USA > Wisconsin > History of the bench and bar of Wisconsin, Vol. II > Part 31
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Judge Siebecker is a man of positive convictions, but charitable and liberal in his beliefs. Religiously, he is identified with the Unitarian church. He was married May 15, 1879, to Josephine La Follette, three sons being the result of this union-Karl L., Robert L., and Lee L.
The appointment of Judge Siebecker to the circuit judgeship was made under circumstances somewhat peculiar, and was, therefore, looked upon with question by politicians and as experimental by some of the lawyers. The appointment was made by a republican governor; Mr. Siebecker had always been a democrat. So far as the writer's recol- lection goes, it was the first instance in which a circuit judgeship was bestowed, by appointment, upon a man of the opposing party. It is cause for congratulation by the friends of a non-partisan judiciary that the precedent then made has been followed by a governor of each party-by Governor Peck in appointing Judge Fish to succeed Judge Winslow, and by Governor Scofield in appointing Judge Silverthorn to succeed Judge Bardeen. In each of these three cases the act of the executive has been ratified by the people at the polls. Judge Siebecker has twice been elected without opposition. This fact answers fully the doubts of the bar as to the wisdom of his appointment. Those doubts were based upon the youth and comparative inexperience of the ap- pointee. But eight years' experience has set all questions at rest. This fact is highly creditable to Judge Siebecker. His predecessors on the bench were men of acknowledged ability; two of them became members of the supreme court. His bar is one of the strongest in the state, as well as one of the most assertive and independent. The amount of business in the circuit is large, and much of it is "heavy liti- gation." By his courtesy, patience, industry, fairness, knowledge of the law and firm purpose to administer justice without fear, favor or hope of reward Judge Siebecker has fully won the confidence of his
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bar and the respect of the people. His ability and character entitle him to these.
THE BAR.
STEPHEN S. BARLOW.
Stephen Steele Barlow, formerly attorney general of Wisconsin, was born August 17, 1818, in Ballston Spa, New York. When he was an infant his parents moved to Saratoga, and, later, to Mount Morris, Liv- ingston county, New York. The boy attended public schools when they were within his reach, worked on his father's farm, clerked in a village store, and, later, attended a select school and began the study of Latin and Greek. For a time he was a student at the Rochester sem- inary, and while there had for instructors the late James R. Doolittle and Prof. Dewey. When circumstances made it necessary for the young man to leave that institution he resumed his labors on the farm of his father. When about eighteen years of age he began the study of the law in the village of Perry, New York, and, later, studied in an office in Albion, Orleans county.
In 1840 Mr. Barlow arrived in Wisconsin, going to his brother's at Delavan, Walworth county. In April, 1841, he was admitted to the bar by Judge Irwin, and at once entered upon the practice in Delavan. He continued to live there about fourteen years. In October, 1843, he married Ann Maria Parsons, and they lived very happily together for thirty-eight years.
In the summer of 1854 Mr. Barlow moved from Delavan to Delton, Sauk county, where he resided until the decease of his wife, in the fall of 1881, since which time he has made his home at different places, at present residing with his son, Henry P., at St. Paul, Minn.
In 1852 Mr. Barlow was a member of the assembly; he served one year as district attorney of Walworth county, resigning that office when he moved to Sauk county; in 1856 he was chosen county judge of the latter county, and in 1860, district attorney; he held the latter position two terms. In 1867 he was member of assembly, and in 1868 and 1869 state senator; from January 3, 1870, until January 5, 1874, he was attor- ney general.
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Politically Mr. Barlow was first a whig and then a republican. His character and make-up are such that he has always had strong friends among his political opponents. Though not great, in either natural ability or attainments, he has performed well the duties which have been assigned him, and by his faithfulness and the uprightness of his character has established a good name.
ALEXANDER BOTKIN.
Mr. Botkin was born in Kentucky, March 4, 1801; removed to Ohio at an early age, and in 1836 settled at Alton, Illinois, where- he was a justice of the peace at the Lovejoy riot, and took an active part in preserving law and order. In 1841 he came to Wisconsin in the capacity of assistant secretary of the territory, A. S. Field being secre- tary. While performing their official duties these gentlemen engaged in the practice of the law, having formed a partnership for that purpose. In 1846 Mr. Botkin was defeated as a candidate for a seat in the first constitutional convention by John Y. Smith. In 1847 he was elected a member of the territorial house of representatives to fill a vacancy, and served at the October session, 1847, and February session, 1848; he was state senator in 1849 and 1850; was defeated as a candidate for re-election; in 1851 was elected to the assembly. In 1849 he received the votes of the whig members of the legislature as a candidate for United States senator. His death occurred suddenly at Sun Prairie, March 5, 1857.
In his biographical sketches of deceased members of the bench and bar Moses M. Strong says: "Col. Botkin was a remarkably 'strong- minded' man, of wonderful self-reliance and self-assurance, but it was his misfortune that his education had been very greatly neglected, of which, however, he appeared all unconscious, as the following sketch, taken from the archives of the state historical society, shows. In a speech in the senate, denouncing the action of a secret caucus, he said : 'We want a fair fight. We don't want to go crawling around in the brush about this measure. We want action on it to be sub rosa and above board.'" Mr. Reed, in his Bench and Bar (p. 338) says that "for the law" Mr. Botkin "had no special training, but, possessing
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naturally a logical mind, strong reasoning powers and fluency of speech, he soon took rank as one of the ablest jury lawyers in the ter- ritory, which position he maintained up to the time of his death. Mr. Botkin was pre-eminently fitted for political tournaments. He be- longed to the whig school of politicians, and Henry Clay, of his native state, was his political idol. He loved Mr. Clay better than any dem- ocrat ever loved Andrew Jackson, and in those days democratic affec- tion for Jackson bordered upon eastern idolatry. The enthusiasm for these respective champions of the whig and democratic parties was not lessened because of our territorial existence, and Mr. Botkin, owing to his political prominence and his great skill and ability as a public speaker, was designated as a leader under whose generalship the whigs hoped to rescue the territory from the control of the Jackson party. He, accordingly, as early as 1845, came to be regarded as the leading whig in the territory outside of Milwaukee, and after the organization into a state, he controlled in a larger degree than any other whig in it, the policy of his party up to the time of its disruption in 1854. He it was who conceived and planned the nomination of Leonard J. Farwell for governor in 1851, and in whose election the democracy of the state received its first stunning blow."
SINCLAIR W. BOTKIN.
Sinclair W. Botkin, formerly of the Dane county bar, but at the time of his death a member of the Minnesota bar, was the oldest son of Alex- ander Botkin, of whom mention is made elsewhere. He was born at Alton, Illinois, September 19, 1838; became a resident of Dane county, . Wisconsin, in 1841; was educated in the state university, being gradu- ated in 1857 with the degree of A. B .; later he received the degree of A. M .; served several years as deputy clerk of the supreme court and as assistant in the state library. He entered the military service as first lieutenant of company A, twenty-third Wisconsin, and soon be- came captain; in 1863 he resigned and returned home, resuming his duties as deputy clerk of the supreme court and assistant in the state library. He finished his preparation for admission to the bar in the office of Spooner & Lamb, and was admitted in 1866. He was for a
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Jonathan Towoman
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time deputy collector of internal revenue and register in bankruptcy. For nearly twenty-five years he was a member of the firm of Welch & Botkin. In May, 1882, the firm removed to Minneapolis, Minnesota, where Mr. Botkin died October 9, 1893.
JONATHAN BOWMAN.
Mr. Bowman was born at Charleston, Montgomery county, New York, May 16, 1828. His parents, Asa and Ruth Bowman, were farmers. The father was a man of prominence in his section, hav- ing served in the legislature of New York. Jonathan Bowman's general education was obtained in his native state, at the Canajoharie academy, and his legal education at the Ballston law school, Ballston Springs, while Professor Fowler was connected with it, whence he was graduated in 1850. In 1851 he came to Wisconsin, and located at Delton in May of that year; soon thereafter he opened a law office there, and engaged in business ventures, notably in the mercantile line. Busi- ness considerations led him, in 1852, to take a prominent part in laying out the village of Newport, Columbia county; associated with him in this enterprise was Joseph Bailey, who afterward attained national fame as the builder of a dam across the Red river during the civil war. About the same time a village of the same name on the west side of the Wis- consin river was established. The money needed for these purposes and for the erection of a warehouse to accommodate the anticipated . traffic was supplied by Mr. Bowman, who was possessed of more surplus means than were usually brought to this state by the early settlers. These villages flourished for some years.
In 1853 the legislature granted a charter for the erection of the first dam across the Wisconsin river at Newport, Mr. Bowman being named as one of the incorporators. During that year he removed to New- port. Owing to the violation of a pledge that a railroad should be con- structed through Newport and the bridge on which it should cross the river should be built there, these villages suffered irreparable injury. The road was located and the bridge built two miles farther up the river, at what is now Kilbourn City, and in order to keep pace with the progress of events and the advance of the tidal wave of pioneer settle-
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ment then sweeping across the state, Mr. Bowman removed to that place in 1862, and resided there continuously until his death, which oc- curred, after a brief illness, July 16, 1895.
What follows was written by one who knew Mr. Bowman well and esteemed him highly-Michael Griffin, now and for some years past a member of Congress and a lawyer and man much respected through- out Wisconsin. Few, if any, who knew the subject of this sketch will disagree with the estimate of him here given. Mr. Bowman "was prominent in all business enterprises, and especially those which as- sumed the form, in any manner, of public benefit, and by his ability and foresightedness gave and maintained for Kilbourn City a prominence which but for his strong individuality and prominence in the state it could not have attained.
"He was alternate delegate in November, 1860, to the national re- publican convention held in Chicago which nominated Abraham Lin- coln for President, and he often subsequently frankly expressed his keen disappointment which he at that time experienced because the con- vention failed to nominate William H. Seward; but this disappointment · eventually turned into expressions of gratitude for the divine interposi- tion which made Lincoln the national standard-bearer of the republican party and the chief magistrate who guided the nation through the dark- est hour of its history. Lincoln was the type of man which Mr. Bow- . man greatly admired. President Lincoln's kindheartedness, sincerity, strict honesty, unswerving loyalty and devotion to his country and its cause always found a ready response from Mr. Bowman, and in these and many other respects the two men were not greatly dissimilar.
"In 1861 Mr. Bowman was elected to the assembly for the first dis- trict of Columbia county, and in 1862 to the senate from the twenty- fifth senatorial district, and was re-elected to succeed himself, thus serv- ing as a senator four successive years. He was a leading member of the respective branches of the legislature during his term of service therein, and was an earnest and able advocate of all measures affording support to the national and state administrations in the prosecution of the war for the preservation of the Union.
"In 1864 he was chosen one of the presidential electors on the repub-
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lican ticket and was selected as chairman of the electoral college for that year. After the expiration of his term in the senate a severe con- test grew up between the city of La Crosse and the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway company, concerning the location of its railway bridge across the Mississippi river near that city, the representatives of the city contending that the bridge should be located at a definite point for the benefit of the city, and the railway company insisting upon the most feasible location for the erection of its bridge.
"Legislative aid was finally invoked to settle the contention, and in recognition of Mr. Bowman's abilities, his services were secured to present to the committees of the legislature the arguments in support of the position of the railway company. The ablest men in the state were engaged in the contest, which finally resulted in securing for the railway company the desired location, and the success was largely at- tributed to the ability displayed by Mr. Bowman in advocating the cause of the railway company.
"In 1874 he again yielded to the importunities of the members of his party in the first assembly district of Columbia county who desired to be represented by their ablest champion, and consented to become a candidate for the assembly, to which he was elected by an overwhelming majority, receiving all the votes cast in his own township but twelve, which attests his unparalleled popularity where he was best known.
"During the legislative career he devoted himself assiduously to the advancement of public interests, as well as those of his district and the locality in which he resided. It may justly be said that the greatest efforts of his life and his best abilities during his public and private career were cheerfully and unstintingly bestowed and employed in the work of securing legislation in behalf of and promoting the enterprise known as the Kilbourn dam. It had always been his strong desire to see the manufacturing interests of the state developed by utilizing the fine water power afforded by the Wisconsin river at Kilbourn City, and he early sought legislation authorizing the erection of a dam at that point with such purpose in view. To this, objection was made by the lumbermen upon the headwaters of the river, who made use of the same for floating to distant points out of the state the timber and logs
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constituting the natural wealth of the section of country in which they operated, leaving nothing in its stead but a barren waste, and conse- quently there was for many years waged in the legislature the most bitter contest in the history of our state legislation over this ques- tion, with the lumbermen of the upper Wisconsin river combined on one side, and Mr. Bowman, almost solitary and alone, on the other. Yet, notwithstanding the great odds with which he contended, he finally won the victory, and the improvement in the river was made and still exists at his late home as an evidence of his devotion to the interests of his locality and maintenance of a sound principle of the state polity.
"Not only were his services and abilities cheerfully given to this enterprise, but his means were also used to the aid in its advancement, and although the water power has not been utilized to the extent which he hoped for, owing to the constant irritation maintained for many years by the use of the river for floating lumber down over the dam, yet it has to some extent been made very useful, and not long prior to his death he manifested great interest in a proposed plan for further de- veloping and utilizing the same, and seemed confident that his cher- ished anticipations of a lifetime were soon to be realized.
"From 1875 to 1879 he was a member of the board of directors of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway company.
"In 1868 he purchased a controlling interest in the bank of Kilbourn and became its president and remained such until his decease.
"In 1856 Mr. Bowman was united in marriage to Miss Hannah J. Davis, of Montgomery county, New York, who survives him, together with three of their five children, viz .: Abram D., Jennie and Emma.
"At about the age of forty-five years Mr. Bowman's health was un- fortunately impaired as the result of a severe cold, and thereafter he did not devote himself as closely to the practice of his profession as he otherwise would have done. His ample means and banking interests also tended to divert his attention from the practice of law, and hence for many years prior to his death he did not seek or desire active work at the bar. One notable feature in his career as a lawyer is found in the fact that a larger number of lawyers graduated from his office than
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from that of any other lawyer in this state which the writer is now able to recall.
"This is attributable to the fact that no other man in his section of the state combined so many of those excellent qualities which invariably attracted the attention of young men possessing an ambition to become lawyers, and which also created a desire on their part to read law in his office. His kindness to young men seeking to rise in the world, the encouragement which he never failed to extend to those who gave some promise of becoming a success in the profession, made a position in his office extremely desirable. A course of reading with him and coming in daily contact with his methods of transacting legal business advanced the student in the direction of practical knowledge of the law more rapidly than could possibly be attained in any ordinary law school. While becoming instructed in a knowledge of the law they witnessed its application to the affairs of life by a master mind and upon a broad, honest and conscientious basis.
"Among the graduates from his law office are to be found judges,. state senators, a state attorney general, a member of Congress, as well as many others who have attained success as lawyers. Not one of the long list of his law students can be found who does not to-day think himself fortunate to have received instruction from, and been able to profit by, the example of such a superior tutor, and all attribute what- ever measure of success they have attained largely to the excellent maxims and precepts which he so frequently advanced for the benefit of the young men who became students in his office.
"In the senatorial contest in 1881, to fill the vacancy in the United States senate from this state occasioned by the death of the lamented Senator Carpenter, Mr. Bowman, although favoring and urging his friends to support the candidacy of Senator Cameron, came within two votes of securing the republican nomination for senator.
"The caucusing and voting upon the question occurred at a time when the railroads were so obstructed by an unprecedented snowfall that those interested in the contest who were not at the state capital before nature's embargo was laid could not reach there, nor were there
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any means of exit for those who found themselves unwilling visitors at the capital.
"Mr. Bowman was at his distant home during the contest, but he did not hesitate to wire his friends to cast their votes for Senator Cam- eron, notwithstanding the fact that he was fully aware of the strong support which he himself was receiving. But this was characteristic of the man under the circumstances. He had encouraged the can- didacy of Senator Cameron and consistently supported him to the detri- ment of his own success.
"Politically Mr. Bowman was always a republican, beginning his political career with the birth of the party. He was among its first and most earnest supporters in this state and always remained an adherent of republican principles. So far as seeking or holding political position is concerned, it always seemed to afford him more pleasure to support some of his friends than to seek the preferment himself, and this dis- position to aid others first unquestionably prevented his own promo- tion to some of the highest positions in the gift of the people.
"He was well aware of this, yet, so strong was his attachment for his friends that he preferred to sacrifice his own golden opportunities to gratify the desires of those who often and anxiously sought his aid and influence.
"As a lawyer Mr. Bowman was one of the ablest and keenest in the state. He was of that class of high-minded lawyers who esteemed it their first duty to avoid litigation if the rights of their clients could pos- sibly be preserved and secured without resorting to legal redress in the courts: hence litigation under his advice was indulged in only as an absolute necessity; but when he once determined that an appeal to the protection afforded by the law was necessary to properly guard the in- terests or secure the rights of his clients his efforts and zeal were un- ceasing in behalf of the cause which he espoused. In the examination of witnesses he was remarkably skillful, and the untruthful witness whom he failed to unmask by his masterly cross-examination was rarely, if ever, found. In jury trials he was very successful, owing to his excel- lent judgment of men, his quick comprehension, his able and intelli- gent arrangement of the facts, as well as his clear and forcible presenta-
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tion of the arguments in support of his contention. His logic was usually unanswerable, and in all his court work he combined that keen business judgment with the fine legal attainments with which he was endowed, hence when he met a worthy adversary the conflict seemed like the meeting of two Damascus blades, for every sudden contact pro- duced such intellectual animation as tended to move and quicken the · sensibilities of all observers.
"He appeared at his best on momentous occasions when the interests were sufficiently great to arouse all his intellectual forces, and no oc- casion of this character occurred when he did not display evidences of a reserved force or power that seemed to be always at his command when emergency required. Had he retained his health and found it necessary to devote himself strictly to the practice of his profession in order to procure a livelihood he would have won a reputation as a law- yer second in rank to none that our state has ever produced. Even while in active practice a wrong suffered by some poor and helpless person more frequently enlisted his sympathies and services, and with- out the hope of remuneration, than did cases offering large returns in the event of success. He was always ready, even at the sacrifice of much personal comfort to himself, to render assistance to those who were themselves unable to protect their rights.
"His traits of character were of the positive order, the negative being the exception. Intellectually strong, he was also physically well equipped to sustain an active life of mental exertion. For his friends he cherished the warmest attachment and regard. In the domestic circle he was conspicuous for his devotion, his kindness and gentleness of manner. His family were indulged in every wish and desire, and it was in this inner life that the most admirable qualities of the man ap- peared to still greater advantage.
"Those who have enjoyed the hospitality of his commodious and attractive home will ever treasure it as a pleasant memory. In all the affairs and relations of life he was the very soul of honor. No dis- honest or questionable act ever received any countenance from him. As a man he was endowed with all that which tended to make up a noble, honorable character, and his life was in strict keeping therewith.
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