painting of a portrait of John 
 Marshall. This picture, an original from life by Inman, was 
 painted in Philadelphia in 1832, and is to-day considered as 
 the historical portrait of the famous Chief Justice. It also 
 started a subscription among the members of the bar 
 throughout the United States for a monument to that same 
 great lawyer. It was unable by itself to carry out the design, 
 but, at the request of the Association, Congress, in 1882, 
 made an appropriation for the balance necessary. The statue 
 was executed in bronze by W. W. Story, and set up in 
 Washington on May 10, 1884, with pomp and ceremony. On 
 this occasion the oration of the day was delivered by William 
 Henry Rawle, the grandson of one of the most active of our 
 founders. The Association now owns over forty portraits 
 and busts of legal luminaries — ^Taney, Gibson, Sharswood, 
 Cadwalader, David Paul Brown and others. 
 
 In one respect only do I find the Association to have 
 been, according tOi modern ideas, unmindful of its duties. 
 During the ninety-six years of its existence it has eaten, 
 or helped to eat, but few dinners. It did participate in a pro- 
 cession on the Centennial Anniversary of Washington's 
 Birthday, but I can find but three instances of its assisting in 
 that modern "lubricator of business," a dinner. Let us hope 
 it will mend its ways in that respect. To show, however, its 
 superiority to mere animal appetite, or was it perhaps with a 
 deep appreciation of the ordinary mid-day lunch, a resolution 
 looking to the employment of a caterer to supply that repast 
 was voted down. 
 
 Our retrospect is now over; we turn our backs on the 
 past and face the future day. 
 
 Thus far, what the Law Association has done it has 
 accomplished by its own members, not assisted in any way 
 by those of our profession who are not members, and almost 
 entirely without State, municipal or outside assistance. Out 
 of a bar list of 1,600 I am sorry to say that but about 500 are 
 members, leaving over 1000 who, I trust, will now recognize 
 
Samuel's Library Installation at City Hall 403 
 
 the opportunity they have lost and the duty they owe their 
 profession by its support. 
 
 As the science of the law is but the knowledge of how 
 most expediently to live, so our profession touches life on 
 more points than either medicine or theology, which, together 
 with the law have been known hitherto as the learned profess- 
 ions. And, therefore, a law library is the least technical of all 
 technical libraries. It appeals not merely to lawyers, but to all 
 classes of thinkers and students outside of the profession 
 itself, more than does any other merely scientific collection of 
 books. Here the poet, the romancer and the playwright can 
 range over the widest scope of the emotions; passion, love, 
 hatred, tenderness and revenge. The myriad phases of 
 untamed humanity can here be studied, not in the figments of, 
 it may be, a distempered intellect, but as they have actually 
 revealed themselves in the thousand instances of crime and 
 weakness. What novels of Gaboriau, Poe or Conan Doyle 
 can vie in intrigue, machinery of detection, in subtle mani- 
 festations of intellectual acuteness and mystery, with the 
 realities contained in the hundreds of separate trials, cele- 
 brated and infamous, of all kinds, the exhibitions of the crim- 
 inal intellect stored on these shelves ? Here also can the his- 
 torian and the sociologist with certainty gather the consecu- 
 tive courses of events, customs, manners and modes of living 
 which went to make up the state of the people he is describing 
 or studying. From the legislation of a community more 
 surely can the life, habits, thoughts, quic quid agunt homines 
 of that community be described, than from the newspapers, 
 broadsides and ballads recommended by Macaulay, to him 
 who is painting the pictures of the past. From a perusal of the 
 statutes of de donis and quia emptores, the legal Owen can 
 here reconstruct, not merely the skeleton, but the living, 
 breathing form and body of the feudal ages. He can note the 
 struggles between the landowner and those who sought to be 
 landowners ; the efiforts on the one hand to avoid, and on the 
 other to impose additional obligations, and the devices of the 
 real estate lawyers of those days to obtain title from' unwilling 
 
404 Law Association Centennial 
 
 lords. What pictures of ecclesiastical greed and tyranny and 
 popular superstition are not limned for us in the statutes of 
 mortmain and uses ? And when the future historian of our 
 own times shall seek to delineate our features, where can he 
 find a more accurate picture of the rise and growth of that 
 controlling manifestation of the present age, the spirit of 
 organization and the desire to avoid individual responsibility, 
 than in the enthronement and protection of that incipient 
 form of socialism, corporate power, which is so marked a 
 feature of modem legislation? On these shelves, too, the 
 inventor and engineer will find that which may save him 
 from the despair of futile and wasted effort. In short, a law 
 library is not merely a collection of books for the use of 
 lawyers only, but should be a reservoir from which all 
 thinkers, students and mere readers can drink not knowledge 
 only, but pleasure and entertainment. The State, the munici- 
 pality, the whole community, and especially our profession, 
 may well be proud of what the Law Association has here 
 created, and should strengthen the hands of those who, 
 unaided and not overburdened with wealth, have furnished 
 so important a contribution to knowledge. 
 
 It must be conceded, I think, that the profession of the 
 law does not occupy so influential a position in the community 
 to-day as it did in the early part of, and down to the middle of 
 this century. In looking for the causes of this decline in 
 power of our profession, the immense growth and importance 
 of applied, as well as abstract, science cannot be overlooked. 
 It is no longer true that law, medicine and theology are the 
 only learned professions. Modem science, in all its varied 
 branches, triumphantly asserts its title to be included in this 
 list. The never-ending charm, the perennial delight of an 
 intimate acquaintance with nature, with the forces and secrets 
 of matter, and the glory and wealth which have come to 
 those who have subjugated them to the uses of men, have 
 attracted to their study many of those abler minds, that, in the 
 pre-scientific period would have naturally gravitated to the 
 law. 
 
Samuel's Library Installation at City Hall 405 
 
 The greatest thinkers of to-day are peering with intense 
 curiosity into, and struggling, with all the might of unsatis- 
 fied desire, to extort from nature, and subdue to our use, its 
 secrets and might. These are now some of the sources of 
 power in man over his fellows, and as such attract the 
 capable, the intellectual and the ambitious. Electricians, engi- 
 neers, metallurgists, meteorologists, chemists, microscopists, 
 all constitute learned professions which employ the highest 
 grade of intellect, and whose successes bring a reputation and 
 a power as much, if not more, widely extended than the most 
 brilliant forensic or even judicial career. 
 
 While this is the case, however, the profession of the 
 law will, from its immediate and direct action on the conduct 
 of men, always retain among its followers a large share of the 
 intellectual force of the community. To retain its influence 
 and to continue it as it has hitherto been in this country, the 
 leading profession, guiding and directing public opinion, can 
 only be effected by maintaining and preserving that high tone 
 and lofty sentiment of personal conduct which has hitherto 
 characterized it. It is in its capacity to resist what Lord 
 Justice James was wont to style, "the commercial con- 
 science," and what a learned judge of the Supreme Court of 
 Pennsylvania has, in a very recent opinion,* stigmatized as 
 "the low level of business morality," that its past power has 
 accrued and its future influence depends. This moral stamina 
 inevitably engendered by our studies, and the confidential 
 character of our avocation, is vitalized and reinforced by our 
 Association. Therefore it is that The Law Association 
 should be, in some sort, a mint, wherein is stricken the stamp 
 of every lawyer's relation to his profession. To belong to it 
 should be to be recognized as a certificate of character. He 
 should require no other endorsement. Every fit member of 
 our bar should feel that unless he can write after his name 
 "Member of the Law Association of Philadelphia," his pro- 
 fessional status is still uncertain, for he is not assisting to 
 his utmost to do that which should be his greatest effort, to 
 uphold the honor and character of the Bar of Philadelphia. 
 
 *Edelman vs. Latshaw, i8o Pa., 419. 
 
CHARTER 
 
 of the 
 
 LAW LIBRARY COMPANY 
 OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA 
 
 To ALL MEN to whom these Presents shall come Greet- 
 ing, Know Ye, that We whose names are hereunto subscribed 
 of the City of Philadelphia, Attornies and Counsellors at 
 Law, being desirous of establishing a Law Library Com- 
 pany within the said City and for that purpose of acquiring 
 and enjoying the powers and immunities of a Corporation or 
 body politic in law, according to an Act of the General 
 Assembly of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania intituled 
 "An Act to confer on certain associations of the Citizens of 
 this Commonwealth the powers and immunities of Corpora- 
 tions or bodies politic in law," We do therefore by these 
 Presents publish and declare that we have associated and 
 do hereby associate ourselves together for the said purposes 
 by the name style and title of "The Law Library Company 
 of the City of Philadelphia" under the Articles and Condi- 
 tions following, to wit. 
 
 I. — ^The said subscribers and their successors shall 
 according to the said above recited Act become and be a 
 Corporation or body politic in law and in fact to have 
 continuance by the name, style and title of "The Law 
 Library Company of the City of Philadelphia," and as such 
 shall have full power and authority to make, have and 
 use one common Seal with such device and inscription as 
 they shall deem proper, and the same to break alter or 
 renew at their pleasure, and by the name, style and title, 
 aforesaid be able and capable in law to sue and be sued, 
 plead and be impleaded in any Court or Courts before any 
 Judge or Judges, Justice or Justices, in all manner of suits, 
 complaints, pleas causes matters and demands whatsoever; 
 and all and every matter or thing therein to do, in as full 
 
Charter of 1802 407 
 
 and effectual a manner as any other person or persons 
 bodies politic and corporate within the Commonwealth of 
 Pennsylvania, may or can do; and shall be authorized and 
 empowered to make rules, Bye Laws, and Ordinances, and to 
 do everything needful for the good government and support 
 of the affairs of the said Company : Provided that the said 
 Bye Laws, rules and Ordinances, or any of them be not 
 repugnant to the Constitution and laws of the United States, 
 to the Constitution and laws of the Commonwealth of Penn- 
 sylvania or to the present instrument upon which the said 
 Company is founded and established: And provided also 
 that none of the said Bye Laws, rules and Ordinances 
 shall extend to a dissolution of the said Company or give 
 power to dissolve the same except by the consent of all the 
 members thereof. 
 
 2. — The said Company and their successors by the 
 name style and title aforesaid shall be able and capable 
 in law according to the terms and conditions of these 
 presents to take receive and hold all and all manner of 
 lands, tenements, rents, annuities, franchises, and heredita- 
 ments and any sum and sums of Money, and any manner 
 and portion of Goods and Chattels, given and bequeathed 
 unto them, to be employed and disposed of according to 
 the objects, articles and conditions, of this instrument, the 
 Bye Laws of the said Company or of the Will and inten- 
 tion of the Donor: Provided, that the clear yearly value or 
 income of the messuages, houses, lands and tenements, rents, 
 annuities, or other hereditaments and real Estate of the 
 said Company, and the interest of the Money by them lent, 
 shall not exceed the sum of Five hundred pounds. 
 
 3. — ^The Stock of the said Company shall be divided into 
 shares, and for each share there shall be paid by the members 
 respectively, the sum of Twenty Dollars, one-half thereof as 
 soon as the Company is incorporated, and the residue when 
 required. After the Company is incorporated Gentlemen of 
 the Bar of Pennsylvania may be admitted as new members 
 on such terms and Conditions as the Bye Laws shall from 
 
4o8 Law Association Centennial 
 
 time to time prescribe; but due regard shall be therein had 
 to the increased value of the Stock. 
 
 4. — Shares in the Stock of the Company may be as- 
 signed by the members or their representatives to other 
 Gentlemen of the Bar of Pennsylvania in such manner as 
 shall be prescribed by the Bye Laws, and such Assignees 
 shall be admitted and entitled to all the rights and privi- 
 leges, and be subject to all the duties of the original members. 
 
 5. — ^The members of the Company shall meet on the 
 monday next preceding the first day of the first Term of 
 the Supreme Court in each year for the purpose of choosing 
 seven Directors and of transacting such other business as 
 may be submitted to them. But the following persons shall 
 be and continue Directors of the Company until the meeting 
 of the members which shall be convened on the monday next 
 preceding the first day of the first term of the Supreme Court 
 in the Year 1803, and shall meet and proceed to business as 
 soon as may be after the Company is incorporated, to wit: 
 Joseph B. McKean, William Lewis, Edward Tilghman, Wil- 
 liam Rawle, Jasper Moylan, Joseph Hopkinson, and John 
 B. Wallace. 
 
 6. — A majority of the Directors shall constitute a 
 quorum for the transaction of any business of the Company, 
 and shall have authority to ordain and enact all necessary 
 Bye Laws, and to appoint, and at their pleasure remove such 
 as may be necessary for conducting the affairs of the Insti- 
 tution. 
 
 7. — The Directors shall meet on the first day of each 
 term of the Supreme Court, and at such other times as they 
 shall think proper, and at the annual meeting of the members 
 of the Company shall present for their inspection a statement 
 of the Funds of the Institution and situation of the library 
 with the minutes of their proceedings and the acts of the 
 said Directors shall be subject to revision, amendment, or 
 repeal by the members of the Company at such annual 
 meeting. 
 
 8. — The Directors as soon as the Company is incor- 
 
Charter of 1802 409 
 
 porated shall collect from the members the sums hereby 
 agreed to be paid for the amount of their respective shares ; 
 they shall also have power to collect from each of the mem- 
 bers yearly and every year the sum of Two Dollars to be 
 appropriated for defraying the contingent expences and sup- 
 plying the Library from time to time with additional publica- 
 tions; and the Directors shall take care the debts, monies 
 or other property belonging, accruing, growing or become 
 due to the Company from time to time, be as speedily as 
 possible fully paid, collected and secured. 
 
 9. — The Directors shall from time to time and as soon 
 as conveniently may be after any monies of the Company 
 shall come to their hands, lay out and invest the same in 
 the purchase of Books for the Library; and the Library shall 
 permanently remain in some convenient place in the City 
 of Philadelphia, unless by the unanimous vote of the share- 
 holders at an annual meeting it shall be otherwise directed. 
 
 10. — The names of those who present or bequeath any 
 Books to the Company shall be inserted in the said Books and 
 be recorded on the minutes of the Directors as the Donors 
 thereof. 
 
 1 1. — The Library shall at all times during the sitting of 
 the Courts be open to the members of the Company, and 
 Books shall be furnished to them and to the Judges for their 
 use in Court. No Book shall be taken out of the Library 
 except for such use but every member shall be permitted 
 to use the Books in the room appropriated for the same, not 
 removing them therefrom, except as aforesaid, under such 
 regulations as shall hereafter be prescribed by the Directors. 
 
 12. — No person shall be admitted to the use of any 
 Book or Books of the said Company who shall not be en- 
 titled thereto under these Articles. 
 
410 
 
 Law Association Centennial 
 
 IN TESTIMONY WHEREOF We have hereunto 
 set our Hands this Thirteenth day of March in the Year 
 of our Lord 1802. 
 
 William Lewis, 
 Jared IngersoU, 
 Charles Swift, 
 William Moore Smith, 
 Jasper Moylan, 
 E. Tilghman, 
 Wm Ewing, 
 Peter S. Du Ponceau, 
 Miers Fisher, 
 Samson Levy, 
 Jno C. Wells, 
 J. W. Condy, 
 Henry Wikoff, 
 Michl. Keppele, 
 Jno. R. Smith, 
 Walter Franklin, 
 William H. Tod, 
 James Milnor, 
 Adam Gordon, 
 Wm Meredith, 
 Robert Hazlehurst, Jr., 
 Jno Ewing, Jun 
 Thos B. Zantzinger, 
 John R. Coates, 
 Samuel Shoemaker, 
 Elihu Chauncey, 
 Washington L. Hannum, 
 John B. Wallace, 
 Charles W. Hare, 
 Zalegman Phillips, 
 John Sergeant, 
 Wm Dewees, 
 Wm Mcllhenny, jun 
 Richd Peters, jun 
 Geo. Vaux, 
 
 CoUinson Read, 
 Moses Levy, 
 John F. Mifflin, 
 Charles Heatly, 
 W. Rawle, 
 A. J Dallas, 
 Thomas Ross, 
 Joseph B. M'Kean, 
 Benj'n R. Morgan, 
 John Hallowell, 
 R. Porter, 
 Joseph Hopkinson, 
 James Gibson, 
 John Read, jun 
 John Jones, 
 R. Frazer, 
 J. H. Brinton, 
 W. Sergeant, 
 John L. Leib, 
 Jos. Reed, 
 Jno W. Vancleve, 
 Bird Wilson, 
 Mahlon Dickerson, 
 Thos B. Adams, 
 Chs Chauncey, 
 George Heyl, jun 
 William Tilghman, 
 Edward S. Burd, 
 Algernon S. Magaw, 
 Edward Bridges, 
 Hor. Binney, 
 Saml Holmes, 
 Saml Ewing, 
 Richd Rush, 
 Wm S. Biddle. 
 
Charter of 1802 411 
 
 I Joseph B. McKean Attorney General of the Com- 
 monwealth of Pennsylvania, do certify to the Honourable 
 Supreme Court of the said Commonwealth, that I have 
 perused and examined the Instrument above written, and 
 am of opinion that the objects. Articles, and Conditions 
 therein set forth and contained, are lawful. 
 
 Joseph B. McKean. 
 
 We Edward Shippen Esquire Doctor of Laws, Chief 
 Justice, and Jasper Yeates, Thomas Smith and Hugh Henry 
 Brackenridge Esquires, Justices of the Supreme Court of 
 the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, hereby Certify that we 
 have perused and examined the Instrument above written, 
 and concur with the Attorney General in Opinion that the 
 objects. Articles and Conditions therein set forth and con- 
 tained are lawful. 
 
 Edw. Shippen 
 
 J. Yeates 
 
 Thomas Smith 
 
 H. H. Brackenridge 
 
 Inrolled in the Rolls Office in Commission 
 
 Book No. 2 Page 157 &c 
 [seal] Witness my Hand and Seal of Office 
 
 This 13th. day of May 1802 
 
 T. Matlack M. R. 
 [Indorsed] 
 
 Pennsylvania ss: 
 
 In the name and by the authority of the Commonwealth 
 of Pennsylvania Thomas McKean Governor of the said 
 Commonwealth to Timothy Matlack Esquire, Master of 
 the Rolls in and for the said Commonwealth : 
 
 Whereas it has been duly certified to me by Joseph B. 
 McKean Esquire Attorney General of the said Common- 
 wealth and by Edward Shippen Esquire Doctor of Laws, 
 Chief Justice and Jasper Yeates, Thomas Smith, and Hugh 
 Henry Brackenridge Esquires Justices of the Supreme Court 
 
412 Law Association Centennial 
 
 of Pennsylvania, that they have perused and examined the 
 within Act or Instrument for the incorporation of the Law 
 Library Company of the City of Philadelphia and that they 
 concur in Opinion that the objects, Articles and Conditions 
 therein set forth and contained are lawful : Now know You, 
 that in pursuance of the Act of the General Assembly in 
 such case made and provided, I have transmitted the said 
 Act or Instrument of incorporation unto You the said 
 Timothy Matlack, Master of the Rolls aforesaid, hereby 
 requiring You to enroll the same at the expence of the 
 Applicants to the intent that according to the objects. 
 Articles and conditions therein set forth and contained, the 
 Parties may become and be a Corporation or body politic 
 in law and in fact, to have continuance by the name, style 
 and title in the said Instrument provided and declared. 
 
 Secy fee paid Given under my Hand and the Great Seal 
 I Dollar of the State at Lancaster the twenty-seventh 
 
 day of March in the Year of Our Lord One thousand eight 
 hundred and two, and of the Commonwealth the Twenty 
 sixth. 
 
 Thos. McKean 
 By the Governor 
 
 T. M. Thompson, Sec. 
 
FIRST BY-LAWS 
 
 (1803.) 
 
 At a meeting of the directors of the Law Library Com- 
 pany at the office of Edw. Tilghman, Esquire, on the 27th 
 day of July, 1803. 
 
 Present 
 
 Messrs. Tilghman, Rawle, 
 
 Lewis, Hopkinson, 
 
 Moylan, Wallace. 
 
 The following by-laws were agreed on by the directors, 
 for the government of the company. 
 
 Of the Treasurer. 
 
 At the first meeting of the directors after their annual 
 election, they shall appoint a treasurer whose duty it shall be 
 to receive and keep the monies belonging to the company ; to 
 pay the debts due therefrom so far as he shall have funds 
 in his hands ; to keep fair and regular accounts of his receipts 
 and expenditures with the vouchers attending the same — he 
 shall attend at the library on the first day of March term in 
 every year to receive such annual subscription as may be 
 ordered to be collected by the directors. 
 
 The Treasurer shall also act as secretary to the direc- 
 tors; keep regular minutes of their proceedings, and sum- 
 mon the directors when required by any two of the direc- 
 tors. 
 
 Of the Librarian. 
 
 A librarian shall be appointed at the same time, remov- 
 able at pleasure. It shall be his duty to attend to the safe 
 keeping and due preservation of the books belonging to the 
 company, and in all respects to conform himself to the direc- 
 tion of the directors. He shall serve the notices to summon 
 the directors to meet, when required. 
 
 He shall receive a compensation of thirty dollars per 
 annum for his services, payable ten dollars each term. 
 
414 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Of New Members. 
 
 G€ntlemen of the Bar of Pennsylvania may be admitted 
 members of the company with the approbation of a majority 
 of the directors on payment of twenty dollars. This regula- 
 tion shall continue in force for two years, unless sooner 
 repealed, and no longer. 
 
 Of the Transfer of Shares. 
 
 Shares in the stock of the company shall not be trans- 
 ferred to any persons except to Gentlemen of the Bar of 
 Pennsylvania; nor to them unless the person to whom the 
 transfer is proposed to be made, be approved by the directors. 
 
 BY-LAWS 
 
 (Adopted 1805.) 
 Of New Members. 
 
 Gentlemen of the Bar of Pennsylvania may be admitted 
 members of the company with the approbation of a majority 
 of the directors, on payment of twenty dollars. This regula- 
 tion shall continue in force for two years, from the 27th 
 July, 1805, unless sooner repealed, and no longer. 
 
 Of the Transfer of Shares. 
 
 Shares in the stock of the company shall not be trans- 
 ferred to any persons, except to Gentlemen of the Bar of 
 Pennsylvania, nor to them, unless the person to whom the 
 transfer is proposed to be made, be approved of by the 
 directors. 
 
 Of the Annual Payment. 
 
 The annual payment to be made by the members shall 
 be two dollars, payable on the 15th day of March, in every 
 year. If any members shall omit to pay it on that day, or 
 within fifteen days thereafter, he shall pay in addition thereto, 
 the sum of one dollar; and if his delinquency shall continue 
 
By-Laws of 1805 415 
 
 for three months thereafter, the penalty shall be increased to 
 two dollars; and if such delinquency shall continue for six 
 months, from the 15th March in such year, the name of 
 such delinquent shall be reported by the treasurer to the direc- 
 tors, that order may be taken thereon. 
 
 Of the Treasurer. 
 
 At the first meeting of the directors after their annual 
 election they shall appoint a treasurer; whose duty it shall be 
 to receive and keep the monies belonging to the company ; to 
 pay the debts due therefrom so far as he may have funds in 
 his hands; to keep fair and regular accounts of his receipts 
 and expenditures, with the vouchers attending the same. He 
 shall attend at the library on the fifteenth day of March in 
 every year, to receive such annual payment as the directors 
 may order to be collected from the members. 
 
 The treasurer shall also act as secretary tO' the directors ; 
 keep regular minutes of their proceedings; and summon 
 a meeting of the directors when required so to do by any 
 two of them. 
 
 01 the Librarian. 
 
 A Librarian shall be appointed at the same time, with 
 the treasurer, removable at pleasure. It shall be his duty to 
 attend to the safe keeping and due preservation of the books 
 belonging to the company, and in all respects to conform him- 
 self to the direction of the directors. He shall serve the 
 notices to summon the directors to meet, when required. He 
 shall receive a compensation of thirty dollars per annum for 
 his services, payable ten dollars each term. 
 
CONSTITUTION 
 
 of 
 
 THE ASSOCIATED MEMBERS OF THE BAR 
 OF PHILADELPHIA [1821] 
 
 Article I. 
 
 This Association shall consist of members of the Bar 
 of Philadelphia, practicing in the Supreme Court of Penn- 
 sylvania, and shall be styled, The Associated Members of 
 THE Bar of Philadelphia. 
 
 Article II. 
 
 As soon as forty members of the Bar subscribe this 
 Constitution, the Association may be organized, and for that 
 purpose they shall meet to elect their Officers, to appoint 
 their Committees, and to carry into eflfect the object of the 
 Institution. 
 
 Article III. 
 
 There shall be four stated sessions of the Association in 
 the year : on the first Mondays in December, March, June, 
 and September. 
 
 Article IV. 
 
 The Officers of the Association shall be a Chancellor, a 
 Vice-Chancellor, a Treasurer, a Secretary, and a Librarian: 
 — and there shall be two Standing Committees: a Com- 
 mittee of Censors, and a Committee of Finance. 
 
Fnm Ihe Eirhing hi King. 
 
 I'NUithrJ fti iniruim .1. Cumfbcll 
 
 ,, L^.^j. 
 
 
Constitution of 1821 417 
 
 Article V. 
 
 It shall be the duty of the Chancellor, to preside at the 
 sessions of the Association: — to convene it whenever re- 
 quired so to do, in writing, by two members of the Com- 
 mittee of Censors, or by the Committee of Finance : — to sign 
 all draughts upon the Treasurer for monies duly appro- 
 priated, to defray the expenses, or to fulfil the resolutions 
 of the Association : — to appoint the Secretary and Librarian, 
 both of whom he may remove at his pleasure: — to see that 
 this Constitution and the By-laws are strictly obeyed by the 
 Officers: — ^to make a report upon its progress, finance and 
 actual condition, at the annual session of election: — and in 
 general, to superintend the interests and designs of the 
 Association. He shall have power at every session to main- 
 tain order, to reprimand or to inflict such fines as shall have 
 been established by By-laws, with an appeal from his judg- 
 ment to the Association: — to call the Association together 
 whenever he thinks proper : — and to appoint all Officers, and 
 Committees, whose appointments are not otherwise provided 
 for, in this Constitution, in the By-laws, or by special resolu- 
 tion. 
 
 Article VI. 
 
 The Vice-Chancellor shall preside in the abseiice of the 
 Chancellor ; and in case of the death, absence, or infirmity of 
 the latter, shall exercise all his functions, and discharge all 
 his duties. He shall, ex-officio, be Chairman of the Com- 
 mittee of Censors, and shall communicate to the Association 
 every report or representation which a majority of that Com- 
 mittee shall adopt, and direct to be so communicated. 
 
 He shall convene the Committee of Censors as soon as 
 may be after their election : — prescribe the duties to be per- 
 formed by each of its members : — take care that a minute of 
 its proceedings be kept, and call said Committee together, 
 whenever any one of its members ,may require it. 
 
 In the absence of both the Chancellor and the Vice- 
 Chancellor, the senior member of the Bar of those present 
 
 27 
 
4i8 Law Association Centennial 
 
 shall preside: — and in case of the death of the Vice-Chan- 
 cellor, of his acting as Chancellor, or of his absence, the 
 senior member of the Bar on the Committee of Censors, of 
 those present shall exercise all his functions, and discharge 
 all his duties. 
 
 Article VII. 
 
 The Treasurer shall, ex-ofificio, be the Chairman of the 
 Committee of Finance. — It shall be his duty to keep correct 
 books of accounts of all monies received, and disbursed by, 
 and owing to the Association : — to collect all fines incurred, 
 or subscriptions due, by the members, to pay all draughts 
 drawn upon him, signed by the Chancellor, Vice-Chancel- 
 lor, or other presiding member, as the case may be, and 
 attested by the Secretary; — and none other: — and to make 
 report at every stated session of the receipts, expenditures, 
 and debts, of the last quarter. 
 
 Article VIII. 
 
 The Secretary shall attest all draughts of the Chan- 
 cellor, Vice-Chancellor, or other presiding members, as the 
 case may be, upon the Treasurer, to defray the expenses, or to 
 fulfil the resolutions of the Association. 
 
 He shall keep fair and correct minutes of all its proceed- 
 ings : — make out a list of all fines incurred at every session, 
 for the Treasurer ; keep transcribed in a book this Constitu- 
 tion, the By-laws, and all the resolutions of the Association ; 
 together with an Alphabetical Roll of the members, with their 
 places of residence, and the dates of their admission to the 
 Bar of the Supreme Court, noted thereon : — and file all the 
 reports of the Officers and Committees of the Association. 
 
 He shall give at least four days notice of each stated 
 session, and he shall take care that due personal notice be 
 given to the members, of the time and place of any special 
 session, legally directed. 
 
Constitution of 1821 419 
 
 Article IX. 
 
 The Librarian shall have the care and keeping of all the 
 records and books belonging to the Association :— he shall 
 keep a catalogue of the same : — arrange the records accord- 
 ing to their respective dates, and have the same, when con- 
 venient, bound up in volumes, for better preservation. 
 
 He shall keep memoranda of all purchases by, or dona- 
 tions to, the Association in his department: — and he shall 
 make report annually in relation to the same, to the Chan- 
 cellor, Vice-Chancellor, or other presiding member, as the 
 case may be. 
 
 The Committee of Censors, shall consist of eight mem- 
 bers, to be annually elected. — It shall be their duty to bestow 
 especial attention upon the practice of the Bar :— to report 
 through their Chairman to the Association, every member 
 whose conduct, professionally, may be deemed reprehensible, 
 together with the circumstances of the case. 
 
 To suggest to the Association all alterations or amend- 
 ments in the rules of practice, adopted in the different Courts, 
 which they may deem wise and beneficial; in order that if 
 approved, they may be authorized to present the same to the 
 proper Judge or Judges for sanction and enforcement; and 
 generally, to aim at maintaining the purity of professional 
 practice, and to prevent unfair intrusions upon the profes- 
 sional ranks. 
 
 The Committee of Finance, shall consist of three mem- 
 bers, including the Treasurer: — two members exclusive of 
 the Treasurer shall be chosen at the first election, one of them 
 to serve for one, and the other for two years ; and at every 
 succeeding election, one shall be chosen for two years in the 
 place of him whose period of service shall then expire. Pro- 
 vided nevertheless, that the member whose period of service 
 expires, may be re-elected to the office. 
 
420 Law Association Centennial 
 
 The said Committee shall invest the funds of the Asso- 
 ciation in such manner as they may deem most expedient, 
 unless otherwise expressly directed by the Association. 
 
 They shall ascertain and report to the Association, every 
 case in which pecuniary aid or relief ought to be afforded : 
 together with the mode in which the same may be done, with 
 the most efficacy as respects the object, and with the least 
 pressure upon the Treasury: — Provided nevertheless, that 
 the said Committee, shall, without previously reporting to the 
 Association, have power to dispose of any sum, for the pur- 
 pose above referred to, not exceeding ten dollars, at any one 
 time. 
 
 All elections shall be by ballot. 
 
 The Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, Committee of Censors, 
 and Treasurer, shall be annually elected on the first Monday 
 in December. 
 
 In each of the above cases, a majority of the votes given 
 shall elect. 
 
 All proposals for admission shall be made at the stated 
 sessions, through the Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, or other 
 presiding member, as the case may be. 
 
 Every proposal shall, at the session when first made, be 
 referred to the Committee of Censors, who shall make report 
 thereon at the succeeding session, when the Association, if 
 prepared, shall ballot for the person proposed; and no per- 
 son shall be admitted a member, unless upon such ballot, two- 
 thirds of the votes be in his favor. 
 
 Every newly admitted member shall, before he be 
 allowed a seat in the Association, sign his name to this Con- 
 stitution, and pay into the Treasury the sum of ten dollars, 
 or such other sum as may hereafter, from time to time, be 
 fixed by the Association. 
 
 Any member subjecting himself to suspension, shall 
 
Constitution of 1821 421 
 
 thereby, for a limited period, lose all his rights and privi- 
 leges as a member: — nor shall he ever regain them, except 
 upon compliance with the conditions, if any, originally an- 
 nexed by the Committee of Censors, or the Association : — 
 and a majority of members present shall have power to inflict 
 this punishment. 
 
 A member subjecting himself to expulsion, shall forever 
 forfeit all his interest in the funds of the Association, and 
 shall be as if he never had been a member. And two-thirds 
 of the members present shall have power to inflict this punish- 
 ment. 
 
 There shall be paid into the Treasury, by every member 
 of the Bar who shall have signed this Constitution, the sum 
 of ten dollars, as soon as the Association shall be organized. 
 And at the expiration of the first year, ever afterwards, the 
 sum of five dollars shall be annually paid into the Treasury, 
 by every member of the Association. 
 
 This Constitution shall not be altered or amended, 
 except with the assent of a majority of the members, at a 
 stated session : — and every such alteration or amendment 
 shall be proposed for consideration one stated session at least, 
 before it can be finally acted upon. 
 
 A system of By-laws shall be prepared and adopted, as 
 the Association shall hereafter direct. No alteration or 
 amendment of any By-law shall be made, except at the stated 
 sessions: — nor unless notice of the same shall have been 
 openly given in the Association, at the preceding session : — 
 nor shall any new By-law be considered or adopted without 
 such notice. A quorum for the election of Ofiicers, making 
 By-laws, and transacting other business, except it be other- 
 wise herein provided, shall consist of not less than thirty 
 members. 
 
BY-LAWS 
 
 of 
 
 THE ASSOCIATED MEMBERS OF THE BAR 
 OF PHILADELPHIA [1821] 
 
 Section I. 
 
 Of the Stated and Special Meetings, and the Order of 
 Business therein. 
 
 Art. I. A notice of each stated and special meeting of 
 the Association, mentioning the day, hour, and place, when, 
 and where it is to be held, and signed by the Secretary, shall 
 be posted up in a conspicuous place in the District Court 
 room of this City and County, and in the room where the 
 Supreme Court, or a Court of Nisi Prius, or of Oyer and 
 Terminer, may at the time be sitting, during the whole week 
 next preceding the day appointed for the meeting. Notice, 
 in writing, shall also be given to the members, or left at their 
 offices. 
 
 Art. 2. Within half an hour at most, after the time 
 appointed for holding a general or special meeting, the Chan- 
 cellor, or he who shall preside in his stead, shall take the 
 chair, and call the members to order, the roll shall be called 
 in alphabetical order, and the Secretary shall mark the names 
 of the absentees, after which, the Association shall immedi- 
 ately proceed to business. 
 
 Art. 3. Every general and special meeting shall begin 
 with the reading of the minutes of the preceding meeting by 
 the Secretary, and conclude with his reading the rough draft 
 of those of the then present sitting, after which the meeting 
 shall be adjourned. 
 
By-Laws of 1821 423 
 
 Art. 4. After reading the minutes, the order of business 
 in general meetings shall be as follows : 
 
 ist, Reports of the Committee of Finance shall be 
 read and acted upon, unless postponed. 
 
 2d, Reports of the Committee of Censors shall be read 
 and proceeded upon in like manner. 
 
 3d, Reports of Special Committees. 
 
 4th, Unfinished business, for which the reports after 
 being read may be postponed. 
 
 5th, The Chancellor, or he who shall preside in his 
 stead, shall communicate any letter, document, or other mat- 
 ter that he may think interesting to the Association, or say 
 that he has nothing particular to communicate. 
 
 6th. Nominations of the candidates for membership in 
 the Association, will be received. 
 
 7th, The election of candidates, proposed at former 
 meetings. Black and white ivory balls to be used for that 
 purpose. 
 
 8th, Any other business not above enumerated, or 
 which has been postponed, may be introduced by any of the 
 members present. The preference in order of discussion 
 shall always be given to reports of Committees, over every 
 other business, unless otherwise ordered by a vote of the 
 meeting. 
 
 9th, At special meetings the business for which the 
 meeting was called shall be first entered into, immediately 
 after the roll is called and minutes read. After this shall have 
 been disposed of, or postponed, any other business may be 
 proceeded in. 
 
 loth. Adjourned meetings shall be considered as a 
 continuation of the preceding meeting, whether general or 
 special, and business shall be taken up where it was left off. 
 
 The calling of the roll and reading of the minutes shall 
 take place at adjourned meetings as at every other. 
 
424 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Section II. 
 
 Of absent Members and Fines. 
 
 Art. i. Every member who shall be absent at the roll 
 call, shall be fined one dollar, unless he delivers a sufficient 
 excuse. No excuse shall be received but sickness, absence 
 from the city, some recent domestic calamity, or being neces- 
 sarily engaged on public business. No member shall with- 
 draw during the meeting without leave of the Chancellor, or 
 person acting in his stead, and any member withdrawing 
 without such leave, shall be fined two dollars, and pay the 
 same within ten days to the Treasurer. 
 
 Art. 2. The absentee shall be bound, within ten days 
 after the fine shall have been incurred, if present and in health, 
 otherwise within the same period of time after his return or 
 recovery from sickness, to pay the amount of his fine to the 
 Treasurer, or deliver to him a declaration in writing of the 
 cause of his absence, which if sufficient, shall be received in 
 lieu of the fine. 
 
 Art. 3. The Secretary shall immediately, or as soon as 
 possible after each meeting, deliver to the Treasurer a list, 
 signed by him, of the absentees, and persons withdrawing 
 without leave, and the Treasurer shall, every three months, 
 send or deliver a list of the delinquents to the Committee of 
 Censors, who shall admonish them to comply with the Laws 
 of the Association, or take such other steps as their pru- 
 dence shall dictate; and if their admonitions be disregarded 
 for three months, the Committee shall report their names as 
 wilful delinquents to the Association, that they may take 
 order thereon. 
 
 Art. 4. Every other fine which shall or may be imposed, 
 and payment to be made under these or any other future 
 By-laws, shall be payable to the Treasurer within ten days 
 after it shall have been due, and if the same be not paid, 
 the Treasurer shall report thereon to the Committee of 
 Censors, who shall proceed in like manner as above. 
 
By-Laws of 1821 425 
 
 Art. 5. Every wilful delinquent, so reported to the 
 Association by the Committee of Censors, shall, ipso facto, be 
 suspended from membership until he shall have paid to the 
 Treasurer double the amount of the fines, or sums for which 
 he is in arrears. 
 
 Section III. 
 
 Of Annual Payments. 
 
 If any member of this Association shall fail to pay to the 
 Treasurer the annual sum prescribed by the Constitution, 
 or to make any other payment hereafter to be ordered, so that 
 the Treasurer report him to the Committee of Censors, he 
 shall be dealt with as a delinquent. 
 
 Section IV. 
 
 Of Standing Committees. 
 
 Art. I. The Committee of Censors shall hold their 
 stated meetings on the last Monday in every month, and may 
 hold special or adjourned meetings at their pleasure. Five 
 members shall be a quorum. 
 
 Art. 2. The Committee of Finance shall hold four 
 stated meetings in every year, to wit, on the last Monday in 
 February, May, August, and November; and may hold 
 special or adjourned meetings when they shall think it neces- 
 sary. 
 
 Art. 3. The Standing Committees shall appoint their 
 own officers, and make rules for their internal organization, 
 subject, however, to the provisions of the Constitution and 
 By-laws, and to the controul of the Association. 
 
 Section V. 
 Of Special Committees. 
 
 Art. I. Every report of a Committee shall be in writing, 
 unless otherwise ordered, and signed by at least a majority of 
 the members. 
 
426 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Art. 2. If a Committee shall fail in presenting their 
 report at the time appointed, each member thereof, unless he 
 offer a sufficient excuse, of which the meeting shall judge, 
 shall be fined five dollars, and the Chairman in double that 
 amount. 
 
 Art. 3. The member first named on a Committee, and 
 on his default, the member next in nomination, shall be the 
 Chairman, and shall have power to call the Committee 
 together, and to preside over them when met. He shall be 
 responsible for the execution of the duties of the Committee. 
 
 Section VI. 
 
 Rules of Order. 
 
 1st, No debate shall ever take place but on motion 
 duly made and seconded, and afterwards stated by the Chan- 
 cellor, or him who shall preside in his stead. 
 
 2nd, When a member speaks, he shall stand up, 
 addressing himself to the Chair; and avoiding desultory 
 remarks, he shall confine himself strictly to the question or 
 point under consideration. 
 
 3d, No member, while speaking, shall be interrupted, 
 unless by the Chancellor or presiding member, when he shall 
 think fit to call him to order, or admonish him to a close 
 adherence to the question under discussion. 
 
 4th, When a member speaking is called to order, he 
 shall instantly sit down, or appeal from the call to the Society. 
 All appeals from the Chair shall be decided on without 
 debate. 
 
 5th, No member shall speak more than twice on the 
 same question, without leave from the meeting. 
 
 6th, Whilst any question or motion is under debate, 
 no other motion shall be admitted, unless to divide, amend, 
 or postpone the question, or adjourn. 
 
By-Laws of 1821 427 
 
 7th, No motion to reconsider a former resolution can 
 be made or seconded, except by a member who voted with 
 the majority. 
 
 8th, No motion under discussion can be withdrawn, 
 without the consent of the meeting. 
 
 9th, All motions for adjournment shall be determined 
 without debate. 
 
 loth, The Chancellor, or he who shall preside in his 
 stead, shall have no vote, unless in case of a tie or equality of 
 votes, or where more than a bare majority of the members 
 present is required, or where the vote is taken by ballot. 
 
 OFFICERS— (1821) 
 
 Chancellor, 
 Jared Ingersoll, Esq. 
 
 Vice-Chancellor, 
 Horace Binney, Esq. 
 
 Committee of Censors, 
 
 William Rawle, 
 Peter S. Duponceau, 
 Samson Levy, 
 Charles Chauncey, 
 John Sergeant, 
 Joseph R. Ingersoll, 
 Thomas Kittera, 
 John M. Scott, Esquires. 
 
 Treasurer, 
 William Meredith, Esq. 
 
 Committee of Finance, 
 William Smith, Esq. 2 years. 
 James Smith, Esq. i year. 
 
 Secretary, 
 George M. Dallas, Esq. 
 
428 
 
 Law Association Centennial 
 
 MEMBERS, 1821 
 
 Jared IngersoU, 
 Moses Levy, 
 William Rawle, 
 Peter S. Duponceau, 
 Samson Levy, 
 James Gibson, 
 William H. Tod, 
 William Meredith, 
 Charles Chauncey, 
 Samuel Shoemaker, 
 Horace Binney, 
 John Sergeant, 
 Samuel Ewing, 
 Richard Peters, Jun., 
 William S. Biddle, 
 Thomas Sergeant, 
 Peter A. Browne, 
 Charles J. IngersoU, 
 Thomas Bradford, Jun., 
 James S. Smith, 
 William Smith, 
 Bayse Newcomb, 
 Joseph R. Hopkins, 
 John Purdon, 
 Benjamin Tilghman, 
 Joseph R. IngersoU, 
 William Delany, 
 William Milnor, Jun., 
 Thomas Kittera, 
 John C. Lowber, 
 E. Spencer Sergeant, 
 Humphrey Atherton, 
 John M. Scott, 
 Josiah Randall, 
 
 William Rawle, Jun., 
 Randal Hutchinson, 
 Charles Wheeler, 
 Nathan R. Potts, 
 Charles Sidney Coxe, 
 Samuel Keemle, 
 Edward IngersoU, 
 Joseph B. Norbury, 
 Thomas J. Wharton, 
 George M. Dallas, 
 Henry Solomon, 
 Thomas F. Gordon, 
 J. Simon Cohen, 
 Edward D. Ingraham, 
 Edward Paxson, 
 Howell Hopkins, 
 James A. Mahany, 
 Richard C. Wood, 
 John Swift, 
 James C. Biddle, 
 James J. Barclay, 
 Joseph P. Norris, Jun., 
 Francis Hopkinson, 
 Thomas Dunlap, 
 John Musgrave, 
 
 A. A. Browne, 
 R. W. Sykes, 
 
 B. M'llvaine, 
 Henry J. Williams, 
 John M. Read, 
 Jonathan Fowle, Jun., 
 Thomas M. Pettit, 
 William M. Meredith. 
 
 (From a pamphlet " Printed for the Association, " 1821.) 
 
By-Laws of 1821 429 
 
 OFFICERS— ASSOCIATED MEMBERS OF THE BAR 
 OF PHILADELPHIA (1823) 
 
 OFFICERS— (1823)* 
 
 Chancellor, 
 William Rawle, Esq. 
 
 Vice-Chancellor, 
 Horace Binney, Esq. 
 
 Committee of Censors, 
 
 Peter S. Duponceau, 
 Samson Levy, 
 Charles Chauncey, 
 John Sergeant, 
 Joseph R. Ingersoll, 
 Thomas Kittera, 
 John M. Scott, Esquires. 
 
 Treasurer, 
 John C. Lowber, Esq. 
 
 Committee of Finance, 
 
 William Smith, Esq., 
 James Smith, Esq. 
 
 Secretary, 
 George M. Dallas, Esq. 
 
 *From Griffith's Annual Law Register, Vol. IV, p. 1382. 
 
CHARTER AND BY-LAWS 
 
 of 
 
 THE LAW ASSOCIATION OF PHILADELPHIA 
 
 (With Standing Resolutions in Force March 13, 1902) 
 
 CHARTER 
 
 of 
 
 THE LAW ASSOCIATION OF PHILADELPHIA* 
 
 (As Amended A. D. 1880, with Other Amendments to 1901, Inclusive) 
 
 To ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME : 
 
 WheeeaSj The Corporate powers heretofore possessed 
 by The Law Association of Philadelphia are derived 
 from the Charter of The Law Library Company of the City 
 of Philadelphia, dated the thirteenth day of March, A. D. 
 i8o2 ; the Amended Charter granted to The Law Association 
 of Philadelphia, upon the union of The Law Library Com- 
 pany of the City of Philadelphia aforesaid with The Asso- 
 ciated Members of the Bar of Philadelphia, on the second 
 day of April, A. D. 1827, and various amendments thereto; 
 
 And Whereas, It is the purpose of these presents to 
 embody the said corporate power in one instrument and to 
 make certain improvements, amendments and alterations 
 thereof under the provisions of the act of the General 
 Assembly of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, approved 
 the twenty-ninth day of April, A. D. 1874, and the supple- 
 ments thereto; 
 
 •Adopted by the Association March ist, 1880. Allowed by court June 
 5th, 1880. C. P. 2, March Term, 1880, No. 669. Recorded in the oflSce for 
 Recording Deeds, &c., for Philadelphia County, in Charter-book No. 5, 
 page 206, &c. Amended March ;2d, 1891 ; amendment allowed by court 
 June 13th, 1891. C. P. i, March Term, 1891, No. 693. Recorded in Charter- 
 book No. 5, page 206. Amended March 5th, 1895 ; amendment allowed by 
 court April 6th, 1895. C. P. 2, March Term, 1891, No. 693. Recorded in 
 Charter-book No. 20, page 491. 
 
Charter of 1880 431 
 
 Now THEREFORE KNOW ALL MeN ThAT ThE LaW 
 
 Association of Philadelphia aforesaid doth hereby adopt 
 this instrument as the Charter of Incorporation thereof, 
 and doth accept the same in lieu of the Charter and amend- 
 ments thereto heretofore in force. 
 
 I. Name, Powers, and Privileges. 
 
 I. The name of the Corporation shall be The Law Asso- 
 ciation of Philadelphia. Under the said title the said 
 Association shall be a body corporate, and shall have, use, 
 and enjoy all the powers and privileges mentioned and speci- 
 fied in the said acts of Assembly pertaining to corporations 
 of the first class : Provided, That no By-law or Resolution 
 of the said Association shall extend to a dissolution thereof 
 or give power to dissolve the same, except by consent of 
 all the members thereof. 
 
 II. Objects. 
 I. The objects of the said Corporation are as follows : — 
 
 (i.) The general supervision of the conduct of Mem- 
 bers of the Bar, and of all persons connected officially with 
 the administration of the law or in charge of the public 
 records, and, in cases of any breach of duty on their part, 
 the institution of such proceedings as may be lawful in 
 respect thereto. 
 
 (2.) The improvement of the law and of its administra- 
 tion; the protection of the Bar and of judicial tribunals, 
 their officers and members, from invasion of their rights; 
 and the maintenance of their proper influence. 
 
 (3.) The keeping up of a Law Library. 
 
 III. Meetings. 
 
 I. Stated meetings of the Association shall be held at 
 such times and in such place as may be fixed by the By-laws : 
 
432 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Provided, That one of the said meetings shall be fixed to be 
 held in December of each year. Special meetings may be 
 called by the Chancellor whenever he may think proper, or 
 when he shall be requested to do so by any five members. A 
 quorum for the transaction of business shall consist of such 
 a number of members as the By-laws shall provide. No 
 voting by proxy shall be allowed. [As amended March 2d, 
 1891.] 
 
 IV. Officers and Standing Committees. 
 
 I. The officers of the Association shall be a Chancellor, 
 a Vice-Chancellor, a Treasurer, and a Secretary. There 
 shall be two Standing Committees, to wit, a Committee of 
 Censors and a Library Committee. Nominations for offi- 
 cers and for members of the Standing Committee must be 
 made in writing, directed to the Secretary of the Asso 
 ciation, at least one month prior to the annual election, 
 which shall be held on the Tuesday following the first Mon- 
 day of December in each year, and such nominations shall be 
 posted at once, by the Secretary in a conspicuous place in the 
 Library room, and so remain until after the election. Votes 
 cast at such election for others than those thus nominated 
 shall not be counted. The officers shall be elected annually. At 
 the annual meeting succeeding the approval of this amend- 
 ment, three members of the Committee of Censors shall be 
 elected to serve for three years, three to serve for two years, 
 and three to serve for one year. At each annual meeting 
 thereafter three members of the Committee of Censors and 
 four members of the Library Committee shall be elected to 
 serve for three years. If for any reason an election is not 
 held at the time specified the existing Officers and Commit- 
 tees shall continue in office until a new election, which may 
 take place at any meeting thereafter called, upon notice that 
 such an election is to be held. 
 
 Each of the Standing Committees shall elect its own 
 officers, keep regular minutes of its proceedings, establish 
 
Charter of 1880 433 
 
 rules for its own government, and fill vacancies in its mem- 
 bership, to serve until the next annual election. 
 
 Vacancies in the offices of Treasurer and Secretary shall 
 be filled by the Library Committee. [As amended March 5th, 
 1895.] 
 
 2. The Chancellor shall preside at the meetings of the 
 Association. He shall preserve order at the meetings and 
 appoint all committees whose appointments are not other- 
 wise provided for by this Charter, by the By-laws, or by 
 special resolution. In the absence of the Chancellor, the 
 Vice-Chancellor shall exercise his powers and perform his 
 duties. 
 
 3. The Treasurer shall, under the direction of the 
 Library Committee, make purchases and contracts for the 
 Association, collect and disburse its funds, and keep proper 
 accounts, which shall be annually audited by a committee 
 of the Association to be appointed for the purpose. He 
 shall, at the meeting held in December of each year, make 
 a report of his receipts and disbursements during the previous 
 fiscal year, and of the financial condition of the Association 
 generally, which report shall be recorded in a book to be kept 
 for the purpose. He shall give security to the Association for 
 the faithful performance of the duties of his office in such sum 
 and form as the Library Committee may require. He shall 
 be ex officio a member of the Library Committee, with power 
 to call meetings thereof. 
 
 4. The Secretary shall give due notice of meetings of 
 the Association, attend the same, keep the minutes thereof, 
 and perform the ordinary duties of his office. He shall 
 also keep transcribed in a separate book this Charter and such 
 By-laws as may from time to time be adopted, together with 
 a roll of the members of the Association, with the dates of 
 their admission to the Bar, and of their becoming members 
 of the Association. He shall be ex oiEcio a member of the 
 Library Committee. [As amended March 5th, 1895.] 
 
 28 
 
434 Law Association Centennial 
 
 5. The Committee of Censors shall consist of nine mem- 
 bers, of whom five shall be a quorum. They shall have 
 charge of the objects of the Association indicated in sec- 
 tions I and 2 of Article II of this Charter, and when any 
 matter relating thereto shall be brought to their notice, they 
 shall, on behalf of the Association, take such action as they 
 may deem proper. They may suggest to the Association 
 such alterations in the rules of practice adopted in the differ- 
 ent courts as may be deemed wise and beneficial, in order 
 that, if approved, they may be authorized to present the same 
 to the proper Court for adoption. 
 
 6. The Library Committee shall consist of twelve mem- 
 bers, in addition to the Treasurer, of whom five shall be 
 a quorum. They shall have a general superintendence of 
 the library, of the purchases of books therefor, and of the 
 appointment and discharge of a Librarian and assistants. 
 They may fix the salaries of the officers and employees of 
 the Association. They shall counsel with and direct the 
 Treasurer, and manage the general business of the Associa- 
 tion. They shall make an annual report, at the December 
 stated meeting, of the condition of the library and of the 
 general business of the Association, which report shall be 
 recorded in a book to be kept for the purpose. 
 
 V. Membership. 
 
 1. This Association shall consist of the present members 
 thereof, and of such Members of the Philadelphia Bar as 
 shall be admitted to membership as herein provided. 
 
 2. Applications for membership shall in all cases be 
 referred to the Committee of Censors, who shall have power, 
 by unanimous vote of the members present at any meeting 
 thereof, to approve such applications. Upon the notification 
 to the Treasurer of such approval, the applicant shall pay 
 to the Treasurer such sum of money and in such manner as 
 
Charter of 1880 435 
 
 the By-laws shall require, and shall, upon full payment 
 thereof, become a member of the Association, and shall 
 receive a Certificate of Membership, signed by the Treasurer, 
 with the seal of the Association attested by the Secretary 
 attached, which certificate shall not be transferable. 
 
 3. Any member of the Association may be suspended or 
 expelled for such cause as the Committee of Censors in a 
 report recommending such action may adjudge sufficient: 
 Provided, That notice shall be given by the Secretary to 
 such member of the action thus recommended, and of the 
 charge made against him, and that he will have an oppor- 
 tunity of being heard in person or by counsel : And provided 
 further, That such recommendation shall be approved by two- 
 thirds of the members present at a meeting specially called 
 to consider the same. 
 
 The disbarment of any member shall ipso facto work 
 his expulsion from the Association. 
 
 In case of the expulsion of a member all his rights and 
 interest in the property of the Association shall thereupon 
 determine. 
 
 The non-payment by any member of annual dues or 
 assessments for two consecutive years, shall work a deter- 
 mination of his membership. 
 
 4. The annual payments by the members shall be regu- 
 lated by the By-laws. 
 
 5. No membership other than as hereinbefore provided 
 shall be allowed, saving the rights of the present life members. 
 
 VI. Law Library. 
 
 I. The terms and conditions upon which the rooms and 
 books of the Association may be used by the members or 
 others, shall be regulated by the Library Committee, except in 
 matters prescribed by the By-laws. 
 
436 Law Association Centennial 
 
 VII. By-Laws. 
 
 I. A code of By-laws shall be adopted by the Associa- 
 tion, upon the approval and acceptance of this Charter, 
 after which no By-law shall be enacted, amended or altered, 
 except at a stated meeting of the Association, after having 
 been publicly read at a previous meeting, and posted in the 
 library room for the period of thirty days before final action. 
 
 BY-LAWS 
 
 of 
 
 THE LAW ASSOCIATION OF PHILADELPHIA 
 
 As amended to March gth, 1901. 
 
 I. Meetings. 
 
 1. The stated meetings of the Association shall be held 
 at 3.30 P. M., on the Tuesday following the first Monday of 
 December, March, June, and October. [Amendment of 
 March 5th, 1901.J 
 
 2. A quorum for the transaction of any business shall 
 consist of ten members. 
 
 3. The order of business at the meetings of the Associa- 
 tion shall be as follows, but may be suspended or changed by 
 a unanimous vote of the members present : — 
 
 ( I.) Reading of the minutes of the previous meeting. 
 
 (2.) Report of the Treasurer and action, thereon. 
 
 (3.) Report of the Library Committee and action 
 thereon. 
 
 (4.) Report of the Committee of Censors and action 
 thereon. 
 
 (5.) Reports of special committees and action thereon. 
 
 (6.) Communications from officers or others. 
 
 (7.) Unfinished business. 
 
By-Laws of 1880 437 
 
 (8.) New business. 
 
 (9.) Ejection of officers. 
 
 4. At special meetings, the business for which the meet- 
 ing has been called shall be taken up immediately after 
 the reading of the minutes of the previous meeting. After 
 disposition or postponement thereof, any other business will 
 be in order. 
 
 II. Membership. 
 
 1. The annual dues of each member shall be twelve dol- 
 lars, payable in advance on the first Monday of March in 
 each year, and the first annual payment of a member may 
 be apportioned. 
 
 2. Members of the Association absent from the city for 
 a period of more than one year, may during their absence 
 be relieved from payment of the annual dues during such 
 absence, upon application to the Library Committee. 
 
 3. Members of the Bar, within twelve months of their 
 admission to practice in the courts of this county, may, 
 with the approval of the Committee of Censors, pay to the 
 Treasurer annually in advance, on the first Monday of March, 
 during three years, the following sums : — 
 
 The first year $6 
 
 The second year 8 
 
 The third year 10 
 
 Upon the first Monday of March of the then following 
 year they shall be admitted to membership, and shall there- 
 after pay the same annual due as other members : Provided, 
 That they shall have made the said three annual payments, 
 and shall first pay the dues for one year at the same rate as 
 other members : And provided further, That upon the failure 
 of any person to complete the payments required by this 
 By-law, all payments made on account shall be the exclusive 
 property of the Law Association. All members of the Bar 
 who have applied to become members of the Association 
 
438 Law Association Centennial 
 
 under the above three-year plan shall make their first payment 
 within two months after their notification of approval by the 
 Committee of Censors. Should any subsequent payments not 
 be made within six months after the first Monday of March 
 on which they become due, the delinquents will not be allowed 
 the use of the library until such payments are made, and 
 should two annual payments become due and unpaid, the 
 privilege will be canceled, and all payments theretofore made 
 shall become the exclusive property of the Association. 
 [Amendment of March 5th, igoi.] 
 
 III. Library. 
 
 I. The use of the library shall be confined to — 
 
 (i.) The Judges of the Courts of Pennsylvania and of 
 the United States. 
 
 (2.) The Presidents of both branches of City Councils; 
 the City Solicitor and his assistants; the District Attorney 
 for the County of Philadelphia, and the District Attorney 
 of the United States for the Eastern District of Pennsyl- 
 vania, and their respective assistants; the Register of Wills 
 for all matters relating to the business of the City; and the 
 members of the Law Committee of Councils for the business 
 of the City. 
 
 (3.) The present life members. 
 
 (4.) Members of the Association whose dues are not 
 more than twelve months in arrears. 
 
 (5.) Members of the Bar who have complied with the 
 rules regulating the three-year plan of becoming members 
 of the Association. 
 
 (6.) Members of the Bar, not in anywise indebted to 
 the Association, who have paid the annual sums required 
 under By-laws allowing them the privilege of using the 
 library. 
 
 (7.) Such other persons, including students at law, as 
 shall be allowed the privilege by the Library Committee, 
 
By-Laws of 1880 439 
 
 upon such terms as they deem proper. [Amendment of 
 March 5th, 1901.J 
 
 2. Members of the Bar not members of the Association 
 will be allowed the privilege of using the library upon pay- 
 ment in advance therefor of the sum of twenty dollars, 
 such privilege to continue for one year from the date of 
 such payment, which payment, for convenience, may be made 
 in sums of ten dollars each — the second payment to be made 
 within six months after the beginning of the subscription. 
 
 3. Members of the Bar paying after the first Monday of 
 March in any year the sums required for the privilege of 
 using the library, and subsequently desiring to become mem- 
 bers of the Association before the expiration of their subscrip- 
 tions, may be credited with the amounts paid by them against 
 annual dues considered as accruing from the first Monday of 
 March preceding their subscriptions. [Amendment of 
 March 5th, 1901.] 
 
 4. No book shall be allowed to be taken from the library 
 room except — 
 
 ( I.) For use by the Judges of the various Courts sitting 
 in Philadelphia County. 
 
 (2.) For use in Court by members of the Association, 
 or by members of the Bar intending to become such under 
 the three-year plan, annual subscribers, and Students in 
 arguments of cases before the Law Academy. 
 
 (3.) Pursuant to regulation of the Library Committee. 
 
 IV. Endowment Fund. 
 
 All donations in money to the Association, except for 
 specific purposes, shall be invested by the Treasurer under 
 the direction of the Library Committee, the interest to be 
 applied to the purchase of books. Such investments, which 
 shall be called "The Endowment Fund," shall not be con- 
 verted into money except for re-investment. 
 
STANDING RESOLUTIONS 
 
 of 
 
 THE LAW ASSOCIATION OF PHILADELPHIA 
 
 1. Resolved, That all donations of whatsoever sort 
 made to this Association hereafter, be acknowledged by the 
 Secretary and Treasurer of the Association, and so of others 
 so far as the same are remembered or can be discovered. 
 
 "That the form of such acknowledgment be as fol- 
 lows : — 
 
 "The Law Association of Philadelphia, 
 
 "Founded 1802, 
 "Has received 
 a gift from 
 
 which will be preserved by the Corporation with particular 
 care, and for which it begs leave thus to return a grateful 
 acknowledgment. 
 "Date 
 
 "Secretary. 
 
 "Treasurer." 
 
 That in all cases of a donation of books, a record of 
 the donation be made in the volumes by a private label. 
 [Adopted June ist, 1846.] 
 
 2. Resolved, That a Committee on Legislation be 
 appointed, which Committee shall consist of seven members 
 of the Association, and shall meet not less than once a 
 month, excepting during the months of June, July, August, 
 and September. The said Committee shall hold special meet- 
 ings at the call of the chairman, and any and all proposed 
 legislation shall be considered by this Committee, who shall 
 make report to the Association in relation thereto, as to 
 them shall seem proper. [Adopted March 3d, 1890.J 
 
Standing Resolutions. Charter of 1880 441 
 
 3. Resolved, That a Committee on Biography and His- 
 tory be appointed, which Committee shall consist of three 
 members of the Association, with the Chancellor and Vice- 
 chancellor, and shall meet not less than once a month, except- 
 ing during the months of June, July, August, and Septem- 
 ber. The said Committee shall hold special meetings at the 
 call of the chairman and shall receive all papers referred to 
 them, and shall collect all data obtainable touching the history 
 of the Pennsylvania Bench and Bar, and of the members 
 thereof, and shall arrange the same in order for publication, 
 and shall submit the papers thus prepared to the Association 
 with such recommendations as to the Committee shall seem 
 proper. 
 
 The Committee on Biography and History may call for 
 pamphlets, etc., in the library, relative to the Pennsylvania 
 Bench and Bar, and may have proper assistance of Librarian, 
 etc. [Adopted March 3d, 1890, December ist, 1890.J 
 
 4. Resolved, That a Committee on Meetings be ap- 
 pointed, which Committee shall consist of five members of the 
 Association, and shall meet not less than once a month, 
 excepting during the months of June, July, August, and Sep- 
 tember. The said Committee shall hold special meetings at 
 the call of the chairman, and shall arrange for meetings of 
 the Association, to be held as often as may be by them con- 
 sidered advisable for the transaction of business or for the 
 purpose of social entertainment or the discussion of matters 
 of interest to the Association or the reading of papers on suit- 
 able topics by members of the Association or other persons. 
 [Adopted March 3d, 1890.] 
 
 5. Resolved, It is the sense of the Law Association that 
 in preparing tickets for the annual election the tickets for 
 members of the Library Committee and of the Board of 
 Censors shall contain at least three names of gentlemen not at 
 the time members of the Committees, respectively. [Adopted 
 March 17th, 1890.] 
 
 6. Resolved, That the Committee of Censors be, and are 
 
442 Law Association Centennial 
 
 hereby, given authority to appoint from time to time, and 
 for such length of time as to them may seem best, a member 
 of this Association to act as counsel for complainants, who 
 are not otherwise provided, in the conduct of complaints 
 before the Committee. [Adopted December 6th, 1892.] 
 
 7. Resolved, That a Committee of seven be appointed by 
 the Chancellor, to be called the Committee on Judicial Vacan- 
 cies, to consider all vacancies occurring in judicial office, with 
 power to recommend to the Association for recommendation 
 to the appointing or electing power, the names of such per- 
 sons as the Committee deem expedient to fill such vacancies. 
 [Adopted March 3d, 1896.] 
 
 8. Resolved, That whenever any member of this Bar 
 shall have been convicted of a crime the prior commission of 
 which would have been sufficient to prevent his admission to 
 practice, and such conviction shall be unappealed from or 
 affirmed, it shall be the duty of the Board of Censors propria 
 motu to petition one of the local Courts of this County for 
 his disbarment and to certify the result of such proceeding or 
 disbarment for any other cause to the Supreme and Superior 
 Courts of this State, to the Federal Courts of this District 
 and Circuit, to the other local Courts of this County and to 
 such other Courts elsewhere as they shall be advised have 
 admitted him to practice therein, upon a certificate from any 
 Court in this jurisdiction. [Adopted October isth, 1900.] 
 
OFFICERS 
 
 of 
 
 THE LAW LIBRARY COMPANY OF PHILADELPHIA 
 
 1802-1827* 
 
 SECRETARY AND TREASURER* 
 
 John B. Wallace 1802-1809 
 
 Yf- ^- ^^'-^ 1809-1811 
 
 Thomas Sergeant 1811-1814 
 
 Benjamin Tilghman 1814-1823 
 
 E. Spencer Sergeant 1823-1824 
 
 Thomas I. Wharton ...'.'..'.'".'' .1824-1827 
 
 DIRECTORS* 
 
 Joseph B. McKean 1802-1807; 1812-1815 
 
 William Lewis 1802-1805 
 
 Edward Tilghman 1802-1807 ; 1815-1816 
 
 William Rawle, LL.D 1802-1807; 1816-1819 
 
 Jasper Moylan 1802-1807 
 
 Joseph Hopkinson, LL.D 1802-1807 
 
 John B. Wallace 1802-1810 ; 1815-1819 
 
 Moses Levy 1805-1807; 1815-1819 
 
 Horace Binney, LL.D 1805-1819 ; 1821-1827 
 
 Joseph Reed 1809-1811 
 
 James Milnor 1809-1811 
 
 John Hallowell 1809-181 1 
 
 William Meredith 1809-1811 ; 1814-1819 
 
 William S. Biddle 1809-1815 
 
 Jonathan W. Condy 1811-1812 
 
 James Gibson 1811-1814 
 
 Thomas Sergeant 1811-1814 
 
 John Reed, Jr 1811-1812 
 
 Charles Chauncey 1811-1815 
 
 William H. Tod 1812-1814 
 
 Benjamin Tilghman 1814-1827 
 
 John Sergeant^ LL.D 1814-1815 
 
 Jared Ingersoll ' 1815-1819 
 
 James S. Smith 1821-1827 
 
 Thomas Bradford, Jr 1821-1823 
 
 Joseph R. Ingersoll, LL.D 1821-1827 
 
 Samuel Shoemaker 1821-1823 
 
 Thomas Kittera 1821-1827 
 
 E. Spencer Sergeant 1823-1824 
 
 John C. Lowber 1823-1827 
 
 Thomas I. Wharton 1824-1827 
 
 *The minute book of the Company and of the Directors contains 
 no minutes for certain years. The lists of officers, therefore, may 
 not be entirely complete. Under the By-laws, the Treasurer was 
 appointed annually by the Directors, and was their Secretary. There 
 was no permanent Secretary for the Company at large. 
 
 (443) 
 
OFFICERS AND MEMBERS OF STANDING 
 COMMITTEES 
 
 of 
 
 THE LAW ASSOCIATION OF PHILADELPHIA 
 
 1827-1902 
 
 CHANCELLORS 
 
 Period of Service Remarks 
 
 William Rawle, LL.D 1827-1836 Died April 12, 1836 
 
 Peter S. Duponceau, LL.D 1836-1844 Died April i, 1844 
 
 John Sergeant, LL.D 1845-1852 Died Nov. 23, 1852 
 
 Horace Binney, LL.D 1852- 1854 Declined re-election 
 
 Joseph R. Ingersoll, LL.D 1854-1857 Declined re-election 
 
 William M. Meredith 1857-1873 Died August 17, 1873 
 
 Peter McCall 1873-1880 Died Oct. 30, 1880 
 
 George W. Biddle, LL.D 1880-1891 Resigned 
 
 Richard C. McMurtrie 1891-1894 Died Oct. 2, 1894 
 
 Joseph B. Townsend, LL.D 1894-1896 Died Oct. 11, 1896 
 
 George Tucker Bispham 1896-1899 Declined re-election 
 
 Samuel Dickson 1899- 
 
 VICE-CHANCELLORS 
 
 Period of Service Remarks 
 
 Horace Binney, LL.D 1827-1836 Resigned 
 
 John Sergeant, LL.D 1836-1845 Elected Chancellor 
 
 Joseph R. Ingersoll, LL.D 1845-1854 Elected Chancellor 
 
 Thomas I. Wharton 1854-1856 Died April 7, 1856 
 
 George M. Dallas 1857-1864 Died Dec. 31, 1864 
 
 Peter McCall 1865-1873 Elected Chancellor 
 
 George W. Biddle, LL.D 1873-1880 Elected Chancellor 
 
 WiLUAM Henry Rawle, LL.D.. .1880-1889 Died April 19, 1889 
 
 Richard C. McMurtrie 1889-1891 Elected Chancellor 
 
 Joseph B. Townsend, LL.D 1891-1894 Elected Chancellor 
 
 George Tucker Bispham 1894- 1896 Elected Chancellor 
 
 Samuel Dickson 1896-1899 Elected Chancellor 
 
 Datid W. Sellers 1899-1901 Died Dec. 24, igoi 
 
 (444) 
 
Officers Law Association 
 
 445 
 
 TREASURERS 
 
 Period of Service Remarks 
 
 Thomas I. Wharton 1827-1841 Resigned 
 
 John William Wallace, LL.D. .1841-1864 Resigned 
 
 Asa I. Fish, LL.D 1864-1879 Died May s, 1879 
 
 William Brooke Rawle 1879-1890 Resigned ; elected Lib. Com. 
 
 Henry T. Dechert 1890-1893 Declined re-election 
 
 Jno. Houston Merrill 1893- 
 
 SECRETARIES 
 
 Period of Service Remarks 
 
 George M. Dallas 1827-1827 Resigned 
 
 Charles Wheeler 1827-1840 Elected Library Committee 
 
 Peter McCall 1840-1852 Elected Library Committee 
 
 Edward Hopper 1852- 1875 Resigned ; elected Finance Com- 
 
 A. Sydney Biddle 1875-1880 Resigned 
 
 Robert D. Coxe 1880-1889 Resigned 
 
 William W. Porter 1889-1891 Declined re-election 
 
 B. Frank Clapp 1891-1899 Declined re-election 
 
 WiixiAM C. Ferguson 1899- 
 
 LIBRARIANS 
 
 Period of Service 
 
 John William Wallace, LL.D.. .1841-1860 
 
 Samuel Dickson 1860-1865 
 
 James T. Mitchell, LL.D 1865- 1873 
 
 George Tucker Bispham 1873-1876 
 
 Francis Rawle 1876- 1892 Elected Library Committee 
 
 Luther E. Hewitt 1892- 
 
 COMMITTEE OF CENSORS 
 
 Period of Service Remarks 
 
 Peter S. Duponceau, LL.D 1827-1836 Elected Chancellor 
 
 Charles Chauncey 1827-1841 Elected Finance Committee 
 
 Joseph R. Ingersoll, LL.D 1827-1836 Elected Library Committee 
 
 Sampson Levy 1827-1832 
 
 Thomas Sergeant 1827-1837 
 
 Thomas Kittera 1827-1839 
 
 John M. Scott 1827-1836 
 
 John M. Scon 1845-1849 
 
 James S. Smith 1832-1841 
 
 Thomas Dunlap 1836-1837 
 
 Thomas Dunlap 1841-1864 
 
 John M. Read, LL.D 1836-1841 Elected Library Committee 
 
 William W. Haly 1836-1841 Elected Finance Committee 
 
 William W. Haly 1842-1845 Elected Finance Committee 
 
 William W. Haly 1849-1852 
 
 John H. Campbell 1837-1841 
 
446 
 
 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Period of Service 
 
 Samuel Keemle 1837-1841 
 
 Ferdinand W. Hubbell 1839-1841 
 
 William Rawle, Jr 1841-1858 
 
 JosiAH Randall 1841-1849 
 
 Charles Wheeler 1841-1846 
 
 Henry J. Williams 1841-1842 
 
 Benjamin Tilghman 1841-1852 
 
 Peter McCall 1841-1842 
 
 Horace Binney, Jr 1841-1870 
 
 George M. Dallas 1842-1845 
 
 William M. Meredith 1845-1857 
 
 Edward Shippen Burd 1846-1847 
 
 George M. Stroud 1847-1848 
 
 George W. Biddle, LL.D 1848-1873 
 
 E. Spencer Miller 1849-1859 
 
 E. Spencer Miller 1873-1879 
 
 James Bayard 1852-1859 
 
 John Cadwalader 1852-1872 
 
 George M. Wharton 1854-1870 
 
 William B. Reed, LL.D 1857-1860 
 
 P. Pemberton Morris 1859-1873 
 
 William F. Judson 1859-1870 
 
 Lewis A. Scott 1860-1870 
 
 George Erety 1864-1867 
 
 J. Sergeant Price 1867-1874 
 
 James T. Mitchell, LL.D 1870-1872 
 
 George L. Crawford 1870-1890 
 
 George L. Crawford 1891-1896 
 
 David W. Sellers 1870-1874 
 
 John Samuel 1870-1890 
 
 Eli K. Price, LL.D 1872-1874 
 
 Eli K. Price 1878-1884 
 
 William K. Shryock 1872-1874 
 
 Samuel Dickson 1873-1890 
 
 Samuel Dickson 1892-1896 
 
 Richard L. Ashhurst 1874-1891 
 
 George Junkin, LL.D 1874-1878 
 
 George Junkin 1879-1891 
 
 Charles S. Pancoast 1874-1885 
 
 John G. Johnson 1874-1886 
 
 Rufus E. Shapley 1879-1891 
 
 Hampton L. Carson, LL.D 1884-1892 
 
 Hampton L. Carson 1899- 
 
 Samuel S. Hollings worth 1886- 1892 
 
 Silas W. Pettit 1886-1893 
 
 Mayer Sulzberger 1890-1893 
 
 Christopher Stuart Patterson. .1890-1893 
 
 Remarks 
 
 Elected Library Committee 
 Elected Finance Committee 
 
 Elected Finance Committee 
 Elected Chancellor 
 
 Elected Vice-Chancellor 
 Elected Library Committee 
 
 Elected Library Committee 
 
 Elected Vice-Chancellor 
 
Officers Law Association 447 
 
 WrTYTx.,. XI ,,, Period of Service Remarlis 
 
 WiLUAM Herbert Washington. .1890-1802 
 
 Frank P. Prichard 1891-1894 
 
 James M. Beck igg^.^g 
 
 James M. Beck ,399-1901 
 
 George Tucker Bispham 1892-1894 Elected Vice-Chancellor 
 
 N. Dubois Miller 1892-1895 
 
 Henry Flanders 1893-1896 
 
 E. HuNN Hanson 1893-1896 
 
 Richard M. Cadwalader 1893-1896 
 
 A. A. Outerbridge 1894-1895 
 
 Albert B. Weimer 1894-1897 
 
 Rowland Evans 1894-1897 
 
 Charles E. Morgan, Jr 1894- 1897 
 
 Jos. C. Fraley 1895-1899 
 
 J. Rodman Paul 1895- 1899 
 
 Geo. Wharton Pepper 1895-1899 
 
 Richard P. White 1896-1899 
 
 Henry Budd 1896-1899 
 
 J. Edward Carpenter 1896-1899 
 
 S. Davis Page 1897-1900 
 
 Walter George Smith 1897-1900 
 
 Lincoln L. Eyre 1897-1900 
 
 G. Heide Norris 1899- 
 
 Chas. Edward Ingersoll 1899- 
 
 Thomas Hart, Jr 1899-1900 
 
 Charles Biddle 1899- 
 
 Alex. Simpson, Jr 1900- 
 
 J. B. CoLAHAN, Jr 1900- 
 
 J. Willis Martin 1900-igoi Resigned 
 
 John R. Read 1901- 
 
 M. Hampton Todd 1901- 
 
 Wm. Wilkins Care igoi- 
 
 Edward Hopkinson 1901- 
 
 LIBRARY COMMITTEE 
 
 Period of Service Remarks 
 
 Joseph R. Ingersoll, LL.D 1827-1841 Elected Finance Committee 
 
 Benjamin Tilghman 1827- 1841 Elected Committee of Censors 
 
 Thomas Kittera 1827-1839 
 
 Josiah Randall 1827-1841 Elected Committee of Censors 
 
 John C. Lowber 1827-1834 
 
 Thomas I. Wharton 1827-1854 Elected Vice-Chancellor 
 
 William Rawle, Jr 1834-1841 Elected Committee of Censors 
 
 Charles Wheeler 1836-1841 Elected Committee of Censors 
 
 Henry J. Williams 1839-1859 
 
 Ferdinand W. Hubbell 1841-1845 
 
 Ferdinand W. Hubbell 1849-1852 
 
448 
 
 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Period of Service 
 
 John M. Read, LL.D 1841-1874 
 
 Samuel H. Perkins 1841-1859 
 
 Peter McCall 1841-1847 
 
 Peter McCall 1852-1860 
 
 Benjamin Gerhard 1841-1864 
 
 Joseph G. Clarkson 1847-1852 
 
 William B. Reed, LL.D 1852-1857 
 
 William Henry Rawle, LL.D.. .1854-1880 
 
 Asa I. Fish 1857-1879 
 
 E. Spencer Miller 1859-1868 
 
 Morton P. Henry 1859-1877 
 
 Henry Wharton 1860-1880 
 
 Moses A. Dropsie 1864-1872 
 
 Edward Hopper 1868-1874 
 
 Edward Hopper 1886-1892 
 
 Samuel Dickson 1872-1873 
 
 Silas W. Pettit 1874-1877 
 
 William J. McElroy 1874- 1877 
 
 David W. Sellers 1874-1878 
 
 George Tucker Bispham 1877-1891 
 
 Albert A. Outerbridge 1877-1886 
 
 George Biddle 1877-1886 
 
 James T. Mitchell, LL.D 1878-1892 
 
 Henry Reed 1879-1889 
 
 Richard C. McMurtrie 1880-1889 
 
 William White Wiltbank 1880-1890 
 
 Richard C. Dale 1880-1891 
 
 Henry Flanders 1880-1893 
 
 E. Coppee Mitchell, LL.D 1880-1887 
 
 Samuel C. Perkins 1880-1895 
 
 Lewis Waln Smith 1880-1881 
 
 Pierce Archer 1881-1893 
 
 Pierce Archer 1896-1899 
 
 William W. Porter 1886-1889 
 
 C. Stuart Patterson 1887-1890 
 
 Henry T. Dechert 1889-1890 
 
 John Douglass Brown, Jr 1889-1893 
 
 Jno. Houston Merrill 1889-1891 
 
 William Brooke Rawle 1890-1894 
 
 Sydney George Fisher 1890-1892 
 
 John Samuel 1890-1899 
 
 Henry Budd 1891-1896 
 
 Henry Budd 1901- 
 
 Alex. Simpson, Jr 1891-1900 
 
 Howard W. Page 1891-1896 
 
 Francis Rawle 1892-1899 
 
 William Drayton 1892- 1900 
 
 Remarks 
 
 Elected Committee of Censors 
 Elected Vice-Chancellor 
 
 Elected Committee of Censors 
 
 Elected Committee of Censors 
 
 Elected Vice-Chancellor 
 
 Elected Secretary 
 Resigned 
 Elected Treasurer 
 
 Resigned. 
 
 Elected Committee of Censors 
 
Officers Law Association 449 
 
 „ ,, , Period of Service Remarks 
 
 Lharles Y. Audenried 1892-1900 
 
 T. EiiioTT Patterson 1893- 1900 
 
 H. Gordon McCouch 1893-1897 
 
 George Wharton Pepper 1893-1894 
 
 Angelo T. Freedley 1894-1898 
 
 John Marshall Gest 1894-1898 
 
 Henry T. Dechert 1894-1898 
 
 William M. Meigs 1899-igoi 
 
 A. H. Wintersteen 1899-1901 
 
 John Weaver 1899-igoi 
 
 Charles C. Townsend 1899-1901 
 
 DiMNER Beeber 1899- 
 
 EiwARD P. Allinson 1899-igoi 
 
 Joseph De F. Junkin 1899- 
 
 John C. Bell 1899- 
 
 WiLiiAM H. Staake igoo- 
 
 N. Dubois Miller 1900- 
 
 JosEPH H. Taulane 1900- 
 
 Dwight M. Lowrey 1900- 
 
 H. La Barre Jayne 1901- 
 
 WlLLIAM W. SmITHERS I9OI- 
 
 NoRRis S. Barratt 1901- 
 
 RUSSELL DUANE I9OI- 
 
 FINANCE COMMITTEE 
 
 Period of Service Remarks 
 
 James S. Smith 1827-1841 
 
 Henry Chester 1827-1841 
 
 William Smith 1827-1841 
 
 Nathan R. Potts 1827-1841 
 
 Charles Chauncey 1841-1842 
 
 Joseph R. Ingersoll, LL.D 1841-1845 Elected Vice-Chancellor 
 
 William M. Meredith 1841-1845 Elected Committee of Censors 
 
 William W. Haly 1841-1842 Elected Committee of Censors 
 
 William W. Haly 1845-1849 
 
 John M. Scott 1842-1845 Elected Committee of Censors 
 
 Henry D. Gilpin 1842-1859 
 
 George M. Dallas 1845-1857 Elected Vice-Chancellor 
 
 James Bayard 1845-1849 
 
 JosiAH Randall 1849-1859 
 
 Isaac Hazlehurst 1849-1877 
 
 Richard R. Montgomery 1849- 1859 
 
 Eli K. Price, LL.D , 1857-1874 
 
 Henry Wharton 1859-1860 -S Elected Library Committee 
 
 John T. Montgomery 1859-1874 
 
 Samuel Wetherill 1859-1874 
 
 29 
 
4SO 
 
 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Period of Service Remarks 
 
 Edward Hopper 1874-1877 
 
 Samuel L. Parrish 1874-1877 
 
 John J. Ridgway, Jr 1874- 1877 
 
 George W. Thorn 1877-1880 
 
 George M. Dallas 1877-1880 
 
 Wayne MacVeagh 1877-1880 
 
 WiLLLAM Brooke Rawle 1877-1879 Elected Treasurer 
 
 Richard C. Dale 1877-1880 Elected Library Committee 
 
 William White Wiltbank 187^1880 Elected Library Committee 
 
 Note. — By the Amended Charter of 1880 the Finance Committee was abol- 
 ished and its duties transferred to the Library Committee, which was increased in 
 number. 
 
OFFICERS, COMMITTEES AND MEMBERS 
 
 of 
 
 THE LAW ASSOCIATION OF PHILADELPHIA 
 
 March 13, 1902 
 
 Samuel Dickson, Chancellor 
 David W. Sellers, Vice-Chancellor* 
 Jno. Houston Merrill, Treasurer 
 William C. Ferguson, Secretary 
 Luther E. Hewitt, Librarian 
 
 Committee of Censors 
 
 G. Heide Norris Charles Biddle 
 
 Wm. Wilkins Carr Alex. Simpson, Jr. 
 
 Charuis Edward Ingersoll J. B. Colahan, Jr. 
 
 Edward Hopkinson John R. Read 
 
 M. Hampton Todd 
 
 Library Committee 
 
 Dimner Beeber Dwight M. Lowrey 
 
 Joseph DeF. Junkin H. La Barre Jayne 
 
 John C. Bell William W. Smithers 
 
 William H. Staake Henry Budd 
 
 N. Dubois Miller Norris S. Barratt 
 
 Joseph H. Taulane Russell Duane 
 
 Committee on Legislation 
 
 Alex. Simpson, Jr. Dimner Beeber 
 
 Frank P. Peichard Wm. Wilkins Carr 
 
 Geo. Wharton Pepper John C. Bell 
 
 John Weaver 
 
 Committee on Meetings 
 
 John A. Clark John Samuel 
 
 Victor Guillou Richard L. Ashhurst 
 
 Francis Rawle 
 
 Committee on History and Biography 
 
 Hampton L. Carson Russell Duane 
 
 Alfred Percival Smith 
 
 *Died December 24, 1901. 
 
452 
 
 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Committee on Judicial Vacancies 
 
 John G. Johnson 
 George Tucker Bispham 
 Richard C. Dale 
 
 J. Levering Jones 
 Silas W. Pettit 
 Charles Biddle 
 Edwin J. Sellers 
 
 Members in Judicial Office 
 
 Hon. Michael Arnold 
 
 " William N. Ashman 
 
 " Charles Y. Audenried 
 
 " Abraham M. Beitler 
 
 " Craig Biddle 
 
 " George M. Dallas 
 
 " G. Harry Davis 
 
 " D. Newlin Fell 
 
 " Joseph C. Ferguson 
 
 " Thomas K. Finletter 
 
 Hon. Charles B. McMichael 
 
 " J. Willis Martin 
 
 " James T. Mitchell 
 
 " Samuel W. Pennypacker 
 
 " Clement B. Penrose 
 
 " William W. Porter 
 
 " Robert Ralston 
 
 " Mayer Sulzberger 
 
 " Robert N. Willson 
 
 " William W. Wiltbank 
 
Law Association Members 1902 
 
 453 
 
 Life Member 
 
 Hon. Craig Biddle 
 
 Members 
 
 Abbey, W. Burling 
 Adams, John 
 Adams, John S. 
 Adler, Francis C. 
 Albertson, Harry M. 
 Alcorn, James 
 Alexander, Benjamin 
 Alexander, Lucien H. 
 Alexander, Robert 
 Alison, Francis J. 
 Anderson, Edward A. 
 Anderson, James R. 
 Anderson, Wm. Y. C. 
 Andrade, Cipriano, Jr. 
 Archer, Pierce 
 Arnold, Arthur S. 
 Ashhurst, Richard L. 
 Ashhurst, Roger 
 Ashton, Aug. Trask 
 Baird, R. Loper 
 Baird, William M. 
 Ballard, Ellis Ames 
 Baltz, John D. 
 Bamberger, Albert J. 
 Bannard, Arthur U. 
 Bannard, Charles H. 
 Barlow, Thomas W. 
 Barnes, J. Hampton 
 Barratt, Norris S. 
 Bauerle, Harry T. 
 Bayard, Jas. Wilson 
 Beale, Clifford S. 
 Beatty, Jno. Eckstein 
 Beck, James M. 
 Bedell, Bradbury 
 Bedford, J. Claude 
 Beeber, Dimner 
 Belknap, Maurice G. 
 Bell, John C. 
 Betts, Rodman L. 
 Biddle, Caldwell K. 
 
 Biddle, Charles 
 Biddle, Frederick D. 
 Binney, Charles C. 
 Bispham, Geo. Tucker 
 Black, Edgar N. 
 Bleakly, H. Graham 
 Bliss, Edward P. 
 Bockius, Morris R. 
 Bodine, W. B., Jr. 
 Boger, Charles W. 
 Bonniwell, Eugene C. 
 Bonsall, Edw. H. 
 Booth, James R. 
 Borneman, Henry S. 
 Boss, Louis 
 Boswell, Russell T. 
 Bowie, R. H. Bayard 
 Bowman, John O. 
 Bowman, Wendell P. 
 Boyd, Peter 
 Boyer, Henry C. 
 Bracken, Francis B. 
 Brand, Walter E. 
 Brannan, Robert 
 Bregy, Louis 
 Breitinger, Fred L. 
 Bricker, William R. 
 Bright, Robert S. 
 Brightly, F. F. 
 Brinton, Ferree 
 Brinton, Jos. Hill 
 Brinton, Sharswood 
 Broadhurst, Joseph J. 
 Brock, John W. 
 Bromley, B. Gordon 
 Brooks, Edward, Jr. 
 Brown, Clarence M. 
 Brown, Francis S. 
 Brown, Henry P. 
 Brown, John A. 
 Brown, John Douglass 
 
454 
 
 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Brown, Reynolds D. 
 Browni William A. 
 Browne, Wm. H. 
 Bucher, Francis E. 
 Buckley, F. Pierce 
 Buckley, Richard Vaux 
 Buckman, J. Hibbs 
 Budd, A. Van Wyck 
 Budd, Henry 
 Bulette, Lorenzo D. 
 Bullitt, John C. 
 Bullock, Geo. A., Jr. 
 Bunting, Joseph T. 
 Burnett, William H. 
 Burr, Charles H., Jr. 
 Burroughs, Joseph H. 
 Busch, Henry E. 
 Butler, Charles N. 
 Buzby, Duncan L. 
 Byron, Robert J. 
 Cadwalader, John 
 Cadwalader, John, Jr. 
 Cadwalader, Richard M. 
 Callaghan, D. J. 
 Campbell, James F. 
 Campbell, John M. 
 Campbell, W. S. 
 Carlile, W. Wilson 
 Carr, George W. 
 Carr, William A. 
 Carr, Wm. Wilkins 
 Carson, Hampton L. 
 Carver, Charles 
 Cassel, John R. 
 Cattell, Henry S. 
 Caven, Joseph L. 
 Chambers, Francis T. 
 Chandler, Percy M. 
 Chapman, Francis 
 Chapman, S. Spencer 
 Chase, Charles A. 
 Chauncey, Charles 
 Chew, Samuel 
 Cheyney, Horace L. 
 Chrisman, William L. 
 Clapp, B. Frank 
 Qark, John A. 
 Qark, Joseph S. 
 
 Clawson, William S. 
 Qay, Harry G. 
 Cleeman, L. C. 
 Qement, Saml. M., Jr. 
 Clevenger, Samuel F. 
 Qoud, Edward H. 
 Qymer, Robert S. 
 Cody, Frank M. 
 Colahan, John B., Jr. 
 Colesberry, Alex. P. 
 Coll, Edward J. 
 Collet, Mark Wilks 
 Colville, Arthur 
 Conard, C. Wilfred 
 Conrade, D. Howard 
 Cooper, Samuel W. 
 Corry, James C. 
 Coulston, J. Warren 
 Coxe, Robert D. 
 Craig, Henry A. 
 Crawford, Andrew W. 
 Crawford, George L. 
 Crittenden, J. Parker 
 Croasdale, J. P. 
 Culbert, Joseph A. 
 Cuyler, Thos. DeWitt 
 Da Costa, Charles F. 
 Daily, Henry A. N. 
 Dale, Richard C. 
 Dallett, Morris 
 Daly, T. Martin 
 Davis, Sussex D. 
 Dawson, H. Horace 
 Dechert, Henry M. 
 Dechert, Henry T. 
 Demming, George 
 Denniston, Arthur C. 
 Depue, Arthur W. 
 Develin, James Aylward 
 Develin, John F. 
 Dewey, Archibald R. 
 Dickson, Arthur G. 
 Dickson, Hazard 
 Dickson, Samuel 
 Dillingham, Conway 
 Dittmann, Matthew 
 Divine, William S. 
 Dixon, Edwin S. 
 
Law Association Members 1902 
 
 455 
 
 Dohan, Joseph M. 
 Donoghue, Daniel C. 
 Doran, Joseph I. 
 Dougherty, D. Webster 
 Downing, Charles H. 
 Doyle, Michael Francis 
 Drake, Frederick S. 
 Drayton, William 
 Drinker, Henry S. 
 Duane, Russell 
 Du Bois, Henry M. 
 Duffield, J. Davis 
 Duffy, James O. G. 
 Dussoulas, FredTc G. 
 Eastlack, Francis F., Jr. 
 Eaton, Arthur B. 
 Edmunds, Charles H. 
 Edmunds, Charles W. 
 Edmunds, Henry R. 
 Eichholz, Adolph 
 Eimerman, Charles H. 
 Elliott, William T. 
 Ellwanger, Wm. F. 
 Elsasser, George A. 
 Elwell, Isaac 
 Embery, Joseph R. 
 Emlen, George 
 Englander, Samuel 
 Etting, Theodore M. 
 Evans, Rowland 
 Evans, Wm. Rees 
 Eyre, Lincoln L. 
 Fahy, Thomas A. 
 Fels, Maurice 
 Felt, Jay Paul 
 Fenstermaker, T. A. 
 Ferguson, William C. 
 Finletter, Thos. D. 
 Fisher, Geo. Harrison 
 Fisher, Sydney G. 
 Fisher, Wm. Righter 
 Fitzpatrick, James 
 Flanders, Henry 
 Fletcher, Robert B. 
 Foss, Cyrus D., Jr. 
 Foulke, John Francis 
 Foulke, Roland R. 
 Foulkrod, S. Walter 
 
 Fow, John H. 
 Fox, Henry K. 
 Fraley, Joseph C. 
 Freedley, Angelo T. 
 Freeman, John S. 
 Freeman, Parker R. 
 Gable, Vivian Frank 
 Gallen, John C. 
 Gangewer, Allen H. 
 Gartley, Frank E. 
 Gaston, Frederick 
 Gates, Thomas S. 
 Gazzam, Joseph M.' 
 Geiger, Fred. J. 
 Gendell, J. Howard 
 Gerhard, John S. 
 Gest, John Marshall 
 Gest, William P. 
 Geuther, H. Walter 
 Geyelin, H. Laussat 
 Gilfillan, Joseph 
 Gill, Henry B. 
 Gilpin, Bernard 
 Gilpin, Hood 
 Glenn, Edwin F. 
 Goodbread, Joseph S. 
 Goodwin, Harold 
 Gordon, James Gay 
 Gorman, John F. 
 Gorman, William 
 Gourley, James P. 
 Gowen, Francis I. 
 Grady, John C. 
 Graham, George S. 
 Graham, John W., Jr. 
 Gray, William A. 
 Greene, John T. 
 Greenwald, Joseph L. 
 Grier, Jay R. 
 Griffith, Nathan M. 
 Griffith, Warren G. 
 Gross, Charles H. 
 Gross, Joseph W. 
 Gross, William C. 
 Guillou, Victor 
 Gummey, C. F., Jr. 
 Haig, Alfred R. 
 Hall, Henry W. 
 
456 
 
 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Hamersly, Edmund G. 
 Hancock, Henry J. 
 Hannis, William C. 
 Hanson, E. Hunn 
 Hare, J. I. Clark 
 Harned, Thomas B. 
 Harrington, Avery D. 
 Harrington, David C. 
 Harris, Bernard 
 Harrity, William F. 
 Hart, Byerly 
 Hart, Charles 
 Hart, Gavin W. 
 Hart, Thomas 
 Hartmann, John F. 
 Hassler, Isaac 
 Hatfield, Henry Reed 
 Hawkes, Thomas G. 
 Heebner, Charles 
 Henderson, George 
 Henderson, Horace L. 
 Hening, Crawford D. 
 Henry, Bayard 
 Hepburn, C. J. 
 Hewitt, Luther E. 
 Hibberd, Dilworth P. 
 Hinckle, Charles F. 
 Hinckley, Robert H. 
 Hirst, Anthony A. 
 Hoffman, Edward F. 
 Hoffman, Edwin D. 
 Holbrook, C. W. 
 Holsman, Daniel 
 Hood, James E. 
 Hopkinson, Edward 
 Hopkinson, Joseph 
 Hopper, Harry S. 
 Hopple, William, Jr. 
 Horton, Arthur W. 
 Horwitz, G. Quintard 
 Howell, Thomas P. 
 Huey, Arthur B. 
 Hunn, E., Jr. 
 Hunsicker, Charles 
 Hunsicker, J. Quincy 
 Hunter, Richard S. 
 Hyneman, Samuel M. 
 Ingersoll, Chas. Edw. 
 
 Ingham, John H. 
 Ingram, Henry A. 
 Innes, Reginald H. 
 Jayne, H. LaBarre 
 Jenkins, Andrew T. 
 Jenkins, Theodore F. 
 Jennings, John W. 
 Johnson, John G. 
 Johnson, William F. 
 Jones, G. Von Phul 
 Jones, James Colliiis 
 Jones, J. Levering 
 Jones, Ray W. 
 Joy, Charles B. 
 Judson, Oliver B. 
 Junkin, George 
 Junkin, Joseph deF. 
 Kane, Francis Fisher 
 Keating, J. Percy 
 Keator, John F. 
 Keene, George Frederick 
 Keir, William G. 
 Keith, Charles P. 
 Keller, J. E. M. 
 Kelly, Robert B. 
 Kendrick, Murdoch 
 Kenworthy, J. W. 
 ICing, James W. 
 King, Leroy N. 
 Kinley, James B. 
 Kirkpatrick, Samuel H. 
 Klinges, J. Peter 
 Knowles, Wm. Gray 
 Koons, Ulysses S. 
 Kratz, Joseph S. 
 Krause, Thad. S. 
 Krauss, Sidney L. 
 Krumbhaar, Chas. H. 
 Lafferty, Henry B. 
 Lamb, John G. 
 Lamorelle, Joseph F. 
 Lancaster, J. Campbell 
 Landreth, Lucius S. 
 Lane, William B. 
 Lansdale, W. Moylan 
 Lardner, James L. 
 Large, J. Barton 
 Latta, James W. 
 
Law Association Members 1902 
 
 457 
 
 Lavis, David 
 Laws, Francis S. 
 Laws, James W. 
 Learning, Thomas 
 Leedom, Joseph 
 Leser, Oscar 
 Leonard, Frederick M. 
 Levi, Julius C. 
 Lewis, Francis A. 
 Lewis, Francis D. 
 Lewis, Howard B. 
 Lewis, John F. 
 Lewis, Wm. Draper 
 Lex, Charles E. 
 Linde, Charles F. 
 Lineaweaver, C. P. 
 Linn, William B. 
 Lisle, R. Mason 
 Lister, Charles C. 
 Little, Henry A. 
 Little, James H. 
 Lloyd, Malcolm, Jr., 
 Lockwood, Charles L. 
 Logue, J. Washington 
 Longstreth, Mayne R. 
 Louchheim, Samuel K. 
 Loucks, Z. K. 
 Loughlin, Henry C. 
 Lovering, Joseph S. 
 Lowry, Benjamin H. 
 Lowrey, Dwight M. 
 Loyd, William H., Jr. 
 Lukens, Wm. H. R. 
 Lyle, Franklin L. 
 McCabe, James 
 McCaffrey, Thomas H. 
 McCall, Wm. E., Jr. 
 McCarthy, Henry A. 
 McCarthy, John A. 
 McClintock, John, Jr. 
 McCoUin, Edward G. 
 McCouch, H. Gordon 
 McCullen, Joseph P. 
 McCullen, M. F. 
 McCully, John E. 
 McFadden, Theodore 
 McGeoghegan, J. V. 
 McGlathery, T. D. 
 
 McGowan, George 
 Mcllhenny, F. S. 
 McLaughlin, Edw. D. 
 McLean, John R., Jr. 
 McMahon, Thomas F. 
 MacCain, Christian S. 
 MacCain, Jas. Scott 
 MacFarland, Leo 
 MacLean, William, Jr. 
 Mackey, Harry A. 
 MacVeagh, Wayne 
 Magill, Edward W. 
 Maher, John F. 
 Maloney, Clifton 
 Manderson, E. W. 
 Mason, Joseph 
 Massey, Henry V. 
 Mathews, Charles H. 
 Matlack, Samuel D. 
 Matthews, Theo. P. 
 Matthews, Trevor T. 
 Maxwell, Robert D. 
 Mayer, Clinton O. 
 Meagher, Thomas J. 
 Mecutchen, Peirce 
 Megargee, S. Edwin 
 Meier, Robert A. 
 Meigs, William M. 
 Melcher, Webster A. 
 Melick, Leoni 
 Mellors, Joseph 
 Mercer, Geo. Gluyas 
 Merchant, Thomas E. 
 Meredith, William M. 
 Merrill, Geo. Irving 
 Merrill, Jno. Houston 
 Messemer, William S. 
 Michener, Edwin O. 
 Middleton, Allen C. 
 Miller, Alfred S. 
 Miller, E. Aug. 
 Miller, E. Spencer 
 Miller, J. Albert 
 Miller, N. Dubois 
 Miller, Philippus W. 
 Mirkil, L Hazleton 
 Mitcheson, Jos. MacG. 
 Moise, Albert L. 
 
458 
 
 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Monaghan, John 
 Montgomery, Wm. W. 
 Moon, R. O. 
 Moore, Alfred 
 Moore, Ziba T. 
 Morgan, Charles E., Jr. 
 Morgan, Randal 
 Morris, Effingham B. 
 Morris, I. Tyson 
 Morris, William 
 Morris, William S. 
 Morris, W. Norman 
 Morrison, J. Howard 
 von Moschzisker, R. 
 Mowlds, Thomas D. 
 Neall, Harry L. 
 Neilson, William D. 
 Nevin, Edwin C. 
 Nevin, William L. 
 Newbourg, F. C, Jr. 
 Newgeon, William R. 
 Nichols, H. S. Prentiss 
 Norris, G. Heide 
 Norris, Thomas J. 
 O'Brien, William H. 
 O'Callaghan, M. J. 
 Ott, Alfred W. 
 Outerbridge, A. A. 
 Page, Howard W. 
 Page, Joseph R, Jr. 
 Page, S. Davis 
 Patterson, G. Stuart 
 Patterson, T. Elliott 
 Patton, J. Lee 
 Patton, John W. 
 Paul, Frank W. 
 Paul, Henry N., Jr. 
 Paul, J. Rodman 
 Paul, Morton Z. 
 Paxson, Curtis 
 Paxson, Edward M. 
 Peace, William H. 
 Peck, J. Newton 
 Peirce, George 
 Pennewill, Walton 
 Penrose, Boies 
 Pepper, Geo. Wharton 
 Perkins, Benj. F. 
 
 Perkins, Edward L. 
 Perkins, Samuel C. 
 Peterson, Albert E. 
 Pettit, Horace 
 Pettit, Silas W. 
 Philler, George S. 
 Phillips, Alfred I. 
 Phillips, Furman S. 
 Pile, Charles H. 
 Pleasants, Henry 
 Potter, Sheldon 
 Price, William S. 
 Prichard, Frank P. 
 Pugh, Edward F. 
 Pusey, Fred. Taylor 
 Putnam, Earl B. 
 Rambo, Ormond 
 Rambo, Wayne P. 
 Randall, Matthew 
 Ravenel, S. Prioleau, Jr. 
 Rawle, Francis 
 Rawle, William Brooke 
 Raymond, Eugene 
 Read, John R. 
 Reath, Thomas 
 Redding, Wm. A. 
 Reed, George W. 
 Remak, Gustavus, Jr. 
 Remick, Henry Qay 
 Repetto, Aug. B. 
 Rex, Walter E. 
 Rhoads, E. Clinton 
 Rhoads, Joseph R. 
 Rich, George P. 
 Richardson, C. B. D. 
 Ridgway, Thomas 
 Robinson, D. Stuart 
 Robinson, V. Gilpin 
 Rodman, Walter C. 
 Rogers, James S. 
 Rogers, John I. 
 Rommel, J. Martin 
 Roney, Albert B. 
 Roney, William S. 
 Rosenberger, Emil 
 Rosengarten, Jos. G. 
 Rotan, S. P. 
 Rothermel, P. F., Jr. 
 
Law Association Members 1902 
 
 459 
 
 Rowland, William P. 
 Rudderow, A. J. 
 Rumsey, Horace M. 
 Runk, Louis B. 
 Russell, George S. 
 Rutherford, John B. 
 Ryan, Michael J. 
 Salmon, Joseph G. 
 Samuel, John 
 Savage, Charles C. 
 Savidge, Frank R. 
 Savidge, Joseph 
 Sayre, Charles H. 
 Sayres, Edward S. 
 Scarborough, H. W. 
 Schermerhorn, F. E. 
 Schermerhom, H. B. 
 Schick, Rudolph M. 
 Schlegelmilch, G. E. 
 Schofield, Charles S. 
 Scott, Henry J. 
 Scott, John, Jr. 
 Scott, John M. 
 Scott, John R. K. 
 Sellers, Edwin J. 
 Sellers, James C. 
 Sergeant, George 
 Sergeant, William W. 
 Shapley, E. Cooper 
 Shapley, Rufus E 
 Sharkey, Charles J. 
 Sharp, Isaac S. 
 Sharpless, Nathan H. 
 Shepard, Jesse S. 
 Sherman, Charles P. 
 Shern, Daniel J. 
 Shields, Albert S. L. 
 Shipley, W. Penn 
 Shippen, Edward 
 Shoemaker, Joseph H. 
 Shoemaker, Wm. H. 
 Shoyer, Fred. J. 
 Shryock, Wm. Knight 
 Simpers, Robert N. 
 Simpsoni Alex., Jr. 
 Simpson, M. Verner 
 Siner, John A. 
 Singer, Jacob 
 
 Sinn, Joseph A. 
 Sinnamon, H. H. 
 Sloan, John H. 
 Smaltz, Henry N. 
 Smith, Alfred P. 
 Smith, Joseph M. 
 Smith, Lewis Lawrence 
 Smith, R. Stuart 
 Smith, Thomas Kilby 
 Smith, Uselma C. 
 Smith, Walter George 
 Smith, Wm. Rudolph 
 Smithers, Elias P. 
 Smithers, Wm. W. 
 Smyth, Charles L. 
 Smyth, G. Albert 
 Smyth, William J. 
 Snare, Jacob 
 Snyder, John M. 
 Snyder, Wm. Henry 
 Sobernheimer, F. A. 
 Solis, Isaac N. 
 Sparhawk, John, Jr. 
 Speckman, John W. 
 Spencer, John T. 
 Staake, William H. 
 Stanton, James L. 
 Stenger, William S. 
 Stevenson, Maxwell 
 Stewart, Ardemus 
 Stewart, Wm. M., Jr. 
 Stillwell, James C. 
 Stilz, Charles F. 
 Stitzell, H. F. 
 Stockley, Frank B. 
 Stoever, William C. 
 Stork, Theophilus B. 
 Stoyle, Richard S. 
 Strittmatter, Thos. P. 
 Strong, John M. 
 Stutzbach, Martin H. 
 Swayne, Franklin 
 Tack, Theodore A. 
 Tafel, Louis L. 
 Tatem, J. Fithian 
 Taulane, Joseph H. 
 Taylor, C. Berkeley 
 Taylor, Francis G. 
 
460 
 
 Law Association Centennial 
 
 Taylor, Samuel J. 
 Taylor, Thomas B. 
 Terry, Henry C. 
 Thole, Francis H. 
 Thomas, John M. 
 Thomas, Joseph B. 
 Thomas, Samuel H. 
 Thompson, H. C, Jr. 
 Thompson, J. W. 
 Thompson, S. Gustine 
 Tilton, Curtis 
 Todd, M. Hampton 
 Toole, Edward J. 
 Tower, Charlemagne, Jr. 
 Townsend, Charles C. 
 Townsend, Jos. B., Jr. 
 Tripple, William Y. 
 Turner, William J. 
 Tustin, Ernest Leigh 
 Vail, Louis dePui 
 Vanderslice, T. L. 
 Van Dusen, Geo. R. 
 Vanuxem, L. C. 
 Vaux, George, Jr. 
 Vollmer, Adrien 
 Von Leer, F. Earle 
 Wadsworth, Edw. D. 
 Wagner, George M. 
 Wagner, Samuel 
 Wagoner, Charles S. 
 Wallerstein, David 
 Wain, S. Morris 
 Walton, Henry F. 
 Wanamaker, A. L. 
 Ward, John A. 
 Warwick, Charles F. 
 Waters, Asa W. 
 Watson, Henry W. 
 Wayland, Francis L. 
 Weaver, John 
 Weil, Edward H. 
 
 Weimer, Albert B. 
 West, W. Nelson L. 
 Westbrook, Chas. K. 
 Wetherill, Charles 
 Wetherill, J. Lawrence 
 Wheeler, Wm. Thomas 
 White, Chas. Doughty 
 White, Elias H. 
 White, John J. 
 White, Richard P. 
 White, Thos. Earle 
 White, William, Jr. 
 Whitlock, Henry C. 
 Wiener, Edward 
 Wiener, Henry, Jr. 
 Wiler, Alfred D. 
 Willard, Walter 
 Willcox, C. Percy 
 Willcox, James M. 
 Williams, Ellis D. 
 Williams, Ira Jewell 
 Williams, James S. 
 Williams, J. Henry 
 Williams, Robert J. 
 Wilson, Albert D. 
 Wilson, W. C. 
 Wintersteen, A. H. 
 Wister, William Rotch 
 Wolff, Otto 
 Wood, George C. 
 Wood, R. Francis 
 Woodruff, Clinton R. 
 Wright, David Henry 
 Wright, Robert J. 
 Wylie, Andrew C. 
 Yeakle, J. Morris 
 Yearsley, James 
 Yocum, Isaac D. 
 Young, James H. 
 Zeigler, Charles F. 
 Zug, Charles K. 
 
Law Association Members 1902 
 
 461 
 
 Instalment Members 
 
 Adams, T. Rawlins 
 Ambler, Harry S., Jr. 
 Armstrong, William O. 
 Atkin, J. F. B. 
 Basford, John F. 
 Baxter, John 
 Bay, Charles 
 Begley, William J. 
 Belknap, Henry H. 
 Benham, Frank H. 
 Bennett, Stanley 
 Bernheimer, Leo G. 
 Bishop, J. V. S. 
 Boylan, Thomas 
 Boyle, Robt. Mason 
 Boyle, Samuel A., Jr. 
 Brinton, Jasper Yeates 
 Brown, Paul R. 
 Buckley, Elton J. 
 Buckley, George W. 
 Cahall, Thomas 
 Chapman, William E. 
 Chase, William T. 
 Clark, Percy H. 
 Conlen, William J. 
 Connell, John 
 Connolly, Paul V. 
 Cooley, William J. 
 Crowley, Jere J. 
 Daley, P. J. 
 
 Davis, Wm. Potter, Jr. 
 Davison, Wm. M., Jr. 
 Dickey, John, Jr. 
 Dixon, Allen T. 
 Dohan, James M. 
 Donoghue, M. Francis 
 Dormon, Horace Paul 
 Douglas, Walter C, Jr. 
 Dripps, Robert Dunning 
 Dwyer, James E. 
 Edwards, Geo. J., Jr. 
 Ehrlich, Franz, Jr. 
 Ephraim, Samuel J. 
 Esling, Henry C. 
 Evans, John Lewis 
 
 Fahy, Walter Thomas, 
 Fell, David N., Jr. 
 Finley, Joseph K, 
 Foulkrod, John J. 
 Frazier, Bertram G. 
 Frazier, John W., Jr. 
 Fridenberg, L. M. 
 Gerhard, Albert P. 
 Goodwin, F. DeWitt 
 Gorman, Leo J. 
 Gratz, Jay H. 
 Griffith, David R., Jr. 
 Hallahan, John W. 
 Hanna, Meredith 
 Harris, Willard M. 
 Hart, Henry G. 
 Heckler, Howard E. 
 Heckscher, Stevens 
 Heidinger, Willis B. 
 Heiligman, Otto R. 
 Heymann, Alfred 
 Hinckley, John C. 
 Hodge, Henry B. 
 Hoffman, Jacob 
 Houston, Samuel J. 
 Howson, Charles H. 
 Huston, Joseph H. 
 Jenks, Robert D. 
 Johnson, Archibald T. 
 Johnson, Howard C. 
 Jordan, Thos. Carrick 
 Justice, George L. 
 Keller, W. R. 
 Kelly, Philip J. 
 Kenny, John E. 
 Klopp, Peter Paul 
 Langstroth, Charles S. 
 Langstroth, James H. 
 Lank, Edgar W. 
 Lees, Wm. Clement 
 Lehr, Charles 
 Leibfreid, Fred., Jr. 
 Lessig, Wm. Brooke 
 Logan, Robert R. 
 Long, Howard M. 
 
462 
 
 Law Association Centennial 
 
 MacEldoney, Wm. A. 
 MacLaren, P. M. 
 McAnany, Hugh R, Jr. 
 McBride, Daniel J. 
 McCarron, Francis A. 
 McConaghy, Jno., Jr. 
 McCoy, Joseph D. 
 McDevitt, John J., Jr. 
 McGeehan, Francis T. 
 McKeehan, Charles L. 
 McMullan, James 
 McNeal, J. H. 
 Maier, Paul D. I. 
 Marsh, John Creth 
 Mayer, Robert 
 Menamin, Francis C. 
 Mitchell, Clarence L. 
 Mohr, Alfred M. 
 Monihan, James L. 
 Montgomery, Robt. H. 
 Montgomery, W. W., Jr. 
 Moore, H. W. 
 Moorhead, Rome J. 
 Morgan, C. E., 3d ' 
 Morgan, F. Corlies 
 Morris, Robert 
 Morris, Roland S. 
 Muhly, George C. 
 Oberholtzer, Edwin T. 
 O'Brien, Edward M. 
 Patterson, John M. 
 Peirce, Thomas O. 
 Powell, Humbert B. 
 Raken, Simon C. 
 Rawle, Francis Wm. 
 Rearick, Bertram D. 
 Reber, J. Howard 
 Reilly, Paul 
 Renshaw, Benj. H. 
 Rhein, William Early 
 Rickert, J. Edward 
 Roberts, Algernon B. 
 Roberts, C. Wilson 
 
 Roberts, Owen J. 
 
 Robinson, DeWitt C. 
 
 Robinson, Louis B. 
 
 Rogers, Joseph P. 
 
 Rosengarten, Samuel R. 
 
 Ross, Carlyle H. 
 
 Sandberg, William 
 
 Schewe, Adolph 
 
 Schneider, Arthur F. 
 
 Sickles, Gustavus 
 
 Sill, Alfred H. 
 
 Simkins, Daniel W. 
 
 Simons, Herbert 
 
 Sinnickson, Charles 
 
 Skeen, William J. 
 
 Sowers, Clinton A. 
 
 Sparhawk, Harris S. 
 
 Stewart, Daniel W. 
 Stockwell, Herbert G. 
 Sundheim, Joseph 
 Swartley, Francis K. 
 Taggart, Claude Terry 
 Terhune, R. S. 
 Thomas, Allen C. 
 Thornton, Albert M. 
 Urquhart, George 
 Vale, Ruby R. 
 Van Dusen, Lewis H. 
 Walker, Charles G. 
 Walker, Jacob B. 
 Walker, Winfield S. 
 Wallace, John S. 
 Weatherby, J. Howard 
 Weil, Arthur E. 
 Weston, George C. 
 White, Thos. Raebum 
 Williams, Henry T. 
 Williams, Parker S. 
 Williams, Thomas S. 
 Wilson, Wm. Henry 
 Wood, Clement B. 
 Yorke, William J. 
 Young, Sidney 
 
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