Centennial history of Missouri (the center state) one hundred years in the Union, 1820-1921, Volume I, Part 22

Author: Stevens, Walter Barlow, 1848-1939
Publication date: 1921
Publisher: St. Louis, Chicago, The S. J. Clarke publishing company
Number of Pages: 1074

USA > Missouri > Centennial history of Missouri (the center state) one hundred years in the Union, 1820-1921, Volume I > Part 22

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One of Champ Clark's Maiden Speeches.

When Champ Clark was in the legislature, in 1889. he named the chaplain in this irresistible nominating speech :

"Born on the soil of Virginia, his parents brought him, as a babe in arms, to Mis- souri, when it was still the habitat of the red Indian and the wild beast, and he has done his full part in laying the broad foundations of this mighty state. He was a pioneer farmer and a frontier blacksmith. A leonine soldier of Jo. Shelby, the bosom friend of Major Edwards, honored and beloved by all who ever looked into his honest eyes, at the close of the war he returned to his little farm, poor as Lazarus, to find his home in ashes and his wife and children huddled in a negro cabin. He didn't whine. He doesn't belong to that school of soldiers. He spent no time in crying over spilt milk; he had too much sense for that. Bravely and resolutely, he took up the burdens of life- without vain regrets on account of the inevitable. Early and late upon his anvil he celebrated the jubilee of peace. Industriously he tickled with the hoe the rich face of a Henry county farm and it smiled with abundant harvest. Joyfully and liberally obey- ing the scriptural injunction to 'multiply and replenish the earth' he has the honor to be the proud and happy father of eleven Missouri Democrats.

"In naming him, placid and majestic Northeast Missouri sends hearty greeting to the glowing and gorgeous Southwest; the old and historic county of Pike clasps hands with the young and ambitious county of Henry; the kid Democrats bow their profoundest acknowledgments to the veterans of the Old Guard; the running water Campbellite backs the shouting Methodist. I present for your suffrages the name of Reverend Peter H. Trone."

Preacher Stribling's Gift.

Bishop Kavenaugh said the Rev. William C. Stribling was "the most remark- able preacher he had ever known." Mr. Stribling's command of language was the marvel of the Missouri Methodist circuits. The annals of the church quote him as having taken a young man to task for smoking in his presence :

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"Sir, the deleterious effluvia emanating from your tobacconistic reservoir so obfus- cates my ocular optics, and so distributes its infectious particles with the atmospheric fluidity surrounding me, that my respirable apparatus must shortly be obtunded, unless through the abundant suavity of your pre-eminent politeness, you will disembogue that luminous tube from the pungent, stimulating and sternatory ingredient which replenishes the rotundity of the vastness of its cavity."

Another illustration of Mr. Stribling's gift which has been preserved in Mis- souri's Methodist traditions was his rendition of "you can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear." The minister expressed it in this way :

"At the present era of the world it has been found impracticable to fabricate a sufficiently convenient pecuniary receptacle from the auricular organ of the genus suo."

The First Campmeeting at Baxter.

Rev. Stephen R. Beggs left this account of the first campmeeting held on the Baxter ground near Liberty :

"Brother Harris and myself were the only preachers present; and we both preached and exhorted, each in turn. The meeting grew in interest until Monday. I tried to preach on that day, and brother Harris was to preach a funeral sermon. When I closed, he commenced giving out the hymn,

"'And am I born to die, To lay this body down?'

"When he came to the second verse,

""'Soon as from earth I go, What will become of me?'

the power of the Almighty came down in such a wonderful manner as is seldom wit- nessed. Brother Harris fell back in the pulpit, overcome by the influence of the Holy Spirit, and called upon me to invite the people forward for prayers. During my sermon I had noticed that one powerfully built man in the congregation was so filled with the power of God, that it was with difficulty he restrained his feelings; now was the time for him to give vent to his feelings, and his shouts of 'Glory to God in the highest!' were such that the whole congregation seemed thrilled with the 'power of God.' It was as if a current of electricity ran through the assembly, setting on fire with the love of Jesus each soul in Divine presence.

"It was a memorable time. The whole campground was convulsed, and the invita- tion was no sooner extended than the mourners came pouring forward in a body for prayers, till the altar was filled with weeping penitents. It was as if the shouts of his 'sacramental hosts were heard afar off.' The meeting continued that afternoon and all night. Late in the night I went to Brother Baxter's house to get some rest; butthe work was so urgent-sinners weeping all over the campground-that I was sent for to come back and continue my exertions; and there we wrestled, the Christian and the sinner, in one common interest, like Jacob of old, 'till the break of day.' On Tuesday morning scarcely a soul remained unconverted, or seeking pardon."

The saving grace of humor was employed with telling effect by these preachers of the Missouri campmeeting. Abraham Millice was one of the preachers who exercised astonishing power over his outdoor audiences. Once at Hickory Grove campmeeting he illustrated the power to banish evil thoughts from the mind by pointing to the birds in the trees overhead and saying "I cannot prevent the

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birds from flying over my head, but I can keep them from building nests in my hair." At the same time he rubbed his hand over a head entirely bald.

Constituting a Christian Church.

The beginnings of the Christian church in Missouri were characterized by liberality in doctrine of such degree that for a time some of the other denom- inations were not inclined to look with favor upon "the Campbellites" as they called them. There were prolonged and heated controversies. One of the early records, preserved by Jesse Boulton, gave the action on which the Chris- tian church of Bear creek in Boone county was "constituted," in June, 182.4. This record read :

"We, the undersigned subscribers, being called upon to examine into the faith and ability of the brethren living on and near Bear creek desiring to be constituted, find them, in our opinion, sound in the faith and possessing the abilities of keeping in order the house of God. We have therefore pronounced them a church of Jesus Christ under no other discipline or ritual of faith and practice, but the Old and New Testaments, pro- fessing at the same time to have charity enough as a church to let each other judge of the doctrines contained in the Scriptures for ourselves. Given under our hands, who are elders and have constituted, the undersigned names.

THOMAS MCBRIDE, WILLIAM ROBERTS, JOHN M. THOMAS."

As late as 1850, a presbytery in the interior of Missouri sent east for min- isters and stipulated that what was wanted was men of the right stamp "rough and ready, who could preach at all times and let slavery alone, leave their eastern prejudices at home. Western people are born and grow up in excite- ment and their religion must have more or less of that ingredient."

It detracted nothing from the dignity or effectiveness of these pioneer preachers that they were given nicknames by the scattered worshipers. Thus. one of the popular ministers of the Christian church in Missouri was known far and wide as "Raccoon John" Smith.

CHAPTER VI

THREE ORGANIC ACTS

Missouri's Constitutions-The Framers in 1820-Three Bartons and Two Bates Brothers- Their Effective Activities in State Making-Personal Characteristics-"Little Red"- David Barton's Marriage Ceremony-"Yankee" Smith-Missouri Follows Kentucky -The Cloth Ineligible for Office-An "Immortal Instrument"-Benton Turned Down- Caucus and Cudgel-Fathers of the State-"Missouriopolis"-Distinctive Provisions- Judge Tucker's "Armorial Achievement"-George D. Reynold's Interpretation-The Rights of Congress-The Second Constitutional Convention-The Framers in 1845- Their Work Rejected by a Decisive Vote-Proposition to Make St. Louis the Na- tional Capital-"A Ridiculous Blunder"-First Plan of Constitutional Emancipation -Too Slow for the Radicals-Convention of 1865-Slavery Abolished-Dr. Eliot's Prayer of Thanksgiving-The "Oath of Loyalty"-Charles D. Drake-Wholesale Dis- franchisement of Southern Sympathizers-Educational Test of Suffrage-"Girondists" and "Jacobins"-Senator Vest's Description-Blair's Denunciation-Supreme Court De- cision-The Test Oath Unconstitutional-Rapid Reaction from the Policy of Proscrip- tion-Political Downfall of Drake Planned-How Schurz Became a Candidate-"The Feeler" Worked-An Oratorical Trap Which Settled a Senatorship-Convention of 1875-An Able Body-William F. Switzler's Distinction-The "Strait Jacket Constitu- tion"-Judge Woodson on the Supreme Court's Construction-Harm Done by Judicial Legislation-Judge Norton's Pride in the Results-An Octogenarian's Recollections- The New Constitution Association.

No person while he continues to exercise the functions of a bishop, priest, clergyman, or teacher of any religious persuasion, denomination, society or sect whatsoever, shall be eligible to either house of the general assembly; nor shall he be appointed to any office of profit within the state, the office of justice of the peace excepted .- First Constitution of Missouri.

Missouri has had three organic acts. Missourians lived under their first con- stitution forty-five years. The third constitution has worn fairly well through forty-five years. Between these two the state struggled with a misfit. David Barton was president of the first constitutional convention. Edward Bates was a member. He had so much to do with the framing that in after years the instru- ment was called "the Bates constitution." It is tradition that many of the sec- tions of the original draft were in the handwriting of Barton. Three Bartons and two Bates brothers had a great deal to do in various ways with the making of Missouri, the state. Their activities even in the territorial period were notable.

Constitution Framers.

Edward- and Frederick Bates were from Goochland county, Virginia. The Quaker descent did not restrain their father from serving under Washington in the Revolution. Neither did it stand in the way of the son of Edward Bates, Lieutenant General John C. Bates, choosing the profession of a soldier and

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CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF MISSOURI 1

rising to the highest rank in the United States army. When not of age Edward Bates enlisted as a private soldier and served in the war of 1812. After his discharge from the army he came to St. Louis, following his brother, Frederick, who had come some years earlier. It is one of the traditions that Frederick Bates was given one of the earliest Federal appointments at St. Louis and was sent here by Thomas Jefferson to watch Aaron Burr and to report confidentially what he was acomplishing in the new territory.

Edward Bates was a seventh son. There were twelve children in his father's family. The genealogical tree of the Bates family in this country went back to the colony at Jamestown. Edward wanted to go into the navy. His mother opposed him. He compromised with her by serving six months in the army during the war of 1812. When he was twenty he came to St. Louis. With a good academic education obtained at Charlotte Hall, with but little means, he went into a law office, Rufus Easton's on Third street, and studied law. His rise to distinction after his admission in 1816 was very rapid. In 1823 Judge ' Bates was married to Miss Julia D. Coalter. He had seventeen children. Within a short time after his admission to the bar he was district attorney for Mis- souri. Among the positions he filled while a young man were delegate to the constitutional convention, attorney general for the state, member of the legis- lature, United States district attorney, and member of Congress. He held other official positions afterwards, but he refused many, preferring to practice his profession. President Millard Fillmore nominated Edward Bates to be his secretary of war and the Senate unanimously confirmed the appointment but it was declined. Devotion to the cause of the Union prompted acceptance of the place in the Lincoln cabinet. Missouri had presented the name of Edward Bates for the Presidential nomination at Chicago in 1860.

The manners of Edward Bates were most . pleasing. In stature the great advocate was not large. He wore ruffles, blue broadcloth and brass buttons in the days when that style of dress was fashionable in the legal profession. He was smooth shaven, had bright black eyes and made friends who were devoted to him. With all of his years at the bar and in politics, Edward Bates never fought a duel nor was challenged. When he was in Congress, Bates was the recipient of attention which seemed insulting from McDuffie, the South Car- olinian. He sent a demand for an explanation and was given one that friends deemed entirely satisfactory.

David, Joshua and Isaac Barton were three of the six sons of a Baptist minister of North Carolina. The Rev. Isaac Barton was an associate of John Sevier's patriots who won the victory at King's Mountain, a battle of the Revolu- tion which impressed the British government more than almost any other engage- ment with the invincible courage of the Americans. David Barton became the first judge of the circuit court of St. Louis; Joshua the first United States district attorney of St. Louis; and Isaac the first clerk of the United States district court of St. Louis. David was elected to the United States Senate. Joshua Barton was killed in the duel with Rector. Isaac Barton continued clerk of the United States district court more than twenty-one years. The brothers had read common law and were acquainted with the English system. When they arrived in St. Louis they found themselves disqualified to practice under the

"MANSION HOUSE"

Where first organic act of Missouri was drafted in 1820. Located at Third and Vine Streets, St. Louis.

WILLIAM G. PETTUS Secretary of first Constitutional Convention of Missouri

DAVID BARTON

President of the convention which drafted the state constitution of Missouri in 1820. United States senator from Missouri, 1821- 1831.

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civil law which had been continued in force. A territorial legislature was elected. The Bartons with the half dozen other American lawyers who had come to St. Louis had influence enough to wipe out the old code. They got through an act which was made the basis upon which the statutes of Missouri are founded. What they did was to pass an act making the common law of Eng- land and certain British statutes not inconsistent with the Constitution and statutes of the United States, the law of Missouri territory. That was done in 1816. The American lawyers were then ready for clients.

Circuit judges were authorized to perform the marriage ceremony when the courts were established under American authority. David Barton, the first cir- cuit judge, had a form which was marvelously brief. The parties stood up.

The judge-" --- - , do you take

to be your wife?"

The man-"I do."

The judge-". - do you take

to be your husband?"

The woman-"I do."

The judge-"The contract is complete. I pronounce you man and wife."

David Barton came to St. Louis just about the time the rangers, who were the rough riders of the war of 1812, were being organized. He joined the command and served with it. Barton was chosen without opposition the first United States senator. The legislature deadlocked on the second place. Barton was allowed to name his associate and chose Benton. Thus it occurred that, although there were several strong men from other states, the two United States senators chosen at St. Louis were from North Carolina.

Barton was known as "Little Red." He got the name when he delivered a speech which made him famous throughout the country. The senate chamber was crowded. Barton had taken sides against the Jackson policies. His arraign- ment and condemnation of the administration for years ranked as one of the greatest speeches heard in the senate. The audience became intensely excited. At the close, while people were crowding out of the gallery, there came a mighty shout, "Hurrah for the little red!" This was repeated again and again in the corridors of the capitol by the Missouri frontiersman who had been a listener. When the man became calm enough to explain, he said the original "little red" was a game rooster he owned which could whip any fighting cock pitted against him. When he heard Senator Barton "putting his licks" in the Jackson crowd and "bringing them down every flutter" he couldn't help thinking of the victories of his "little red." The newspapers took up the application. Barton went by the name of "Little Red."

The Free Soilers of Smithville.

Feeling ran high in Howard county when the delegates were elected to the first constitutional convention. Humphrey Smith, a miller from New York state, had settled in Howard. He was for a free state. He had a controversy with Burckhartt who was a candidate for delegate to the convention. A few days later, a band of fifteen or twenty men came to Smith's cabin and sent one of their number to the door to ask for a night's lodging. Smith protested he had no room. The stranger said he would have to stop there; he could go no farther. Smith turned to get a rope to hitch the man's horse, when he

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CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF MISSOURI

was seized and thrown to the ground. The mob came from behind the cabin and began to whip Smith with hickory sprouts. They raised welts and brought blood. Smith was dragged away from the cabin to a fence where one man held his head down while the whipping was continued. Mrs. Smith, hearing the shouts and oaths, ran out of the cabin, picked up what was known in those days as a "swinging block" and struck the man who was holding her husband, knocking him down. Smith thus released ran. The man who had been struck, got up, jumped the fence and started after Smith. Mrs. Smith got in his way. This so angered the man that he struck Mrs. Smith over the head, smashing a brass comb which she wore and so injuring one eye that it gave her trouble as long as she lived. Smith made his escape. The mob reassembled and issued a declaration that Smith must leave Missouri territory within three days or die. Smith remained in hiding while his family moved to Carroll county where he joined them,-far out on what was then frontier. Calvin Smith, son of Hum- phrey, in his autobiography, says that in that campaign "Hell was turned loose" in Howard county; that "the free state men fled from the territory and that half of them never returned."

Smith estimated that mob violence and the fear of it drove 3,000 citizens out of Missouri territory between 1816 and 1821 on account of their free soil. views. Smith and his brothers owned slaves. He said that in the time of slavery it was "a matter of compulsion and necessity" to keep slaves in Missouri for work, but that the Smiths never sold a slave, setting those they owned free when the Civil war came on. The Smiths of Smithville became widely known as free soilers. The head of the family, Humphrey Smith, commonly called "Yankee" Smith, never forgot his early experiences with the mob in Howard county. When he was nearing the end of his life in 1857, he left to his sons this injunction: "Never let the nigger thieves know where I am buried, until my state is free; then write my epitaph."

"Yankee" Smith's Epitaph.

Frequently "Yankee" Smith was knocked down for the expression of his anti-slavery sentiments. Some one would ask, "Smith, are you an abolitionist?"

"I am," the old man would answer promptly. Then would come the knock- down. As he arose from the ground and brushed off the dust, the old man would say calmly :

"O, that's no argument. You are stronger than I am, but that don't prove you are right."

Smith died of smallpox and the story circulated in the neighborhood was that infection was carried by a newspaper called "The Herald of Freedom" which came through the mail from Lawrence, Kansas, to Smith. The tomb- stone, reared after the Civil war, bears this inscription :

"This patriot came to Missouri in 1816, from the State of New York; labored to make the territory into a free state, for which he was mobbed by armed slaveholders, scourged, bruised and dragged at midnight from his house. His ever faithful wife, com- ing to his assistance, received injuries at the hands of the mob which caused her years of affliction. He was compelled to leave the state. His wife and family fled from Howard to Carroll county; there joining his family he moved to Clay county, where for many

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years he kept up the struggle against the 'negro thieves or man stealers.' They denounced him as an abolitionist, because he was in favor of human liberty for all men. His re- quest was, 'Never let men stealers know where I am buried until my state is free, then write my epitaph: Here lies Humphrey Smith, who was in favor of human rights, universal liberty, equal and exact justice, no union with slaveholders, free states, free peoples, union of states, and one and universal republic.'"

Politics at a Campmeeting.

In the midst of the statehood agitation the grand jury of Howard county returned an indictment against Humphrey Smith. This was made public on the 20th day of October, 1820. The indictment was signed by J. S. Findley. foreman, and set forth that --

"He, the said Humphrey Smith, wished that the negroes would raise an insurrec- tion; that he, the said Smith, would volunteer in their cause and head them as their general, that he would rejoice to see an hundred thousand lives lost in effecting their emancipation, thereby endangering the peace and safety of the good citizens of said coun- ty, in violation of the duty of a good citizen, and contrary to the peace and dignity of the United States of America, and the laws and sovereignty thereof."

This indictment of Humphrey Smith grew out of a campmeeting trouble which was reported in the St. Louis Enquirer some time before the finding of the grand jury. The newspaper headed the trouble "A Mob at Boone's Lick" and went on:

"The circumstance transpired at a campmeeting where there was a considerable num- ber of people collected. Smith was discovered to be very busy among the blacks, even so tar as to encourage them to mutinize; some of the citizens remonstrated with him upon the impropriety of such conduct. In reply Smith used insulting language, and declared that if the negroes in the territory would revolt and embody themselves, he would lead them to battle, if necessary. On his uttering these expressions, he was immediately chas- tised, as he would have been anywhere else for similar conduct-there was not the least violence used toward his family."

The First Constitution.

In the general provisions of its first constitution Missouri followed closely Kentucky which state had been admitted in 1792. Universal suffrage was one of the provisions of the Missouri constitution. The purpose of the framers to maintain strictly separation of church and state was shown in the disqualification of clergymen for offices. The legislature was prohibited from granting a charter for more than one bank. St. Louis had just passed through an uncomfortable experience resulting from the competition of two banks in the issue of paper currency and the extension of credit. Both the Bank of Missouri and the Bank of St. Louis had been compelled to suspend. The issue of slavery was not raised seriously in the constitutional convention. The members seem to have taken position unanimously against restriction of slavery. Previous to the presentation of Missouri's petition for statehood in 1818 there had been some sentiment against slavery. When the petition was delayed by Congress and the "Tall- madge" resolution sought to impose conditions on admission. Missourians quite generally resented that action. The framers inserted in the constitution a declaration that the legislature should have no power to emancipate slaves with-

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out the consent of the owners. The constitution further stipulated that the legis- lature might provide for emancipation with the consent of the owners, but if this was done it became the duty of the state to insure humane treatment of the freed slaves. Furthermore the legislature was directed to provide by neces- sary legislation that all free negroes and mulattoes be excluded from the state.

Half a score of sections were devoted to slavery. One of them provided for jury trial in case a slave was.charged with a serious crime. Another forbade any more severe penalty for a convicted negro than for a convicted white man. A third section required the legislature "to oblige the owners of slaves to treat them with humanity and abstain from all injuries to them extending to life and limb."

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Centennial history of Missouri (the center state) one hundred years in the Union, 1820-1921, Volume I, Part 22

Author: Stevens, Walter Barlow, 1848-1939 Publication date: 1921 Publisher: St. Louis, Chicago, The S. J. Clarke publishing company Number of Pages: 1074

Author: Stevens, Walter Barlow, 1848-1939
Publication date: 1921
Publisher: St. Louis, Chicago, The S. J. Clarke publishing company
Number of Pages: 1074