History of Philadelphia, 1609-1884, Part 162

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898. cn; Westcott, Thompson, 1820-1888, joint author
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Philadelphia, Pa. : L. H. Everts & Co.
Number of Pages: 992

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His time and energies were not, however, solely engrossed with his professional obligations, and with the discharge of those public duties incident to his incumbency of the official positions indicated; he was connected with other enterprises of wide scope, and in many societies and associations rendered, with- out remuneration, services professional and otherwise, He was the first president and one of the founders of the Social Art Club, for many years a director and the counselor of the Musical Fund Society, one of the trustees of the Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Art, etc.

Burdened, as Mr. Cuyler was, by a multiplicity of onerous duties, and laboring, as he did, with untiring zeal in the line of his profession, and in such respon- sible and honorable positions as he chanced to be placed, it was but natural that his health should eventually give way, despite the fact that he pos- sessed naturally a vigorous constitution. After sev- eral months of ill health, superinduced by a too active participation in two or three very important railroad suits, he died on the morning of April 5,

1876. The funeral services were held in the Second Presbyterian Church, on Saturday, April 8th, Dr. Beadle, the pastor, delivering a strong and profound discourse upon the life and character of the deceased. At a meeting of the bar, held on April 7th, presided over by Justice George Sharswood, resolutions eulo- gistic of Mr. Cuyler were adopted, and appropriate remarks were made by Messrs, Henry M. Phillips, George W. Biddle, William A. Porter, Daniel Dough- erty, Stephen S. Remak, Chapman Biddle, and Judge Amos Briggs. On the 5th of April, upon the direc- tion of President Judge Joseph Allison, a minute was entered upon the records of the Court of Quarter Sessions of the Peace, reciting the extraordinary pro- fessional abilities, and the distinguished career at the bar of Mr. Cuyler. Resolutions, or minutes, of a highly eulogistic character, were also adopted by the directors of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, the Park Commission, the Social Art Club, the Pennsyl- vania Museum and School of Industrial Art, the trustees of the Second Presbyterian Church, and the Equitable Life Assurance Society.

Robert Cooper Grier was a native of Cumberland County, Pa., the son of Isaac Grier, a Presbyterian minister of the gospel. Isaac Grier was a near re- lation to Margaret Grier, who married Andrew B. Stephens, a native of the region near the mouth of the Juniata River, and father of Alexander H. and Linton Stephens, of Georgia, the former Vice-Presi- dent of the Confederate States, and lately Governor of Georgia, and the latter at one time one of the judges of the Supreme Court of that State. Judge Grier graduated at Dickinson College in 1812, the same year in which his kinsman, Alexander Stephens, was born. He was then eighteen years old. After spending some time as head master of a college, he studied law under Charles Hall, Esq., a lawyer of Sunbury, and was ad- mitted to the bar in 1817. His first judicial appoint- ment was as judge of the District Court of Alleghany. In 1846, on the death of Judge Baldwin, he was made one of the judges of the Supreme Court of the United States.

Judge Grier was one of the most extensively and variously-informed men who have ever sat upon the bench. The habits of youth and younger manhood, that the straitened circumstances of his family made necessary, resulted in the production of such an ac- complishment, which when exhibited with becoming sparingness and modesty are extremely interesting to contemplate. Ile removed, two years after his ap- pointment, to Philadelphia. No man who had pre- ceded Judge Grier upon the bench has left a better reputation for courtesy and kindness to bench and bar, and for probity and fairness in the rendition of the judgments of the court for extent and variety of learning, and for strength and comprehensiveness of mental grasp. During the exciting times of con- tinued agitation of the various questions pertaining to slavery, the Fugitive Slave Law, the repeal of

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the Missouri Compromise, the Kansas-Nebraska, and give direction to the religious education of his child. other Congressional proceedings regarding slavery in ' The decision affirmed such right, and it was indorsed, the Territories, and the opening of the civil war, he with a complimentary notice of the presiding judge, by Judge Kent. presided as a tower of strength in the courts of the United States. Baldwin, his predecessor, had been thought by some to be almost too prompt in enfore- ing the laws upon these subjects ; but Judge Grier carried himself with the deliberateness and the equa- bility, neither hasting nor resting, that he employed in every question, great or small, that involved no principles except those which related only to the or- dinary transactions of mankind. Whatever were his opinions regarding the morality of the institution of slavery, or the misfortunes that its existence iu- flicted. he felt that he could not but hold himself to the law which he was sworn to follow, and leave where it belonged the province of repeal or amend- ment.

Mr. Brown in the "Forum," says, "Mr. Justice Grier is a man of more general and practical knowl- edge than Judge Washington. His classical attain- ments are higher and more cultivated. The grasp of his mind is stronger and more comprehensive; but for experience, and perspicuity, patience, dignity,- and above all, disinterestedness,-no judge that has ever preceded or followed Judge Washington ever equaled him."

The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, since its or- ganization in 1838, has had several very able judges. Ellis Lewis was a native of York County. Medicine was the profession that he first was inclined to adopt, but he gave it up when fully of age, was admitted to the bar in 1822, and the following year became deputy attorney-general for Lycoming and Tioga Counties. At Bradford, whither he removed from Williamsport, he rose into lucrative practice, and in compliment for the able service he had rendered in the Legislature, and his warm support of Andrew Jackson, he was ap- pointed in 1833, by Governor Wolf, attorney-general of the State. This office he held for only a few months, resigning in order to take that of presideut of the Eighth Judicial District. In 1845 he became president judge of the Second Judicial District. In the year 1851, Judge Lewis was elected to the bench of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, and through the rotation prescribed by law (a singular law, we re- mark, by which the judge who held for the shortest term-three years-was so honored) he became, ou the expiration of the term of Judge Black, chief jus- tice, and so continued until the end of his term, in 1857. Judge Lewis has ever been regarded as a very able judge, notwithstanding the fact that he devoted so much of the time not occupied with official duties to polities and other studies. One of the most cele- brated and important of his decisions, made while he was district judge, is that of Commonwealth vs. Arm- strong, a decision that Chancellor Kent quoted in his "Commentaries on American Law." The question was as to the extent of a parent's exclusive right to

George W. Woodward was a native of Bethany, Tioga Co. After the completion of his education at Wilkesbarre he studied law in the office of Garrick Mallery, Esq., and was admitted to the bar in 1830. In 1841 he became judge of the Fourth Judicial Dis- trict, and in 1852, upon the death of Judge Coulter, he was appointed to the bench of the Supreme Court by the Governor for the unexpired term of the de- ceased, and at the election by the people the same year was elected for the full term of fifteen years. The personal resemblance of Judge Woodward to Judge Gibson was often remarked. Upon their re- semblauce in other respects David Paul Brown runs the following interesting comparison between them : "Judge Gibson's attainments were more comprehen- sive and diversified, but less concentrated and avail- able; his mental grasp was stronger, but it was not so steady. Judge Gibson struck a harder blow, but did not always plant it or follow it up so judiciously. Judge Gibson sometimes rose above expectation ; Judge Woodward never falls below it. Judge Gib- son's industry did not uniformly equal his talents ; Judge Woodward's talents are, if possible, surpassed by his industry. Judge Gibson was, perhaps, the greater man, Judge Woodward the safer judge."

John C. Knox. born in 1817, appointed deputy attorney-general for Tioga County in 1840, became judge eight years afterward, having been appointed by Governor Shunk president judge of the Tenth Judicial District. The judiciary becoming, under the new Constitution, elective, he was elected in 1831 to the presidency of the Eighteenth Judicial District. In 1853 he was raised to the Supreme Court by Gov- ernor Bigler for the remainder of the term of Judge Gibson, who had died, and was elected by the people in the same year. His reputation as a judge was high. He died Aug. 28, 1880.

One of the most eminent of the judges who have sat npon that bench was George Sharswood. And be- cause of his so recent decease we might fitly make an extended notice of this great judge. But besides the delicacy involved in such work, his career, both as judge and author of works upon legal science, is too well known to require but a brief summary. After having enjoyed and profited by the best advantages of academic studies, graduating at Pennsylvania University, and reading in the office of Joseph R. Ingersoll, he began the practice in 1831. Since the organization of the Supreme Court of the State, whether since it was made dependent upon election by the people, or receiving appointments from execu- tive action, it has not had an incumbent superior to Justice Sharswood. For several years he was in moderate practice as a lawyer, and was somewhat prominent in politics as a member of the Whig party.

Geo. Thesword

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He was a member of City Councils for some years, a member of the Pennsylvania Legislature, House of Representatives, 1837-38, a member of Select Coun- cil from 1838 to 1841, and a member of the House of Representatives, 1841-43. His opinions being known to be in favor of free trade, his party gradually dritted away from him, until he found himself numbered with the Democrats. On the 2d of April, 1845, he was appointed associate judge of the District Court of the city and county by Governor Francis R. Shunk. On the 1st of February, 1848, he was com- missioned president judge of that court, in place of Hon. Joel Jones, resigned. He was elected president judge of the same court in 1850, and was re-elected in 1860. He remained at the head of that tribunal until 1867, when he was elected, as a Democratic candidate, associate jus- tice of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, and took his seat in 1868. By rota- tion as the oldest judge in commission, he became chief justice Dec. 4, 1878, and held the office until the first Monday of Jan- uary, 1883, when he re- tired. He was the recip- ient of a banquet given in his honor by the Philadel- phia bar shortly after- ward. He died May 28, 1883, aged seventy-two years. Judge Sharswood was an industrious legal author while yet at the bar. He edited " Black- stone's Commentaries," "Byles on Bills," "Star- kie on Evidence;" at a later period, " Russell on Crimes," "Leigh's Nisi Prius," " Roscoe on Crimi- nal Evidence," and "Smith on Contracts." He was the author of original works : "Professional Ethics," 1854; "Popular Lectures on Commercial Law," 1856; and " Lectures Introductory to the Study of the Law," 1870. Some of these were the results of his eighteen years' work as professor of law-between 1850 and 1868-in the University of Pennsylvania.

Davis Paul Pour.

The District Court for the city and county of Phila- delphia (organized in 1811) has had a succession of able judges. Among these George McDowell Stroud was conspicuous, not only for the vigor, but the rapidity of his decisions and actions. The enormous quantity of business that devolved upon that court, however, required a judge that was swift in its dis- patch, even if, as was sometimes complained of Judge

Stroud, he may have been at times too impatient, and so made rulings that operated inconveniently to counsel and parties litigant. Impatience in a judge is far better than indolence. Impatience, in most cases, may be rendered harmless by a reversal of a decision, either by the judge who made it, after subsequent calm reflection, or by a higher tribunal, whereas indo- Jence brings those sickening delays that are often as hurtful to justice as the denying or selling it would be. Judge Stroud was appointed in 1835, for ten years. He retired at the end of his term, but was re- appointed in 1848, and in 1851 was elected under the amended Constitution, and re-elected in 1861. He continued to the end of his term, in 1871, making a nearly continuous service of thirty-six years. He died in 1875.

Among others of the judges of the Court of Common Pleas may be mentioned the names of John Hallowell, J. Rich- ter Jones, Anson Virgil Parsons, James Camp- bell, Oswald Thompson, William D. Kelley, Jo- seph Allison.

We close the account of those members of the bench and bar who are deceased with a reference to David Paul Brown, to whose work, the " Fo- rum," we have so often referred, which has been of inestimable service in the work we have had on hand. He also has, too, recently deceased, and is too well remembered to allow of any other than a brief sketch. His liter- ary productions are no- ticed in another chapter. HIe was born in Philadelphia, Sept. 28, 1795, was edu- cated partly by his mother and private teachers, and in Massachusetts by a clergyman in the classics. ou the completion of his education he decided that his future profession should be the practice of medicine. For that purpose he entered the office of Dr. Benja- min Rush, and remained until the death of the latter, when he abandoned the medical profession, and turned his attention to the law. 1Ie entered the office of William Rawle, the elder, and after a due course of study was admitted to the bar on the 4th of September, 1816. He was a brilliant and effective speaker, and soon attracted attention. In criminal cases he was at one time considered an advocate of great power, especially with a jury, and he had for

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some years the leading criminal practice of the city, with occupation in the civil courts of importance and value. At one time he appeared in almost every important criminal case, and his practice was lucra- tive. But, while he was earning money with ease and great rapidity, he was deficient in economy and frugality, and seemed to spend faster than he made. The profitable period of the life of a lawyer will not extend over his whole life, if his term at the bar should be as extensive as was that of Mr. Brown. Of late years he went out from the public sight, and, with but a moderate practice, amused himself by literary pursuits. His poems occasionally found their way into the newspapers. Some of them were originally published in the Sunday Dispatch. In earlier life he wrote and published "Sertorius," a tragedy, in which the elder Booth took the principal part ; "The Prophet of St. Paul's," a drama, which was also performed in one of the Philadelphia theatres ; "Love and Honor," a farce, which, we believe, was never played. His book entitled "The Forum; or Forty Years' Full Practice at the Philadelphia Bar," was published in two volumes octavo, and, although it contains much that is interesting, is also remarkable for its utter absence of allusions to many matters connected with law and lawyers in Philadelphia, in the period named, which were of great interest. Mr. Brown's great strength profes- sionally was in the skill and power which he pos- sessed in the examination of witnesses, his easy and flowing oratory, his classic style, and, particularly, a readiness of retort and repartee, which frequently did more than his most impassioned eloquence.

One of the most distinguished of the living contem- poraries of David Paul Brown is Hon. Benjamin Har- ris Brewster, at present the Attorney-General of the United States. He was born in Salem County, N. J., Oct. 13, 1816, and is a son of Francis E. and Maria Hampton Brewster. His grandfathers (Brewster and Hampton) were both surgeons in the Revolutionary army. His father was an eminent lawyer, who ranked high at the bar of this city, and other mem- bers of the family have distinguished themselves in various relations of life. Mr. Brewster is, of course, college-bred, and, like all young Jersey gentlemen of his day, an alumnus of Princeton, being a member of the class of 1834. He now wears the degrees of A.B., A.M., and LL.D. The effect of his Princeton training is reflected in much that Mr. Brewster says and writes. He is orthodox in everything, and or- thodoxy in everything commands his respect and admiration. Simultaneous with leaving college Mr. Brewster began the study of the law. His preceptor was the now venerable Eli K. Price, the Nestor of the Philadelphia bar. He was admitted to the prac- tice of his profession in 1838, and won prominence at once. There were giants in those days,-Binney and Sergeant and Meredith and the other great men who have shed an ineffaccable lustre upon the Philadel-

phia bar being still active; but even in this great company the abilities of the young advocate were easily discernible. He soon achieved greatness, and for thirty years has been the preferred counselor of Philadelphians. A list of the great cases in which he has been engaged would fill a column in a news- paper. No living Philadelphia lawyer has so ex- tended a reputation, and no one has been oftener summoned abroad to argue important causes.

Mr. Brewster's reputation as a legal practitioner is of a twofold character. He not only possesses a mind stored with ripe knowledge and jurispru- dential acumen, but, unlike many eminent jurists, his power as an eloquent advocate before a jury is great. The only two public offices of great im- portance which Mr. Brewster has held have been strictly within the line of his profession. In 1867 he was appointed by Governor Geary attorney-general of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania. His term of service continued until 1869, when he resigned. In 1881, upon the resignation of Hon. Wayne Mac- Veagh, Mr. Brewster was appointed by President Arthur to the office of Attorney-General of the United States. This office he still holds, having during his two years' incumbency of the high posi- tion reflected great credit upon the country, the national administration, and the bar.

Besides the two great offices mentioned, Mr. Brew- ster has seldom been in the service of the public. He has rarely been an office-holder, and never an office- seeker. His first taste of public life was in 1846, when, at the age of thirty years, he was appointed a commissioner by President Polk to adjudicate the claims of the Cherokee Indians against the United States.

Besides his labors at the bar, and his public ser- vices in the State and nation, Mr. Brewster has de- voted very considerable attention to literary pursuits ; and as a finished linguist, a delightful conversation- alist, an attractive orator, and a polished writer he is equaled by few. His numerous public addresses upon a variety of occasions have been replete with rich erudition, and his contributions to current litera- ture have been characterized by great learning and rhetorical skill. In the words of a biographer, "He has been a close student of belles-lettres, is a versatile and brilliant essayist, a correct, original, and pro- found thinker, a graceful, eloquent, and forcible speaker;" and, as another biographer has said,-

"To listen to him is at once to be enchanted and to be instructed. Every ancient and modern author is at his tongue's end, and the only trouble one ex- periences is when he throws at the more unlettered of us some quotation from Eschylus or Horace or Virgil. The study of the history of the Middle Ages- of that long, black period, when the only lamp that illumined the world was held in the hands of 'Holy Mother Church'-seems to have especially fascinated him, and his lecture or monograph upon Gregory VII.

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is, in my opinion, the greatest tribute ever paid to the greatest man of his time, who lived between the decay of Pagan Rome and the rise of Christian civilization, -a greater man than Charlemagne."

In his personal and domestic life Mr. Brewster is none the less eminent. Like the great Duc de Guise, who, with his brother, the Cardinal Lorraine, founded the mighty Catholic League in France, and was the power behind the throne during the reign of three monarchs, and who had hopes of royalty himself, he bears the marks of recognition on his face. Of little more than medium height, and now slightly inclined to corpulency, he dresses with faultless taste, but after the style of a generation ago. In dress, as in manners and morals, he is inclined to be old-fashioned. His manners are courtly, he recalls the ancien noblesse, and he would be distinguished in any assemblage. His popularity among his friends and acquaintances is proverbial.

Before his appointment to the cabinet, and prior to his removal to Washington, Mr. Brewster was noted for his domesticity. His home was characterized by solid comfort, substantial wealth, and uncontaminated virile taste in everything. His inner office, the sanc- tum sanctorum, as it were, which was in the same building, was a delightful spot. There was no other law-office in Philadelphia to compare with it in its comforts, furnishings, and attractiveness.

In 1857, Mr. Brewster was married to Elizabeth Von Myrbacke de Reinfeldts, a Prussian lady, who died in 1868. In the summer of 1870 he was again married, his second wife being a daughter of Robert J. Walker.

Hon. William Darrah Kelley, jurist and statesman, senior member of the National House of Representa- tives, and so often termed the "Father of the House," was born in Philadelphia April 12, 1814, and was the grandson of Maj. John Kelley, an officer of the Rev- olutionary army. His success in life is altogether the fruit of his own efforts, as his father died when he was a mere child. His first employment was as a reader in a Philadelphia printing-office, which he left to spend seven years as an apprentice in a jewelry- house. Thoroughly learning his trade, he accepted a situation in Boston from 1835 to 1839. His leisure hours were given to study, and when he left the latter city to return to Philadelphia, he had acquired a reputation as a writer and speaker. Here he studied law, and exhibited so decided a tendency for political affairs that in several campaigns he took the stump for the Democratic party. In 1841 he was admitted to the bar; in 1845-46 he was attorney-general of Pennsylvania, and from 1846 to 1856 judge of the Court of Common Pleas of Philadelphia. In 1854 he abandoned the Democratic party, and signalized his entrance into the Republican party by an address in which he opposed the admission of slavery into Kansas or any other of the Territories. In 1860 he was elected by the Republicans to the House of

Representatives of the Thirty-seventh Congress, and has been re-elected ten times in succession ; so that he is now in his twenty-third year of uninter- rupted service. He has filled memberships of all the important committees of the House, and was chair- man of the Committee on the Centennial Celebra- tion. There is no more ardent and efficient advocate and defender of the system of protection of American industry, and his speeches and documents upon the question are a library of reference and informa- tion. Since the retirement of Mr. Blaine from the House of Representatives, he has been chosen to the chairmanship of the Ways and Means Committee in each Congress of which the Republicans have had control. In addition to his many political speeches, a number of addresses on general topics have been published from his pen. In the summer of 1883 he went to Europe for medical treatment, and returned in a much improved condition.

Furman Sheppard, another distinguished member of the bar of to-day, was born at Bridgeton, Cumber- land Co., N. J., in 1824. He graduated with distinc- tion at Princeton in 1845. After leaving college he devoted himself to teaching the classics and mathe- matics in schools and private families for some time, and then commenced the study of law with Judge Garrick Mallery. He was admitted to the bar Sept. 7, 1848, and remained for several years associated with Judge Mallery in the active management and conduct of the business of his office. His range of subsequent practice has included many cases of im- portance and responsibility in the Federal as well as the State courts, and the professional ability therein displayed is conceded by the bar, and has not been without frequent mention and recognition by the bench. He was nominated the Democratic candi- date for the office of district attorney for the city of Philadelphia in 1868, and in October of that year was elected to the office for the term of three years. The entire city ticket was claimed to have been elected by the Democrats, but this being disputed, a contest was entered upon by the Republicans, and the matter went before the courts. A decision was ren- dered affirming the election of D. M. Fox as mayor, but annulling that of the district attorney, the re- ceiver of taxes, and some others. Mr. Sheppard obtained a rehearing of his case, in which it was shown that the court, in deciding against him, had committed an arithmetical error, and he was there- upon restored to the office as its rightful possessor. In the mean time, for about six months, it had been occupied by Charles Gibbons, the opposing candi- date. An appeal from this latter decision was made, and the case carried before the Supreme Court, where, on review, the judgment of the inferior court was affirmed, and Mr. Sheppard thereupon resumed the duties of the district attorneyship, his administra- tion being marked throughout by energy and a high sense of responsibility. In 1871 he was renominated,

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History of Philadelphia, 1609-1884, Part 162

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898. cn; Westcott, Thompson, 1820-1888, joint author Publication date: 1884 Publisher: Philadelphia, Pa. : L. H. Everts & Co. Number of Pages: 992

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898. cn; Westcott, Thompson, 1820-1888, joint author
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Philadelphia, Pa. : L. H. Everts & Co.
Number of Pages: 992