USA > Pennsylvania > Luzerne County > Families of the Wyoming Valley: biographical, genealogical and historical. Sketches of the bench and bar of Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, vol. III > Part 11
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country will always point with honest pride, as being among the ablest and noblest men of his epoch.
His political connections, as well from his own instinct as from inherited influences, had always been with the democratic party. From the foundation of the government his family had also been democrats. Belonging to the yeomanry of the state, whigs during the revolution and soldiers in the continental army, they had no sympathy with, and nothing to hope from, the class of men who formed the federal party of that day. His father had been elected sheriff by the democracy of Wayne county and commissioned by Governor Mckean, and his commission as judge had been given him by Governor Snyder, one of that staunch race of German governors who impressed sound views of public questions upon the people of Pennsylvania in a way that art, sophistry, falsehood, violence and terrorism have in vain sought to disturb. His brothers were also democrats, and were prominent in the politics of the northern part of the state. One of them died in 1825, holding the offices of register, recorder, prothonotary, and clerk of the courts in Wayne; and another of them subsequently repre- sented the Northampton district, to which the county was then attached, in the legislature. Devoted as he was to his profession, he always exhibited a warm and abiding interest in the political issues then pending. The struggle between the administration of General Jackson and the United States Bank was going on with all its virulence, and the position of Judge Woodward in support of the administration was taken promptly and firmly and maintained with unyielding courage and vigor. In 1835, in the unfortunate division of the party between two rival candidates, which resulted in the disaster of the election of Governor Ritner, he took strong ground in favor of Mr. Muhlenburg and against Governor Wolf. The influence of Mr. Ritner's administration upon all the interests of Pennsylvania was evil in an inexpressible degree. It also brought into power for the first time a class of dangerous men. It led to the introduction into the government of the state maxims and practices previously unknown, which, fostered by one party and tampered with by the other, have tended to subvert all safe theories, to demoralize large numbers of the people of the state, and to destroy in many politicians all
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sense of personal honor and public virtue. The chartering by the state legislature of the United States Bank in 1836; the avowed and shameless profligacy in the management of public improvements ; the encouragement given to corporations, and cognate questions, preparing as they did, in an insidious way, the public mind for that tendency to centralized despotism in the national government which is so lamentably manifest now, were all fruits of this original misfortune. From that time to the present there has been no single hour when the public interests have not required at the hands of every Pennsylvania patriot the most patient and vigilant watchfulness and the most energetic and unrelaxing effort to defeat the selfish schemes of speculators and jobbers, and to arrest the tendency which has been uniform and constant toward the subversion of all democratic institutions. In this duty, it is but justice to Judge Woodward to say, that he was always ready to make the sacrifices and to assume the bur- dens which patriotism required of him. Acting steadily with the democratic party, watching anxiously the course of public events, and always ready with his pen, his voice, and his vote to vindi- cate safe principles, he shrunk from none of the occasional odium and none of the local inconveniences which all men who keep unflinchingly in the path of duty must at some period encounter.
In 1836 Judge Woodward was elected a delegate to the con- vention called by the legislature to reform the constitution of the state. Associated with him from Luzerne county were Andrew Bedford, M. D., William Swetland and E. W. Sturdevant, Esqs. In May, 1837, the convention met. It embraced the most expe- rienced and able men of the commonwealth. Its numbers included lawyers in the leading ranks of the bar, judges who had been long upon the bench, and gentlemen who had held high positions in the state and national governments. When it assem- bled there was a small majority opposed to any reform whatever, and that majority included almost every member of established reputation. As a leading member upon the judiciary committee, although only twenty-eight years of age, he at once took rank with such men as John Sergeant, James M. Porter, Thaddeus Stevens, Daniel Agnew, Tobias Sellers, William Findlay, and William M. Meredith. As a pungent, polished, erudite debater
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he found few equals and no superior, and soon took high rank. He believed in all that was expressed in the old democratic motto, "This world is governed too much," and "the best gov- ernment is that which governs least." Judge Woodward was then an obscure and unknown lawyer from the north and one of the youngest men in the convention ; and with defined and strong views in favor of reform, the prospect of success seemed disheartening and unpromising enough. But the feelings of the people of the state were distinct and soon came to be distinctly announced. One step after another was gained, and in the end every object which had been sought by the call of the convention was gained. These debates covered in their range all the leading and vital questions involved in the theories and practices of repre- sentative government. Under the old constitution the judges of the state had been appointed by the governor for life. A leading struggle in the convention was to limit this tenure, and it resulted in a provision for the appointment of judges of the Supreme Court for fifteen years and of the judges of original jurisdiction for ten years. Inferior magistrates had been appointed for life also. It was provided that they, as well as the executive officers of the different counties, should be elected by the people. The power of corporations to appropriate the private property of the citizen under legislative grant was restricted, and in all cases of such appropriation security to the citizen was required. In order to settle a question, which had even then become a source of anx- ious and angry controversy, by constitutional enactment, the right of suffrage was limited to the white inhabitants of Pennsyl- vania. In the earlier constitutions of the state no necessity had occurred to their framers for the insertion of this limitation. No man had dreamed that the rights of political citizenship would be ever claimed for negroes. The argument of Judge Woodward upon this question in the convention was the clearest, ablest, and most convincing vindication of the proposed amendment which the debates contain. In all that has been written and spoken upon the subject since there has been no such satisfactory dis- cussion of the peculiar status of the negro in this country. It was proved that his race was a caste, and that for their benefit, as well as the benefit of the white population, his position of political
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and social inferiority must be recognized. It was shown that any attempt to inculcate practically the theory of the equality of the races would involve the inevitable necessity of leveling not the negro up, but the white man down. It was demonstrated that in all the history of the world, the order of Providence had been that in the struggle of races the weakest should depend on the strongest; that the development and civilization of mankind had been thus always promoted ; and that all efforts founded on the morbid, uneasy, impatient, and restless conscientiousness of extreme men must end in incalculable injury to the superior race, - and in the almost certain annihilation of the inferior and depend- ent caste. It is gravely to be regretted that principles so sound and salutary have come to be abandoned and derided by our present rulers.
At the close of the reform convention Mr. Woodward returned to Wilkes-Barre and resumed the practice of his profession. In the autumn of 1838, after a vigorous contest, David R. Porter, the democratic candidate for governor, was elected. He was sup- ported by Mr. Woodward most ably and efficiently. In April, 1841, a vacancy having occurred in the office of president judge of the fourth judicial district, composed of the counties of Miff- lin, Huntingdon, Centre, Clearfield, and Clinton, he was appointed to that office. His splendid career in that distinguished position is yet well remembered. Before him were then practicing in Bellefonte, where Judge Woodward resided, such men as James Macmanus, H. N. M'Allister, James T. Hale (afterwards on the bench), Colonel (afterwards judge) James Burnside, Andrew G. Curtin, (since governor and minister to Russia), Samuel Linn (since judge), D. C. Boal, and other distinguished lawyers. Shortly after his appointment a division of the district was made, leaving the counties of Centre, Clinton, and Clearfield to compose the fourth district, in which he remained until the expiration of his term, in April, 1851. He discharged the duties of the office acceptably to the people of the district and with great ability and great energy.
From the time of his appointment to the bench, in 1841, Judge Woodward was debarred, by the public opinion prevalent in his party, from active personal participation in political contests.
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His interest in public events, however, was maintained, and he watched their progress with an observant eye, ever ready to coun- sel and advise those who were charged with the responsibility of the government. He supported Mr. Polk for president, and Francis R. Shunk for governor, in 1844, and after the election, as soon as it was ascertained that Mr. Buchanan was to become a member of the cabinet of Mr. Polk, the minds of the leading members of the party throughout the state were turned to Judge Woodward as the candidate for United States senator, to be select- ed in order to supply the vacancy thus created. He received the nomination of the caucus of the democratic members of the legislature, and by every rule regulating the action of political parties in the state was entitled to an election, which the majority of the democrats in the legislature was large enough fully to ensure. Influences, however, were brought to bear upon several members of the majority, whose votes secured his defeat and the election of Simon Cameron, the candidate of the whigs, and of a faction representing for the first time in the politics of the state a native American party. In the case of every democrat who voted against Judge Woodward, his motives, and the manner in which he was controlled, were well known, and, in most instances, fully disclosed at the time; but the pretext by which they attempted to justify their conduct was common to them all.
But although bad men thus gained a temporary triumph over Judge Woodward, by a base and slanderous representation of his feeling towards foreigners, our adopted citizens themselves well understood his position in relation to them. They knew that he had been more truly and earnestly their friend than any of the demagogues who have successively courted, abused, and spurned them. Whenever they have been the victims of popu- lar prejudice-in 1844, when the native American party was first founded; in 1854, when the know-nothing organization swept the northern states with the pervading ruthlessness of an Egyp- tian plague-he was foremost in denunciation of the efforts of bad men to trample on their rights. And the support which he received from foreigners when a candidate for judge of the Supreme Court in 1852, proves that they recognized and realized the falsity of the charges which bad men, from time to time, made
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pretexts for defamation. Mr. Polk was inaugurated in March, 1845, and congress met on the first of the following December. In the interval, the Hon. Henry Baldwin, a justice of the Supreme Court of the United States for the circuit composed of the states of Pennsylvania and New Jersey, had died. On December 23 Mr. Polk appointed Judge Woodward to fill the vacancy. This was done without consultation or communication with him. In conferring the appointment, undoubtedly Mr. Polk was influ- enced by the result of the senatorial election, and by the purpose. to rebuke the unprincipled and unscrupulous intrigue by which that result had been attained. Unfortunately for the success of Mr. Polk's object, the appointment had been made without con- sultation with Mr. Buchanan, the secretary of state, and his oppo- sition to the confirmation, in connection with the hostility of Gen- eral Cameron, led to the defeat of Judge Woodward in the sen- ate. But although General Cameron succeeded in seducing some three or four democrats to unite with him, Judge Woodward had the proud satisfaction of receiving an immense majority of the democratic vote, including all the most illustrious senators of his party.
Judge Woodward thenceforth devoted himself to the discharge of the duties of his office during the remainder of his term, which expired in April, 1851. He then resumed the practice of law in his former office in Wilkes-Barre, and was thus employed until May, 1852, when Governor Bigler appointed him a judge of the Supreme Court, to fill a vacancy caused by the death of the Hon. Richard Coulter. By a constitutional amendment adopted in the year 1850, this office had become elective, and the appointment, therefore, extended only to the first of December, 1852. He was nominated as the democratic candidate by the convention of the party by acclamation, and thus for the first time was able to sub- mit his merits and his claims to the decision and discrimination of the people of the state. He was a candidate in the year of the presidential election, and that was at that time dependent upon the result of the general election in October. It was found in his case, as has been often proved in other cases, that the man who is apparently the last choice of the political managers may well be the first choice of the mass of the voters. In the county
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of Luzerne, where he had spent the greater part of his life, and in several adjacent counties where he was intimately known, he received a larger vote than had ever been polled for a candidate in a contested election ; and he succeeded by a majority in the state that vindicated most amply his professional fitness, his polit- ical position, and the integrity of his character.
Judge Woodward discharged the duties of this responsible and laborious office until 1867, and throughout the whole period his reputation as a judge had been deservedly high. With unusual powers of concentration and great capacity for labor, his style of discussing legal questions was singularly forcible, distinct, and clear. Avoiding all affectation of fine writing on the one hand, and all tendency to epigram on the other, he says of a case just that which it is necessary to say in English, that is always simple, elegant, and racy. There are no opinions in the Pennsylvania reports more intelligible to plain and unlearned men, and there are none more thorough, able, and exhaustive. The judgment of the Supreme Court upon the question of the constitutional right of soldiers to vote was prepared and entered by him. It was decided that this right did not exist, and the plain letter of the constitution was a sufficient warrant for the judgment.
The political position of Judge Woodward was perfectly famil- . iar and perfectly intelligible to the people of Pennsylvania. Reso- lute in his opposition to any dismemberment of the union- ready to sustain the national government in every legitimate and constitutional effort-with two sons connected with the northern army in the east-with two nephews from the outbreak of the war in the armies of the west, and with multitudes of relatives in the military service of the nation everywhere, he insisted upon the maintenance of the institutions of the government in their spirit and integrity-upon the supremacy of the law-upon the preservation of the liberty of the citizen-upon freedom, within clear, legal limits of action, and thought, and speech. He insist- ed upon the maintenance of the constitutional immunities of the states. He was hostile to the whole theory of centralization. Upon this subject, in a letter written on the first day of July, 1852, he said: "The great lesson taught us is, that the Union itself, the product of the states, is to be preserved only by main-
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taining the just rights of the states. This truth, as old as our constitution, is too often forgotten. That the states were pre- existant to the Union, as sovereignties absolutely free and inde- pendent, accountable to no power on earth for their domestic institutions and internal economy ; that they exist still in all the plenitude of their original sovereignty, save in the few particulars and to the precise extent of their voluntary surrender of it in a written constitution, are first principles, to which we do well often to recur." He was opposed to the exercise of every form of arbitrary, discretionary, and despotic power, and was always pre- pared to resist it. That the existence of a war justifies a presi- dent in governing peaceable communities by martial law ; that a temperate discussion of political questions, involving even criti- cism of the policy of the administration, may be punished at the mere whim of a subordinate military officer ; that for such offense punishments may be invented which are unheard of in our juris- prudence; and that the life, liberty, and property of the citizen of a state containing no armed enemy may be invaded upon a government official's theory of "military necessity," are heresies to which Judge Woodward never assented in any position which the accidents of life called upon him to fill.
In 1863 Judge Woodward became the democratic candidate for governor of the state against Governor Andrew G. Curtin, but he was defeated by a majority of over 15,000, although Lu- zerne gave a majority of 2,786 in his favor.
For four years prior to the expiration of his term of office on the supreme bench, he acted as chief justice by virtue of senior- ity of commission, and he gave notice a year before his retire- ment that he should decline a re-election. Hon. George Shars- wood succeeded him.
In June, 1867, he went to Europe, and the death of Hon Charles Denison, who had been elected to represent the twelfth district of Pennsylvania in the fortieth congress, occurring, Judge Woodward was nominated and elected during his absence to fill the vacancy, his majority in Luzerne county being 1,881 over his opponent, Hon. Winthrop W. Ketcham. He was re-elected to a full term in 1868, his majority in Luzerne county being 3,074; his opponent was Hon. Theodore Strong, of Pittston, brother
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of Justice Strong, of the Supreme Court of the United States.
In IS70 he was unanimously nominated by the democratic party for the office of president judge of the eleventh judicial district, but owing to local dissentions in the party he was defeat- ed along with the major part of the ticket, Hon. Garrick M. Harding being his opponent.
After the expiration of his congressional term Judge Wood- ward resumed the practice of the law at Wilkes-Barre, but hav- ing been retained in a number of important cases requiring his presence in Philadelphia, he removed in the fall of 1870 to that city. Here he opened an office on Walnut street, and entered at once upon his professional duties. Owing to his extensive ac- quaintance throughout the state, as well with the people as with the lawyers of the different counties, business came to him from all quarters, and his name will be found associated with many of the great causes of the five years previous to his death. Upon the very morning, and almost at the exact moment, that the tele- gram announcing his death arrived, the Supreme Court, at Har- risburg, was pronouncing its opinion in the case of Cox v. Der- inger, in which he had originally brought suit, and in the trial of which he had participated as principal counsel. As a further co- incidence it may be mentioned that the opinion of the court was read by Hon. Warren J. Woodward, a nephew and former stu- dent of the deceased, who had been elected to the supreme bench at the previous fall election.
While practicing law in Philadelphia Judge Woodward was elected as a delegate at large in the last constitutional convention on the democratic ticket. In that body he was chairman of the committee on "private corporations, foreign and domestic, other than railroads, canals, and religious and charitable corporations and societies," and a member of the committee on "judiciary." His long experience on the bench and wonderful forensic ability made his services very valuable to these committees. In July, 1873, he resigned his seat in the convention, but his resignation was not accepted, and he resumed his position when the conven- tion re-opened the ensuing fall.
Hon. William M. Meredith was president of the convention, and, like Judge Woodward, was also a member of the constitu-
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tional convention of 1837, but died on August 17, 1873, before the convention had concluded its labors. Judge Woodward, in speaking of his death, said :
"Somebody has said that a great man has departed. A great man, indeed, sir! We did not appreciate him. It is the habit of the American mind not to appreciate their great men. The American people seem not to discover the good qualities of a man until he is dead. The old Romans treated their public men differently. If a general achieved a victory for the Roman arms, a triumphal arch was erected, he was welcomed home with wreaths and banners and music, and orations were pronounced upon him, and he was permitted to know what his fellow-coun- trymen thought of him. And so were men of genius, whether orators or poets, honored with public ovations. But in our day the case is very different. The living man is continually belittled. He is regarded as in the way of somebody ; he is slighted; he is neglected ; and yet, when we look at his works, when we listen to his thoughts, after death has set its great seal upon him, we all discover that our fellow-citizen was, indeed, a great and good man. We withhold the meed of praise during his life, but we hasten to bestrew his grave with flowers, now that he is gone.
"Mr. President, in that inimitable form of prayer that is used at the grave, prescribed by the church of England, we are directed to "render hearty thanks for the good examples of all those who, having finished their course in faith, do now rest from their labors." Hearty thanks, sir ! "Hearty thanks" are due only for great blessings ; and is it not a great blessing that we have such an example, the example of such a life as Mr. Mere- dith's ; his learning, his acquisitions of knowledge, his use of that knowledge in illustrating his profession, his high-toned honor that never knew a stain, though he would have felt a stain worse than a wound? Yes, sir, let us be thankful for the good exam- ple of this man, especially now that his work is finished. There is no more danger to him. There is no mis-step that he can take. His labor is done; his work is finished; his record is made up forever. And, sir, allow me to add in conclusion that he died as he had lived, in the faith of Christ, because without touch of fanaticism about him, with no ostentation in his religion, Mr. Meredith was an humble and faithful believer in Christ, and a member of Christ church in this city, and for many years an honored representative in the diocesan conventions, as we all know."
When Judge Woodward was called to the Supreme Court bench the other judges were Black, Gibson, Lewis, and Lowrie,
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all able and eminent jurists, but with whom the new comer at once stood fairly equal. His opinions are exceedingly well writ- ten, clear and forcible, and on all constitutional questions, or questions in which personal rights were involved, they give forth no uncertain sound. His opinions are reported in thirty-six volumes of the Pennsylvania state reports, commencing with Deal v. Bogue, 8 Harris, and ending with Oakland Railway Company v. Keenan, 6 P. F. Smith.
Judge Woodward married, September 10, 1832, Sarah Eliza- beth, only daughter of George W. Trott, M. D. Her mother was Lydia Chapman, daughter of Captain Joseph Chapman, for- merly of Norwich, Connecticut, and subsequently of Brooklyn, Susquehanna county, Pennsylvania. Hon. Charles Miner, in 1849, writes : "On the 12th of February, 1799, in company withi Captain Peleg Tracy, his brother Leonard, and Miss Lydia Chap- man, in one sleigh, Mr. John Chase, of Newburyport, and myself in another, set out from Norwich, Connecticut, and arrived at Hop- bottom the 28th. The snow left us the first night, when we were only twelve miles on our way, and we were obliged to place our sleighs on trundle wheels. Our cheerful, undaunted female friend, through the patience-trying journey of sixteen days (never a tear, a murmur, or a sigh), lived to see her grandchildren, the children of an eminent judge of the Supreme Court." And again he writes: "Miss Lydia Chapman, a lady of high intelligence and great merit, became an inhabitant of Wilkes-Barre and an instructress of a school. Married with Dr. G. W. Trott, their accomplished daughter intermarried with the Hon. George W. Woodward." The children of Judge and Mrs. Woodward were Hon. Stanley Woodward, of this city; Colonel George A. Woodward, of Washington, D. C .; Charles Francis Woodward, of Philadelphia; Ellen May Woodward, deceased; Lydia C. Hancock, deceased, wife of E. A. Hancock; Elizabeth, wife of E. Greenough Scott, of this city ; William Wilberforce Wood- ward, deceased ; John K. Woodward, deceased ; Mary H. Wil- liamson, deceased, wife of J. Pryor Williamson, deceased. Mrs. Woodward died June 21, 1869. In 1871 Judge Woodward mar- ried the widow of Edward Macalester, a man of note and large wealth, in Lexington, Kentucky, and a brother of the late Charles
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