History of Cook County, Illinois From the Earliest Period to the Present Time, Part 61

Author: Andreas, A. T. (Alfred Theodore), 1839-1900
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Chicago : A.T. Andreas
Number of Pages: 875

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THE FIRST UNIVERSALIST CHURCH .- The first at- tempt to organize a Universalist Church in Chicago was made in 1836. In that year Rev. William Queal preached to a small congregation, and on the 11th of June organized the society which consisted of N. H. Bolles, E. E. Hunter, A. N. Marble, Chester Tupper, S. G. Trowbridge and S. C. Bennett, who worshiped for a number of years in Mechanic's Hall, in the old Saloon Building. Other places were occasionally oc- cupied, as Bennett's school-house, and the court-room. For a number of years the congregations were quite small, but among them were several persons who after- ward became prominent and leading citizens. Previous to 1843 the Church had no regular minister, but de- pended upon missionaries as supplies. The first church building erected by this society was located on Wash- ington Street, near the Clark-street Methodist Episcopal church. It was a frame building, thirty by forty-five feet in size, and cost $2,000. It was dedicated October accepted a call to the Church in the preceding January

THE FIRST UNITARIAN CHURCH was organized June 29, 1836, under the laws of Illinois, and with the title of "The First Unitarian Society of Chicago," $800 were at once subscribed for the purchase of a lot. The first Unitarian preaching in Chicago was a few days or weeks previous, but in the same month of June. The services were held in the Lake House, which stood at the corner of Rush and Michigan streets. Dr. Charles Follen preached the sermon. Miss Martineau, who was on a tour through the West at the time, refers to that occasion in the following language: " We were unexpectedly detained over the Sunday in Chicago, and

Dr. F. was requested to preach. Though only two hours' notice was given, a respectable congregation was assembled in the large room of the Lake House, a new hotel then building. Our seats were a few chairs and benches and planks laid on trestles. The preacher stood behind a rough pine table, on which a large Bible was placed. I was never present at a more interesting service, and I know that there were others who felt with me." For some time after the organization was per- fected the society had no regular pastor. Rev. Mr. Huntoon preached for some months in the summer of 1837.

THE NEW JERUSALEM, OR SWEDENBORGIAN, CHURCH .- Previous to 1835 there were probably no Swedenborgians in Chicago, or in northern Illinois, In September of that year J. Young Scammon arrived in the city, and for some time was alone in his belief in the doctrines of the Church of the New Jerusalem. Ac. cording to Swedenborg, the Divine Love and Wisdom constitute the essential Church, and any individual who is receptive of the Divine Love and Wisdom, con- stitutes an external Church in its smallest entity. Upon this principle Mr. Scammon commenced to hold New Church worship on Sundays in his office, almost imme- diately upon his arriving in Chicago. In 1836 he be- Came acquainted with Vincent S. Lovell, a young mer- chant in Chicago, and converted him to the doctrines of the New Church. Afterward the two united in Sun- 23, 1844, by Rev. William E. Manley, D. D., who had - day worship. In 1837 Mr. Scammon was married to Miss Mary Ann H. Dearborn, of Bath, Maine, a re- ceiver of the doctrines of Emanuel Swedenborg. Upon bringing his wife to Chicago, he took up his residence in the City Hotel, and here, in his private parlor, Mr Scammon, his wife and Mr. Lovell held Sunday morn- ing worship, in company with those invited who chose to attend.

Relative to religious sects and places of worship the following table exhibits data that has been compiled from the Federal census reports of 1850, 1860 and 1870; the report for 1880 not having yet reached the publica- tion of such statistics.

Churches of each denomination ..

Decade of census.

Churches.

Number of sittings,

Valuation of church

property.

Baptist.

Christian,

Congregationalist.

Lutheran.

Methodist.

Presbyterian.

Catholic.

Episcopal,

Free Church.

Unitarian.

Universalist.

Minor sects.

Jewinh.

Dutch Reformned.

Swedenborgian.

1850

25.975

$276,400

1860

109

74.470

2,131,850

1870

210

139.499

8.427,350

. .

* The classification by creeds is according to the various censuses cited ; in 1870 it will be noticed that several prominent sects are entirely ignored.

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THE BENCH AND BAR.

The prosperity of a people depends as much upon a wise interpretation as on a judicious framing of its laws. The advocate is as necessary as the lawgiver; the Bench and Bar as indispensable as the Governor and Legislature. Nowhere else has the legal profession ex- ercised a more powerful influence in framing the laws and molding the destinies of the people than in the United States, Here they form the leading political class, being the most thoroughly educated in all that appertains to the civil life of the nation.

In the State of Illinois their influence has been para- mount from the first, Nearly all the great names con- nected with its early history are also to be found on the roll of lawyers. They have been leaders of the people, not alone, as was to be expected, in the domain of law, but in every intellectual, moral, educational, charitable and even commercial enterprise. And the firm stand taken by the profession against repudiation, in the dark period of t837 to 1842, was creditable to their judg- ment and worthy of the leadership they had tacitly assumed.

It is now half a century since Chicago began to have a Bench and Bar of her own, in 1833, and in every im- portant crisis of her history since then, in each succes- sive step of the petty hamlet toward metropolitan great- ness, lawyers have been among her most active leaders and most influential counselors. They soon attained among the members of the profession throughout the State the prestige that always attaches to commercial centers, which the rapid growth and concentration of large interests here have exceptionally enhanced. The wealth of clients, corporate and individual, has stimulat- ed the powers of the profession, until to stand among one's brethren of the Chicago Bar, well toward the front with name untarnished, is perhaps the most enviable position that can be reached by a citizen.

THE JUDICIARY UNDER THE CONSTITUTION OF 1818,-The fourth article of the constitution of 1818 instituted a judiciary for the new State by the following provisions:

I. The judicial power of this State shall be vested in one supreme court, and such inferior courts as the general assembly shall, from time to time ordain and establish.

2. The Supreme Court shall be holden at the seat of govern- ment, and shall have an appellate jurisdiction only, except in cases relating to the revenue, in cases of mandamus, and in such cases of impeachment as may be required to be tried before it.

3. The Supreme Court shall consist in a chief justice and three associates, any two of whom shall form a quorum. The number of justices may, however, be increased by the General Assembly after the year 1824.

4. The justices of the Supreme Court and the judges of the Inferior courts shall be appointed by joint ballot of both branches of the general assembly, and commissioned by the governor and shall hold their offices during good behavior until the end of The first session of the general assembly, which shall be begun and held after the Ist day of January, in the year of our Lord 1824. at which time their commissions shall expire; and until the expiration of which time the said justices respectively, shall hold circuit courts In the several counties. in such manner and at such times, and shall have and exercise such jurisdiction as the General Assembly shall by law prescribe. But ever after the aforesaid period the justices of the Supreme Court shall be commissioned during good behavior and the justices thereof shall not hold circuit courts, unless re- quired by law.

5. The judges of the inferior courts shall hold their offices during good behavior, but for any reasonable cause, which shall not be sufficient ground for impeachment, both the judges of the supreme and inferior courts, shall be removed from office on the ad- dress of two-thirds of each branch of the General Assembly: Pro- vided always, that no member of either house of the General Assembly nor any person connected with a member by consanguin- ity or affinity, shall be appointed to fill the vacancy occasioned by such removal. The said justices of the Supreme Court, during their temporary appointment, shall receive an annual salary of one thousand dollars, payable quarter-yearly out of the public treasury. The judges of the inferior courts, and the justices of the Supreme Court who may be appointed after the end of the first session of the General Assembly which shall be begun and held after the first day of January, in the year of our Lord 1824, shall have adequate and competent salaries, which shall not be diminished during their con- tinuance in office.

6. The Supreme Court, or a majority of the justices thereof, the circuit courts or the justices thereof shall respectively appoint their own clerks.

7. All process, writs, and other proceedings shall run in the name of " The people of the State of Illinois."" All prosecutions shall be carried on " In the name and by the authority of the peo. ple of the State of Illinois," and conclude "Against the peace and dignity of the same."

S. A competent number of justices of the peace shall be ap- pointed in each county, in such manner as the General Assembly may direct, whose time of service, power, and duties shall be regu- lated and defined by law. And justices of the peace, when so ap- pointed, shall be commissioned by the governor.

Accordingly the State was divided into four judicial circuits, in which the chief justice and his three asso- ciates performed circuit duties until 1824. By an act of December 29, 1824, the State was divided into five judicial districts, and five circuit judges ordered to be elected by the General Assembly. These were to per- form all circuit duties, relieving the Supreme Court of that labor, and were to continue in office during good behavior, as provided in the constitution.

But this was soon regarded as a piece of legislatire extravagance. Four judges of the Supreme Court at $Soo each, and five of the Circuit Court at $600 each, or in all, $6,200 annually. It was therefore repealed, January 12, 1827, and the State was again divided into four Circuit Court districts, to each of which was as- signed one of the justices of the Supreme Court. Two years later, January 8, 1829, it was found necessary to create a fifth circuit, to include the whole region north of the Illinois River, and for it a judge was chosen by the General Assembly, the justices of the Supreme Court doing duty in the four circuits south of that river.

CHICAGO'S EARLIEST JUDICIARY .- Before treating of the Bench and Bar of Chicago in the stricter sense of judges and lawyers, assembling amid customary sur- roundings, made respectable by the inherent majesty of law, if not by outward pomp and court forms, it is thought proper to refer to the earliest representatives and processes of law in the future city.

As in the traditional history of ancient nations, the warlike conqueror and founder of empire is always fol- lowed by the pacific lawgiver and civil organizer, even so by curious coincidence did it happen in the predes- tined metropolis of the Great West. Scarcely had the military outpost of Fort Dearborn been established, be- fore a lawyer came here to reside; and as if yet further

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HISTORY OF COOK COUNTY.

to justify the parallelism, he came in the interests of order and justice. Reference is made to Charles Jouett, a lawyer of Virginia, and afterward judge in Kentucky and Arkansas, who came here in 1805, as the first Indian Agent.

The earliest mention in the legal records of the State of a Chicago Justice of the Peace, is the following: "June 5, 1821, at the second term of the Commission- ers Court of Pike County, upon motion of Abraham Beck, Judge of Probate, John Kinzie was recommended as a suitable person for Justice of the l'eace." Chicago was then in Pike.

At a term of the Commissioners Court of Fulton County, held December 2, 1823, John Kinzie was again recommended for Justice of the l'eace. Chicago was then in Fulton.

l'eoria County, including the region of Chicago, was set apart from Fulton County, January 13, 1825, and on the same day Austin Crocker and - Kinsey were confirmed by the State Senate as Justices of the Peace for the new county. There is no reason to doubt that

= Kinsey " was intended for John Kinzie, who, however, was not commissioned until July 28, 1825. He was, therefore, not only the first resident Justice in Chicago, but one of the first two confirmed for l'eoria County. It seems probable, in the absence of any men- tion of his having performed the duties of the office, that the previous indorsements had not been followed by a formal appointment or commission.

Alexander Wolcott and Jean Baptiste Beaubien were made Justices September 10, 1825; and they and Kinzie were judges of election in Chicago precinct December 7, 1825. John L. Bogardus, of Peoria, Assessor of Chicago in 1825, was appointed Justice January 15, 1826.

JUSTICES MADE ELECTIVE .- By a law of December 30, 1826, Justices were made elective, and their term of office extended to four years. A supplemental act of February 9, 1827, continued in office those previously appointed until the election of successors. In Chicago, Wolcott and Beaubien were re-commissioned December 26, 1827, having been elected by the voters of the pre- cinct, or perhaps continuing in virtue of the law referred to. There are on record at least five marriages by Beaubien, two in 1828, and three in 1830, but none by Wolcott; and no trials by either. John S. C. Hogan was elected July 24, and commissioned October 9, 1830; and Stephen Forbes was elected November 25, 1830. Chicago was still in Peoria County.

Of the four Justices of Cook County, commissioned May 2, 1831, only one, William See, was a resident of Chicago. Another, Archibald Clybourne, did not reside in the Chicago of that day, although what was then his farm is now within the city limits. Russel E. Heacock became a Justice September 10, 1831 ; and was probably the first Justice before whom trials were held. Isaac Harmon was elected June 4, 1832 ; perhaps to succeed See. Justices Heacock and Harmon seemed to have served until August, 1835. They are both mentioned as Justices in the Chicago American of July 11, 1835 ; and Harmon was re-elected, August 9, 1835. Mean- while John Dean Caton was elected Justice July 12, 1834, by one hundred and eighty-two votes out of a total of two hundred and twenty-nine, the remaining forty-seven being given to his competitor, Dr. Josiah C. Goodhue. He continued in office probably until August, 1835, and is said to have then given but little promise of the success which afterward marked his career as Justice of the Supreme Court of Illinois. E.

W. Casey was elected Justice of the Peace, August 9, 1835, but did not serve long.

THE CIRCUIT COURT .- By an act of February 16, 1831, it was provided that " The counties of Cook, La- Salle, Putnam, l'eoria, Fulton, Schuyler, Adams, Han- cock, McDonough, Knox, Warren, Jo Daviess, Mercer, Rock Island and Henry shall constitute the Fifth Judi- cial Circuit * Richard M. Young shall perform cir- cuit duties in the Fifth Judicial Circuit. * * There shall be two terms of the Circuit Court held annually in each of the counties. In the county of Cook on the fourth Mondays in April and second Mondays in September.

It will be noticed that this circuit embraced such dis- tant points as Galena, Quincy, Peoria and Chicago, and the fifteen above-named counties, now increased by sub-division into thirty-nine.

The Constitution of 1818 only ordained that the Circuit Courts should have and exercise such jurisdic- tion as the General Assembly should by law provide ; and by that body they had been endowed with juris- diction in criminal and civil cases, and in the latter, both at common law and in chancery.

EARLY TERMS, 1831-34 .- There is no little uncer- tainty about the first terms of the Circuit Court in Chi- cago. As stated, the county of Cook was organized in the spring of 1831, and by the foregoing statute it was entitled to a September term. If reliance can be placed on a historical pamphlet on Chicago by Governor Bross, issued in 1858, such a term was held or provided for " at Fort Dearborn, in the brick house, and in the lower room of said house." At the funeral of Colonel Hamil- ton in 1860, Judge Manierre also stated that the first term was held in September, 1831. And again in 1832, in the same work of Mr. Bross, the Court of County Commissioners is on record as ordering that the Sheriff shall secure one or more rooms for the Circuit Court at the house of James Kinzie, " provided it can be done at a cost of not more than ten dollars." In confirmation of the view that such court was held, the same work states that Judge Young, accompanied from Galena by Lawyers Mills and Strode, brought tidings to Chicago of the disturbed state of the Indians, which culminated later in the Black Hawk War.

" In May, 1833," says Charles Ballance in his history of Peoria, " Judge Young made his appearance in the village of Peoria, and announced that he was on his way to Chicago to hold court. * * On this occasion I attended court at Chicago, partly to seek practice as a lawyer, and partly to see the country."

" The first term of the Circuit Court held in Cook County," says Hon. Thomas Hoyne, " was in Septem- ber, 1833, by Hon. Richard M. Young. In 1834, he also held the term in May."* This last, in the opinion of Hon. J. D. Caton, was the first term held here, or at least the first at which any law business was done. Ex- cept an appeal from some Justice Court, which was No. I on the docket of the Circuit Court of Cook County, a case tried by him, was the first ever tried in Chicago in any court of record ; and this he is confident was at the May term in 1834. If this view is correct, although Judge Young may have come to Chicago on any or all of the years from 1831 to 1833, no regular court was held until the spring term of 1834, which in view of all the facts may be accepted as the verdict of history.

THE FIRST LAW OFFICE .- The first lawyer in Chi- cago to make a living by his profession alone was Giles Spring ; and separated from him by a few days was * ** The Lawyer as a Pioneer."

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THE BENCH AND BAR.

John Dean Caton, who arrived June 19, 1833. There was but little law business in Chicago then, but not- withstanding antoward appearances, both rose to emi- nence and acquired wealth. Early in July, while they

kept office as was facetiously said, "On the head of a barrel at the corner of Lake and Wells," Caton ob- tained his first case, which also proved to be Spring's, on the other side. It is here subjoined as "the first larceny case in Chicago ; " that is, the reader need scarcely be told, the first to receive legal cognizance, for not a little stealing had been done from " Lo" and others, before that time.

In December, 1833, Mr. Caton rented of Dr. Tem- ple the back room and attic of his "building" on Lake Street, converting the attic into a bedroom, and extend- ing to Spring the courtesy of desk.room in the room below, which thus became the first law-office in Chi- cago.

THE FIRST LARCENY CASE .- The first larceny case heard before a Justice of the Peace occurred in July, 1833. Mr. Hatch had been robbed of thirty-four dol- lars in Eastern currency, at the tavern, and hired Lawyer Caton to recover it. Suspicion rested on a fellow-boarder who was arrested by Constable Reed and taken before Squire Heacock for examination, fol- lowed by a large part of the population. The search had proved fruitless, and the prisoner was about to be released amid many jeers at the legal fledgling who had prosecuted the investigation. Just then Caton detected a suspicious lump, which distended the cul- prit's stocking, and making a hurried grab, brought forth the tell-tale roll of stolen bills. The constable took charge of the prisoner, who was duly arraigned the ensuing morning, with Spring and Hamilton as his lawyers, who obtained a change of venue to Squire Harmon, on the North Side. Afterward to satisfy the public interest in this first case, Harmon adjourned to the tavern on the West Side, where the public could hear the young lawyers to the best advantage. " The court-rooms in those days," says Arnold, "were always crowded. To go to court and listen to the witnesses and lawyers was among the chief amusements of the frontier settlements."

Fifty years later Judge Caton confessed that he had never been more interested in a case. The criminal was convicted, but escaped punishment by the device of straw-bail, which seems to have been introduced into Chicago at the same time as its earliest jurisprudence. Caton obtained his fee of ten dollars out of the recov- ered money, but Spring and Hamilton were cheated out of theirs by the runaway thief.

ADVENTURES OF A LAWYER IN SEARCH OF PRAC- TICE. - In the golden leisure of mature age Judge Caton has often found pleasure in relating the following stories :

"Clients were few, fecs small and money running low, with board bills fast maturing. It was in that first July, and the proceeds of the first larceny case were gone or going fast, when we both hired out to carry the chain for a surveyor, who had just got a job on the North Side. Returning at noon, we learned from R. J. Hamilton that a party had been inquiring for a lawyer,

and, to avoid all partiality, it was agreed that he should follow us to our work in the afternoon. As he ap- proached, blindly groping through the thick and high alders, which concealed us as we sat, while the choppers were clearing a lane for our operations, I saw that he was making straight for where Spring stood, when I dropped on each other the surveying pins I held in my hand, and, repeating the performance, succeeded in attracting his attention and directing his steps to where I sat. He secured my services, paying me in advance. Spring felt that he had been tricked and was a little sore, but actually got the best side of the case, being hired by John Bates, whom he enabled by interpleading to retain the property unattached, against which my client had hoped to obtain judgment. Spring got the larger fee and won the more substantial victory, though I had no difficulty in securing for my client a worthless judgment against an insolvent debtor, who was proved to have lost the ownership of the contested property.

" In August, 1833, there resided in Chicago six or seven free colored men, all of whom had come from free States. The law-givers of Illinois, however, had not contemplated such a contingency, the earlier popu- lation having come mostly from slave States. The laws had provided that if a negro was found in the State without free papers, he should be prosecuted and fined, and, if necessary, sold to pay the fine. Some enemy of the black man, or pro-slavery admirer of the black code, or believer in the blessings of the peculiar institution for the heaven-marked subject race, or possibly some aspirant for political preferment at the hands of the dominant party, which was largely under the control of the slave-holding aristocracy of the South, felt it to be his duty or his interest to prosecute these early repre- sentatives here of the proscribed race. J. D. Caton undertook their defense, and pleaded their case before the Court of County Commissioners. This was putting a very literal interpretation of judicial powers on the rather euphemistic term court as applied to the board of County Commissioners. But court was then the legal designation of that body, and the young lawyer overcame their natural modesty, or their unwillingness to assume a function hitherto unheard of. They ended by acced- ing to the learned jurist's exposition of the law, and as the highest accessible representatives of the judiciary of the sovereign State of Illinois, they granted to his grateful clients the required certificates of freedom, which were never questioned and passed for excellent free papers. Mr. Caton's fee was a dollar from each of the beneficiaries."

FIRST CHICAGO DIVORCE .- That term in May, 1834, " when," says Judge Caton, "we all first met together in the unfinished loft of the old Mansion House, jast north of where the Tremont now stands," is memorable for witnessing the initial steps in the first of a long and unfinished line of divorce suits in Chicago. The par- ties to the suit were Angeline Vaughan, petitioner, and Daniel W. Vaughan, respondent. The petition was dated April 12, and made returnable May 14, 1834, but the outcome has not been learned. They had been married July 9, 1831, the maiden name of the bride being Hebert.

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History of Cook County, Illinois From the Earliest Period to the Present Time, Part 61

Author: Andreas, A. T. (Alfred Theodore), 1839-1900 Publication date: 1884 Publisher: Chicago : A.T. Andreas Number of Pages: 875

Author: Andreas, A. T. (Alfred Theodore), 1839-1900
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Chicago : A.T. Andreas
Number of Pages: 875