USA > Michigan > Bench and bar of Michigan : a volume of history and biography > Part 23
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WILLIAM L. CARPENTER, Detroit. Judge William Leland Carpen- ter was born in Orion township, Oakland county, Michigan, November 9, 1854, the son of Charles K. and Jeannette Coryell Carpenter. He is of the eighth generation of the family in America in descent from William Carpenter, who emigrated from Amesbury, Wiltshire, England, in 1636, and settled at Providence, Rhode Island, with Roger Williams, and was one of the original proprietors of Providence Plantations. On his mother's side his great-great-grandfather, Edward Henderson, was a soldier in the Revolution. His father was a native of Steuben county, New York, and a farmer. His mother was a native of Livingston county, New York, although she was of Huguenot descent, and her immediate ancestors were residents of New Jersey. William L. attended district school until he was sixteen years old and then attended the Agricultural College at Lansing, from which he was graduated in 1875. Afterward he entered the Law Department of the University of Michigan, and upon completion of the course was graduated with the class of 1878. On March 27th of that year he was admitted to the Bar at Ann Arbor. For a year following he was in the office of the late Judge Crofoot at Detroit. In 1879 he opened an office as a member of the firm of Carpenter & Mclaughlin in Detroit. Since his admission to the Bar he has always been a resident of that city. After an existence of three years the partnership mentioned was terminated by the withdrawal of Mr. Mclaughlin from the firm, and Mr. Carpenter continued in practice alone until January 1, 1885, when he formed a part- nership with Ovid M. Case, under the style of Case & Carpenter. This relation was terminated by the death of the former December 26, 1886. Hle was alone again until May, 1888, when he became associated with Col. John Atkinson. This partnership continued until January ist, 1894, when Judge Carpenter assumed judicial duties by virtue of an election to the Circuit Bench the previous April. As a lawyer his practice was general, large and successful. Politically he is a Republican, but never held polit-
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Elliott Strauss Leson
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ical office, or, indeed, any office but that of judge. In 1885 he married Elizabeth Ferguson, daughter of Daniel Ferguson, of Goderich, Ontario. Lela and Rolla, a daughter and a son, are the offspring of this union. Judge Carpenter has social proclivities as suggested by membership in the Detroit Club and the Michigan Club. He is also a Mason and Odd Fellow and a regular attendent of the Congregational Church. A prominent member of the Detroit Bar says, Judge William L. Carpenter is a consci- entious, able and learned lawyer and judge, and has fully justified the high expectations entertained of him at the time of his election to the Bench. lle has tried many important cases, among which should be named the suit brought by heirs of the late Captain Eder B. Ward against the trus- tees appointed by his will, charging fraud and involving property of the value of several million dollars. The evidence was very voluminous, and the case was one of the most complicated and difficult ever brought in the Wayne Circuit Court. Several of the leading attorneys of Detroit and Chicago were engaged in the trial, and the arguments extended over six weeks. At the close of the arguments Judge Carpenter announced that he would decide the case on the following morning, at which time he rendered an able and exhaustive opinion, going into the details of many features of the case, and showing a complete mastery of its most intricate parts and of the law applicable thereto. The ability and learning displayed by Judge Carpenter in this case, his quick grasp of complicated facts and the ready application of the law appropriate thereto, have been said to be among the ablest judicial proceedings in the history of Wayne county
ELLIOTT G. STEVENSON, Detroit. Elliott Gresette Stevenson is a Canadian by birth, but of Irish descent and parentage. His father, William Stevenson, was born near Belfast, Ireland. His mother was Mary McMurray, member of a family whose nativity was the North of Ireland and whose home was near Belfast for several generations. Elliott G. Stevenson was born in Middlesex county, Canada, May 18, 1856. His parents appreciated the value of a good education as capital for a young man and gave to him in boyhood the best opportunities available for prim- ary instruction and academic studies. The family removed to Port Huron during his childhood and he attended the public schools of that city until twelve years of age. After that he attended the academy at London, Ontario. At the age of eighteen he began the study of law in the office of O'Brien J. Atkinson, of Port Huron, under whose instruction he remained three years. In December, 1877, he was admitted to the Bar and received into partnership by his preceptor, thus constituting the firm of Atkinson & Stevenson. This association was maintained for eight years and during that time Mr. Stevenson became well established in the practice and well known to the profession. In 1885 he became associated with
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P. H. Phillips, in the firm of Stevenson & Phillips. This partnership was dissolved in consequence of his removal in 1887 to Detroit, where he became the successor of Judge George S. Hosmer, in the firm of which Don M. Dickinson was the head. The name and style was Dickinson, Thurber & Stevenson. Mr. Stevenson has subordinated every other interest and object in life to the attainment of a broad and thorough knowledge of the law and its application to the affairs of life; its conservation of the rights of the individual and the interests of society; its nature as a science and the art of invoking it to secure the ends of equity and justice. He has sought to comprehend its genesis and revelations. He has always been a general practitioner - equally qualified for the defense or prosecution of a person indicted for crime, and the management of a civil action involving the rights of property or any other question of law and fact. He has no specialties and no hobbies. Having served two terms in the office of prose- cuting attorney he became conversant with the criminal laws of the State. He has been retained in a great many libel cases since he became a resident of Detroit and has been the regular legal representative of the News, and the Tribune, and at different times of the Journal, the Free Press and the Times - all Detroit newspapers. His solid and practical attainments in the law are probably not excelled by those of any lawyer of his age in the State. In response to a request of the editor for an estimate of his char- acteristics, a distinguished Detroit judge sends the following :
" Elliott G. Stevenson is a careful and discriminating student of the law. Ilis greatest strength is as an advocate. In this department he probably has no superior and few equals in the State. He is strong, not only with the juries, but with courts as well. He attracts and holds the closest attention of both. His wide knowledge of the law and careful preparation of his cases are always instantly available. Ilis candor and honesty and brilliant powers of advocacy make him a most formidable antagonist in any case. He has been engaged in nearly all of the import- ant cases that have been tried at the Bar of Detroit during the past ten years. In the treatment of his brethren at the Bar and his bearing toward opposing counsel, his manner is courteous and affectionate. He is there- fore greatly admired and bound to his associates by the most intimate ties. He rarely says an unkind word of attorneys who may be opposed to him, unless first attacked; but when provoked by opposing counsel he has abundant resources of wit, sarcasm and invective, which he does not hesi- tate to use to the discomfiture of his opponents. In all the relations of life - domestic, social, political and professional - Mr. Stevenson is an upright, honorable man. It is not adulation to speak of such a man in terms of praise, but only the commendation which is justified by his char- acter and reputation. The members of his profession who have tried his mettle and the neighbors who know his work are his strongest witnesses and most eloquent panegyrists."
Mr. Stevenson was the first Democratic official elected in St. Clair county after the war, and his election as prosecuting attorney took place in 1878. He was re-elected two years later. In 1885 he was elected mayor of Port Huron and served one term. He declined to accept the
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nomination for Congress urged by his party in 1882 and again in 1886, although such nomination would have insured his election. He was chair- man of the Democratic State Central Committee in 1894 and served two years. In 1896 he was elected first delegate at large to represent Michigan in the Democratic convention held at Chicago. He was chosen because of his sound money views and made a strong fight in the committee on credentials for the cause he espoused and for the right of himself and his colleagues to sit in the convention. A majority of the committee holding adverse views and the contest being relentless; while he held his seat a suf- ficient number of his associates were ousted in order to seat contesting advocates of the free and unlimited coinage of silver to give the entire vote of Michigan under the unit rule to the opposition. After due delib- eration he decided to support the nominees of that convention and there- upon a dissolution of the copartnership between Mr. Dickinson, Mr. Thurber and himself followed. In 1879 he married Miss Emma A. Mitts, of Port Iluron, and three children born of that union are living: George Elliott, Helen and Kenneth.
ELISHA A. FRASER, senior member of the law firm of Fraser & Gates, Detroit. Mr. Fraser was born at Bowmanville, Ontario, Dominion of Canada, March 13, 1837. His father, Rev. Niram A. Fraser, was also born in Canada, in 1811. His great-grandfather, Elisha Fraser, was a native of Massachusetts and his grandfather was born in that colony in 1775, and married in New York in 1794, subsequently locating in Canada. The father of our subject was a clergyman, who particularly desired that his children should enjoy the best possible opportunities for education and did all that his limited means permitted to secure that end. The name Fraser is derived from a French word signifying strawberry. The history of the Frasers, who constituted a clan of the Highland Scots, extends far back into the Middle Ages. Several elaborate histories of the clan have been written. They are first recognized in array among those volunteers who accompanied William, the Norman Conqueror, into the borders of Britain. They extended thence northward, where they possessed large estates both in Tweedale and Lothian. The representation of strawberries was a distinguishing mark on the coat-of-arms of the family, whose motto was, "Je suis prest." The Frasers constituted one of the largest of the clans of Highland Scots. To-day branches of the family are found in all parts of the world. Elisha A. Fraser is equally Scotch on the side of his mother, Elizabeth Fletcher, who was the daughter of Alexander Fletcher, a wealthy and influential citizen of Bowmanville, Ontario, where she was born. She was in full sympathy with the views of her husband in regard to the education of their children and her labors and self-denial in that behalf were unceasing. He pursued his studies of a preparatory nature
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principally at Oberlin, Ohio, and was graduated from the University of Michigan, after completing the classical course in 1863. In 1866 he received the degree of A. M. from the same University. Immediately after graduation he became principal of the public schools at Jonesville, Michigan, and held the position one year. During this year Mr. Fraser was married to Maude J. Lymburner, daughter of Wil- liam Lymburner, of Ancaster, Ontario, Dominion of Canada. For nine years next ensuing he was superintendent of the public schools at Kalamazoo, Michigan, where thousands of pupils passed under his influence and many were prepared for admission to the University of Michigan and other colleges, whence they have gone to the active duties of the Bar and the Bench, and to the halls of legislation in the State and Nation. In 1873 Mr. Fraser resigned the superintendency of the Kala- mazoo schools and was admitted to the Bar in that city, Hon. Charles R. Brown on the Bench. The following year he removed to Battle Creek, where he practised for two years as a member of the firm of May, Buck & Fraser. Ilis partners were Hon. Charles S. May, at one time Lieutenant Governor of the State, and Hon. George Buck, afterwards Judge of the Ninth Judicial Circuit. This was a branch office in charge of Mr. Fraser, while the principal office was at Kalamazoo. A large and profitable busi-
ness came to the firm during the two years. Among the many cases in which he was engaged were, Macomber vs. Nichols (34 Michigan, 21), involving the use of steam locomotives on the highway ; Merritt vs. Dickey (38 Michigan, 41), involving administrators liability and rights of surviving partner. During the last year of his residence in Battle Creek he served as city attorney, an office to which he was appointed without solicitation on his own part. In 1876 he located in Detroit in order to have a larger field for practice. The senior member of the firm at Battle Creek accom- panied him and the firm of May, Fraser & Gates was constituted. Within a year Mr. May retired, leaving Fraser and Gates in a partnership which has since remained unchanged. Previous to his removal from Battle Creek Mr. Fraser had been employed by Mrs. Doctor Newcomer in several suits relating to her property rights which had become entangled in consequence of her confinement in an asylum for the insane. These cases having been managed in a satisfactory manner, the firm of Fraser & Gates in Detroit was retained by the same client to bring suit against the superintendent of the asylum at Kalamazoo for damages on account of false imprisonment. This case is reported as Newcomer vs. Van Dusen (40 Michigan 90). It has been influential in modifying the regulations for admission of patients to asylums for the insane in several of the States besides Michigan. Dur- ing the past twenty years Mr. Fraser has been employed in very many important causes, some of which have found their way into the Supreme Court and contributed largely to the case law of the State. Among the latter may be mentioned, Tuxbury vs. French (39 Michigan, 190), same (41 Michigan, 7), Williams vs. Hodges (41 Michigan, 695), Alexander vs.
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Hodges (43 Michigan, 564), Westchester Fire Insurance Co. vs. Dodge Administrator (44 Michigan, 420), Burrough vs. Diebold (47 Michigan, 242), Stansell vs. Leavett (48 Michigan, 225), Ford vs. Bushor (48 Michi- gan, 534), Ford vs. Detroit Dry Dock Co. (50 Michigan, 358), Durfee vs. Abbott (50 Michigan, 379 and 479), Blitts vs. Union Steamboat Co. (51 Michigan, 558), Stansell vs. Leavett (51 Michigan, 536), Forncrook Manu- facturing Co. vs. Barnum Wire Works (54 Michigan, 552), Foster vs. Hill (55 Michigan, 540), Reeg vs. Burnham et al. (55 Michigan, 39), Newkirk vs. Newkirk (56 Michigan, 525)), Watson vs. the Lyon Brewing Co. et al. (61 Michigan, 595), Forncrook Manufacturing Co. vs. the E. T. Barnum Wire and Iron Works (63 Michigan, 195), Catherine Stackable vs. the Estate of George Stackable, deceased, (65 Michigan, 515), Rose vs. Rose (67 Michigan, 619); Pulling vs. Durfee, Judge of Probate (88 Michigan, 387), Charles F. Power vs. the Estate of Abram L. Power, deceased (91 Michigan, 587), In re Estate of Pulling (93 Michigan, 274). This settled some nice points in relation to antenuptial contracts which had not been raised previously in the State of Michigan. The case Carmichael vs. Lathrop et al, growing out of the same estate and more recently con- sidered, establishes the law of Michigan on questions of advancements and ademption. In addition to the foregoing many other causes will be found in the Michigan reports and still others will soon be published: Lewis vs. Bell, Plum vs. Penn Mutual Life Insurance Co., and the litigation growing out of the large estate of William B. Morley, deceased. He has also been entrusted with the settlement of several large estates in the Probate Court. In 1891 a series of articles appeared in one of the Detroit daily papers, entitled "Pen Pictures of Prominent Detroit Lawyers," written by a well known member of the Detroit Bar, and generally regarded as just characterizations. The writer says of this subject :
" Mr. Fraser bears a striking resemblance to the late Gen. U. S. Grant, both in countenance and physique. Ilis facial expression is calm and cold, almost stern. Physically he may be described as stocky, broad-sholdered and deep-chested. lle wears his beard in Grant fashion. Although probably fifty-six years have passed over his head, he is a very vigorous, active man. He is one of the few real orators among the members of the Detroit . Bar. His presence is dignified and imposing; he possesses a clear, powerful baritone voice of considerable range, which he uses to the best advantage. Evidently he has not neglected the study of elocution, for his gestures are graceful and appropriate, his enunciation distinct and his voice skilfully modulated. It may be said also that his diction is elegant ; his power of illustration and comparison far above the average, his imagi- nation lively and far reaching. Although outwardly resembling General Grant, he is emotional and magnetic, quite unlike the General. Born an orator, by assiduous study he has trained his fine intellectual faculties as an athlete trains his muscle, and has stored in his mind a vast fund of infor- mation, which is ever at command. Elisha A. Fraser is a strong man, mentally and physically, and withal a man of wit and humor. One natur- ally expeets bursts of true eloquence from such a man, and is seldom disappointed. His oratorical efforts are always satisfactory, sometimes
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inspiring even to enthusiasm. He is a very modest man, reserved and quiet in manner. He is not a ' hustler.' One can not help thinking that he sticks too closely to his office duties. As a lawyer Mr. Fraser stands high among his brothers of the Bar. He would quickly rise to distinction in the political arena, for in addition to oratorical powers he possesses the broad and comprehensive qualities of the true statesman.'
He has always been a Republican in politics and sometimes made political speeches, but has never been a candidate for office. Since the establishment of the Detroit College of Law, he has been a member of the faculty, filling the chair on contracts. Ile takes a deep interest in religious matters; is a member of the Presbyterian Church, in which he has been a ruling elder for nearly thirty years. For the last eighteen years he has been one of the elders of Fort Street Presbyterian Church of Detroit. He was appointed Commissioner of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church which met in New York city in 1889 and was a member of the judicial committee of that body.
JASPER C. GATES, Detroit. Mr. Gates was born on a farm near Pleasantville, Venango county, Pennsylvania, March 23, 1850. He was the son of Rev. Aaron Gates, a Baptist minister, and Amanda M. Cross, grand-niece of Samuel Payne and Elisha Payne, the founders of Madison University. His father was educated in that institution and married Miss Cross during his college course. His paternal grandfather, Aaron Gates, was a volunteer soldier in the war of 1812, and commanded a company at Sackett's Harbor. The ancestors of his mother were French and emi- grated from France (where the name was La Crosse) to New England in the early part of the eighteenth century. At the opening of the Revolu- tion, in 1775, his great-grandfather, Uriah Cross, was living near Buck. land, Vermont. He was a patriot, inspired by the love of freedom, and with his six brothers entered the Colonial army and served throughout the war. As an officer under Col. Ethan Allan, he took part in the capture of Ticonderoga, Skenesborough and Crown Point. He was with Allen when that officer was captured, but with a few comrades made his escape by breaking through the British lines. Later he served in a Connecticut regiment. His grandfather, Calvin Cross, was born January 21, 1781, and about twenty years later removed to Payne's Settlement (now Hamilton), New York. At this place he courted and married Polly Hosmer, eldest daughter of Rev. Ashbel Hosmer, who was then pastor of the Baptist church, at Hamilton, and one of the earliest officers of The Hamilton Baptist Missionary Society, which preceded the New York Baptist State Convention. Ile was one of the founders of the denomination in that region. Calvin Cross was also an officer in the war of 1812. Jasper C. Gates was brought up on his father's farm, and remained on the farm with
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his mother after the death of his father, February 17, 1861. His early education was obtained in the district schools and Pleasantville Academy. In 1869 he entered the school of Civil Engineering in Union College, Schenectady, New York. Soon afterwards he determined to take the literary course in that college, and thenceforward kept up the studies in both courses. He was graduated in engineering in 1872 and from the literary department, with honors, in 1873, receiving the degree of A. B. Three years later he received the degree of Master of Arts. His deter- mination to become a lawyer appears to have been formed as a result of a lecture by the late Judge Ira Harris, in the Albany Law School. Although present by chance he became much interested in the law as expounded by the lecturer. He was influenced by this circumstance and the panic of 1873 to enter the law school at Albany in the fall of that year. He was graduated in June following with the degree LL. B. May 8, 1874, he was admitted to practice in all the courts of that State by the Supreme Court of New York. In July, 1874, he entered the law office of Josiah I .. Hawes, at Kalamazoo, Michigan. In November of that year he was admitted to the Bar and privileged to practice in all the courts of Michigan. Subsequently he was admitted to the Federal Courts. He succeeded to the large practice of Judge Hawes in 1875, on the accession of the Judge to the Bench. His singular good fortune in the management of cases in the Circuit Court led to the offer and acceptance of a partnership with Hon. Charles S. May and Elisha A. Fraser. In June, 1876, Messrs. Fraser & Gates removed to Detroit, where they have since been in partner- ship continuously. The preference of Mr. Gates is real estate law, chancery cases and probate practice. A few years after his admission to the Bar he prepared for trial, both as to the law and the facts, the cele- brated case of Newcomer vs. Van Duzen. The legal contests concerning the Pulling Estate, in progress since 1890, have established some important points as to the ante-nuptial agreements and ademption of legacies by gifts of real property. The litigations over the Morgan estate, in both State and Federal Courts, have been scarcely less important. In 1894-95 Mr. Gates conducted successfully the contested election case of Attorney- General vs. May, securing the office of county clerk of Wayne county for his client and establishing the constitutionality of all the provisions of the Australian Election Law of this State. For several years he has been a member of the faculty of the Detroit College of Law, in which he teaches the laws of real estate, evidence and domestic relations. For many years he has been active in the local and state work of the Baptist Church, and is now president of the Baptist Convention of the State. He was married October 9, 1878, to Miss Lulu Foster, of Kalamazoo. One child, Miss Lulu Gates, born August 4, 1879, is the fruit of this marriage. Following is from a Detroit paper :
" Mr. Gates is one of the most promising young lawyers at the Bar. He has a 'legal head' and, as a matter of course, views everything from
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a lawyer's standpoint. Ile is a small man physically, almost fragile in appearance. So far as presence goes he doesn't 'cut much of a figure' before a jury. He is not oratorical, nor rhetorical. And yet he is success- ful. It is high praise, but it is not going too far to say that Jasper C. Gates is one of the best, if not the best lawyer of his age, at the Detroit Bar. One doesn't mean that he is a great advocate, but the word lawyer is here used according to its strict technical meaning. Ilis knowledge of the law is simply wonderful, and he applies his knowledge to masses of facts with great rapidity and acuteness of understanding. What he knows he knows thoroughly and accurately. One notable feature about him is his inexhaustible patience. He goes about his legal work in a cool, deliberate manner, is never rattled, is vigilant, wide awake and armed at all points. The most microscopic weak spot in the enemy's armor does not escape his notice. His intellectual make-up is of the diamond order, bright and hard. As an advocate he is fairly successful before juries; he talks fluently, reasons logically, brings out facts so as to further his side as much as possible, and is a keen, shrewd cross-examiner. As an attorney he has no superior at the Bar, his knowledge of practice and legal points and details being immense."
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