USA > Connecticut > Hartford County > History of Hartford County, Connecticut, 1633-1928, Volume I > Part 43
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JAMES G. BATTERSON (1823-1901)
JOHN M. TAYLOR
President Connecticut Mutual Life Insurance Company
JACOB L. GREENE (1837-1905)
President Connecticut Mutual Life Insurance Company
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C. Dunham was made president of the Travelers on Mr. Batter- son's death.
Thomas W. Russell (1824-1901), whose connection with the Connecticut General from its start has been noted, retained his vigor to the last. He was a native of Greenfield, Mass., and began his insurance career as a representative of the Charter Oak Life, of which he was made vice president in 1857. In 1864 he went with the Connecticut Mutual and was secretary of the newly launched Connecticut General ten years, after which he was presi- dent twenty-seven years, or until his death. He was active in public life in Mystic, his early home, and also here. For over thirty years he was a deacon in the Park Congregational Church. He was the father of Thomas W. Russell, now in the Connecticut General's agency here. Robert W. Huntington, with both youth and experience as assets, followed Mr. Russell in the presidency.
Jacob L. Greene (1837-1905) was a decided factor in Hart- ford life from the time he came here in 1870 as assistant secretary in the Connecticut Mutual Life, to the presidency of which he was called eight years later. Colonel Greene looked the part-which he had played well-of an officer closely associated with the great cavalryman of the Civil war and the plains, assistant adjutant- general on the staff of General Custer. He was of Revolutionary ancestry, born in Waterford, Me. With brevet of lieutenant- colonel for his services, he was chief of staff for Custer through his term in command of the Central Division of Texas. After that he was connected with the Berkshire Life Insurance Com- pany till he came here. Outside of his company he was connected officially with the Connecticut Trust and Safe Deposit Company, the Phoenix National Bank and the Society for Savings. As an authority on insurance, his writings carried much weight. He wrote on other subjects also and his monograph on General Franklin at Fredericksburg and his memorial volume on that officer and fellow citizen are valuable contributions to history. As a public speaker the colonel was frequently in demand. He was chairman of the Citizens Committee when President Roose- velt spoke here in 1902, and he officiated at the inauguration of President Luther of Trinity in 1904. He was grand marshal at the dedication of the Soldiers' Memorial Arch in 1886, of the parade in 1904 when the Army of the Potomac and the Grand Army of the Republic were guests of the city, and of the sound-
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money parade that same year. Yale gave him the degree of LL. D. in 1898, and Trinity the same in 1904. He was senior warden of Trinity Church and a member of patriotic organiza- tions. His son, Jacob Humphrey Greene, who was major in the Connecticut State Guard during the World war, is secretary of the Connecticut Mutual. President Greene's successor was John. M. Taylor.
John M. Taylor (1845-1918) was a student in historical research and a writer as well as an insurance man. Some of his papers were on General Franklin and the Fredricksburg cam- paign of the Civil war, on Roger Ludlow, on witchcraft in New England and on Maximilian and Carlotta. He was born in Cort- land, N. Y., and came here in 1872 as assistant secretary of the Connecticut Mutual Life Insurance Company, after having prac- ticed law in Pittsfield, Mass. He became president of the com- pany in 1905 on Colonel Greene's death. He also was vice presi- dent of the Connecticut Trust and Safe Deposit Company and was otherwise prominent in banking. Greatly interested in Loomis Institute of Windsor, he served as its president and he was a member of the board of the Hartford Retreat. He was the father of Col. Emerson G. Taylor, novelist and newspaper correspondent, whose part in the World war is mentioned else- where and whose book on the campaigns of the Twenty-sixth Division is of great value.
One whose place was hard to fill was Jeremiah M. Allen (1833- 1903), president of the Hartford Steam Boiler Inspection and Insurance Company, prominent in many activities. Of an old colonial ancestry, he was a teacher in his native town of Enfield and in Ellington when he came to Hartford to be steward at the asylum for deaf-mutes. He was one of the Polytechnic Club which devised the plant for the Hartford Steam Boiler Inspection and Insurance Company, of which in 1867 he was chosen the first president, as has been told. How well those principles of preven- tion, by educational propaganda and by constant inspection, have worked out, the present company is evidence. The propaganda by means of the publication still carrying the name Locomotive and the quaint locomotive title head was his idea. In addition to his presiding over the Board of Trade for ten years, as elsewhere noted, he was president of the Y. M. C. A. and developed the mechanical and educational lines there, did much for the Hart-
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ford Theological Seminary and designed the beautiful Case Memorial Library, dedicated in 1893. Lyman B. Brainerd suc- ceeded him as president of the insurance company.
Jonathan B. Bunce, whose career was summarized in the account of the reorganization of the Phoenix Mutual Life in 1889, resigned as president of that company in 1904, when he was chosen president of the Society for Savings, but was prevailed upon to remain as chairman of the board. John M. Holcombe, vice president and so long associated with Mr. Bunce in advanc- ing the company, was the choice for his successor.
The changes taking place in insurance were not so conspicuous as those in industry, transportation, commerce and general finance, but they were hardly less radical or significant. The fire companies were approaching a more nearly scientific system and extending their coverage far beyond what even the progressives of the nineteenth century could have thought possible; the life companies were exploring new fields successfully and making their branch, in various ways, more impressive-devising how to make it feasible that more men provide protection for their families, their homes, their business and their fortunes. From the old 4 per cent reserve basis, the life companies had dropped to 31/2 per cent and now were coming down to 3 per cent. That was index of the estimate of the most solemnly responsible financiers of the day. They were calculating that a financial cycle of lower interest rates had been entered into; that premiums then charged must be calculated on reserves that always would earn an interest item no less than that at the time of writing the policies; that many of these policies or the special payments under their provisions would run on indefinitely into the future, and that altogether sufficient reserves must be built up to make a 3 per cent earning ample. It was a quarter of a century before larger interest earn- ings were to cause among conservatives a drift toward the old basis. At that period, insurance, in its energy and compre- hensiveness, was to be as little like that of 1900 as the automobile was like the bicycle or gas like electricity.
XXXVI
NEW CONSTITUTION NOT WANTED
SENTIMENT OPPOSED TO CHANGE INSISTED UPON BY MANY IN CONVEN- TION - CAUSES OF GENERAL CONFUSION - NEW ARMORY - IN CHURCHES AND SCHOOLS.
One does not have to go deeply into the records to find that in the joyous zest of the new living there was not popular will to break with the old, at least in governmental affairs. What with the spirit of change and the opening up of unsuspected vistas, it might seem in retrospection that the beginning of the century was preeminently the time for changing the state's Constitution. But those now living who participated in the effort to bring about the change know that there was no such special selection. Into such error can retrospection lead us. Neither print nor verbal tradition may reveal the fact to the superficial student of history that all these changes in what goes to make up the life of the people, swift as they actually were as items in the history that deals with long periods, were in reality almost imperceptible to the body of the actors on the stage. They jangled their bells and drank their toasts at midnight of December 31, 1900, and then went their ways. They were busy or were absorbed in family or neighborhood affairs.
The murmurings against the constitution of 1818, specifically in the particular of representation in the General Assembly, had their beginnings back when immigration began noticeably to swell the census rolls and what time the drift of population was from country to city. There would be an occasional communication in the newspapers, by "Pro Bono Publico" or "A Citizen," then an editorial in the democratic press-ultimatley without regard to party,-occasional reference at state elections, heated remarks on the floor of the House, and finally, in the '90s, a crystallization by men of weight. The chief evil they saw was fundamental, and about as solid as Talcott Mountain. It had to do with popular
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representation in the General Assembly. As contention by the cities that they should have larger representation became spirited, the small towns came to feel that their rights were rooted in the historic Constitutioon of 1639 and a surprising amount of mis- information gained circulation. The document they had in mind provided for four deputies from each of the three original towns, and of all other towns as formed "so many deputies as the Court should judge meet," according to the number of freemen in each. Through early years, when ordinarily there were two from each town, all representation from certain towns was occasionally suspended because of their slender means, and at sundry times recommendations were made for reducing representation because of financial burden on the state. The Constitution of 1818 con- tinued the old principle but insisted that there be at least one representative from each town. In the progress of time towns with two representatives were jealous of their rights, while many in the cities considered the men from the country a necessary check on extravagance, though the towns never voted en bloc, however much might be said about the "farmers' vote."
The issue was joined in the election of 1890, when George P. McLean of Simsbury (and Hartford) was elected governor. In his inaugural he put these sentences: "For more than two cen- turies the fundamental law of Connecticut has been the admira- tion and inspiration of the representative republics of the world." "Nothing is so destructive of the credit and the general well- being of society as constant modification of fundamental law." "The general plan of our Constitution in its protection against the wrong kind of liberty is, in the judgment of many, better than that possessed by any other state in the Union." Today "it is theoretically possible for less than 20 per cent of the people of Connecticut to elect a clear majority of both branches of the General Assembly and so secure absolute control of the entire state government." The proposal to increase the Senate he con- sidered no remedy for "the real and growing injustice in the apportionment of the representation in the House." "There are at present eighty-seven towns having two representatives and eighty-one having but one." He expressed fear of a constitutional convention and advocated amendments.
The amendments submitted-and rejected-gave increased representation to the larger towns and cities. The Committee on
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Constitutional Amendments called for a convention. Rather than have complete failure, the governor favored this and said: "If the small towns ever lose their right of representation in the General Assembly it will be due to their own refusal to so exercise that right that it can be defended by its best friends."
The state voted for the convention, 47,317 to 26,745. The smaller towns were greatly outvoted. Hartford County's vote was 8,205 to 5,373; Hartford City's, 3,846 to 819.
Charles B. Andrews of Litchfield, former governor and chief justice, was president of the convention which assembled January 1, 1902; Frank E. Healy of Windsor Locks was clerk, and George E. Hinman of Willimantic assistant clerk. John H. Perry of Southport and former Governor Thomas M. Waller of New Lon- don were vice presidents. It was a distinguished body. The twenty-one eminent lawyers included Lewis Sperry of South Windsor, Marcus H. Holcomb of Southington, Percy S. Bryant of East Hartford, Noble E. Pierce of Bristol, and T. M. Maltbie of Granby. Frank W. Cheney of South Manchester and Edward H. Sears of Collinsville were among the eminent manufacturers. The clergy was represented by Rev. William M. Brown of Bloomfield, who was made chaplain.
Debates were tedious and individual opinion was not much changed. Vice President Perry, in the "History of Connecticut," says of it: "Near the close of the second of the last three days, Mr. Bissell of Suffield proposed the rule of composition for the House and Senate which on the next and final day was adopted by a vote of 88 to 66. It did not differ materially from others which had come to the surface throughout the session and was not satisfactory to many who voted for it, but the members were tired and wanted to go home." It might be added that it was evident that they might as well go, and the decision which pre- viously had been opposed by so many in hope of something better was welcomed as a relief.
The document provided for one representative from every town; two for towns with from 2,000 to 50,000 population ; three for those from that maximum to 100,000; those above that to have four and one additional for each additional 50,000. The Senate should have forty-five members from as many districts of as nearly equal population as possible. President Andrews and Vice President Perry favored the document. The chief opposition in
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the convention was based on the ground that great expense would result; that failure to make the House the town body with one representative from each town and the Senate the population body would never satisfy the cities, and that the calling of future conventions was made almost impossible by the rule that the request must be approved by a majority of the entire electorate.
With an apathy increased by the fact that this was not a regular election day, the people of the state voted against it by 10,377 to 21,234. This was only 15 per cent of the total registra- tion at the last previous state election, when 79 per cent of the total had voted. In Hartford County those voting were only 23 per cent of the registration, and of them 6,897 were against and 2,635 for. At the state election the county had polled 70 per cent of its possible. Hartford's vote was 1,208 for and 3,949 against; of the total majority against, the cities contributed less than 9,000. In Hartford County the only towns voting yes were Bloomfield, East Granby, Newington, Rocky Hill, South Windsor and Wethersfield. Says Vice President Perry, for the members of the convention who had obeyed the call of the electorate and had worked four and a half months "with marked personal sacri- fice": "It was the lack of voting and not the result which grieved them."
The Hartford County delegates to the convention were as follows, the names starred being those who voted against the com- promise document: Hartford, Charles H. Clark; Avon, Robert J. Holmes; Berlin, Charles M. Jarvis; Bloomfield, William M. Brown; Bristol, Noble E. Pierce *; Burlington, E. Samuel Gillette; Canton, Edward H. Sears; East Granby, Julius G. Dickinson *; East Hartford, Percy S. Bryant; East Windsor, Howard A. Mid- dleton; Enfield, Thompson S. Grant; Farmington, Amasa A. Red- field (absent) ; Glastonbury, Henry E. Loomis *; Granby, William C. Case (who died before the convention and was succeeded by Theodore M. Maltbie) ; Hartland, George W. Miller *; Man- chester, Frank W. Cheney; Marlborough, Frederick J. Cooley *; New Britain, Robert J. Vance (absent) ; Newington, George E. Churchill; Plainville, Aquilla H. Condell; Rocky Hill, Owen R. Havens; Simsbury, Joseph L. Bartlett *; Southington, Marcus H. Holcomb; South Windsor, Lewis Sperry (absent) ; Suffield. Charles C. Bissell: West Hartford, William H. Hall; Wethers- field, Stephen F. Willard; Windsor, D. Ellsworth Phelps; Windsor
44-VOL. 1
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Locks, Thomas L. Healy. For the measure, 20; against, 6; absent, 3.
Governor McLean served two terms, till 1903. Henry Roberts ยท of Hartford, who had been lieutenant governor from 1903, was elected governor on the republican ticket in 1905 and served one term. Everett J. Lake of Hartford was lieutenant governor 1907-09. Marcus H. Holcomb was speaker of the House in 1905 and attorney-general from 1907 to 1910.
The long career of Gen. Joseph R. Hawley ended March 18 of that year (1905), which was fatal to so many others prom- inent in Hartford life. Never since his first election by the Legislature in 1880 had his position as senator been seriously challenged. Not only was this because Connecticut had observed the wisdom of continuing service in the Senate but because Haw- ley's name, even before he went to the Senate, had been a house- hold word in every city and hamlet of the state and his wisdom had been availed of in national councils. Moist-eyed veterans, men of high position and men of humble rank, women, children, delegations, individuals, from all parts of the state and beyond, passed by his bier in the Capitol rotunda. Governor MeLean's address was a classic. The general's life was so woven into the history of his town and the state as to call here for only the more personal features of it. His birthplace was Stewartsville, N. C., in 1826, but he was of New England ancestry, his father, a clergyman, having gone South on missionary work. The family returned to live in Farmington and then for a brief time in Cazenovia, N. Y., while Joseph was still young. With a diploma from Hamilton College in 1847, he was admitted to the bar in 1850 and became a partner of John Hooker in Hartford. His work in forming the republican party, his energy at the outbreak of the war, his distinguished service as soldier and administrator, his journalistic life and his political career have been followed in preceding pages. The general's first wife was Harriet Ward Foote of Guilford. Her field work in looking after the needs of the soldiers in camp and hospital won reverence for her but undermined her health. The memory of courage and fidelity is faithfully preserved at the Asylum Hill Congregational Church. His second wife, whom he married in 1887, was Edith Hornor of Halsted, England, a woman of distinguished family who had
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fitted herself for hospital work and had done patriotic duty in South Africa. She was prominent in various kinds of welfare work in Washington and in Hartford. Of their daughters, Marion married Louis Coudert; Roswell makes her home in Hartford. Margaret Hawley, relative of the general's first wife and adopted into the general's family, has won distinction as a miniature painter.
Strict regard for principle in whatever cause he espoused and with never an eye to financial return was a fetich with the general throughout life. As an all-embracing illustration: An associate on the Courant found him fuming at his desk one morning after his return from a long campaign in behalf of a colleague in Penn- sylvania. In answer to a query, the indignant senator tossed upon the table a letter from the chairman of the campaign com- mittee enclosing a check for $1,000 for his expenses. "Well?" queried his friend. "Well!" stormed the senator. "Do you think I would accept money for expenses in campaign work? I never have yet and I'm too old to begin now." With that he thrust the check into a letter he already had written. He was democratic and always solicitous for the welfare of others. Returning in a smoking car from a political rally, late one night when most men of his age would have been in bed, he saw a disgusting sot reeling around the car and finally dropping into a seat near the door, muttering that he must get off at the next station. Without a word the general left his companions and went forward to sit by the fellow. As the train slowed down and the man began to rise, the general who so many years had been a commanding figure in the United States Senate also rose, took the man's arm and care- fully assisted him to the station platform. The conductor held the train till the general, himself slow of step, had led his uncouth protege to a place of safety and then said to one of the general's friends, "I never shall forget that sight. But I wouldn't have intruded after the general began to help." As has been said, the Legislature gave Morgan G. Bulkeley the honor of succeeding the general in the Senate.
Theodore Roosevelt was intensely popular during his first term as President and his occasional visits to his sister, the wife of Commander William Sheffield Cowles of the navy, were made the occasions for demonstrations, some of them formal. Herbert
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Knox Smith of Farmington was one of the young men intimates who came to be known as the President's "tennis cabinet" and was called to be deputy commissioner of business corporations, in which capacity he assembled statistics in reports which were of very great value and at a time when they were exceptionally useful. Later he was candidate for governor on the progressive ticket, when Roosevelt led the bolt from Taft's renomination.
George L. Lilley of Waterbury, after a term in Congress where he had tried to check torpedo-contract scandals, took office as governor in 1909 and with his family made his residence in the former Pliny Jewell house on Farmington Avenue. He was a man of exceptional business capacity. He died early in his first term of service, worn out by his first experiences in public life.
Alexander Harbison was the first mayor of the city in the new century, succeeded by Ignatius A. Sullivan, William F. Henney (two terms) and Edward W. Hooker in order. Mayor Henney was a lawyer, a writer on local institutions and a student of public problems. Largely by his inspiration an effort was made to purify local politics and in 1906 there was a citizens committee, under the chairmanship of Rev. J. J. MeCook, to work for cleaner elections. Young men rallied to the call and certain evils that were developing were squelched. Voting machines, which had been introduced in 1903, already had worked some reform, but were not yet above suspicion.
New problems were arising in municipal life as also in home life. There was much to excite the public mind. Hartford was having its share in what was coming on for the United States as a whole. The fear of silver currency was allayed, but there was something to take its place-something not to arouse alarm if recognized and properly handled, yet something that was new to this generation and therefore something about which there must be experiment in handling. In the previous quarter-century there had been a subsidence in the world's supply of gold, accom- panied by a then unanalyzed spirit of discontent over economic conditions. Increase in sources and improvement in methods of separating the precious metal came simultaneously with the elec- trical marvels, the revolution in individual transportation through streets and highways, the accumulation and unequal distribution of capital, and the battle of highly capitalized railroads for prece- dence each over the other. Any or all of these things and their
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notable adjuncts could not directly affect the "man on the street," but history is witness that, whatever the exceptional condition, it is reflected in the mental attitude and behavior of the people.
Locally was furnished an exciting example of the battle be- tween railroad giants. The New York, New Haven & Hartford, whose dividends so long had fattened Connecticut bank accounts and in whose strength common people and institutions alike had cause to glory, was one of them and normally the favorite. The other was represented by the winding "milk-route" road, the Connecticut Western, which crept slowly around and over the hills of Northern Connecticut from the Hudson and was now a tentacle of a tremendous combination of capital looking for its own all-through line from the West to Boston's docks. The average man and the Legislature were told simply that residents of sparsely settled communities wanted better access to commer- cial centers, wanted Springfield's stores as well as Hartford's. The great "New Haven," serene in its power in the Legislature, prepared for the fight without taking the public into its con- fidence. The Connecticut Western began to acquire right of way from a point on its line west of Hartford to Springfield and to a connection with a line independent of the "Consolidated," as the New York, New Haven & Hartford had been called since it took over the other roads in Connecticut. But there proved to be a strip of ordinary land-the Montague farm-in East Granby which could not be bought. Backers of the "Consolidated" smiled but immediately awoke to find that, despite all that had been said in committee hearing, the Legislature had granted a five-mile detour around the obstructing property. The first trip, in 1902, over the "Tariffville loop" was an event reminiscent of the pioneer days of railroading. The question of obtaining the right to the strip of land went first to the courts and then to the Legislature, the halls of which were scandalized by lobbying; the House voted for the Connecticut Western, the Senate against it. Not long after, the land was sold to the Connecticut Western for a paltry $150, and the year following that, in 1904, the "Consolidated" acquired control of the Connecticut Western. It was merely to continue its somnolent career till these later days when, with new arrangements and adjustments, its traffic has been reduced to a minimum. Time may bring a cure for its paralysis.
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