USA > Illinois > Adams County > Quincy > Quincy and Adams County history and representative men, Vol. I > Part 15
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74
Desiring a quieter place of residence for his family than Galena, then on the extreme frontier and little more than a mining eamp infested with speenlators, gamblers, and every variety of social out- casts who respected neither moral nor civil law, Judge Young moved to Quiney in the spring of 1831.
EVOLUTION OF JUDICIAL SYSTEMS
The Legislature of 1840-41 again took a hand in manipulating the judicial system of the state. By the aet which passed that body and was approved February 10, 1841, all acts were repealed authorizing the election of cireuit judges by the Legislature. It also provided for the appointment of five additional associate judges of the Supreme
140
QUINCY AND ADAMS COUNTY
Court, making nine in all; reimposed the circuit duties on the mem- bers of the State Supreme Court and divided the state into nine cir- cuits.
The continuity of the county judiciary inferior to the Circuit Court is carried along through the probate and county systems, with the justices of the peace as useful and, at times, very busy auxiliaries. In fact, under the Constitution of 1818, and for thirty years thereafter, matters usually classed as probate and those not assigned to justices of the peace, were under the jurisdiction of what were denominated probate justices of the peace.
The Constitution of 1848. made all judicial officers elective by the people, and provided for a Supreme Court of three judges; also for Circuit, County and Justices' courts, and conferred upon the Legis- lature power to create inferior Municipal courts. Since that time all probate matters are adjudicated by the County Court in Adams. Under the Constitution of 1348 appeals lay from the Circuit Court to the Supreme Court for the particular division in which the county might be located. The term of office for Supreme Court judges was nine years and for cireuit judges, six. Vacancies were to be filled by popular election, unless the unexpired term of the deceased or retiring incumbent was less than one year, in which case the governor was authorized to appoint. Circuit courts were vested with appellate jurisdiction from inferior tribunals, and each was required to hold at least two terms annually in each county, as might be fixed by statute.
The Constitution of 1870 retained the popular elective feature of the judiciary and the terms of office of the Supreme and Circuit Court judges as fixed by the Constitution of 1848. The number of Supreme Court judges was increased to seven, as at present. In 1873 the state was divided into twenty-seven circuits and in 1874, into thirteen. Under the provisions of the latter year, while the twenty-six judges already in office were retained, an additional judge was authorized for each district to serve two years, making the entire circuit judiciary to consist of thirty-nine judges. In all this legislation Cook County was in a class by itself, constituting one cireuit; the same is true re- garding the act of 1897, which increased the number of eirenits to seventeen (exclusive of Cook County), while the number of judges in each eircuit remained the same.
The Constitution of 1870 provided for the organization of Appel- late courts after 1874. The Legislature established four of these tribu- nals. Each Appellate Court is held by three Circuit Court judges named by the State Supreme Court, each assignment covering three years, and no judge is allowed to receive extra compensation or sit in review of his own rulings or decisions. Two terms are held in each district yearly. The Appellate courts have no original jurisdiction.
After the reorganization of the Appellate Court, by legislative enactment, in 1877, and the redistricting of the state, the counties of Brown, Hancock, Fulton, Sehuyler, Pike, McDonough and Adams were formed into another circuit.
141
QUINCY AND ADAMS COUNTY
FIRST CIRCUIT COURT SITS
With the groundwork of the judicial systems thus laid in Adams County, the personal and local details calculated to bring home the picture of the beneh and bar of this part of the state are marshaled at this point. The first session of the Circuit Court of Adams County, or of any eourt whatever in the county, was held in August, 1825. in Willard Keyes' log house. This first temple of justice was a cabin about sixteen feet square, situated at what would now be the foot of Vermont Street. The main room was for the court, over which pre- sided John Yorke Sawyer, with JJ. Turney as circuit attorney and John II. Snow as elerk. A small outside poreh was set aside for the Petit jury, while the Grand jury was to retire to the shade of a large oak tree not far from the courthouse.
The lists of citizens who had been drawn to sit upon any business which might be brought before them, and decide upon the reasonable- ness of bringing various matters and persons to trial, were as follows :
Grand Jury-Morrill Martin, Lewis Kinney, Daniel Whipple, Joshua Streeter. John L. Soule, Samuel Goshong. John Wood, John Droulard. Ira Pierce. Amos Bancroft, Daniel Moore, JJohn Thomas. 2d, William Burritt, Abijah Caldwell, Zephaniah Ames, Peter Jour- ney. Ebenezer Harkness, Cyrus Hibbard, Thomas MeCrary, Luther Whitney, Hiram R. Hawley, Benjamin MeNitt, Samuel Stone and Levi Wells.
Petit Jury-Willard Keyes, Lewis C. K. Hamilton, Hezekiah Spill- man, William Journey, Elias Adams, Earl Wilson, Curtis Caldwell, Samuel Seward, Truman Streeter, James Moody, Evan Thomas, Silas Brooks, James Greer. George Campbell, Peter Williams, Henry Jacobs, Thomas Freeman, Riell Crandall, William Snow, David Ray and David Beebe.
WOOD VS. LISLE, SURE-ENOUGH SLANDER
As nearly all the citizens of the county were included in the lists of the jurors, or the roster of officials, the Grand jury found few in- dietments. A couple of the male inhabitants were ordered into court for quarreling on election day, and among the few cases actually tried was an exciting suit for slander brought by John Wood against Daniel Lisle. It seems that Lisle had charged Mr. Wood with having drowned a horse thief in Bear Creek. The basis for the story was the fact that Messrs. Wood and Keyes had bought some hogs from a stranger. who had afterward sneaked away and been accused of horse stealing. If "honest John Wood" had known of the charge at the time of his dealings with the unknown he would undoubtedly have arrested him ; but the stranger completely dropped out of sight ; it was said that he was a horse thief ; the energetic Mr. Wood was known to be very bitter against that class of criminals. Lisle was an undoubted busy-body with a rapid tongue-and there you have the combination that started
FRA
28
THE QUINCY HOUSE ( FROM AN OLD DRAWING)
Completed in 1838: Burned in 1883. Lincoln and Douglas Were Among its Many Famous Guests. It Stood at What is Now the Southeast Corner of Fourth and Maine Streets. Outside of "Court," the Quincy House Was the Most Popular Gathering Place of the Profession.
143
QUINCY AND ADAMS COUNTY
the trouble. But there was nothing to the case when it was brought into court.
THE JOVIAAL JUDGE SAWYER
It is said that on the 31st of October a more businesslike term of the Circuit Court was held than that of Angust, which was more a formal and an initial sitting designed to oil the legal machinery and get it in motion. As Judge Sawyer would force the seales well up to 400 pounds, it is reasonable to suppose that some little time was re- quired to get him in motion. He was of a jolly nature and, as he was also honest and a man of ability and wit, he was respected and popular during his two years' term. "Madam," said he, upon one occasion to an old Quincy landlady, "aren't your cows of different color ?" "Yrs," she answered, "we've got 'em black, red, white and spotted." "I thought so," concluded the judge. "Your butter speckles that way." Judge Sawyer was a Vermont Yankee, whose name first ap- pears enrolled as a lawyer on December 7, 1820. After leaving the bench in 1827 he resumed his profession at Vandalia and died March 13, 1836, at which time he was editor of the Vandalia Advocate.
SAMUEL D. LOCKWOOD, ILLINOIS' FIRST LAWYER
Judge Sawyer was succeeded by Samuel D. Lockwood, one of the Supreme judges, whose name stands recorded as the first lawyer to commence practice in Illinois, licensed May 14. 1819. Judge Lock- wood was born in Central New York and came to Ilinois in 1818, when statehood had just been adopted. Ile first stopped at Kaskaskia, but finally settled at Jacksonville, making that place his home until his tinal retirement from the bench in 1848. He then moved to Batavia, Kane County, where he died about 1873. One of his professional friends thus speaks of him: "He had an excellent education, a very refined mind, studious habits and proverbial purity of character. Lifted carly in life to the Supreme bench, he honored the ermine as few others have. His appearance was appropriate and imposing- white-haired while yet young, of graceful form. dignified and courteous in demeanor, he was a model jurist and, if not possessing the higher native intelleet of some who graced the Supreme bench, in the aggre- gate of qualifications he was unexcelled. No public man of Illinois passed under a longer period of constant observation and has been clothed with as much of general confidence and respeet."
RICHARD M. YOUNG
Judge Lockwood was sneeessively a whig and a republican, and his sueeessor, Richard M. Young, was his opposite both in polities and general character. Judge Young ascended the bench in 1831, when, because of the increase of business devolving on the Supreme
144
QUINCY AND ADAMS COUNTY
judges, a fifth judicial circuit was created in Illinois. He was a Kentnekian by birth, settled in the state when it was yet very young, and for many years held publie positions of great prominence. He was a man of strong common sense and much dignity; had virtually no elasticity or magnetism, and seemed, at times, almost dull. Yet he steadily forged ahead of associates who seemed far abler than he, and whatever he accomplished added to the general confidence reposed in him. His polities were of the stern Jacksonian democracy. Judge Young's service on the circuit bench ceased in 1837, when he took a seat in the United States Senate to which he had been elected during the previous winter. Filling ont his full term of six years, during which period he was appointed by Governor Carlin state agent, he visited Europe in the latter capacity. Later, he was appointed to the Supreme bench, and became successively clerk of the House of Representatives and commissioner of the General Land Office. Later he was engaged in a legal and agency business and although he spent several of the last months of his life under medical treatment in the Government Hos- pital for the Insane at Washington, he partially regained his mentality but finally died of physical exhaustion in November, 1861. He was buried in the Congressional Cemetery at the National Capital.
JAMES H. RALSTON
The seat on the eireuit bench vacated by Judge Young in 1837 was filled by the appointment of James H. Ralston, who for several years had been an active practicing lawyer of Quincy, and member of the Legislature. Unlike Judge Young, he seemed to have no talents for polities, although unduly ambitions in that field, and it was the gen- eral opinion among his friends and professional associates that he would have attained far more success had he confined his industry and undoubted abilities to the province of the law. He was a tall. rather ungraceful man, and not attractive as a speaker, so that his reputation on the bench exceeded that which he made at the bar.
James H. Ralston was born in Bourbon County, Kentucky, in 1807, and soon after attaining his majority moved to Quiney and entered upon the practice of the law. He served in the Black Hawk war, and subsequently represented his district in the lower house of the State Legislature at a time when Lincoln, Douglas, Hardin, Shields and Baker were members of that body. After serving as circuit judge from 1837 to 1839, he resigned from the bench, and in 1841 was elected to the State Senate.
Judge Ralston took an active interest in politics until the Mexican war, when he was commissioned captain and placed in command of the Alamo at San Antonio, Texas. From that point all supplies and munitions of war were forwarded to the American army operating in Northern Mexico. Soon after the close of the Mexican war he moved to California, and was a member of its first State Senate. In 1856 he was an unsuccessful candidate for the chief justiceship of Cali-
145
QUINCY AND ADAMS COUNTY
fornia. Removing to Nevada in 1860, he became prominent as a public character in the formative period of that commonwealth and died near Austin in 1864, the year of statebirth.
PETER LOTT
Peter Lott's service of two years brought credit to the judge per- sonally and to the Circuit Court as an institution. As a lawyer, he was genial almost to the point of indolence, but had a naturally keen legal mind balanced by sound judgment. A native of New Jersey, .Judge Lott came to Illinois from that state in 1835 and located for practice at Carthage, Hancock County. A few months later he moved to Quincy, where he resided during the succeeding four years as a lawyer engaged in somewhat indifferent practice, because of his tem- peramental drawbacks noted heretofore. His many friends and ad- mirers, however, believed that he would make a good judge ; and they were not mistaken, although he was retired from the beneh under the operations of the law of 1841. In his prime Judge Lott is described as above the medium height, powerfully built, of light complexion and hair, with a broad face singularly expressive of humor. Like Judge Ralston, he was a whig until about 1836, when he joined the democratic party, of which he became a state leader.
After his retirement from the bench, Judge Lott resumed legal practice, was elected to the lower house of the Legislature in 1844: enlisted in Colonel Bissell's regiment of Illinois infantry on the out- break of the Mexican war, soon after became captain, and acquired credit at the battle of Buena Vista. At his return from Mexico, in 1848, he was elected cireuit clerk and recorder, and shortly after the expiration of his four-year term he went to California. He was placed in charge of the I'nited States mint at San Francisco, and died a few years later.
OPPORTUNITY FOR STEPHEN A. DOUGLAS
It is said that the change in the state judiciary, brought about by the Legislature of 1840-41, was caused by the dissatisfaction of the democratie party with its personnel. As the State Supreme Court then stood, three of its judges were whigs and only one a democrat : and, under the constitution, they all had a life tenure of office, de- pendent upon sanity and good behavior. Under the circumstances, the judicial outlook was not bright for the majority democrats; but they controlled the Legislature of that session, and the law was there- fore passed by which the old circuit judge system was abolished (and with it, Judge Lott), its five judges being replaced by the addition of five democrats to the State Supreme Court.
The appointee for the district including Adams County was Stephen A. Douglas. He assumed the office of circuit judge in 1s11. Judge Douglas has long ago gone into history as a national character, Vol. 1-10
146
QUINCY AND ADAMS COUNTY
and it cannot therefore be given a local stamp. Even at that time he was not considered as ranking among the leading lawyers of Illi- nois, but rather as a democratic politician and a coming statesman of great strength and wonderful personality. He had, however, sev- eral vexatious local questions to judicially determine, such as those connected with the Mormons and the division of Adams County. There was sharp division of sentiment over them, but Judge Douglas managed to compromise the difficulties while he was on the bench, so that he descended from it without loss of popularity or prestige. In 1843 he was elected to Congress over O. H. Browning, afterward a public man of national fame himself.
CONGRESSIONAL FIGHT BETWEEN DOUGLAS AND BROWNING
The contest between Douglas and Browning became historieal, and in the political history of Illinois had perhaps only one parallel as to ability of leadership and fierceness of warfare; the people of Adams County would hardly concede superiority in those features to the famous Lincoln-Douglas debates and campaigns. General John Tillson thus writes of the home affair: "Unusnal interest, of course, attached to an election which would determine who were to be the future 'great men' of Illinois, and special attention was turned toward the Quincy Distriet, which was of doubtful political complexion, and in which the two foremost of the rising leaders in their respective parties were pitted in opposition. These were Stephen A. Douglas, the presiding judge on this cirenit, and O. II. Browning, the ad- mitted head of the bar in the western part of the state, both residents of Quincy. Each enjoyed a prestige of almost unbroken political success, a most devoted party popularity, and a personal reputation for consistency and integrity which was unassailable. They were nearly of the same age. Douglas had been a conspicuous politician from his first coming to the state. Browning, whose eminence was more definitely legal, held an equally prominent political reputa- tion, and his ambitions were then strongly in that direction. He was, and no doubt correctly, considered at the time, as the most attractive and able debater of the two. Douglas, though strong on the stump, had not attained that peculiar position he studied for and after- ward attained, of being, as he unquestionably ranked in later years, the most popular and powerful stump speaker of the day.
"Douglas was not the first choice of his party in convention. Judge Cavalry, of Greene, and Governor Carlin preceded him in the early ballots, but the nomination finally fell to him. Browning was nominated by his party within opposition. It is more than probable that had either of the two first named received the Democratic nomina- tion, Browning's popularity would have won for himself the elec- tion, and it is equally sure that against any other candidate than Browning, Douglas' majority of about 400 would at least have been doubled. They canvassed the distriet most exhanstively during the
147
QUINCY AND ADAMS COUNTY
early summer months to within less than a week before the election in August, when both were taken down with sickness which nearly proved fatal, and from the effects of which it took many months to restore them. This was the most complete carrying out of the old 'stump speaking' custom that could be imagined. The parties trav- «led together, sometimes slept together, spoke together almost daily at half a dozen or more places in each of the counties.
"The result of this spirited contest between two men whose names have sinee become national, was that Browning carried the city by a majority of 19 and the county by 410, but was beaten in the dis- triet by 409 votes. It is curious to speculate how delayed might have been the growth to eminence of Indge Donglas had he failed at this election. That his great talents would have sooner or later made themselves controlling is true, but his advent to national notice at this particular time was several years gained in his movement to fame. "
Judge Douglas was a citizen of Quiney from 1841 to 1852, which covered his careers as circuit judge, his five years in Congress and the carliest period of his service as United States senator. lle moved to Chicago in 1852 and died in that city while a member of the upper house of Congress, in 1861. Although his state prominence had not been cradled in Adams County, it was from Quiney, as he once expressed it, that he "was first placed upon a national career. where he was ever after kept." His old-time rival and lifelong admirer, O. IT. Browning, filled out his unexpired term.
JESSE B. THOMAS
Stephen A. Douglas was succeeded as circuit judge by desse B. Thomas, a son of the lesse B. Thomas who was territorial judge of Illinois in 1809-18, one of the first two United States senators and author of the Missouri Compromise. Judge Thomas was probably born in Indiana Territory. He was a well educated gentleman, ple- thorie and dignified, and not wanting in ability. His judicial record falls in the classification Creditable, withont placing special emphasis even on that indifferent word He was also a democrat. Transferred after a term of two years to a northern cireuit, he died a few years Jater.
NORMAN HI. PURPLE
There have been few occupants of judicial positions in the country who have been more closely adapted to the requirements of the office than Norman H. Purple, who, in 1543, succeeded Judge Thomas on the cireuit bench of Adams County. He allowed himself to be led away by no side issues. The law, whether he practiced it or admin- istered it, was all-in-all to him: so that both as a lawyer and a judge he achieved eminence, although he had more admirer- for his work
148
QUINCY AND ADAMS COUNTY
on the bench than that at the bar. He was well read, and had a quick, clear intellect, and an intuition directed by a keen analytie mind, which could not be swerved by fancy or personal considera- tions. Prompt, precise and brief in his rulings, as a judge he held the confidence of the bar, and all his social and individual relations earned him the same unshaken belief in his absolute honesty and impartiality. Judge Purple's physical characteristics were a strik- ing index of his character; he was tall and of rather slender frame, with sharp and regularly-cut features and a facial expression indiea- tive of concentrated thought and reserve. The constitution of 1848 making judges elective, and the circuits being changed at the same time disuniting Adams and Peoria counties, Judge Purple, whose residence had been at Peoria, declined further service on the beneh in that eireuit. As an expression of their regret at such aetion, the members of the bar honored him with a farewell banquet. Judge Purple subsequently practiced law successfully at Peoria, where he died about 1864.
WILLIAM A. MINSHALL
The election for the eircuit judgeship in 1848, and under the pro- visions of the new constitution, developed considerable aerimony between the whig candidate, William A. Minshall, of Schuyler County, and William R. Archer, of Pike. The former was elected. Judge Minshall was a native of Kentucky and resided for some time in Ohio before coming to Illinois. At the time he was elevated to the beneh he was one of the oldest lawyers in the state. In his earlier years he had stood at the head of the Schuyler County bar, but as a member of the Cireuit Court he brought to the bench more solidity than quick- ness of thought and decision. At that period of his life he was a heavily-built man, of medium height, and, as the phrase runs, had "seen his best days." Judge Minshall died at Rushville, Schuyler County, about 1860.
NEW JUDICIAL CIRCUIT FORMED
The old Fifth Judicial Circuit, originally ineluding all the coun- ties in the Military Traet, taking in the northwestern seetion of the state and formed in 1829, was by an aet of the Legislature in 1851 divided and a new circuit formed which was composed of the counties of Adams, Hancock, Henderson and Mereer. This broke up many of the old-time legal associations and limited, to some extent, the practice of the Quiney lawyers, who, for twenty years, had been aceustomed to "follow the circuit" twice a year and appear at the bar of each county in the tract. Many of them had local partners outside of Adams. O. C. Skinner, who had resided in Carthage before coming to Adams County, and while there had rapidly risen to the leading position at the Hancock County bar, a reputation which he
149
QUINCY AND ADAMS COUNTY
had more than sustained in Quincy, was recommended by the bar for the judgeship of the new circuit.
The desire was then, as it had been at the first judicial clection, to keep the contest from becoming political. I'pon this occasion, the wish succeeded. The cirenit. on a party vote, was undoubtedly whig, and Skinner was a radical democrat, but his high judicial capacity was recognized and, no opposition being made, he was unanimously cleeted. It is said some effort was made to bring party considerations into the campaign for proseenting attorney, but it ent no figure, and J. HI. Stewart, an experienced lawyer from Henderson County, a whig, but not a politician, was elreted to that office.
ONIAS C. SKINNER
Adams and Haneock counties having been created a separate cir- enit, as stated, Judge Minshall was succeeded by Onias C. Skinner, who for several years had been a prominent lawyer both in Hancock County and at Quiney. Judge Skinner was a remarkable lawyer, a remarkable judge and a remarkable man, and it was a matter of deep regret that his service on the circuit bench could not have been longer. He was born in Oneida County, New York; was a cabin boy on the Erie Canal, a sailor on the lakes, school teacher, farmer and preacher, before he finally foreed his energies and talents into the channels for which they were destined. Although hampered by a limited eduea- tion, his remarkable intelleet and legal aptitude lifted him above all earlier defeets to a front rank among the lawyers and jurists of Illi- nois. As a lawyer he was the most daring, speculative and successful litigant that ever practiced at the Adams County bar. No stronger or more energetie reliance in doubtful or desperate cases could be found than he. As a counselor, out of eonrt. he was not so valable. On the bench his standing was high. Ante, courteous and proud of his position, he fully filled the requisites of his place, and it was a regret to the profession that he was elected to a vacancy in the State Supreme Court.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.