USA > Indiana > Courts and lawyers of Indiana, Volume I > Part 25
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manipulation. It was political suicide, and any man in his position must have known it. Ray was a very weak man in some ways. Men like Scott and Holman must have realized this in a short time and it is of course impossible that they should have helped or encouraged his senatorial aspirations. He may have resented this, but it is more likely he merely felt that jealousy towards them which weak men usually en- tertain toward strong ones. Whatever the explanations, the new appointments were good men; one of them was perhaps a better lawyer than had sat on the Supreme bench up to the time. The criticism is not that weak or corrupt men were appointed, but that politics or some other ulterior considera- tion was allowed to play a part in constituting the highest tribunal of the state. Such acts are liable to have far-reaching consequences in lowering the standing of the court in the estimation of the people. It leads scheming politicians to be- lieve they can trifle with the highest institutions of the state.
STEPHEN C. STEVENS.
Judge Stevens seems to have been somewhat of a puzzle to the men of his immediate acquaintance. In society, politics and religion he was irregular. Even in the practice of law he was accustomed to using a surplus of form and verbiage that tended to obscure his solid learning. However, beneath all his seeming eccentricities there was a solid basis of reason.
He came with his mother to Brookville before 1812. At the first session of the Territorial court, held at Brookville, June 24, 1811, and presided over by Benjamin Parke, he was indicted for selling a tin pan to an Indian. The indictment was quashed. He was admitted to the bar at Brookville, March 3, 1817. He was evidently then a young man. He ex- perienced something of the Indian war then going on. He seems to have engaged in business and made the trip to New Orleans during the winter of 1813-14, arriving at New Orleans in time to join the army of General Jackson. At the battle of New Orleans he received a musket ball wound in the head, which troubled him throughout his life and perhaps caused his insanity in old age. After his return to Brookville he read law
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and engaged, as all young lawyers did, in politics. In 1817 he represented his county, Franklin, in the Legislature.
Brookville was then pretty well occupied by lawyers and he moved to Vevay. There is an entry on the Franklin Circuit court docket showing that he and Senator Noble had a fight in the court room in 1817. Both drew fines of five dollars for their pugnacity. High temper was characteristic of Stevens throughout his life. He was a big, burly man and should have given a good account of himself, though the court records are silent as to the results of the encounter. In the year 1817 he was before the Supreme court in two cases taken up from Dearborn county. At Vevay he drifted into business again and helped organize the Vevay branch of the State Bank. He was president and Isaac Blackford, cashier. During these years he rode the circuit with James B. Ray, who later appointed him Judge.
When the bank failed he again took up the practice of law actively. In 1822 he was again before the Supreme court in a case from Lawrence county, defending counterfeiters. In 1823 he was, again in the Legislature, representing Switzerland county. The next year he was re-elected, serving as speaker during the session. In 1825 he was not returned, but in 1826 and 1827 he represented Switzerland. In 1828 he was elected to the Senate, serving in 1828, 1829 and 1830. When he finished this term he was appointed on the Supreme bench. What part he took in the quarrel between Ray and the Senate does not appear, but it is very probable he supported the governor and thereby shared with him the unpopularity that resulted. At any rate he never held an elective office again.
During these years he evidently enjoyed a wide practice, for he was before the Supreme court in many cases from the southeastern counties. Nearly all these cases had to do with collections, a branch of the law in which he seems to have specialized.
After serving till May, 1836, he resigned and began the practice again at Madison, to which town he had moved about 1830, attracted no doubt by the growing commerce' of that city. He built up a valuable practice, somewhat in the nature of a modern collection agency. During the period when Madi-
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son was the chief city of the state he prospered, accumulating a good fortune for that day. In 1852 this was swept away to the last dollar in an unsuccessful railroad promotion. The loss unbalanced his mind. In 1869 he was placed in the state hospital for the insane, where he died a pauper, November 7, 1870, and is said to have been buried at the expense of the Indianapolis bar. He must have been past seventy years of age. He had lived in Indiana fifty-eight years and must have been at least of age when he came to Brookville.
He had all the characteristics of a New Englander, though there are no records as to his nativity. In most things he was an extremist, almost an absolutist. In politics he was an abo- litionist, making the race for governor on the Liberal ticket in 1846. He helped organize the Grand Lodge of Masons of In- diana in 1817, but withdrew from active participation in the order after the Morgan affair. In religion he was a Presby- terian, withdrawing from the regular church on account of its attitude on slavery and other questions. He was not bril- liant, but he was a hard worker and a close, careful student.
JOHN T. M'KINNEY.
The other new member of the court appointed at the same time was Gen. John T. Mckinney, of Brookville. It is certain Stevens and Blackford were well acquainted at Brookville; and it is very probable that Mckinney and Governor Ray were also there at the same time. It is stated in the current bi- ographies of Governor Ray that he came to Brookville early in 1818, but it seems he was there earlier. General Mckinney was admitted to the bar, March 15, 1815. Two years later he and Miles C. Eggleston pleaded guilty to fighting in the court- room and each was fined five dollars. The records show that Hendricks, Noble, Mckinney, Stevens, Eggleston and Amos Lane did the bulk of the law business at the Brookville bar. We have the testimony of Mckinney's contemporaries that he was the equal of any of these men at the bar.
According to Blackford's Reports, he did not appear be- fore the Supreme court while it sat at Corydon, but in 1825 he reversed a case on O. H. Smith. The suit was against a tax collector and went up from Fayette. In the same year he and
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Governor Ray were associated in a chancery case before the Supreme court. He was not often before the Supreme court, however.
The fugitive notices of him that have come down to us leave very much to be desired in the way of a biography. He was a tall, lean man. Already in 1831 the hand of incurable disease was laid upon him. Though often unable to do the work con- nected with his office, he lived till May 29, 1837, and died of consumption. Those who were well acquainted with his work call him a first-rate lawyer and his decisions are fair. He must have been about forty-five years of age at his death.
His political popularity is evidenced by the fact that he served two sessions as representative and three as senator, entering the Assembly in 1826 and serving consecutively in the two houses till 1831, when he was appointed Judge, making in all twelve years of continuous public service.
CHARLES DEWEY.
Judge Dewey was appointed to the Supreme bench by Gov- ernor Noah Noble, May 30, 1836, to succeed Judge Stevens, who had resigned. One does not have to search for the reasons for his appointment. He had been a leader of the state bar since the state was admitted and had taken a creditable part in the political and social life of the times.
Charles Dewey was a New Englander of pronounced char- acteristics. He was a native of Sheffield, Massachusetts, where he was born March 6, 1784, being thus less than two years older than Judge Blackford. In due time he was graduated from Williams College; whether he read law or what he did from the time he left college till he came to Indiana in 1816 does not appear. The presumption is that he had been prac- ticing, since he entered at once into the practice upon his arrival in the new state.
On the records of the United States District court for In- diana at its second term, held at Corydon, November 3, 1817, Mr. Dewey, along with his old companion, Harbin Moore, was admitted to the bar. He had located in 1816 at Paoli in time to practice at the first Circuit court held in Orange county. That he soon obtained recognition as an attorney is shown by
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the fact that Governor Jennings in 1818 retained him as his attorney in the contest with Christopher Harrison over the possession of the governor's office.
According to Blackford's Reports, he first came before the Supreme court in 1818 on a case over an eight hundred dollar note. The case was appealed on him from Clark county and reversed. From that time on he was before that court per- haps as often as any attorney in the state. His practice cov- ered the territory west of a line from Madison to Indianapolis and south of the National road. His principal competitors were Samuel Judah, of Vincennes, Jude Hall, of Princeton, Harbin Moore, of Corydon, Calvin Fletcher, of Indianapolis, and Reuben S. Nelson, of New Albany. He was frequently opposed in criminal cases to James Whitcomb, the best prose- cutor on the circuits of the early state.
In 1821 Dewey was a representative from Orange county. The following year he was a candidate for Congress against William Prince, of Princeton. The campaign was an amusing one. Prince had been a follower of Burr on his wild flight down the Ohio and Mississippi. Dewey was said to be a Hart- ford Convention Federalist. It was too early, however, for a New Englander to be elected from southern Indiana. Dewey served as United States district attorney of Indiana from 1821 to 1829.
Two years after this campaign, 1824, Dewey moved to Charlestown, Clark county, where he continued to reside till his death. In 1832 he again made the race for Congress, but was defeated by John Carr, sheriff of Clark county.
He served on the Supreme bench from 1836 to 1847, eleven years. In 1842 his friends secured his appointment as the United States District Judge for Indiana to succeed Judge Hol- man. Whether the office was not attractive, or whether he disliked to accept office at the hands of President Tyler, is not apparent, but he refused to accept. Either reason is entirely compatible with his independent temper. He enjoyed the prac- tice of law, and perhaps preferred the independence he felt as a free attorney at the bar better than the duties of public office.
After his term as Judge was over he resumed the practice
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of law at Charlestown, which he continued till his death, April 25, 1862. He was buried in the cemetery at Charlestown. He was a man of athletic build and great strength. At middle age he was fond of wrestling and, if need be, would mix it with an opponent in rough and tumble fight. In 1849 he was thrown from a buggy and crippled. Thereafter he went on crutches.
In a brief biography such as this it is impossible to give an adequate idea of the versatile strength of Judge Dewey. On the bench he spoke with great dignity and decorum. He was a model Judge. He liked better, though, to urge a cause before a jury or court where he could unleash all his powers of forensic argument. On such occasions he was not ornate or eloquent in the popular sense, but he pursued his point with invincible logic, enlivened by wit and enforced with abundant sound sense. His legal arguments were unassailable from the standpoint of precedent, but, like all lawyers of the very first rank, he did not hesitate to break away when inevitable logic or sound political considerations showed the way. He was not limited by the letter of the law. This freedom made him espe- cially strong in the equity branch of the law. In this he ex- celled, though he understood and practiced all branches with apparently equal satisfaction.
Popular applause or censure had no influence with him in the discharge of official duty. On one occasion a sheriff hesi- tated in the face of a threatening mob to protect a colored criminal in his charge. The Judge informed him that he would hold him responsible on his bond for any harm done the prisoner and then sternly ordered him to lock his pris- oner up in the jail. The firm attitude overawed the mob and prevented a lynching. Neither was he always careful to con- ceal his lack of respect for ignorant Judges. For this reason he often found himself out of favor with Associate Judges and justices. On one occasion he was continually distressed by the adverse ruling of a petty court. He finally lost his pa- tience, of which he did not have a large amount, and after severely denouncing the court, he turned on it with, "Now, damn you, fine me; send me to jail, too; you ought to if you have any respect for yourselves."
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He was a capital companion and always had an endless stock of stories and incidents gathered from his long career on the circuit. It is an inestimable loss to history that he did not, like O. H. Smith, write these up for posterity. Such reminiscences would have done for southwestern Indiana what Smith's "Trials and Sketches" has done for southeast- ern Indiana.
He was a true friend to his profession and to his profes- sional fellows. His eulogies on Isaac Howk and Judge Parke were long remembered. The former died suddenly at his room in Indianapolis while attending the Supreme court. The mem- bers of the bar gathered around the dead body of their com- rade next morning and listened to one of the most touching memorial addresses ever pronounced in the state. The sense of personal loss was touching in the extreme. The other eu- logy was a formal address delivered before the State His- torical Society, which Judge Parke had founded.
He was a reader of the best literature and kept fully abreast of the times. Political animosities were common and bitter at that time. He was a pronounced Whig and voiced his opinion of men and measures in language that could not be misunderstood. For this reason he had many bitter ene- mies. However, unlike Stevens, he was not an extremist or an agitator. He had less appreciation for Abolitionists than for Democrats. He regarded them as iniquitous troublers of the state. When the Whig party dissolved he passed easily over to the Republican. Two of his sons and two of his grand- sons served in the Northern army, three of them paying the last full measure of patriotic devotion.
Judge Dewey was a lifelong member of the Presbyterian church, living as nearly up to its discipline as possible and leaving its problems of a doctrinal nature to the theologians. He was a great admirer of Henry Ward Beecher, whose church he attended while in Indianapolis. Some of the mannerisms of the great preacher did not escape the good natured remarks of the great Judge, however. Such in brief was the life of one of the very greatest of our lawyers and citizen's.
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JEREMIAH SULLIVAN.
Upon the death of General McKinney, Governor Noble ap- pointed Jeremiah Sullivan to the vacant seat. Again we are not required to seek any ulterior motive for the appointment. The appointee was a man of recognized ability and social standing. Few if any men in the state had better quali- fications.
Judge Sullivan was born at Harrisonburg, Virginia, July 21, 1794. He was thus ten years the junior of Dewey and eight of Blackford, his companions on the bench. He was of Irish descent. Being an only child, he was well educated. He entered William and Mary College, then the headquarters of the young Virginian aristocracy, and graduated in due course. The records have it that he studied law and was ready to be admitted to the bar when the War of 1812 broke out. If so, he must have been quite young for a lawyer, being only twenty in 1812.
After the war was over, the lure of the West came upon him and he started for Kentucky on horseback. His destina- tion was Louisville, but, visiting Cincinnati on his way, he was urged to go to Madison, then one of the promising young towns on the north side of the Ohio. It was thought at that time, and for many years after, that Indiana would have some river city such as Pittsburgh was to Pennsylvania, Cincinnati to Ohio and Louisville to Kentucky. Madison for many years bid fair to be that city.
In 1817 Sullivan located at Madison and that remained his home. Madison had even at that early date some of the leading men of the state. Sullivan at once allied himself with these. In December, 1817, he attended the meeting of Masons at Corydon in which the Grand Lodge was organized. Alex- ander Meek, of Madison, was elected deputy grand warden and Sullivan, grand orator, a tribute to his graceful oratory even at that early date. He withdrew from the order during the Morgan era and never rejoined it. In 1819 he was elected to the General Assembly and re-elected in 1820. An incident of his service here was the naming of Indianapolis, which name he is said to have suggested. In 1824 he made an unsuc- cessful race for Congress against William Hendricks. He is
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said to have declared at this time that he would never again enter actively into politics. He felt that it took too much of his time from his profession, to which he was passionately attached. In 1829 he was appointed to represent Indiana in an attempt to determine a plan for building a canal from the Wabash to Toledo. This required a working agreement be- tween Ohio and Indiana. The two commissioners met at Cin- cinnati and drew up an agreement which was ratified by the two state Legislatures and under which the canal was built.
His connection with the internal improvements of the state continued till 1836, though he never took a leading part. In 1837 he was appointed to the Supreme bench and served there till 1846, when Governor Whitcomb ripped up the bench.
From 1846 to 1869 he devoted himself to the practice of law, enjoying the solid reputation he had earlier built up. In 1869 he was appointed Judge of the Jefferson Criminal court. In 1870 he was elected to the position, but died suddenly, De- cember 6, three hours before time to open court.
Besides being a good lawyer, Judge Sullivan measured up to the full height as a citizen. All movements promising good to the community had his support, especially the church and schools. This feature of the man was beautifully described by Joseph E. McDonald, who very much resembled him in char- acter, in a public address : "As a Judge, he was learned and inflexibly just and an ornament to the bench. As a practicing lawyer, he was able and honorable and an ornament to the pro- fession. As a sincere Christian, he was an ornament to the church. As a man of exalted personal character, he was an ornament to society."
Like all sons of the Old Dominion, Judge Sullivan did not neglect the social man. In receptions, in entertaining public men either by the city or in his home he was always ready for service. When General Scott visited Madison in 1852, he gave the welcome address, which is a model of good taste and dic- tion. Judge Dewey used to take his vacations visiting at the Sullivan home. The two Judges were the most congenial of men and very similar in their interests.
In religion, Mr. Sullivan was a Presbyterian. His father was a Catholic Irishman and had intended the son, so it is
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stated in his biography, for a priest. If so, he took a rather risky course when he sent him to William and Mary College. His mother was a Methodist. In the Presbyterian church Judge Sullivan favored the more moderate views, aligning himself with the New School. He was an elder and took an active part both in the support and management of the local body.
In politics he supported the Whig and later the Republican parties. He was democratic in his views, favoring the com- mon men as against the large corporation of his city. He walked midway between the two aggressive politicians of his town, Jesse Bright and Joseph G. Marshall. As a consequence he exerted little political power. In 1848 he amused himself by ridiculing the bombastic announcements of Jesse Bright concerning the devastation of Mexico by Bright's Invincibles. In 1850 he opposed the selection of William McKee Dunn to the State Constitutional Convention on the ground that he was a corporation partisan. At the outbreak of the Civil War he aided Governor Morton materially in marshalling the state's resources. His eldest son was an officer in the Mexican War and his youngest son led a company to the Civil War. The latter rose by promotion to be a brigadier-general.
Judges Sullivan, Dewey and Blackford undoubtedly consti- tuted the best court that sat under the old Constitution, if indeed it has been excelled in the history of the state. All were college-trained men, representing Williams, William and Mary and Princeton, three leading colleges of that day. Each man was thoroughly devoted to the law. Each brought his own individual strength to the bench. Blackford was learned in the law, diligent in searching out every precedent that could possibly throw light on the case at bar. Dewey knew the law, but preferred also to rest his decisions on the principles of morality and politics as well as on precedent. Sullivan brought to the bench a catholicity of training and apprecia- tion that gave their decisions a literary elegance not at all times common to the law. Literary elegance with Sullivan meant an expression devoid of all temporary, provincial or foreign terms, such an expression as would in plain English go to the point and there stop. Politics with Dewey meant
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the consideration of the final good of the state. Blackford would have excelled as a special pleader ; Dewey, in a court of equity. Sullivan would have made an ideal trial Judge where the various interests of society came into active conflict. All made a team which for excellence was recognized not only in every state in the Union, but even in England.
From 1843, the election of Whitcomb, to 1849, when the Legislature also became safely Democratic, the Whigs and Democrats were engaged in a quarterless struggle for state control. The Democrats felt that they were commissioned to drive the Whigs from power and they proceeded to do so on the root and branch plan. The General Assembly of 1844, by one casting vote of Lieutenant-Governor Bright, refused to go into the election of a United States senator. When the terms of the Supreme Justices expired in 1846, there were few people in the state interested in such affairs but con- fidently expected to see the old Justices reappointed. Gov- ernor Whitcomb was an excellent man, but he never gave any explanation of why they were not reappointed. It has been asserted time and again that Governor Whitcomb attempted to make a deal by which he would reappoint the old bench in return for enough votes in the General Assembly to make him United States senator. Failing in this, he refused to appoint the two men who were responsible for the failure. The story is plausible and was not denied by the governor, but that does not prove its truthfulness in this case. It was also said that Ashbel P. Willard was responsible for the non-appointment of Judge Dewey.
Governor Whitcomb, on one occasion, said the Judges were too old and there was need of young men to clear the docket of the court, now far behind. He first appointed Charles H. Test and Andrew Davidson. These men were not confirmed. He next nominated E. M. Chamberlain and Samuel E. Per- kins; when these were rejected, he nominated W. W. Wick and James Morrison. When these were rejected, he appointed Samuel E. Perkins and Thomas L. Smith to serve till their successors were appointed and qualified. The fight in the Senate for the old court was led by Joseph W. Chapman, a Democratic senator from Laporte. After all the evidence
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available had been examined it seems the famous court was sacrificed to the desire of the ruling Democrats to get Whigs out of office and Democrats in. Had Dewey and Sullivan been Democrats, as Blackford was, there is little room to doubt that they would have remained on the bench, as he did.
THOMAS L. SMITH.
Judge Smith located at New Albany about 1839. He was soon deeply involved in the political struggle then going on. Like his companion on the bench, his reputation was largely political. The bar of New Albany was entirely Whig till his coming. He was joined about 1844 by Ashbel P. Willard, a Kentucky school teacher. The two soon built up a strong political organization. It was ably supported by the Ledger, a new Democratic paper owned and edited by John Norman.
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