USA > Illinois > Champaign County > Historical encyclopedia of Illinois, Volume II > Part 44
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USA > Illinois > Piatt County > Historical encyclopedia of Illinois, Volume II > Part 44
USA > Illinois > Piatt County > Historical encyclopedia of Illinois, Volume II > Part 44
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Another feature of interest in the record is the small number of indictments found by the
was then bent down and fastened to his feet. which, being left free, raised the legs of the prisoner their length from the ground, in which position he was about as secure as if behind modern bolts and bars."-Haddock's Reminis- cences, in the Champaign Times.
730
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HISTORY OF CHAMPAIGN COUNTY.
Judge Harlan continued to hold the courts of this county until 1841, when by a reorgani- zation of the courts of the State by the General Assembly, which body under the Constitution of 1818 elected all of the Judges, Judge Sam- uel H. Treat was chosen one of the Judges of the Supreme Court, who, by the law then in force, also held the Circuit Courts. Judge Treat was assigned to hold the courts of this, the Eighth Circuit, which embraced all of the counties, fifteen in number, lying between the Illinois River and the Indiana line, and in- cluding Sangamon on the South and Living- ston on the north. These courts he most sat- isfactorily held until the adoption of the Con- stitution of 1848.(1)
Judge David Davis, a resident of Blooming- ton' and long a practicing attorney at this bar, was the first Judge for this Circuit under the Constitution of 1848. He came to his position at the May term, 1849, and held every term until the conclusion of the April term, 1861, when, by the division of the circuit, Cham- paign County was set off from the Eighth and became a part of the Twenty-seventh Cir-, cuit. (2)
Oliver L. Davis was chosen Judge of the Twenty-seventh Circuit at the first election held in March, 1861, at which time Joseph G. Cannon, then just commencing his profes- sional career in the new county of Douglas,
Grand Juries. Not until more than three years of the life of the county was the first indict- ment returned into court, and only twenty bills were found during the first ten years. These were for offenses most likely to occur in a new country. The offenses charged were: Disturb- ing the peace; obstructing a road; passing coun- terfeit money; assaults of various kinds; sell- ing whisky without license; kidnaping; lar- ceny, and carrying deadly weapons. Only two convictions followed.
(1) Under the Constitution of 1848 Judge Treat was chosen a Supreme Judge, where he served until his appointment in 1855 as Federal Judge for the Southern District of Illinois, in which capacity he served until his death in 1887.
(2) The last term held here by Judge Davis was a notable term for other reasons than the fact that it severed the strong ties which had bound the upright jurist to the people and the bar of the county for many years. At this term was heard the second murder trial in the his- tory of the county, that of John Murphy, in- dicted for the murder of S. S. Rankin. It was the first criminal case prosecuted by the Hon. J. G. Cannon, then just elected prosecuting at- torney for the circuit, and then entering upon the public career which has led him so near the head of the nation. While Mr. Cannon was making his closing address in that case, Beaure- gard opened fire upon Fort Sumter, and set in motion a force which only ended after four years of bloody war. This term ended with the call to arms. north and south.
was chosen Prosecuting Attorney. Judge Davis also served the people very acceptably. He resigned his office after five years and was succeeded by James Steele of Paris, who held but one term before the county was detached from the Twenty-seventh Circuit and added to the Seventeenth Circuit, over which that eminent "nisi prius" Judge, Charles Emmer- son, then presided.
In 1867 Arthur J. Gallagher was chosen to succeed Judge Emmerson and served very ac- ceptably until succeeded in 1873 by C. B. Smith, who was a great favorite with the peo- ple of the circuit, insomuch that he was twice re-elected, and rounded out the unprecedented term of eighteen years of judicial service, em- bracing the period of the greatest pressure of judicial business in the history of the county.
Judge Smith was succeeded by Francis M. Wright, whose second term had not been com- pleted when he was called to a position on the Federal Court of Claims by appointment of the President.
Both of the last named Judges were chosen from the local bar and, during their long pe- riods of service, gave great satisfaction to the bar and the people.
Solon Philbrick, another local attorney, has succeeded Judge Wright, being chosen to the position without a dissenting vote in the coun- ty which he is most to serve. It is expected that his judicial career will fully justify the confidence universally reposed in him.
A marked change in the manner of select- ing Judges has taken place within a few years. Neither Judge David Davis, the first Judge to be elected by the people, nor any of his suc- cessors down to the last term of Judge Smith, which commenced in 1885, were chosen as the candidates of a political party. All were chos- en solely with reference to personal fitness for the office in view. Indeed, to have sug- gested to Judge Emmerson or to either of the Judge Davises, the idea of being the nom- inee of a political party for the office held by them, would have been to invite an indignant refusal. Yet, when the Legislature elected Judges under the Constitution of 1818, none
but those in harmony with the political views of the majority elected to that body, were considered eligible. A notable instance of a political · judiciary under that system came about in the reorganization of the Supreme Court in 1841. Since the year 1885 the judi-
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BINNER WALLS CO
OBSERVATORY
BURRILL AVENUE
CONSERVATORY
(University of Illinois.)
LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF IEBINGIS
731
HISTORY OF CHAMPAIGN COUNTY.
cial office has been held to be assets belonging to the political party holding the majority of votes. Locally it can not be claimed that the public service has materially suffered by rea- son of this fact, although sometimes the los- ing party to a controversy before the court, in summing up the causes of defeat, has reck- oned the fact that he votes a different ticket from that voted by the Judge of the court, as the cause, rather than the fact that his cause was a weak one from a legal standpoint.
Soon after the holding of the first courts, the necessity of a building for court purposes was seen, as no place in which the courts could be held was in existence other than the few cabins used as private residences. To meet this want the County Commissioners, in January, 1836, ordered a temporary court house of hewn logs, twenty-four feet long and twenty feet wide, to be erected upon one of the county lots fronting on the public square. In compliance with the terms of this order the contract for the work was let to John Craig, the lowest bidder. This building was completed so far as to permit its use at the September term, 1836; for the record of that term, and of the succeeding term, shows that they were held "at the court house in Ur- bana." No further use for county purposes seems to have been made of this "temporary court house," as the next and several succeed- ing terms were held at private houses. (1)
(1)The lot upon which this temporary court house was erected, being lot No. 27 of the town of Urbana, as laid out by the County Commis- sioners in 1833, was, with the corner lot No. 25, sold to Asahel Bruer, March 1, 1841, who re- moved the building to the corner lot where it was clapboarded and became the hotel of Mr. Bruer, which he called the "Urbana House." and which hostelry was long the best the coun- ty-seat afforded. In it were sheltered and fed many times the Judges of the Court, Treat and. afterwards Davis, the members of the bar who went from county to county with the Judge. among whom may be named the eccentric and brilliant U. F. Linder, Abraham Lincoln, Leon- ard Swett, J. W. Fell, Kirby Benedict, Josiah Lamborn, D. B. Campbell, J. A. McDougall (after- wards United States Senator from California), Josiah N. McRoberts, Asahel Gridley, Amzi Mc- Williams, O. L. Davis, John Pearson, afterwards Circuit Judge; and many other foreign attorneys in attendance upon the terms of the Court who attained great fame as jurists and statesmen. In it the writer found his first home and rest in Urbana, as did many who were, like him, here first as adventurers and afterwards as per- manent citizens.
The building, as thus inaugurated, was from time to time added to as public demands in- creased, and its name changed, until it became the well known "Pennsylvania House," of the middle 'sixties. under the veteran caterer, Sam- uel Waters. Before him, besides Asahel Bruer -the first to open its doors to the public-were
Not until the May term, 1841, when the term is shown again to have been held at "the court house," did the Circuit Court have a home of its own.
The court house, so occupied, was a one- story building of wood, forty by twenty feet in size, and nine feet from floor to ceiling. It had a court room twenty by twenty-six feet in size, the residue of the interior space being divided into two jury rooms. Its cost was $340.(1)
In this building Judge Treat held the terms of the Circuit Court during his period of serv- ice, and in it men of the bar, then of as hum- ble life as any beginner of to-day, yet who later attained great fame, attended the court as at- torneys.
The third court house was a very pretty building built of brick and wood, thirty by forty feet on the ground, two stories high with a bell-tower on the center of the roof, stone floor and window sills, and caps. It was built in 1848 by E. O. Smith, of Decatur, contractor, at a cost of $2,744. In the lower story was a hall eight feet wide running from front to · rear, with two offices on each side. In the up- . per story were the court room and two jury rooms. (2)
John H. Thomas, C. M. Vanderveer, and others whose names are not now remembered.
These lots have now again passed to the own- ership of the county and are now occupied by the third jail built by the county.
(1) This building, after serving the double purpose of a school house and the county as a court house, became the first exclusive school house for Urbana. It was removed in 1848 to make room for its successor, to the lot now occupied by the First Methodist Episcopal Church. In it for several Urbana's
years youngsters received the mental training which prepared them for greatness under such teach- ers as John Wilson, R. P. Carson, John Camp- bell, Samuel C. Crane, Noah Levering, William Sim, Joseph W. Sim and others.
Again the building was removed to a vacant lot at the corner of Elm and Vine streets, where after being used again as a school house, it was sold at auction to the highest bidder, Feb- ruary 19, 1859 .- Our Constitution, February 12. 1859.
(2) In this building were delivered many of Mr. Lincoln's great speeches, which, with oth- ers, gave to him the reputation of being, before an audience of average people, one of the strongest men who ever appeared upon an American platform. One of these speeches he delivered here on the evening of the 24th of October, 1854, it being third in order of his speeches delivered against Mr. Douglas' cele- brated "Squatter Sovereignty" doctrine. Major Whitney thus referred to this speech on page 215 of his "Life on the. Circuit with Lincoln:"
"On the evening of October 24th. 1854, the writer hereof called at the old Pennsylvania House, on the east side of the public square, in Urbana, where he found Mr. Lincoln and Judge
732
HISTORY OF CHAMPAIGN COUNTY.
Here for the first time were furnished by the county office-rooms for county offi- cers. Until the completion of this build- ing the Clerk, Mr. Webber, had kept all pa- pers and books pertaining to the public serv- ice at his own house or at the store of Mr. Alexander, of which he had charge. True, un- til 1848, the accumulation of records and pa- pers was small, and there was little need for public offices or repositories for records which had only begun to exist.
This building stood with the end to the north, occupying the center of the public square. When built, and for some years there- after, the grounds about the court house were unfenced and contributed their share of pas- turage to the support of the cows and pigs of the town.
This house gave place, in the autumn of 1859, at the close of the October term, to the third permanent house of the county, which most citizens of this day will remem- ber, and so little need be said of its character. It was built of brick, stone and iron, by B. V. Enos, a contractor, of Indianapolis, at a cost of about $30,000. It was so far completed as to receive the county officers into their respective apartments in the autumn of 1860, and to permit the holding of the August term (1861) of the Circuit Court in the court room. The building was not a success in its exterior ap- pearance, but, barring the acoustical quali- ties of the court room, was well calculated to accommodate the courts and executive offices of the county at that time. This it did for forty years. When built it was exceeded in excellence by few in the State, but the growth
of the county from 1860 to 1900 was such as to expand all departments of the public serv- ice far beyond the capacity of the building, although many changes in the interior had been made from time to time to accommodate the growing demands.
It is reported that each of these four enter- prises called forth denunications upon the heads of the authorities which carried the enterprises through, on account of the alleged extravagant outlays of the money of the pub- lic. This opposition was particularly marked and bitter in the latter case. West Urbana- since called Champaign-had reached a posi- tion in population and influence equal to that of Urbana, and its ambitious citizens had as- pirations after the county-seat. The authori- ties of the county were friendly to Urbana and probably thought, as did the citizens of Urbana, to set to rest at once and forever the county-seat question by the erection-even in advance of the wants of the county-of a court house so complete as to render another build- ing unnecessary for many years to come, and so costly as to make it improbable that it should ever be discarded for another. This evident intention to forestall public needs and opinion for the benefit of Urbana met with fierce opposition in West Urbana, from which it radiated to other parts of the county and operated to overthrow the County Board, which was then made up of the County Judge and two associates, who had inaugurated the new court house movement, by the adoption of the system of township organization at the No- vember election in 1859, followed by the choice of a Board of Supervisors. (1)
Davis in their plainly furnished bed-room, upon the hearth of which was a comfortable wood fire. It was my first interview with either of those distinguished men, but I was put at com- plete ease, at once, by the cordiality of my welcome by both. I at once mentioned to Mr. Lincoln the fact, which had just ap- peared in the papers, that he and Douglas had had an encounter the previous week at Peo- ria, to which he answered, 'Yes, the Judge and I locked horns there.' After some further con- versation and a few preliminary arrangements, the old court room opposite shone resplendent in the coruscation of eleven tallow candles, glued on the top of the nether sashes of the windows, to which place we adjourned, and where, with no preliminaries, Mr. Lincoln de- livered to a full house, the following speech. never before published and it being the third speech he ever made on the mighty issue of slavery in our nation."
"On Tuesday evening Hon. A. Lincoln, of Springfield, addressed a large assembly at the court house, in opposition to the Nebraska Bill." -Urbana Union, October 26, 1854.
(1)Up to this epoch in the history of the county all its fiscal affairs were managed by a Board of three citizens chosen for the purpose. From the organization of the county to 1849, a board of three members, known as the "Court . of County Commissioners," which was made up of the three County Commissioners, and was de- clared to be a "court of record," but having no real judicial authority among its legal powers, seems to have been somewhat of an anomaly.
At the adoption of the Constitution of 1848, this body was superseded in all of its powers by the County Court, made up of the County Judge and two Associate Justices. At the time above referred to, this court consisted of Ed- ward Ater, of Urbana, County Judge; John P. Tenbrook, of Sadorus, and Lewis Jones of Salt Fork, Associate Justices. These gentlemen were old residents and were chosen with refer- ence to the work which they did. At this time the germ of local emulation between the two towns had well developed and the county-seat was being contested for between the old and the new elements.
The passing away of the County Court as
733
HISTORY OF CHAMPAIGN COUNTY.
The controversy caused by the order and contract of the County Court for the building of this court house was probably the warmest and most bitterly conducted ever carried on in the county. Two newspapers in West Ur- bana-both conducted by able editors who were masters of vituperation of the billings- gate brand-turned themselves loose upon the members of the County Board, as individuals, and for months gave them no rest. The effect was to stir public sentiment to its foundations, and even to move some to acts of lawless vio- lence. On May 29, 1860, a member of the offending Board-an Associate Justice, who was a farmer-drove his carriage, containing his wife and other members of the family, to West. Urbana. Upon entering the town he was, without warning, assailed by a party of zealous citizens with a shower of eggs, which spattered the carriage and the party. The sequel of this riotous act was the raw-hiding of the leader of the egging party by the official who was assaulted, and the infliction of heavy fines upon both. (1)
When the newly organized Board of Super- visors came together in obedience to the man- date of the people, a searching investigation was made into the acts of the late County Court, touching the contract for the building of the new court house, which occupied the three days of the session, with the result that all acts were unanimously approved, and the construction of the new building went on to completion without a ripple, and public senti- ment was at rest.
The new century in this county was com- menced with a new court-house, with which the younger readers of this sketch will prob- ably long be familiar. The character of the. structure and its high adaptability to meet the public wants, even of a much larger pop- ulation, and consequent business to be pro-
vided for, renders it probable that another half-century will pass before the authorities will be called upon to meet the court-house question again.
Upon the site where was driven in the early morning of June 21, 1833, the first stake by the commissioners named in the organic act, charged with the duty of locat- ing the county-seat, has at last arisen a Temple of Justice, the lineal successor of the little wooden building of 1840, for which the fabled blind Goddess-were she to un- hoodwink herself for once-need never blush; nor need those guardians of the pub- lic welfare, the County Board of Supervisors, responsible for its existence, offer Her High- ness any apologies. The public records are well and safely housed, and public business may be conducted with comfort and dignity.
The attention of the reader need hardly be called to the contrast between the first and the last structure; for contrast between the then and now confronts him at every turn in the story of his county. It is but the story of American life repeated for the thousandth time. One building cost $34,000 and aroused a storm of complaint at the wanton extrav- agance of the Board; the other building cost $150,000, and awoke no word of complaint from a constituency which commended the outlay.
On the fourth Monday of September, 1901, Hon. Francis M. Wright, a citizen of Cham- paign County, one of the Judges of the Cir- cuit Court, opened the first term in the new court-house; as it happened, it was very near the fortieth anniversary of the opening of the August term, in 1861, by Hon. Oliver L. Davis (then Judge of the Twenty-seventh Circuit), in the public building which gave way to the present building.
The history of that other public building -the jail-is more briefly told than is the story of the various court-houses.
As has been seen, various were the expe- dients resorted to by the officers for the de- tention of persons charged with crime before the construction of a county jail. Fortunate- ly, it seldom happened that a prisoner who was unable to give bail for his attendance to answer a charge of crime or of misde- meanor, came to the hands of the Sheriff. The records before 1840 show but few in- dictments, and those which were returned
the manager of the fiscal affairs of the county and the coming in its place of the Board of Supervisors, marked the passing of a system adopted by the early settlers of Illinois in vogue in Virginia and Kentucky, whence they origi- nated, and the adoption in its place of the New England ideas and plan of county management. The former in public matters acted by counties. while the latter acted through the township. as the smallest unit of government. The Coun- ty Court system was favored by the people of Southern Illinois, while the latter was brought here by the New Englanders of Northern Illi- nois .- See "Old Virginia and Her Neighbors." Vol. II., page 32.
(1) See Urbana Clarion, June 2, 1860.
734
HISTORY OF CHAMPAIGN COUNTY.
into court were for petty misdemeanors only. The need, however, of a place of detention was upon the County Board; so, at the Janu- ary meeting, 1838, the plans and specifications were agreed upon for a county jail and en- tered at large upon the record. The build- ing was to be built of hewn logs, squared and closely adjusted, dove-tailed at the corners, in size eighteen by 'eighteen feet, and two stories in height. The specifications show abundant care on the part of the designer to safely hold a prisoner unarmed with any tool less offensive than a common pocket-knife, but the building could offer little obstruction in the way of the wanderings of a prisoner armed with a good-sized gimlet or an ordi- nary auger. Such it proved to be. The con- struction of the building was awarded to Col. M. W. Busey, at the March term, 1839, of the Board, at the price of $850, he being the lowest bidder. Not until the September term, 1840, was the work completed and accepted by the authorities. The sum of $20 was al- lowed by the Board for extras incurred in the construction. (1)
In this dungeon William Weaver, the con- victed murderer of David Hiltibran, was held awaiting the death penalty, which, by the judgment of the court, he was to suffer on the 27th day of June, 1845, when, a few days -or nights rather-before that set for his execution, a friendly auger passed to him afforded the means of escape. Just then de- lays were dangerous to poor drunken Bill Weaver, for Sheriff Lewis had the rope and scaffold ready, so he did not await a fare- well word from friends, but sped away to
(1) This building was standing and in use by the Sheriff for the detention of prisoners in 1853. when the writer came to the county. An out- side stairway afforded the means of reaching the second story, where, by the only door of the building, access and egress were had. Through it prisoners were taken for confinement, and from the second story a trap-door in the floor gave access to the lower story, where the worst prisoners were placed. The prisoner was sent down the ladder, which being removed, he was considered safe. The only light was ad- mitted through narrow grated windows in the lower story. No means of heating either story existed. The writer, when acting as a Justice of the Peace in 1855, in the case of a person charged with horse-stealing, found in the evi- dence probable guilt, and, as required by the letter of the law, committed the unfortunate to this bastile in the dead of winter, with no means furnished but an abundance of bed-
clothing to keep him from freezing. The law would have been more honored in the breach than in the observance in that case. The pris- oner did not die of cold, however, but met his fate in another manner.
the North, as the winds go. At that time the tangled forests and the untramped prai- ries afforded unexcelled means for seclu- sion and escape, and the condemned man, once a mile from town, might well bid fare- well to every fear of being caught and hanged, as he doubtless did. Years after- ward Weaver was heard from in far North- ern Wisconsin, a useful, law-abiding citizen. No effort was ever made to bring him back from his delicious exile. The widow of the murdered man, Mrs. Margaret Hiltibran, lived here until a few years since.
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