»-•-, V .'i'^ ^ ""^^0^ f. jP-a r ^ «, ►^ •.c«55J^i-k*- o '^^^'^ /\J^y^4s, with which he was so identified that even the briefest sketch of his public services should include some special reference to them. They were the issue of legal tender notes, herein- after discussed in connection with the legal tender cases, and the establishment of the National Banking System, involving, as it did, the extinction of State Banks of issue. ullyp National banking B^BUm The establishment of a uniform National Banking System was, like most great measures, of gradual development. It was much discussed and many minds contributed to the working out of the details, but Chase seems to have a pretty clear claim to its general authorship. Upon him more directly than anybody else was impressed the necessity for some kind of reform in that respect, for while each citizen was experiencing difficulty in his dealings with individual banks, he was compelled to deal with practically all of them, and, therefore, felt, in a consolidated form, the com- bined disadvantages that others suffered in detail. In view of what we now enjoy, and the ease with which, looking backward, it appears that it should have been brought about it seems incredible that an 33 intelligent people should have so long suffered the inconveniences of the old System. It can be accounted for only from the fact that for the Government in a general way, and for the people in a commercial and general business sense, that was the day of small things, and it was tolerated because they were accustomed to it, and because there was a natural aversion, especially on the part of the banks, to making radical changes that were necessarily in some degree of an experimental character. But finally there came a precipitating cause, and the contest was inaugurated to substitute something better. The case was a plain one, but resistance was stubborn. Aside from the universal and almost unbearable inconvenience of doing business with a currency that had no uniformity of issue, appearance, or value ; and which had no proper safeguards against counterfeits and forgeries, was the fact that it was not possible for such a discredited and unsatisfactory System to render the Government much substantial help in placing its loans or in conducting any of its important fiscal transactions. Chase saw clearly, and from the first, that such a System could not co-exist with a uniform national system such as he contemplated, and that the existing State Institutions would not surrender their charters, and take new ones under an Act of Congress, unless 34 they were offered more substantial advantages than the Government should be required to give, or instead were deprived of the privilege of issuing their own notes, and that the best way to solve the problem was to tax their issues out of existence. It was a hard matter to bring others to agree with him. The opposing banks commanded in the aggre- gate a tremendous influence, and with the aid of doubting Congressmen and newspapers they long delayed, and finally so crippled the first Act that was passed, that it failed to provide an acceptable and successful plan, largely because it left the State issues untouched. It continued so until the law was so amended as to embrace practically all the recommendations Chase had made and insisted upon, including a tax of ten per cent, on the issues of State Banks. This did not happen until he had quit the Treasury Department, but it was his plan and his work, consummated, that gave us freedom from the worst banking system that could be well imagined, and substituted therefor one of the best any country has ever enjoyed. It was a work of high character and of enduring benefit to the whole country. It was the crowning act of his admin- istration of the Treasury Department, if not of his whole life, and, coupled with his other successes, entitles him to rank, after Hamilton, who has had no equal, with Gallatin and Sherman, and the other great Secretaries who have held that high office. 35 ^lattona to Mr. Slittrnln It was unfortunate for his influence then and his reputation now that at times he showed less satisfac- tion with his position and exhibited less cordial good- will in his relations to Mr. Lincoln than he should. Personal disappointment was probably the chief cause. From his first appearance in public life he was talked about for the Presidency, and almost from the beginning he talked about and for himself in that connection. Barring the indelicacy manifested, there was no impropriety in such talk until after he accepted a seat in the Cabinet. It was different after that, for while there was all the time more or less opposition cropping out to the renomination of Mr. Lincoln, yet there was never at any time enough to justify a member of his political household, who had been part of his administration and policies, in the encouragement of that opposition, particularly for his own benefit. That Chase was a passive candidate during all the time he was in the Cabinet and a good part of the time an active candidate, cannot be doubted. His many letters and diary entries show this ; not so much by his open advocacy of his claims as by criticisms of Mr. Lincoln and his manner of conducting the public business and the general encouragement he was giving and evidently intend- ing to give to the opposition sentiment. He may not have realized fully the character of record he was making in this respect, for he was no doubt somewhat blinded by the fact that he never could quite outgrow the idea that Lincoln did not deserve to be put ahead of him in 1860, and that the country would surely sometime learn its mistake and right the wrong. In addition he had a conceit that he was of greater importance than he was getting credit for at the hands of the President, and that when he and the President differed about anything in his department the President should yield, as he always did, except in a few instances when his sense of duty and responsibility prevented. At such times he was especially liable to say and do peevish and annoying things. On a number of such occasions he went so far as to tender his resignation, accompanied each time with a letter expressing a deep sense of humility but with an air of injured innocence that he no doubt keenly felt. Notwithstanding the trial it must have been for Mr. Lincoln to do so, he, each time, with singular patience, that only the good of his country could have prompted, not only refused acceptance, but apparently placed himself under renewed obligations by insisting that he should remain at his post. Naturally this was calculated to cause Chase to more and more regard himself as indispensable, until finally, June 30th, 1864, on account of new differences connected with the appointment of an Assistant United States Treasurer at New York, he made the mistake of tendering his resignation once too often. 37 Tkis time Mr. Lincoln promptly, and to Mr. Chase's great surprise and chagrin, accepted it and clinched the matter by immediately appointing his successor. He was thus suddenly left in a pitiable plight so far as his personal political fortunes were concerned, and but for the uncommon generosity of Mr. Lincoln, he vv^ould have so remained. Mr. Lincoln had been renominated, and the vic- tories of Grant and Sherman were every day strengthening his Party and his chances of election. All thoughtful men could see that the end of the war could not be much longer deferred, and that, with victory assured and Mr. Lincoln re-elected, there was renewed strength with continuance in power ahead for the Republican party. It was a bad time for a man who had sustained the relations he had to the Party, and the war, and the administra- tion, to drop out of the ranks and get out of touch with events; but there he was, "outside the breast- works, ' ' and nobody to blame but himself. It was a hard fate that seemed to have befallen him ; and such it would have been if almost anybody but Mr. Lincoln had been President, for most men would have left him helpless in his self-imposed humiliation. But Mr. Lincoln was a most remarkable man. He was enough like other men to enjoy, no doubt, the discomfiture Chase had brought on himself, but 38 enough unlike other men to magnanimously overlook his weaknesses and offenses when public duty so required. Accordingly, remembering only his long and faith- ful services and his high general and special qualifi- cations for the place, he made him Chief Justice. From the date of his resignation until December, when he was appointed, were probably his bitterest days. He had nothing to do, and no prospect. He made an effort, or at least his friends did, to secure his nomination for Congress from his old Cincinnati District, but so signally failed as to give painful evidence that he was not only out of office and out of power, but also out of favor. He was almost out of hoi^e also when Chief Justice Taney died. He was conscious that he had no claim on Mr. Lincoln for that or any other place, not alone because he had petulantly deserted him at a critical moment, but also and more particularly because in his vexation of spirit he had said some very unkind things of him, but he did not hesitate to allow his friends to urge him for that high honor, and, notwithstanding many protests, Mr. Lincoln gave it to him. It would be hard to recall an instance of greater magnanimity than was thus shown by Mr. Lincoln. 39 It was magnanimous because, while in most respects Mr. Chase 's qualifications for the position were high, they were not of such exceptional character as to single him out above all other men for the place; certainly not if we consider only his experience at the bar, for while the first six years of his life in Cincin- nati were devoted to the practice of his profession, yet, like the same period with other beginners, they were not very busy years. He had no exceptional successes. His progress was satisfactory, and prob- ably all that should have been expected, but there was nothing extraordinary to forecast for him the great honor of the Chief Justiceship. During the following thirteen years, until he was elected to the Senate, his time was so occupied with political demands that he did not have much oppor- tunity for professional work, and what time he did devote to his law practice was taken up very largely with Fugitive Slave Law cases, aside from which there is no record of any case or employment that he had during all those nineteen years, from 1830, when he located in Cincinnati, until 1849, when he was elected to the Senate, that was of anything more than passing importance. During all that time, he prob- ably never had any single employment of sufficient importance to bring him a fee of so much as $1,000. It is probable that in all that time he never had a X^atent case, or an admiralty case, or any occasion to 40 make any study whatever of international law, and yet at that point virtually ended not only his career as a practicing lawyer, but also his study of the science of the law except as an incident of his public services. During the next six years— until 1855— he was a member of the Senate, and devoted all his time to his public duties and to public questions and affairs. He was next, for four years, Governor of Ohio, and then came the national campaign of 1860, the election of Mr. Lincoln and the Secretaryship in his Cabinet, which continued until his resignation shortly before he was appointed Chief Justice. And yet he was, all things considered, probably the best qualified of all who were mentioned for the place. His limited experience at the bar was not without precedents. Neither Jay nor Marshall had any very considerable experience of that character. Both of them, like Chase, were prepared for their great work more by their public services and studies as statesmen, than by the general study of the law and the trial of cases in the courts. It was much the same with Taney. He had a larger experience as a practitioner, and was Attorney-General, but his appointment was due more to his general public services than his professional achievements, although they were highly creditable and his standing as a lawyer was good. 41 Jay was intimately identified with the formative stages of our Governmental institutions, and in that way was familiar from their very origin with the public questions it was thought might arise for de- cision ; and Marshall, a soldier of the Kevolution and a careful student of the great purposes and results of that struggle was thereby equipped for not only his distinguished political career, but also for the great work for which the American people owe him a debt of everlasting gratitude, of so interpreting the Con- stitution as to breathe into it, with the doctrine of implied powers, that life, flexibility and adaptability to all our exigencies and requirements, that have made it, not only a veritable sheet anchor of safety for us, but also the marvel of the statesmen of the world. With Chase, as with his illustrious predecessors, it was his long, varied and important public services rather than his professional labors, that prepared him for the Chief Justiceship and secured him the appointment. They were of a character that broad- ened his views by compelling a study of the Constitu- tion and the foundation principles of our Government in connection with their practical application. Mr. Lincoln not only understood and appreciated this, but he foresaw, and no doubt had much anxious concern on that account, that, after the restoration of peace, all the great transactions and achievements of his Administration would have to run the gauntlet of 42 the Courts. The abolition of slavery, the status of the freedmen, the status of the seceding States, the status of their inhabitants— the leaders who had brought about the war, and the masses of the people who had simply followed them, the confiscation of property, all the great war measures that Congress had enacted, including the legal tender acts, he knew must in the order of events sooner or later come before the Supreme Court for final adjudication. It was natural to conclude that no man was so well qualified to deal intelligently and satisfactorily with these questions as he who, in addition to having good general qualifications, had been a capable and respon- sible participator in all that gave rise to those ques- tions. There were many other great lawyers, but there was no other lawyer of equal ability who had sus- tained such a relation to these subjects. Mr. Lincoln had a right to expect that with Chase Chief Justice the fruits of the war, in so far as he might have occasion to deal with them, would be secure, and this doubtless turned the scales in his favor. In large measure he met every just and reasonable expectation. In so far as he failed to do so, it was generally charged, whether rightfully or not, to his ambition to be President, which he should have put 43 away forever on his accession to the Bench, but which he appears to have indulged until his very last days. This is particularly true of his failure to bring Jefferson Davis to trial; and with respect to his rulings in the Impeachment of Andrew Johnson ; and his opinions in the Legal Tender cases. Most men are now agreed that he acted wisely as to Davis, and that he ruled honestly and in most cases correctly on the trial of Johnson. aIJ|? ICfgal ^mhn Qlaaps As to the Legal Tender cases he was at the time and has been ever since much censured, aside from the merits of the controversy, on the ground that he tried to undo on the Bench what he did, or at least was largely responsible for, as Secretary. No complete defense against this charge can be made, but the case against him is not so bad as generally represented, for, while finally assenting to such legislation, and from time to time as occasion required availing him- self of its provisions, he was at first opposed to the step on the ground of policy and from doubt as to the power, and at last reluctantly yielded his objections rather than his opinions, only when the necessities of the Government seemed to imperatively so demand, and when Congress had fully determined to resort to the measure anyhow. 44 For him to have longer opposed would have been futile to prevent it, and could not have had any other effect than to discredit the notes when issued, breed discord, and put him at cross purposes with men, as competent to judge as he, with whom it was his duty to co-operate in every way he could to accomplish the great purpose all alike had in view of preserving the Union. The situation was so unlike anything with which we are to-day familiar, that it is not easy to recall it. Instead of the annual revenues of the Government aggregating the abundant and almost incomprehen- sible sum of seven hundred millions of dollars, as they do to-day, they amounted then from all sources to less than fifty millions of dollars. Instead of two per cent, bonds selling readily in wholesale quantities, as they do to-day at a premium, six per cent, bonds were sold only with difficulty, and in dribbling amounts at a ruinous discount. In lieu of a national paper currency, good every- where as the gold itself, we had only an inadequate suppply of notes of uncertain and varying value, subject to no regulation or provision for their re- demption in gold, except such as was imperfectly provided by the different States. Few saw and appreciated until the second year of the war in what a gigantic struggle we were involved, and how stupendous must be the financial operations 45 and provisions of the Government to meet its require- ments. For this reason no comprehensive or well consid- ered plans were adopted at the start, as foresight of what was coming would have suggested, but on the contrary mere temporary expedients, such as the sale of bonds in comparatively small amounts, and to run for short periods, demand loans, interest and non- interest bearing Treasury certificates and notes, demand notes, and whatever form of obligation could be utilized for the time being were resorted to, and relied upon to tide over what it was hoped and believed would be, although a most severe, yet only a temporary emergency. As the war progressed and we met with reverses in the field, that indicated it would be prolonged, specie payments were suspended, and the national credit became more and more strained and impaired. In consequence it became practically impossible to longer raise by such methods the necessasry funds with which to conduct the Government and prosecute the war, or even to transact satisfactorily the private business of the country. The point was finally reached where the people must come to the financial help of the Treasury, or the Union must perish. Chase saw as well as others that the law of the case was Necessity, but^he did not yield without an effort 46 to have attached as a condition, provision for a uniform National Banking System. The condition was not accepted, but was provided for later, and long before the legal tender cases arose. Whatever else may be said about the legal tender clause, it is a fact of history that the effect for good on the Union cause was instantaneous and immeas- ureable. If it was a forced loan from the people, they gladly made it. If it was a hardship on anybody, it was not complained of by any friend of the Union. It gave confidence and imparted courage, and from that moment success was assured, not only for the Union cause, but for everybody connected with it, and especially for Chase himself, for without it his ad- ministration of the Treasury Department would have been a dismal and mortifying failure. Such a measure, arising from such a necessity, and accomplishing such results, was as sacred as the cause it subserved, and, aside from the wholesale disasters involved, it never should have been called in question by anybody, especially not by anyone who had the slightest responsibility for its enactment, and least of all by a personal or official beneficiary. It is both impossible and unnecessary, if not inap- propriate, to here discuss the legal propositions involved in the legal tender cases, but, on the other hand, it is both appropriate and essential to the com- pleteness of these remarks to speak of Chief Justice Chase's attitude with respect to them. 47 No one can make a better defense for him than he made for himself. In Hepburn vs. Griswold, anticipating the criti- cisms he knew must follow his decision that the legal tender clause was unconstitutional as to debts pre- viously contracted, he said, manifestly by way of attempted personal justification: "It is not surprising that amid the tumult of the late Civil War, and under the influence of appre- hensions for the safety of the Republic almost universal, different views, never before entertained by American statesmen or jurists, were adopted by many. The time was not favorable to considerate reflection upon the constitutional limits of legislative or executive authority. If power was assumed from patriotic motives, the assumption found ready justi- fication in patriotic hearts. Many who doubted yielded their doubts; many who did not doubt were silent. Some who were strongly averse to making government notes a legal tender felt themselves con- strained to acquiesce in the views of the advocates of the measure. Not a few who then insisted upon its necessity, or acquiesced in that view, have, since the return of peace, and under the influence of the calmer time, reconsidered their conclusions, and now concur in those which we have just announced. These conclusions seem to us to be fully sanctioned by the letter and spirit of the Constitution." In the Legal Tender Cases he amplified this some- what, but without adding to its strength. His opinions in these cases were in dignified style and, from his point of view, very able ; but there was then and still is, and perhaps always will be, much difference of opinion as to their merit. In all other respects his work as Chief Justice is now universally considered highly creditable— some of it particularly so— especially his opinion in Texas vs. ^^Hiite, which he regarded with great pride and satisfaction as a sort of Culminating fruit of his life's labor. His opinions were usually brief and always clear and strong. They cover almost every phase of the litigation growing out of the Civil War and the reconstruction acts that followed, and all the decisions of the Court, while he presided, remain un- questioned, except, inferentially, the constitutional- ity of the income tax. He died May 7, 1873, in the sixty-sixth year of his age, after only eight years of service on the Bench ; but they were years of great anxiety to the American people, for, during all that time, the country 's destiny was in a large measure in the hands of the Supreme Court. On its decisions de^Dended the issues of the war— w^hether to be upheld and made secure or over- thrown and brought to naught. The Court was equal to all requirements and did its part so splendidly and brilliantly of the great work of regeneration and preservation that Chase and his associates deserve to stand— and do— in public esteem and gratitude next after Marshall and his associates. The one dealt with the construction of our government, the other with its reconstruction. The labors of both were vital. 49 If he had been content to devote himself to his judicial work exclusively, he would have been spared much that was disagreeable, and his fame would have been brighter than it is. All his life, until his last two years, he had robust health, unlimited energy, and an almost uncontroll- able disposition to participate in the general conduct of public affairs. In consequence, while Chief Justice he was in what was regarded as a sort of intermeddling way, con- stantly giving attention to questions that belonged to Congress and other departments of government, and was from time to time freely offering advice and making suggestions as to legislative enactments and governmental policies ; but, more unfortunately still, he was all the while listening to the suggestions of unwise friends and mere flatterers about the Presi- dency. Much work was done for him with his knowl- edge and approval to secure the Republican nomina- tion in 1868, but early in that year, seeing there was an irresistible sentiment in favor of General Grant, he withdrew himself from the race. If he had remained out there would have been but little criti- cism, but he was scarcely out of the Eepublican race until he was entered for the Democratic. While the impeachment trial of President Johnson was yet in progress he signified a willingness to become the Democratic candidate, and set forth in letters to his friends that inasmuch as the slavery questions had 50 all been settled there was nothing in his political beliefs inconsistent with the principles of Democracy in which he had always been a believer. For a time there seemed strong probability that he would be the Democratic nominee. But it is familiar history that before his name could be presented the Convention was stampeded to Governor Seymour. Naturally there were charges that he was influenced, on account of his Presidential candidacy, by political considera- tions, and in this way he was shorn of much of the dignity, confidence and influence that rightfully be- longed to him in his high office. He suffered in this way, not only as Chief Justice, but also as a man. This is especially true of his candidacy in 1868 for the nomination first by the one party and then by the other, for at that time there was such a radical differ- ence between the parties, and so much bitterness of feeling, that it was incomprehensible to the average mind how any honorable man could so lightly, and with such apparent equal satisfaction to himself, belong to first the one and then the other, and with like zeal seek, or at least be willing to accept, the honors of both. The explanation is in the fact that it was the weak- ness of a strong man. He was so conscious of his mental powers and of his qualifications by reason of his long public service, to make a capable and efficient Chief Magistrate, that it was easy for him to think his claims for such recognition better than those of 51 others; especially others who had been differently trained, as Grant had been, and, therefore, to believe that his friends were right in their judgment that he was, for just reasons, the people's choice, and that it was his duty to his country, as well as to them, to become their candidate. With all his faculty for measures he had but little for men. He was himself so simple-minded, truthful and straight-forward in his dealings with others that he seemed incapable of understanding how untruthful and deceitful others were capable of being in their dealings with him, especially if their pretensions were in accord with his own views and desires. As time passes these features of his career will fade out of sight and be forgotten. Already he has taken his proper place in history, and in the appreci- ation of the American people, as the great figure he really was— a strong, massive, patriotic, fearless and controlling character in the settlement of the mighty questions that shook to their foundations the institu- tions of our Government. He will be remembered also for the purity of his life, for his domestic virtues, for his deeply religious nature, ever depending on Divine help, and for that love and zeal for humanity that made him brave social ostracism and sacrifice, if necessary, all chance of personal political preferment that he might champion the cause of the slave and break the power that held him in fetters. In the light of true history the consistency^ of his conduct will not 52 be determined by the record of his party affiliations, but by the constancy of his devotion to the cause that filled his heart and dominated all his political actions. Measured by that test, few men have run a straighter course or done more to merit a high place in the esteem of their countrymen. 53 r l|on. Jamps (B. Srttktns U. g". (Kirtnit ^nigp. Setlrrli May it Please the Court: I shall not attempt to gild refined gold. After the long service upon which we have attended, my address should properly be in the nature of a benedic- tion and of necessity brief. The able and exhaustive analysis of the life and character of Chief Justice Chase by the distinguished Senator from the State of Ohio renders useless further reference to the sub- ject ; but at the risk of imposing upon your patience, and of weakening by repetition the masterful por- traiture of the Chief Justice to which we have lis- tened, I cannot refrain from reference to a single act of his life which, in my judgment, indellibly stamped him a great man and a great Judge. As Secretary of the Treasury during the time of the Civil War, Mr. Chase was confronted with the great problem of National finance— of obtaining money to meet the necessarily enormous expenditures required for the successful prosecution of the war. 54 He devised the scheme of issuing the demand notes of the Government, making them a legal tender for all debts, public and private. He was the father of the greenback. Perhaps it is not too much to say that without such or similar scheme, the war could not have been prosecuted to successful conclusion; certainly not nearly so soon as it was. That scheme received the endorsement and approval of the people of the North, and was successful in an eminent degree. When Mr. Chase was transferred to the Supreme Court of the United States as its Chief Justice, the question was presented whether the legal tender clause of the act authorizing the greenback was con- stitutional, so far at least as it affected contracts entered into prior to its passage. Chief Justice Chase was called to pass upon the legality of his own act. Without impropriety he might have excused himself from assuming that task ; but with a lofty conception of duty unsurpassed, he approached the subject, clothed in the spotless ermine of clear judgment, hon- esty of thought, impartiality of intent, with every passion and every prejudice hushed in the solemn deliberation of the law. His intellectual honesty forced him to the conclusion that his own scheme, embodied by the Congress into statute law, so far as it made the greenback a legal tender as applied to contracts made before its passage, was unconstitu- tional and void. When subsequently the Court, 55 changed in its personnel, overruled the former deci- sion and held the act constitutional, the Chief Justice adhered to his previous ruling, writing the principal dissenting opinion. This action, in my judgment, exhibits markedly the greatness of the man, the purity of his thought, his intellectual honesty, the bravery of his soul. With every inducement to take no part in the decision, with every natural bias, with every prejudice impelling him to make legitimate the child of which he was the acknowledged father, he spurned the strong tempta- tion to justify himself, and clung fast to the constitu- tion as he read it. In all judicial history I know of no more signal devotion to duty, no more signal instance of loyalty to honesty of thought. The act shows the great judicial intellect, the great judge. Mr. Justice Clifford speaks of this act in the fol- lowing beautiful language : "From the first moment he drew the judicial robe around him he viewed all questions submitted to him as a Judge in the calm atmosphere of the bench, and with the deliberate consideration of one who feels that he is determining issues for the remote and unknown future of a great people. * * * Men find it easy to review others, but much more difficult to criticise and review their own acts ; and yet, it is the very summit to which the upright Judge should always be striving. Judges sometimes surrender 56 with reluctance a favorite opinion, even when con- demnation confronts it at every turn, and they find it well nigh impossible to yield it at all when it happens to harmonize with the popular voice, or if gilded with the rays of successful experiment. Judges and jurists may dissent from his final conclusion and hold, as a majority of the Court did, that he was right as Sec- retary of the Treasury, but every generous mind, it seems to me, should honor the candor and self control which inspired and induced such action. ' ' Well may the people rejoice when their Judges exercise such independence of thought and judgment, such purity of intent, such moral courage. So long as such qualities shall characterize the bench, so long will the liberty of the citizen be safe from all encroachment of arbitrary power; so long will con- stitutional right be maintained; so long will liberty be preserved; so long shall we have freedom, not license ; freedom regulated by constitutional law. Gentlemen of the Bar, you honor yourselves when you place upon the walls of this temple of justice the portraits of distinguished jurists who have given their lives to the sacred cause of justice. At the same time and by the act you render service to the State. These counterfeit presentments look down upon you as you labor here, seemingly to observ^e how you act your part ' ^ in the noble profession which is charged with the earthly administration of the justice of 57 God." They will prove an incentive to the intelli- gent discharge of duty, seemingly by their presence urging to nobler conception of right, to greater study, to unselfish labor in your profession. They will teach the lesson that in this commercial age needs to be impressed upon the minds of all of us, that there are some things in the world better than your gold or your silver ; that honor and truth and loyalty to duty are rather to be regarded ; that a good name is better than much riches. They will point the young lawyer to the goal to which he may attain if he correctly appre- hend the nature of his profession and is true to his ethics. They will teach him that the temple of fame wherein are enrolled the names of those who have faithfully ministered at the altar of justice and kept burning the lamp of truth, honor and truth and right are in high regard and may not be sacrificed to vulgar gain. They will incite him to dedicate his life to the maintenance of justice among men, that his name may be written upon the roll of honor of those who have faithfully served the State. They will impress all who shall enter this temple of justice with the dignity and the sacredness of the labor here per- formed, and will foster a more willing submission to law and higher respect for order ; and so, being dead, these Judges shall yet speak in defense of society, for the safety of the State, for the welfare of the people, for virtuous life and conduct, for the honor 58 and dignity of our noble profession, and their message to you shall be to advance yet higher the standard of professional honor and of professional attainments. 59 g>fat?BmattBi^tji mih PoUtirB Abirp0H bg Man. 3. iFrank i^anlg douemnr of Sn&iana May it Please the Court : To American ears these are familiar terms. Synonymous in their highest and best sense, they differ widely in the common acceptation of their meaning. In the popular mind there is indeed a wide difference between them. It is a far cry from the politician to the statesman. A statesman is said to be one versed in the art of government or who exhibits conspicuous ability and sagacity in the direction of public affairs. The term statesmanship refers to the qualifications, duties and employment of a statesman, or to the practice of the science of government. Politics is said to be the art of influencing public opinion, attracting and marshaling the voters, and obtaining and distributing public patronage as far as the possession of office may depend upon the politi- cal opinions or political services of individuals. In 60 the popular mind it is the art of guiding and influenc- ing the schemes and intrigues of political parties, or of cliques or individual politicians. In popular estimation a politician is one primarily devoted to his own advancement in public office, or to the success of a political party, or one addicted or attached to politics as managed by parties; a schemer, an in- triguer. Statesmanship may be defined as the science of government; politics as the science of exigencies. Statesmanship studies the public weal; politics, pri- vate advantage. Statesmanship is born of love of countrj^ ; politics, of meaner parentage. Statesman- ship is actuated by pure and lofty purposes ; politics, by low and sordid ones. Statesmanship is willing to champion an unpopular cause, if it be right, and is capable of great sacrifice in its behalf; politics joins only in popular acclamations, gives no concern to the merits of the issue and is incapable of sacrifice. Statesmanship exemplifies the power of a great con- viction ; politics, the cohesiveness of spoils and plun- der. Statesmanship directs the State into sane and safe ways, perpetuates its institutions, augments its power, adds to its prestige and fame and gives splendor to its glory; politics leads the State into dangerous and doubtful ways, undermines its insti- tutions, depletes its strength, detracts from its power and prestige, dims its fame and strips it of its splen- dor. 61 The statesman is ambitious for his country; the politician for himself. The statesman serves his countrymen, but his countrymen serve the politician. The statesman studies the present in the light of the past, that he may understand and interpret the future to his country's good. The ijolitician knows little of the past, and cares nothing whatever about the future, so long as he is permitted to batten on the present. Occasion itself is the child of the statesman, but it is the father of the politician. Statesmen are among the State's most valuable assets. Politicians are among its most dangerous liabilities. Statesmanship and politics in this country are so closely blended as to require keen discernment on the part of the people to distinguish between the art of the politician and the appeal of the statesman. In fact, statesmanship and politics meet and mingle in the deeds and lives of most public men. The politi- cian is rarely totally lacking in the elements of states- manship, and the statesman who possesses none of the meanness of politics is yet more rare. The lives of few public men more forcefully exem- plify this fact than does the life of Chief Justice Chase. In his campaign for the senatorship in 1849, for the presidency in 1856 and 1860, and especially in 1864 and 1868, he played the game of politics much as the politician plays it. In that role he was not himself, at least not his better self ; in fact, he was at 62 his worst. The impress of those days, made by his unfortunate campaign for the great office of the presi- dency, left something of a shadow upon an otherwise flawless fame. But Chase at his best was not a politician. He was a statesman ; a statesman, too, of constructive power, bold, skillful and sagacious. He possessed great and abiding convictions concerning freedom and the rights of men, and there never was an hour in his life when there was in him enough of the politician to cause him to surrender these convictions even for the presidency. As to these he never yielded nor compro- mised, nor did he ever shrink from moral responsi- bility in his public service. Honesty and indomitable persistence were always his. He was a statesman when as a young man, living in a pro-slavery community, he turned his back upon his own apparent interests and sacrificed, as he had a right to believe, a brilliant career to champion an unpopular cause and become the defender, in the courts, in the press and upon the stump, of a despised, enslaved and persecuted race. He was a statesman when at the peril of his own personal safety he stood for the freedom of speech and declared for the freedom of the press. He was a statesman when he saw and announced the fact that slavery and freedom of speech could not continue to exist in the same country and that the enslavement 63 of the black man endangered the freedom of the white man. He was a statesman when he battled against Douglas in the Senate of the United States for the freedom of the Territories. He was a statesman when in that debate he declared: "All men are cre- ated eqnal; they are endowed by their Creator with inalienable rights. Aggressions upon these rights are crimes." He was a statesman when amid the disasters of defeat, after the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska bill, he wrote to the despairing friends of freedom this line from Milton : "Bate no jot Of heart or hope, but still bear up and steer Right onward," He was a statesman when in February, 1861, he declared that the laws of the Union should be enforced at all hazards and against all opposition. He was a statesman when he put into the mouths of the friends of the Union, in the days of doubt and indecision, the battle cry: "Inauguration first, ad- justment afterward. ' ' He was a statesman when he piloted a confused and bewildered nation through the waters of monetary disaster into the harbor of finan- cial safety. He was a statesman when he gave to his country the basis of the present national banking system. He was a statesman when he foresaw and an- nounced the dangerous power of great corporations through the control of the country's transportation 64 facilities. He was a statesman when as Chief Justice, presiding over an unwilling Senate, he held it against its will to its proper character as a judicial body dur- ing the impeachment trial of President Johnson. He was a statesman when in the days of reconstruction he gave judicial sanction to the theory of an 'indis- soluble Union of indestructible States" and to the re-establishment of national authority throughout the South. Gentlemen of the Bar, you do well, therefore, when in memory and in appreciation of what he was to each of the three great departments of the Government- legislative, executive and judicial; of what he there stood for and of what he there did, you give this portrait to this most august tribunal ; and you, sirs, representatives of the great judicial system of which li was a conspicuous part, do well to accept this por- trait in memory and in appreciation of those attri- butes of heart and mind and character that made him ^reat and gave him enduring fame. 65 Aaifptmtr^ of J^ortratt bg tl|f (Hantt "Slttiteh States SiBtrtrt Jniige The thanks of the Court are due and are hereby tendered to the members of the bar by whose generous action this excellent portrait has been pro- cured and presented to the Court. The occasion which brings us together is a significant one, and the portrait has a meaning far beyond its intrinsic value. The portraits presented to the Court in 1903, with simular interesting ceremonies, have taught us that there is a permanent and highly beneficial value to be attached to them. They create an atmosphere of his- torical interest and professional pride. They lead the younger attorneys to a further study of the characters which thus speak to us from the canvas. The Court, its officers, jurors and the public are alike affected by this wholesome influence, and many touching and eloquent allusion of counsel have been inspired thereby. 66 It is always beneficial to study the life of a great mau. To the profession it is specially valuable to study the achievements of one who as lawyer and publicist took so important a part in the discussion of the questions culminating in the Civil War; who as executive officer did so much to sustain the govern- ment during the war, and who as Chief Justice presided in that great tribunal whose decisions secured forever the results of the war. Gentlemen of the bar, a lasting service has been rendered to the Court by the gift of this portrait. The best expression we can make as showing our appreciation of that service has been voiced by our senior brother, Judge Jenkins. The distinguished lawyers and statesmen who have addressed the Court on this occasion have our most cordial thanks. Their able addresses deserve to be widely read, and to be preserved as a permanent addition to the judicial literature of the country. To our friends, the ladies and gentlemen who have done us the honor to be present, we express the hope that they share with us a keen enjoyment of these exercises, believing that what makes for the accomp- lishment of the highest standards in our judicial svstem inures to the benefit of every citizen. 67 Wvhn nf (Enurt Now, on this day the Court, having heard the motion of Hon. Charles S. Deneen on behalf of the attorneys of the district, and the Court having also heard the addresses in support of the motion by Hon. Joseph B. Foraker, Hon. J. Frank Hanly, and Hon. James G. Jenkins, it is therefore Ordered, That the portrait of Salmon Portland Chase be received into the custody of the Court, and that it have a permanent place upon the walls of this Court room, or any Court room hereafter to be occupied by this Court, and that the said addresses be spread at large upon the records of the Court. 68