USA > Pennsylvania > Pennsylvania in American history > Part 6
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This graphic and somewhat highly wrought narrative is certainly entertaining and interesting, but there are some features about it which suggest the query as to whether or not it is entirely trust- worthy.
The celebrated William Cobbett, one of the great masters of the English language and later a member of Parliament, was present upon all but five days of the session of 1795-6. " Most of the members will without doubt," he says, "recollect seeing a little dark man, clad in a grey coat some- thing the worse for wear, sitting in the west corner of the front seat. That has been my post." On the 8th of December, 1795, Washington came before the Senate and House assembled in the hall
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of the House, to present his message concerning Jay's treaty with England. He found Congress in a state of "composed gravity" and "respectful silence," and the gallery "crowded with anxious spectators." Cobbett then proceeds :
"The President is a timid speaker. He is a proof among thousands that superior genius, wis- dom and courage are ever accompanied with excess- ive modesty. His situation was at this time almost entirely new. Never till a few months preceding this session had the tongue of the most factious slan- der dared to make a public attack on his character. This was the first time he had ever entered the walls of Congress without a full assurance of meet- ing a welcome from every heart. He now saw even among those to whom he addressed himself numbers who to repay all his labors, all his anxious cares for their welfare, were ready to thwart his measures and present him the cup of humiliation filled to the brim. When he came to that part of his speech where he mentions the treaty with his Britannic majesty he cast his eyes toward the gal- lery. It was not the look of indignation and reproach, but of injured virtue which is ever ready
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to forgive. I was pleased to observe that not a single murmur of disapprobation was heard from the spectators that surrounded me; and if there were some amongst them who had assisted at the turbulent town meetings I am persuaded that they were sincerely penitent. When he departed every look seemed to say: God prolong his pre- cious life."
John Adams, the second President of the United States, was inaugurated here on the 4th of March, 1797. As Adams and Jefferson entered, they were each applauded by their respective party followers. Adams took his seat in the chair of the speaker; Jefferson, Washington, and the secretary of the Senate were upon his left hand, and the Chief Justice and Associate Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States at a table in the centre. Gen- eral James Wilkinson, commander-in-chief of the army, all of the officers of State and foreign min- isters were present. Adams made a short speech, and then, going down to the table at which the judges were sitting, took the oath of office adminis- tered to him by the Chief Justice, Oliver Ellsworth. After his withdrawal, Jefferson was sworn into
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office as Vice-President. John McKoy, who was present, wrote a description of the scene for Poul- son's Daily Advertiser. He says: "The first nov- elty that presented itself was the entrance of the Spanish minister, the Marquis Yrujo, in full diplo- matic costume. He was of middle size, of round person, florid complexion, and hair powdered like a snowball; dark striped silk coat, lined with satin; white waistcoat, black silk breeches, white silk stockings, shoes and buckles. He had by his side an elegant hilted small sword, and his chapeau, tipped with white feathers, under his arm. Thus decorated, he crossed the floor of the hall with the most easy nonchalance possible and an occasional side toss of the head (to him habitual) to his ap- pointed place. He was viewed by the audience for a short time in curious silence. He had scarcely adjusted himself to his chair, when the attention of the audience was roused by the word ' Washington,' near the door of the entrance. The word flew like lightning through the assembly, and the sub- sequent varied shouts of enthusiasm produced im- mediately such a sound as
'When loud surges lash the sounding shore.'
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It was an unexpected and instantaneous expression of simultaneous feeling which made the hall tremble. Occasionally the word ' Washington,' 'Washington,' might be heard like the guns in a storm. He en- tered in the midst and crossed the floor at a quick step, as if eager to escape notice, and seated himself quickly on his chair, near the Marquis Yrujo, who rose up at his entrance as if startled by the uncom- mon scene. He was dressed similar to all the full- length portraits of him-hair full powdered, with black silk rose and bag pendant behind as then was usual for elderly gentlemen of the old school. But on those portraits one who had never seen Wash- ington might look in vain for that benign expression of countenance possessed by him and only suffi- ciently perceptible in the lithographic bust of Rem- brandt Peale, to cause a feeling, as Judge Peters, in his certificate to the painter, expresses it. The burst at the entrance had not subsided, when the word 'Jefferson,' at the entrance door, again electrified the audience into another explosion of feeling sim- ilar to the first, but abated in force and energy. He entered, dressed in a long, blue frock coat, single breasted, and buttoned down to the waist ;
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light sandy hair, very slightly powdered and cued with black ribbon a long way down his back; tall, of benign aspect and straight as an arrow, he bent not, but with an erect gait moved leisurely to his seat near Washington and sat down. Silence again ensued. Presently an increased bustle near the door of the entrance, and the words 'President,' ' President Adams,' again produced an explosion of feeling sim- ilar to those that had preceded, but again diminished by repetition in its force and energy. He was dressed in a suit of light drab cloth, his hair well powdered, with rose and bag like those of Wash- ington. He passed slowly on, bowing on each side, till he reached the speaker's chair, on which he sat down. Again a deep silence prevailed, in the midst of which he rose, and bowing round to the audience three times, varying his position each time, he then read his inaugural address, in the course of which he alluded to, and at the same time bowed to, his predecessor, which was returned from Washington, who, with the members of Congress, were all standing. When he had finished, he sat down. After a short pause, he rose up and, bowing round as before, he descended from the chair and passed
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out with acclamation. Washington and Jefferson remained standing together, and the bulk of the audience watching their movements in cautious silence. Presently, with a graceful motion of the hand, Washington invited the Vice-President, Jef- ferson, to pass on before him, which was declined by Mr. Jefferson. After a pause, an invitation to proceed was repeated by Washington, when the Vice-President passed on towards the door and Washington after him."
Among the spectators of this interesting scene was Rembrandt Peale, the artist, who had a seat in the gallery. Mrs. Susan R. Echard, who in 1859 was still living in Philadelphia at the age of eighty- three years, and who was present, wrote a contem- porary letter to a kinsman in which she said: "When General Washington delivered his Farewell Address, in the room at the southeast corner of Chestnut and Sixth streets, I sat immediately in front of him. It was in the room Congress occu- pied. The table of the speaker was between the two windows on Sixth street. The daughter of Dr. C. (Craik), of Alexandria, the physician and inti- mate friend of Washington, Mrs. H. (Harrison),
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whose husband was the auditor, was a very dear friend of mine. Her brother Washington was one of the secretaries of General Washington. Young Dandridge, a nephew of Mrs. Washington, was the other. I was included in Mrs. H.'s party to wit- ness the august, the solemn scene. Mr. H. declined going with Mrs. H., as she had determined to go early, so as to secure the front bench. It was fortunate for Miss C. (Custis), afterward Mrs. L. (Lewis), that she could not trust herself to be so near her honored grandfather. My dear father stood very near her. She was terribly agitated. There was a narrow passage from the door of en- trance to the room, which was on the east, dividing the rows of benches. General Washington stopped at the end to let Mr. Adams pass to the chair. The latter always wore a full suit of bright drab, with lash or loose cuffs to his coat. He always wore wrist ruffles. He had not changed his fashions. He was a short man, with a good head. With his family he attended our church twice a day. Gen- eral Washington's dress was a full suit of black. His military hat had the black cockade. There
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stood the 'Father of his Country,' acknowledged by nations the first in war, the first in peace, and the first in the hearts of his countrymen. No mar- shals with gold-colored scarfs attended him; there was no cheering, no noise; the most profound silence greeted him, as if the great assembly desired to hear him breathe, and catch his breath in hom- age of their hearts. Mr. Adams covered his face with both his hands; the sleeves of his coat, and his hands were covered with tears. Every now and then there was a suppressed sob. I cannot describe Washington's appearance as I felt it-perfectly composed and self-possessed till the close of his address-then, when strong nervous sobs broke loose, when tears covered the faces, then the great man was shaken. I never took my eyes from his face. Large drops came from his eyes. He looked to the youthful children who were parting with their father, their friend, as if his heart was with them, and would be to the end."*
While Congress held its sessions in this build- ing, the United States Mint and the United States Bank were established; Vermont, Kentucky and *G. W. P. Custis's " Recollections of Washington," p. 434.
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Tennessee were admitted into the Union; the army and navy were organized upon a permanent basis; Jay's treaty, determining our relations with Eng- land, resulting in much difference of opinion, was considered and ratified ; the whiskey insurrection was suppressed; the wars with the Indians, con- ducted successively by Harmar, St. Clair and Wayne-all of them Pennsylvanians-were fought, and, in the ably managed campaign of Wayne, the power of the hostile tribes was finally broken, and the West won for civilization; and the brief war with France, reflecting much credit upon our youthful navy and upon Commodore Thomas Trux- ton, afterward Sheriff of Philadelphia County, was courageously undertaken and maintained. Here, too, was officially announced the death of Wash- ington, when John Marshall offered a resolution " that a committee, in conjunction with one from the Senate, be appointed to consider on the most suitable manner of paying honor to the memory of the man first in war, first in peace and first in the hearts of his countrymen," thus originating an ex- pressive phrase destined in America never to be for- gotten. Congress sat here for the last time on the
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14th day of May, 1800. The last act of the Sen- ate in this building was to request the President to instruct the Attorney-General to prosecute William Duane, editor of the Aurora, for a defamatory libel. Then, after the passage of a resolution extending its thanks to "the commissioners of the city and county of Philadelphia for the convenient and elegant ac- commodations furnished by them for the use of the Senate during the residence of the national govern- ment in the city," that august body adjourned to meet thereafter in the city of Washington, and the éclat incident to the location of the capital of the country departed from Philadelphia forever.
At a later period a committee of Congress recommended the appropriation of a sum of one hundred thousand dollars as compensation by the government for the use of these buildings, but nothing came of the proposition, and this city has the satisfaction of knowing that among its many patriotic services is the fact that without return of any kind, it furnished during ten years an abiding place to the homeless nation .*
* Brodhead's "Location of the National Capital," Magazine of American History, January, 1884.
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The subsequent history of the building is less eventful, and, though covering a period when it would seem that the facts ought to be accessible, is in reality much more obscure. A plan in a volume entitled "Philadelphia in 1824," shows that at that time the north room of the lower floor was occu- pied by the District Court, the south room by the Common Pleas, the north room of the upper floor by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, the south room by the Circuit Court of the United States, and that between these two rooms on the upper floor on the west was the Law Library, and on the east were the Controllers of Public Schools. Definitely when these courts began their sessions here neither Judge Mitchell, nor Thompson Westcott, who made a thorough search of the newspapers and most other sources of contemporary information, was able to ascertain. Some further light can now, however, be given. In the printed report of the trial, in 1809, of General Michael Bright, before Judges Bushrod Washington and Richard Peters, in the Circuit Court of the United States, an important case which involved a question of jurisdiction be- tween the State of Pennsylvania and the United
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States Government, and whose events of a very warlike nature caused the house at the northwest corner of Seventh and Arch streets to be known as Fort Rittenhouse, upon page 201, there appears an affidavit of Thomas Passmore, an auctioneer of the city. He deposed "that, on Sunday last, the 30th of April, ultimo, between five and six o'clock in the afternoon, as he was standing near the door of the County Court House, at the corner of Sixth and Chesnut Streets, he heard some voices calling from the balcony of the Court House, 'Corless, that's wrong.' Upon looking round this deponent saw Matthias Corless, who this deponent under- stood was one of the jurors in the case of the United States against Bright and others, passing from the said Court House across the street towards the Shakespere Hotel, a tavern situate at the north- west corner of Sixth and Chesnut Streets." That court was therefore sitting here in 1809. The directory for 1809 says that the Orphans' Court then sat "on the third Friday of every month at the County Court House." The jurisdiction of the Orphans' Court was at that time exercised by the judges of the Court of Common Pleas, who
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were also the judges of the Courts of Oyer and Terminer and of the Quarter Sessions. It is prob- able, therefore, that the United States Courts and the Common Pleas, with its accessories, commenced their sessions here soon after the building was sur- rendered by the Congress, and presumably the Common Pleas continued to hold its sessions in the building until the number of criminal cases became so great as to require continuous sessions of the criminal courts. The United States Courts remained until September 15, 1826. According to Westcott, the District Court began to hold its sessions here in 1818, and it continued to sit here until its final dissolution on the 4th of January, 1875. The following list of the judges of that court while in this building is taken from Martin's "Bench and Bar":
PRESIDENT JUDGES.
JOSEPH HEMPHILL, May 6, 1811.
JOSEPH BORDEN MCKEAN, October 1, 1818. JARED INGERSOLL, March 19, 1821. MOSES LEVY, December 18, 1822.
JOSEPH BORDEN MCKEAN, March 21, 1825.
JOSEPH BARNES, October 24, 1826.
THOMAS MCKEAN PETTIT, April 22, 1835.
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JOEL JONES, April 8, 1845. GEORGE SHARSWOOD, February 1, 1848. JOHN INNES CLARK HARE, December 1, 1867.
ASSOCIATE JUDGES.
ANTHONY SIMMONS, May 6, 1811.
JACOB SUMMER, June 3, 18II.
THOMAS SERGEANT, October 20, 1814.
JOSEPH BORDEN MCKEAN, March 27, 1814.
JOSEPH BARNES, October 1, 1818.
JOSEPH BORDEN MCKEAN, March 17, 1821. BENJAMIN RAWLE MORGAN, March 29, 1821. JOHN HALLOWELL, March 27, 1825.
CHARLES SIDNEY COXE, October 24, 1826.
THOMAS MCKEAN PETTIT, February 16, 1833.
GEORGE MCDOWELL STROUD, March 30, 1835. JOEL JONES, April 22, 1835.
JOHN KING FINDLAY, February 5, 1848.
JOHN INNES CLARK HARE, December 1, 1851.
MARTIN RUSSELL THAYER, December 1, 1867.
THOMAS GREENBANK, December 7, 1868.
MARTIN RUSSELL THAYER, March 27, 1869.
JAMES LYND, December 5, 1870.
JAMES TYNDALE MITCHELL, December 4, 1871. AMOS BRIGGS, March 25, 1872.
Upon the abolition of the District Court and the reorganization of the Courts of Common Pleas, the south room of the upper story C and the north room D were assigned to the Court of Common
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Pleas No. 2, and have been occupied by that court until to-day. The judges of No. 2 who have sat here have been :
PRESIDENT JUDGE. JOHN INNES CLARK HARE, January 4, 1875.
ASSOCIATE JUDGES.
JAMES TYNDALE MITCHELL, January 4, 1875. JOSEPH T. PRATT, January 4, 1875.
DAVID NEWLIN FELL, May 3, 1877. SAMUEL WHITAKER PENNYPACKER, January 9, 1889. THEODORE FINLEY JENKINS, January 1, 1894. MAYER SULZBERGER, January 1, 1895.
Three of the judges have gone from this build- ing to the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania-George Sharswood, James Tyndale Mitchell and David Newlin Fell-and perhaps no living American is more widely respected among men of the English- speaking race for his learning and attainments as a jurist than the president judge of this court. The south room of the lower floor was used by the Court of Oyer and Terminer until the erection of the brick building on Sixth street below Chestnut, in 1867, as I am informed by Judge F. Carroll Brewster; and among the famous murder cases tried
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here were those of Richard Smith, Arthur Spring, Charles Langfeldt, and that most ferocious of Phila- delphia murderers, Anton Probst. The Court of Quarter Sessions continued to hold its sessions in that room until its removal to the City Hall, at Broad and Market streets, July 31, 1891. From that time until the present, it has been used for jury trials by Judges Craig Biddle and François Amedée Bregy, of the Court of Common Pleas No. 1. For many years the Law Academy of Phil- adelphia held its moot court in room D.
The Law Association had its meetings and kept its library upon the upper floor from 1819 till 1872, and on October 28, 1841, made a circular announcement that "Gentlemen who wish to con- verse will be pleased to withdraw to the conversation room on the east side of the hall."
The north room of the first floor has been the office of the Prothonotary of the Courts of Com- mon Pleas, Colonel William B. Mann, since Janu- ary, 1879. Before that date it was occupied as the Tax Office, and at a still earlier time by the High- way Department.
The venerable building has not been without
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its vicissitudes. On the 26th of December, 1821, a fire, caused by a defective flue, burned the north- ern part of the roof and injured the cupola, but the activity of the firemen preserved it from destruction. During a conflagration at Hart's building in Decem- ber, 1851, it caught fire several times and was in the greatest danger, but was again happily saved. At one time legislation was proposed and passed by one of the Houses at Harrisburg to tear down the State House and other buildings and sell the ground for what it would bring at auction. The Act of August 5, 1870, providing for the appointment of a building commission, directed that this hall should be removed but, fortunately, that part of the Act has never been carried into effect, and was repealed at the last session of the Legislature. Nor has it been without a suggestion of trag- edy. Upon the morning of December 11, 1866, Judge F. Carroll Brewster, though holding the Court of Common Pleas, sat temporarily in Room D to hear an application for the appointment of a receiver in a case of Vankirk vs. Page. As he leaned forward to talk to an officer an iron ventilator weighing seventy pounds fell from
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the ceiling and crushed the back and legs of his chair .*
On the 16th of February, 1893, the case of Lukens vs. the City, which had been on trial in room D for four days, was given to the jury shortly after three o'clock in the afternoon. As the judge left the court room, the plaintiff asked him whether he would not wait and take the verdict. After a momentary consideration, he declined, saying it could be sealed and brought into the court the next morning. A short time afterward, a mass of plaster and lath, eight inches in thickness and weighing hundreds of pounds, fell upon the bench and chair, crushing the bench to the floor, and so filling the room with débris that for some days the court was held in the lower story. The danger to the judges had no effect to deter a ribald wit of the bar from suggesting, " Fiat justitia, ruat ceiling."
The hour for departure has arrived. There is a French `proverb which runs, that the man who wears silk stockings is careful about stepping into the mud. It has been the good fortune of the Court of Common Pleas No. 2 hitherto to conduct its proceed-
The Press, December 12, 1866.
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ings amid surroundings and influences calculated to be helpful in aiding it to maintain a high standard of rectitude and professional effort. In this place those measures were taken which established the government of the United States upon a firm basis, and started it upon its wonderful career of develop- ment and prosperity. Here for the greater part of a century the rights of personal liberty of the citi- zens of Philadelphia were decided, and their rights of property, since the judgments of the District Court were for the most part final, were deter- mined. The tread of Washington and Adams and Jefferson had scarcely ceased to resound amid these walls, before they began to hearken to the learning of Mckean and Sharswood and Hare. The elo- quence of Stockton and Morris, of Marshall and Boudinot, strenuous and urgent about matters of state and finance, died away into the past only to give place to the eloquence of Binney, and Meredith, and McCall, and Cuyler, and Brewster, and Shep- pard, striving for the solution of abstruse and intricate legal problems, and that of Reed, and Brown, and Mann, and Cassidy, contending over questions of life and death. And it is to be hoped
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that the end is not yet. We depart with an assured faith that the people of this efficient and forceful community, possessing as they do the sacred fanes of America, and mindful as they are of the import- ance and value of such possession, will see to it that this building is retained unchanged for the future generations of citizens, and that its hallowed mem- ories are carefully preserved and proudly cherished.
THE PURCHASE OF LOUISIANA
[An address delivered at the ST. Louis FAIR on Pennsylvania Day, the one hundred and tenth anniversary of the Battle of Fallen Timbers. ]
I N the United States of America, while the terms east and west are more or less uncertain in their designation, it is perhaps sufficiently accu- rate to say that when reference is made to the West that region is intended which is not included within the limits of the thirteen original states and lies to the westward of the Allegheny mountains. The settlement of this region and the knitting of the ties which were to unite it to the states bordering upon the Atlantic ocean were of the utmost im- portance to the nation. In time it has come to be the centre of population, as well as of political in- fluence, and if it had remained permanently under the control of Spain, France or England, or of any other foreign country, in the large sense there never
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would have been a nation at all. During the War of the Rebellion there were sacrificed a half million of lives and there were expended four billions of dollars to prevent a cleavage of the country by a line running eastward and westward. It was cor- rectly felt that such a division meant the ultimate loss of all that the future had in store for us and that supreme efforts must be exerted to avert the threatened calamity. A cleavage by a line run- ning northward and southward along the Allegheny mountains would have been equally fatal. We are able in this way to form some estimate of the im- mense advantages to the country which resulted from securing that region as a part of the national domain. If it shall come about, as now seems probable, that the American people are to be one of the dominant nations, imposing their race char- acteristics, seizing the avenues of trade, and extend- ing their institutions, and if, as also seems probable, their national force shall be exerted under the in- fluence of the states within the valley of the Mis- sissippi, then the settlement of the West was an event of tremendous significance in the history of the world.
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