USA > Maine > Maine; a history, Volume II > Part 12
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'It is said that Mr. Fessenden was asked about Clifford's ability by several Demo- crats who trusted in his fairness and good judgment, and that his opinion that the candidate was qualified for the place saved him from rejection.
Nathan Clifford
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On the other hand, the Oxford Democrat, though a strong Republican paper, said of Clifford : "In every public position he has filled, he has always exceeded the expectations of his friends." The Democrat had no doubt that he would disappoint some who said he was incompetent for the high position, by uniting industry and indomitable perseverance. "Judge Clifford, doubtless, has in times past, and may again find himself embarrassed in con- sequence of a defective early education ; but greatly to his credit he has those elements of character which enables him to conquer all such obstacles."
The editorial was quoted both by the Bath Tribune and the Argus. The latter paper also said that the people of Maine seemed to make it a rule to depreciate home talent; that a larger percentage of ability was required to obtain recognition for a citizen of Maine than for citizens of several other States; that there was a sort of traditional public impression that men of first-class ability were presumed to dwell in certain localities. "A few of the original States that took the foremost part in the early strug- gles for independent nationality have very naturally been regarded by a kind of common consent of the public as possessing all the highest talent of the country." Mr. Clifford's nomination was confirmed by a vote of 26 to 23. The prophecy that Mr. Clifford would win an honorable reputation as a Judge of the Supreme Court was fulfilled, but the difficulties were great. Hon. George F. Emery says in his "Reminiscences of Bench and Bar": "Though Mr. Clifford had enjoyed a large practice in the State courts, and was familiar with criminal law in Maine, but was wholly inexperienced as a practicioner in the District and Circuit Courts and without knowledge of practise therein, which is quite different from our local modes of procedure. . The law appertaining to patents, which constitutes a very large share of cases in the First Circuit, he had never studied, and is a science of itself and a difficult one at that for a novice. Besides these difficulties in his path, Judge Clifford was looked down upon in Massachusetts as an unworthy successor of Judge Curtis, and his appointment was attributed to partisanship rather than fitness for the position. The prestige of success was therefore all against Judge Clifford, and no one knew it better than he. But this condition, so far from discouraging him, moved him to noble endeavor, and wrought a determination in his own mind that if time should be given him he would demonstrate to the bar of Boston, and to the public, that the President had made no mistake. He at once addressed himself night and day to informing himself on matters of practice, and to preparing himself at all points for the discharge of his varied duties. He lived to conquer prejudice, and died respected as an able and useful judge. But to achieve success imposed upon him an amount of labor of which the outside world little knew, and which, but for a wonderful power of endurance and an inextinguishable ambition, would have closed his career long before it was reached.
As a presiding judge he was patient and impartial, and his urbanity on
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the bench was pleasing to, and noticeable by everybody. "His opinions were prepared with unusual care and study, and his conclusions in general com- mended themselves to the bar, though often reached after a somewhat tedi- ous reading, and seemed sometimes unnecessarily protracted. Judge Clif- ford was not apt to take anything for granted, and each opinion written he seemed to think should exhaust all the learning and authorities on the sub- ject, and should be a guide and landmark for all time."
Senator Bradbury said of him :
"He loved legal study and investigation. To this he applied himself with the energy of a devotee. He was wedded to the philosophy of the sci- ence of which the legal profession is the student and exponent. He liked to trace the history of judicial decisions down through successive years, and examine the manner in which the great minds of the law regarded the opera- tion of those principles that affect the relations and rights of men. He liked to follow out these fundamental principles as they appeared in their deci- sions, and to imbue himself with their spirit.
"By his power of application, his unparalleled ability for continuous labor, and his conscientious devotion to duty, he was enabled to accomplish his grand life-work and achieve the character of a great jurist. No man ever devoted himself more thoroughly to his duty. He labored in season and out of season, by night and by day, allowing no diversion from his work. The only exception for years was for an excursion into the country for two or three days in a year. Study was his recreation; and even in his vaca- tion he would be at his books in his magnificent library at four o'clock in the morning."
When first appointed to the bench he devoted himself for several years with all his energy and with untiring labor to the clearing of the docket, which had become seriously congested, and at the close of his career he shattered his health and shortened his life by his hard and unremitting labors in clearing the docket of his circuit, where the death of Judge George F. Shepley had left "a mass of grave and difficult cases unsettled."
The other members of the "board of trade" obtained their offices more easily. Mr. Appleton was appointed Assistant Secretary of State. W. B. S. Moore became Consul-General for Canada; other faithful Democrats were given good offices. Moses McDonald, the only representative from Maine who voted for the Nebraska bill, was appointed collector at Portland. Ex- Governor Anderson was made surveyor at the same port. George F. Shep- ley was reappointed district attorney. The Bangor Whig said that S. H. Blake, of Bangor, sought the position, and repeated a story "that when Mr. Blake obtained his brief interview with the President, 'Old Buck' squinted at him over his left shoulder and, pulling out of his pocket a copy of a Bangor paper of 1854, asked the candidate if he was the gentleman who appeared therein as an enthusiastic and eloquent speaker at an anti- Nebraska meeting. The story goes that Mr. Blake was considerably dashed
'Coll. Me. Hist. Soc., II, VIII, 132-134.
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at first; but, seeing that it was a gone case with him, rallied and plumply told the President that he was the very individual who made that speech, and, further, that if its sentiments of opposition to the Nebraska bill had prevailed with the Democracy, instead of the present Southern platform, its flag would have been flying on every hill in Maine."
The Straight Whigs fared badly. The only important national office in Maine assigned to them was the collectorship at Waldoborough. The Republicans were glad to "rub the sore." The Rockland Gazette said in substance that before election the Democrats approached the Straight Whigs with the soft beguilement of Poor Pussy, Poor Pussy,-but that after elec- tion, when Pussy wants a share of the cream, it is only, Scat, you. But the Democrats of the Waldoborough district were much displeased that even this tiny saucer of cream was given to Whigs, especially as it came out of their pan.
Immediately after Buchanan's inauguration the Supreme Court gave its decision in the famous case of Dred Scott. The opinion of Chief Justice Taney, which was generally regarded as the opinion of the court, stated that a descendant of a negro slave could not be a citizen of the United States, and that Congress could not prohibit slavery in the territories. The decision was in truth another blow to the slave power and another nail in the coffin of the Democratic party, but most of the Democratic papers hailed it as a victory. The Argus said that it had caused "a great fluttering in Republican ranks, as well it may. It has cut them up root and branch, and dispersed their straggling forces even beyond the headwaters of Salt River.
Do they really intend to maintain the ground of disunionists, now that their own court has shown them to have been in the wrong? Or will they, as good citizens, retreat from their untenable position and submit cheerfully to the law of the land as it has been expounded?" A strange demand for a follower of Andrew Jackson.
The Advertiser at first took ground that suggests Douglas' later posi- tion, that whatever the formal legal right, the will of the people of a terri- tory would determine the admission or exclusion of slavery. The Adver- tiser acknowledged that the decision was a nominal advance for slavery, but said: "In practice, however, the result in the territories is to depend largely on the competing powers of free and slave communities. Will the general government be strictly impartial in the new era of tremendous competitions ? Will agitation be extinguished? We will see."
A few days later, on March 14, it described the various finalities and said: "Thus, during a period within the memory of middle-aged men, the extensionists of slavery-who curiously enough officiate as its most anxious settlers-have devised four settling finalities and destroyed three. How long will the last stand?
"Now what is the meaning of all this ? What lesson does it give? Any- thing like this? Freedom and Slavery are irreconcilably hostile, and all
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legislative and judicial shifts which are meant for the security and perpetua- tion of bondage must, in this free country, prove transient, and compel their inventors to expedients and inconsistencies.
"Let the people consider these things and see whether it is not time for Liberty to have something to do as a settler and finality. Slavery would seem to have tried its hand near long enough."
In reply to the assertion of the Argus that there was no choice between submitting to the decision of the Court and becoming a Garrisonian dis- unionist, the Advertiser said: "The Supreme Court is not a Grand Lama, before whom body and soul are to be prostrate in abject passivity. It is the creature of a free and intelligent people, bound to interpret their laws wisely, and whose voice is promptly respected not for its infallibility, but out of regard for the safety of the whole system of which the Court forms a part. The Judges differ-some of them err, and perhaps all of them (for they are all human), and time reverses their firmest decrees. If their judg- ments do not commend themselves to the best and general intelligence and morality of the nation, they become dead letters and ought not to stand. If they cannot be freely discussed, one judicial error may breed a hundred, and the people, through their sheer respect for law, may at last find them- selves at the mercy of a lawless, because irresponsible despotism."
The Bangor Whig said: "That the decision will reopen the slavery question, in a form, too, more bitter and dangerous than we have yet seen it brought forward, there can be little doubt. . It is very obvious why this decision was not made public until after the presidential election ; if it had been before the public at that time, the pro-slavery Democracy could not have carried a single free State."
The Republicans determined to again make the extension of slavery the issue of their campaign for Governor. Their State Convention resolved "that the License Liquor Law passed by the Legislature of 1856 is inad- equate to the suppression of the evils of intemperance and that the public welfare can best be secured by a 'suitable prohibitory law,"10 and believing that all laws should not only be both just and constitutional but permanent in their character and effect, and for the purpose of removing this great moral question from the arena of party politics, we recommend that any enactment designed to prohibit the sale of intoxicating liquors be submitted to the people upon some day other than that of our annual state election."
The action in regard to prohibition was approved by the leading Repub- lican papers. The Kennebec Journal praised the call for the convention on the grounds that to mention State questions might seem dictatorial and that the Democrats would try to draw attention from the main issue, that of the extension of slavery.
The Portland Advertiser highly approved the action of the convention
1ºA quotation from the Democratic platform of the year before.
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in regard to the prohibitory law. "As the measure of the people it will have force and efficiency, and be much more easily maintained upon the statute book. . By inducing a party to adopt it as a part of its creed, you inevitably carry the other party against it. The Bangor conven- tion therefore wisely determined to leave this subject outside of the arena of party politics. It is best for temperance that it should be so."
There had been three principal candidates for the Republican nomina- tion, Acting-Governor Williams, J. J. Perry of Oxford, for years an influ- ential Democrat, now a Republican, and Lot M. Morrill. Before the con- vention met Williams, who saw that he had little chance of success, with- drew for the sake of harmony. Perry withdrew in the convention stating that he had steadily declined being considered as a candidate and Morrill was nominated by a vote of 585 to 16 scattering. The Argus said that Morrill was nominated because he could obtain the support of men of dif- ferent views while Williams could not. It also declared that Hamlin had made Morrill a bob to his kite when the latter wished to be a Senator, but that Hamlin had advised him to "follow my example," and that Morrill had done so. "The aristocratic Senator from Portland (Mr. Fessenden) is not to domineer and have his own way any longer. He has got to sub- mit, quietly or otherwise, to be laid on the shelf, and the sceptre. which aforetime, was swayed by Portland and anon by Bangor, henceforth is to be wielded by Augusta. There may be a little faint kicking and squirm- ing by the Kents and the Fessendens, but it won't avail. While they slept, the snares were set and the game of which they are part, is already bagged."
Lot M. Morrill was born at Belgrade, Maine, on May 3, 1815. When thirteen he was taken by his father to a trial for burglary. The defense was conducted by Samuel Wells, the future Supreme Court Judge and Governor, and young Morrill was so impressed by it that he at once deter- mined to be a lawyer. "Of all employments, it seemed to him that that of the advocate, who stands before the tribunals of justice to defend the rights and liberties of his fellow men is the noblest." He supported himself for some years by teaching school, attended Waterville College for a time, was admitted to the bar in 1839 and two years later moved to Augusta and formed a partnership with James W. Bradbury, afterwards United States Senator, and Richard D. Rice, later a Judge of the Maine Supreme Court. In 1853 he was elected to the Maine House of Representatives and two years later to the Senate.
"There were in Mr. Morrill's intellectual characteristics certain en- dowments eminently fitting him for the functions of a legislator, that are not usually found in common. He had the strong feelings and earnest con- victions that belong to the enthusiast and the reformer, united with the practical sagacity that belongs to the man of affairs. He looked at pro- posed projects of law, as they would be likely to affect established institu- tions, existing conditions of society, with sentiments warmed and inspired by the ethical side of his nature. In debate he readily became ardent, im-
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passioned, sometimes eloquent; at the same time he never permitted his moral enthusiasm to overwhelm and sweep away the limitations which legal science has established to define the boundaries. He had a more clear con- ception, perhaps, than some of his more conspicuous associates in the Senate, of what matters were fairly within the scope of remedial legislation, and how many desirable reformatory ends legislation was incompetent to achieve.
"Besides these high intellectual qualifications Mr. Morrill possessed, in his amiable disposition, in the purity and integrity of his personal character, in the guileless sincerity, frankness and directness of his manners, a basis for the high esteem and solid consideration in which he was steadily held by all the men associated with him in the responsibilities of public life.""1
The Democratic convention nominated Manasseh H. Smith to run against Lot M. Morrill. The Boston Journal remarked: "Our friends in Maine seem to have taken to Scripture names on both sides,"" and had the editor been gifted with the second-sight, he might have spoken more strongly, for when Messrs. Smith and Morrill ceased to run, their places were taken by Ephraim Smart and Israel Washburn.
Mr. Smith had not been very prominent in politics, but in 1848 and 1849 he had been a member of the Council, and in 1856 had been a candi- date for Congress. Indeed it was reported that his nomination for Governor was brought about by Farley, the former Whig leader, and Henry T. Ingalls of Wiscasset, because, having Congressional ambitions themselves, they wished to get Smith out of the way.
The Rockland Democrat said that Mr. Smith's grandfather had been a chaplain in the Revolution, that he himself was a graduate of Bowdoin, a lifelong Democrat, and not the nominee of a clique like Morrill. "Ed- ucated and refined, talented and social, Mr. Smith is one of the most enter- taining and instructive men in the world. There is not a drop of aristocratic blood in his veins."
As in the preceding year the Republicans attempted to make the fight one over slavery. The Democrats insisted on discussing prohibition. The Argus declared that the Republicans had abandoned their demands for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, the repeal of the fugitive slave law, the restoration of the Missouri Compromise, the refusal to admit any more slave States, and their war on the foreign population, and that the Maine Law was the vital principle of the party. At the same time it again endeavored to alienate the radical prohibitionists from the Republicans on the ground that the latter were deserting them. It pointed out that the Temperance Journal had declared that the vital issue before the Republican convention was prohibition, but that when the convention refused to make it so, it said that if the temperance men set up for themselves there would be a breach which would postpone prohibition indefinitely. The Argus claimed that Morrill had said in a speech at Durham: "I will not insult
"Talbot, "Lot M. Morrill," Coll. Maine Hist. Soc., II, V, 225-275.
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your understandings by presenting so low an issue as the Maine Law. What do we care how much grog you drink. Take your bitters when you please. Only vote right."
The Argus said that a referendum such as was proposed by the Repub- licans would be unconstitutional and had been decided to be so by the highest court of one of the largest States in the Union.
The campaign was much less exciting than that of the year before and the number of votes fell off 22,000. The official count stood, Morrill, 54,655, Smith, 42,968, scattering 255.
The Argus at first treated the election as a sort of drawn game. It said "While therefore neither party has achieved anything which its friends deem worth crowing over, so neither has experienced a reverse that causes disappointment." A little later it manifested an inclination to crow, declar- ing that the Democrats had gained thousands of votes with no exertion, while Banks, Burlingame, Washburn and Morse had stumped the State for the Republicans.
The Bangor Whig claimed a triumph. It said that many young men, three-fourths of whom were Republicans, had gone West, that thousands had come back to vote the preceding year but very few this year, that Maine was safe for the Republicans for years," and that where there was anything like a contest the Republicans had gained.
The Republicans were now obliged to draw a prohibitory law for sub- mission to the people. With some difficulty one was prepared.
An earnest effort was made to allow the manufacture of liquor to be sold outside the State. In former years much molasses had been brought to Portland from the West Indies and made into rum and it was thought that a revival of distilling would help business. But the prohibitionists were on the alert; the attempt was defeated, and many provisions put in the new law which the more moderate men would have gladly left out. A separate act provided for a special election at which the people should vote for the license law of 1856 or the prohibitory law of 1858, the one receiving the most ballots to be the law of the State.
The Democrats attacked the referendum provision. The Argus de- clared that the courts of Rhode Island, New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Indiana, Wisconsin and Iowa had pronounced such laws unconstitutional. The editor said that he did not advise refraining from voting in June but that for himself he preferred to wait until September. The Age advised its brethren to do the same, "instead of wasting their energies in an idle and objectless contest with the ram-rod wing of the party on the 7th of June." The Democratic Advocate opposed voting on the ground that a referendum was of doubtful legality, contrary to the American theory of
"The Republicans elected their candidate regularly until 1879, a period of twenty- two years, though in 1863 they transformed themselves into the "Union Party," nominated a war-Democrat, and renominated him in 1864 and 1865.
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government, and that the law, if passed, would settle nothing since the ram- rods claimed the right to add "teeth" to it. The Advocate called the action of the Legislature a mean and cowardly shirking of responsibility.
The Democrats believed that a contest and a drawing of party lines would drive Republicans who were opposed or indifferent to prohibition, to vote for the law and that its enactment by a small vote only would deprive it of moral authority. The Skowhegan Free Press said: "In this vicinity, and we presume that it is so everywhere else except in Bangor, we propose to say at home, and let those who got up this submission humbug give it the finishing stroke. We intend to be quiet, and let every man vote for the new law who chooses to. Every man who does not vote for it will be against it, and there will be a far less number vote for it if party lines are not drawn, than if they are. We conclude that it will be more comfort- able to let this election go by default, than contest it, and much more satis- factory to gain a big victory than none at all."
The Republicans seem to have feared to take the responsibility for the law. On the day of voting their leading papers declared that no man's party standing would be affected by any vote that he might give.
The attempt of the Democrats to prevent the polling of a heavy vote was successful. The number of ballots cast was 34,776, or 20,000 less than Governor Morrill received the year before and 63,000 less than the whole vote of that year. Of the votes cast prohibition had a large majority, receiving 28,864, against 5,912 for license.
The Whig said that the light vote was due to the farmers being busy with their fields, to the efforts of the Democrats to prevent voting, to the indifference of many, and to the moderate friends of prohibition taking counsel of their fears and not voting. Apparently the Whig had consid- erable sympathy with these gentlemen, for it said: "Hardly any friend of prohibition claims that the new prohibitory law is wise and judicious in all its provisions. Experience will develop its defects and point out the com- mon sense remedies to future legislators." And the Whig urged "that the law be not murdered by injudicious enforcement."
The Argus declared that prohibition was doomed by the vote. The Temperance Journal speaking of the small vote in Penobscot County said, "Nothing else could be expected as the Republican press was a dumb dog that did not bark in reply to the previous attacks upon it. The most it did in that county was to faintly mew once or twice. It did not have spunk enough even to spit cat-fashion at the yelping curs, and the result is what every sagacious man must have foreseen."
In 1857 the Democrats had had a heavy burden to carry in the Dred Scott decision; in 1858 another was imposed on them, that of "Lecompton." The slavery men of Kansas held a constitutional convention at Lecompton, the free-state men refusing to take part in it on the ground that it was illegal, and submitted a constitution which, if adopted, was to be "with"
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