A Project Gutenberg of Australia eBook
Title: The Story of my Life (1932)
Author: Clarence Darrow (1857-1938)
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Language: English
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Title: The Story of my Life (1932)
Author: Clarence Darrow (1857-1938)
CONTENTS
1. BEFORE THE BEGINNING
I "arrive."
2. MY CHILDHOOD IN KINSMAN
On religious and social questions, our family early learned to
stand alone.
3. AT THE THRESHOLD OF LIFE
As I look back at my school-days, I am astounded at the appalling
waste of time.
4. CALLED TO THE BAR
I never advise any one to play poker or not to play poker, but I
always advise them to keep the limit down.
5. I MAKE A HIT
I discovered that a little book, "Our Criminal Code and Its
Victims," was to make its author my idol, and my life what it is.
6. GETTING ON
Providence provides for me by ill-treating my superior.
7. THE RAILROAD STRIKE
No one knew what Mr. Debs and the A. R. U. were enjoined from
doing; it depended upon how many inferences the court could base on
further inferences.
8. EUGENE V. DEBS
From his cell in Atlanta Prison he saw the flowers in the garden
but not the bars at the window.
9. HOW I FELL
Defending men charged with crime soon meant something more than
winning or losing a case; it meant searching for the causes of
human conduct.
10. CHILD TRAINING
There are very few, even among idiots, who cannot fill some
position if rightly trained.
11. I MEET MR. BRYAN
Altgeld said: "I have been thinking over Bryan's speech, and what
did he say anyhow?"
12. PARDONING THE ANARCHISTS
Before pardoning the anarchists, John P. Altgeld said, ". . . from
that time, I will be a dead man."
13. JOHN P. ALTGELD
The poor, the dreamers, the idealists, with haunted gaze, came to
his office as the anchorite would visit a shrine.
14. THE COAL STRIKE
A million people cannot be kept at the point of want without
protesting.
15. A FLIER IN POLITICS
Every session of the legislature was opened with prayer, before any
of the members could canvass around for people to hold up.
16. THE SKELETON IN THE FOREST
Through it all flitted shadow-pictures of Robin Hood, the greenwood
tree, and Daniel Boone, blazing a trail toward a new civilization.
17. THE ATHENS OF THE SAGE-BRUSH
Through a desert waste, a strip of green turns and twists and loops
and zigzags; thus the Snake River leads one to Boise, Idaho.
18. THE HAYWOOD TRIAL
Harry Orchard tells his story:--and what a story!
19. STILL RATTLING THE SKELETON
Once more the doctor lovingly examined the skull with the hole in
it, and gave as his opinion that the deceased was killed by a
bullet.
20. IN SEARCH OF A GERM
A newspaper man brought a telegram to me at the hospital which
read: "Darrow dying; interview him."
21. THE McNAMARA CASE
We found that the state would claim a wide conspiracy, involving
investigations from Indianapolis to California.
22. LIGHTS AND SHADOWS
We were living and fighting on less than a hundred dollars a month,
when a stranger of standing wired: "You have defended men for
nothing all your life. I will let you have all the money you
need."
23. GEORGE BISSETT
He was taken to a hospital to die, but unfortunately he recovered.
24. BACK TO CHICAGO
By the calendar we had been away two years. It seemed a lifetime.
25. WAR
If nations persist in treating each other as enemies, instead of
friends, they will always find causes for wars.
26. THE AFTERMATH OF THE WAR
All the efforts to foster individual freedom are shattered with
shot and shell.
27. THE LOEB-LEOPOLD TRAGEDY
I went in to do what I could . . . against the wave of hatred and
malice.
28. THE LOEB-LEOPOLD TRIAL
A summer of restless days and sleepless nights.
29. THE EVOLUTION CASE
Mr. Bryan made it clear that he was not so much interested in the
Age of Rocks as in the Rock of Ages.
30. SCIENCE VERSUS FUNDAMENTALISM
Making Tennessee safe for knowledge.
31. THE BRYAN FOUNDATION
The monument at Dayton has progressed to the point of an abandoned
hole in the ground.
32. A "DRY" AMERICA
Bodies "overstuffed" with overeating are popular among the "good"
people, but swallowing a drop of alcohol is injurious.
33. THE EIGHTEENTH AMENDMENT
For more than ten years tens of millions of people have defied this
fanatical law.
34. THE NEGRO IN THE NORTH
I may not be true to my ideals always, but I never see a negro
without feeling that I ought to pay part of a debt to a race
captured and brought here in chains.
35. A YEAR IN EUROPE
Montreaux, and The Mediterranean:--How happy one can be with
either!
36. LEARNING TO LOAF
I had stood with the hunted until I was seventy-two years old; I
decided to close my office door and call it my day's work.
37. THE CAMPAIGN AGAINST CRIME
It is not a campaign against crime, but an orgy of hatred and
vengeance.
38. CAUSE AND EFFECT
A physician traces a condition to its cause, and then treats the
cause.
39. THE BLIND LEADING THE BLIND
The poor men who have gone to their deaths on gallows are not the
only murderers.
40. WHY CAPITAL PUNISHMENT?
When judges add to the death-sentence, "And may God have mercy on
your soul," they have their fingers crossed.
41. A NEW HABIT
I had other interests and inclinations; and the time was growing
short.
42. QUESTIONS WITHOUT ANSWERS
Better to say "I don't know," than to guess at answers.
43. FUTURE LIFE
No one can even imagine the place or form of a future life.
44. DELUSION OF DESIGN AND PURPOSE
If there is purpose in the universe, then what is that purpose?
45. THE LAW AS IT IS
To the average man, a lawsuit is a calamity.
46. SLOWING DOWN
The big arm-chair in the library lures me.
47. TOWARD THE END OF THE TRAIL
In spite of all philosophy, we are prone to feel regret over things
beyond recall.
THE MASSIE TRIAL
APPENDIX
CHAPTER 1
BEFORE THE BEGINNING
It may seem absurd that I should be sitting here trying to write
about myself in an age when only a mystery story has any chance as
a best-seller. I can think of nothing about myself to distort into
any such popular fiction. If I tell anything it will be but a
plain unvarnished account of how things really have happened, as
nearly as I can possibly hold to the truth.
First of all, I have noticed that most autobiographers begin with
ancestors. As a rule they start out with the purpose of linking
themselves by blood and birth to some well-known family or
personage. No doubt this is due to egotism, and the hazy,
unscientific notions that people have about heredity. For my part,
I seldom think about my ancestors; but I had them; plenty of them,
of course. In fact, I could fill this book with their names if I
knew them all, and deemed it of the least worth.
I have been told that I came of a very old family. A considerable
number of people say that it runs back to Adam and Eve, although
this, of course, is only hearsay, and I should not like to
guarantee the title. Anyhow, very few pedigrees really go back any
farther than mine. With reasonable certainty I could run it back
to a little town in England that has the same name as mine, though
the spelling is slightly altered. But this does not matter. I am
sure that my forbears run a long, long way back of that, even--but
what of it, anyhow?
The earliest ancestor of the Darrow family that I feel sure
belonged to our branch was one of sixteen men who came to New
England the century before the Revolutionary War. This Darrow,
with fifteen other men, brought a grant from the King of England
for the town of New London, Conn. He was an undertaker, so we are
told, which shows that he had some appreciation of a good business,
and so chose a profession where the demand for his services would
be fairly steady. One could imagine a more pleasant means of
livelihood, but, almost any trade is bearable if the customers are
sure. This Darrow, or rather his descendants, seemed to forget the
lavish gift of the King, and took up arms against England under
George Washington. So far as having an ancestor in the
Revolutionary War counts for anything, I would be eligible to a
membership of the D. A. R., although I would not exactly fit this
organization, for, amongst other handicaps, I am proud of my rebel
ancestors, and would be glad to greet them on the street, should
they chance my way.
But it is not for love of looking up my ancestry, or a desire to
brag, that I am setting all this down, but for a much more personal
reason. All of it had an important bearing upon me, and shows the
many, many close calls I had when I was casting about for an
ancestral line and yearning to be born. The farther back I go, the
more unlikely it seems that I am really here, and I sometimes pinch
myself to make sure that it is not a dream; but I assume that I am
I, and that I really came all the way from Adam, with all the
vicissitudes of time and tide that are so entwined with mortal
life.
Did you, who read this, ever figure what a scant chance you had of
getting here? If you did come from Adam, you must have had
millions on millions of direct forbears, and, if one ancestor had
failed to come into the combination, you would not be you, but
would be some one else entirely, if any one at all. So I do not
allow myself to worry about the long-lost trail, but am content
with thinking over the slight chance my father and mother had to
meet, and hence my own still lesser chance for life after I had
jumped all the hurdles between Adam and my parents.
If a man really has charge of his destiny at all, he should have
something to say about getting born; and I only came through by a
hair's-breadth. What had I to do with this momentous first step?
In the language of the lawyer, I was not even a party of the second
part. Two generations back is not so very far away; the reader
will not need to try to consider all the near-accidents since Adam,
but I will illustrate the whole venture by one narrow escape I had
seventy-five years before I was born.
It seems that my grandfathers from both sides came from
Connecticut. They had never met in the East, and did not come at
the same time. Both of them drove from New England, for there were
no railroads in that day, much less automobiles. The journey was
long, and more or less disagreeable. My father's parents came
first, but, for some reason, stopped at the little town of
Henrietta, near Rochester, N. Y. Why they stopped there, I cannot
imagine. I was there once myself, but I did not stop. When I
visualize the paternal grandfather Darrow driving off on a thousand-
mile trip into a near-wilderness I can hardly refrain from shouting
to tell him that he has left Grandfather Eddy behind. But later on
my grandfather on my mother's side drove away into the unknown West
as if in search of a mate for one of his unborn daughters, so that
I could have a couple of parents after many years. He drove and
drove for weeks and months into the West until he pitched his tent
in the wilds that later were named Windsor, Ohio. No doubt they
drove through Henrietta, for that was along the main road into the
West, but they did not stop, even long enough to meet my future
mother's parent. Some years later my father's father drove from
Henrietta to western Ohio and stopped at the little hamlet of
Kinsman, twenty-five miles from Windsor, the town where my mother
was waiting to be born. Thus far, my chance for getting into the
scheme was about zero. It was necessary for the boy and girl to
meet before they could become my father and mother, and this chance
seemed less than one in a million when the families lived in
Connecticut.
Both grandfathers were poor and obscure, else they would have
stayed where they were. But their children, as they grew up, were
sent to school. About thirty-five miles from Windsor and sixty
from Kinsman, was a little town called Amboy, in northern Ohio,
near Oberlin. In Amboy was a well-known school. Emily Eddy and
Amirus Darrow were destined to go to that school, and so they went.
I can leave the rest to the reader's imagination. When I think of
the chances that I was up against, even when so near the goal, it
scares me to realize how easily I might have missed out. Of all
the infinite accidents of fate farther back of that, I do not care
or dare to think.
It is obvious that I had nothing to do with getting born. Had I
known about life in advance and been given any choice in the
matter, I most likely would have declined the adventure. At least,
that is the way I think about it now. There are times when I feel
otherwise, but on the whole I believe that life is not worth while.
This does not mean that I am gloomy, or that this book will sadden
the Tired Business Man, for I shall write only when I have the
inclination to do so, and at such times I am generally almost
unmindful of existence.
But as I write these words the sun is shining, the birds are making
merry in the bright summer day, and I am asking why I sit and
plague my brain to recall the dead and misty past while light and
warmth and color are urging me to go outdoors and play.
Doubtless a certain vanity has its part in moving me to write about
myself. I am quite sure that this is true, even though I am aware
that neither I nor any one else has the slightest importance in
time and space. I know that the earth where I have spent my life
is only a speck of mud floating in the endless sky. I am quite
sure that there are millions of other worlds in the universe whose
size and importance are most likely greater than the tiny graveyard
on which I ride. I know that at this time there are nearly two
billion other human entities madly holding fast to this ball of
dirt to which I cling. I know that since I began this page
hundreds of these have loosened their grip and sunk to eternal
sleep. I know that for half a million years men and women have
lived and died and been mingled with the elements that combine to
make our earth, and are known no more. I know that only the
smallest fraction of my fellow castaways have even so much as heard
my name, and that those who have will soon be a part of trees and
plants and animal and clay. Still, here am I sitting down, with
the mists already gathering about my head, to write about the
people, desires, disappointments and despairs that have moved me in
my brief stay on what we are pleased to call this earth.
Doubtless, too, the emotion to live makes most of us seek to
project our personality a short distance beyond the waiting grave.
But whatever the reason may be, I am doing what many, many men have
done before, and will do again--talking and gossiping about the
past. I am doing this as a boy plays baseball by the hour or
dances through the night. I am doing it because all living things
crave activity, and I am still alive. Whether the movement is a
journey around the globe or an unsteady walk from the bedroom to
the dining room and back, it is but a response to what is left of
the emotions, appetites and energies that we call being.
The young man's reflections of unfolding life concern the future--
the great, broad, tempestuous sea on whose hither shore he stands
eagerly waiting to learn of other lands and climes. The reactions
and recollections of the old concern the stormy journey drawing to
a close; he no longer builds castles or plans conquests of the
unknown; he recalls the tempests and tumults encountered on the
way, and babbles of the passengers and crew that one by one dropped
silently into the icy depths. No longer does the aging transient
yearn for new adventures or unexplored highways. His greatest
ambition is to find some snug harbor where he can doze and dream
the fleeting days away. So, elderly men who speak or write turn to
autobiography. This is all they have to tell, and they cannot sit
idly in silence and wait for the night to come.
Autobiography is never entirely true. No one can get the right
perspective on himself. Every fact is colored by imagination and
dream. The young look forth across the sea to a mirage of
fairylands filled with hidden treasures; the aged turn to the
fading past, and through the mist and haze that veils once familiar
scenes, bygone events assume weird and fanciful proportions.
Almost forgotten men, women and children reappear along the far-off
shore, and their shadows are reflected back in dimmed or magnified
outlines in the softly setting sun. Then, too, all human egos, and
perhaps other egos, place prime importance upon themselves; each is
the centre of the great circle around which all else revolves; no
one can see and feel in any other way. Although all intelligent
people realize that they are as nothing in the procession that is
ever moving on, yet we cannot but feel that when we are dead the
parade will no longer move. So while we can still vibrate with
tongue and pen and with every manifestation of our beings, we
instinctively shout to the crowd to pause and for a little time
turn their eyes and ears toward us. That is what I am doing now,
and am doing it because I have nothing else to do. I am doing it
because it helps to pass away the time that still remains. I know
that life consists of the impressions made upon the puppet as it
moves across the stage. I shall endeavor not to magnify the
manikin. I am interested not in the way that I have fashioned the
world, but in the way that the world has moulded me.
I hope that no one will turn from this book for fear it is sad and
will make him unhappy. I am not an optimist in the ordinary sense
of the word. I can tell of my life only as I see it, but I fancy
that the story will not be unduly serious or tragic. I have never
taken any one very seriously, and least of all myself. I am not
trying to teach any moral or point any way. The billions on
billions of humans that have come upon the stage, made their bow,
and then retired beyond the scenes, have one and all played the
same part. One and all they, for a time, have taken a distinctive
form and name, and then disappeared forever. One and all, they
have known joys and sorrows, and most of them are now lost in sleep
and oblivion. My life has not been sad, and as the end approaches
it brings no sorrow. When the evening hours have crept on I have
always looked forward with satisfaction, if not pleasure, to the
night of rest; a space of time with no consciousness to mar the
peace and serenity of the void between the evening and the coming
dawn. So, to-day, after a long life of work and play and joy and
sorrow, I am fully aware of the friendly night that is stealing on
apace. The inevitable destiny brings no fear or pain, so why
should others be saddened by what I have to tell?
One cannot live through a long stretch of years without forming
some philosophy of life. As one journeys along he gains
experiences and even some ideas. Accumulated opinions and
philosophy may be more important to others than the bare facts
about how he lived, so my ambition is not so much to relate the
occurrences as to record the ideas that life has forced me to
accept; and, after all, thoughts, impressions and feelings are
really life itself. I should like to think that these reflections
might make existence a trifle easier for some of those who may
chance to read this story.
As I have already said, my father's ancestors were rebels and
traitors who took up arms against Great Britain in the War of the
Revolution. It is easy for me to believe that my father came of
rebel stock; at least he was always in rebellion against religious
and political creeds of the narrow and smug community in which he
dwelt. But ancestors do not mean so much. The rebel who succeeds
generally makes it easier for the posterity that follows him; so
these descendants are usually contented and smug and soft. Rebels
are made from life, not ancestors.
My father, in his early life, was a religious man. He was born
into the Methodist Church. This indicates that he came of plebeian
stock, for there were also an Episcopalian and a Presbyterian
Church in the little town. Either his parents were too humble for
one of these aristocratic temples, or, perhaps my grandfather was
converted at a Methodist revival, which was one of the affairs to
go to, even after I was born. My father had a serious but kindly
face. In his leisure hours he was always poring over books. I
wish I knew more about his youth; it might furnish some interesting
data as to the development of the family and the pranks of heredity
and environment. He was one of seven children who came with their
father to eastern Ohio, which was then almost a frontier land. The
family must have been very poor, and their means of existence
precarious in those early days, at the beginning of the nineteenth
century. When a boy, I knew most of my uncles and aunts; they
seemed fairly intelligent, but I cannot remember ever seeing a book
in the house of any member of my father's family excepting in my
father's home.
Not only were there no books in my grandfather's house, but there
were practically none anywhere in the community. One of my
earliest recollections is the books in our home. They were in
bookcases, on tables, on chairs, and even on the floor. The house
was small, the family large, the furnishings meagre, but there were
books whichever way one turned. How my father managed to buy the
books I cannot tell. Neither by nature nor by training had he any
business ability or any faculty for getting money.
My mother's father was a fairly prosperous farmer. Neither he nor
any of his family were church attendants. Out of the five or six
children, my mother alone cared especially for books. Her family
were substantial people of fair intelligence, but were inclined to
believe that a love of books was a distinct weakness, and likely to
develop into a very bad habit. One who spent his time reading or
studying when he might be at work was "shiftless" and improvident.
Benjamin Franklin's Almanac, with its foolish lessons about
industry and thrift, was the gospel of the family.
Aside from one uncle who seemed fairly well-informed, I do not
remember that a single one of my mother's brothers and sisters
cared at all for books. Of my father's children, seven of us grew
to mature years, and all but one had a liking for reading and
learning; most of us would leave almost any sort of work or
amusement to spend our time with books. How did it come about that
of my father's family he alone, out of seven or eight, had any
thirst for learning? And why was it that of my mother's family she
was the only one that cared for books? And why did it happen that
of the children of my father and mother all but one always had an
abiding love for reading?
Of the group interwoven with my father's early life, why had he
alone that overwhelming desire for books?--a love so strong that it
remained with him and solaced him to his dying day, at the age of
eighty-six. Was it imparted to him through the seed from which he
grew? Was heredity the cause? Apparently his father did not care
for books, and certainly conveyed no fondness for learning to his
other sons and daughters. My grandparents on both sides each
reared one child who in the yearning for education seemed as
strangers to the rest.
I know nothing of my great-grandparents, but they must have been
still more obscure. Is there any reason for speculating upon some
possible spark of life from some unknown and improbable outside
source? In my parents' offspring, the case was reversed; but the
problem is the same; one child cared nothing for the intellectual
life, and all the others prized books. If I knew my father's and
mother's childhood associates I might find that some companion or
school teacher at the right time kindled the quenchless flame in
their young minds; but of this I have no knowledge. It is clear
that both my parents, who met at school, away from home, had
already shown a bent for study; and this was doubtless nurtured by
the school. They married, and their zest for books was a part of
the new home life, and we children were brought up in an atmosphere
of books, and were trained to love them. It is easier for me to
believe that our taste for them came from our early environment
than that it was carried down in the germ-plasm of which so little
is really known. Why did one brother not care at all for books?
Who can tell? He was older than I, and of course I did not know
his closest friends or when some alien influence might have entered
and moulded his life. It seems reasonable to believe that by some
intervention at a critical period he was led into another direction
that perhaps changed the whole tenor of his nature and his life.
Soon after the marriage of my father and mother they went to
Meadville, Penna., for a time. My father chose Meadville on
account of Allegheny College, a Methodist institution, located in
the town. I know nothing of how they lived. I should have known,
but, long before I ever thought of beguiling my last years with a
story of my life, the lips which could have spoken were closed
forever. It would be hopeless to search for the happenings and
doings of an obscure man. My father must have undergone great
privations. He graduated from the college, where my two sisters
received diplomas later on. He was still religious. His religion
was born from a sensitive nature that made him pity the sad and
suffering, and which, first and last, tied him to every hopeless
cause that came his way.
On one hill in Meadville stood Allegheny College, sponsored by the
Methodist Church. On another elevation was a Unitarian seminary,
and in the town was a Unitarian Church. Both my parents must have
strayed to this church, for when my father's time had come to take
a theological course he went to the Unitarian school in Meadville,
on the other hill from the Methodist college, where he took his
first degree. In due time he completed his theological course, but
when he had finished his studies he found that he had lost his
faith. Even the mild tenets of Unitarianism he could not accept.
Unitarianism, then, was closer to Orthodoxy than it is to-day, or
he might have been a clergyman and lived an easier life. In the
Unitarian school he read Newman and Channing, but later went on to
Emerson and Theodore Parker. His trend of mind was shown by the
fact that his first son was Edward Everett. When it came my turn
to be born and named, my parents had left the Unitarian faith
behind and were sailing out on the open sea without a rudder or
compass, and with no port in sight, and so I could not be named
after any prominent Unitarian. Where they found the name to which
I have answered so many years I never knew. Perhaps my mother read
a story where a minor character was called Clarence, but I fancy I
have not turned out to be anything like him. The one satisfaction
I have had in connection with this cross was that the boys never
could think up any nickname half so inane as the real one my
parents adorned me with.
CHAPTER 2
MY CHILDHOOD IN KINSMAN
Some years before I was born my parents left Meadville and moved
back to the little village of Kinsman, about twenty miles away. I
have no idea why they made this change, unless because my father's
sister lived in Kinsman. All life hangs on a thread, so long as it
hangs; a little movement this way or that is all-controlling. So I
cannot tell why I was born on the 18th of April in 1857, or why the
obscure village of Kinsman was the first place in which I beheld
the light of day. When I was born the village must have boasted
some four or five hundred inhabitants, and its importance and
vitality is evident because it has held its own for seventy-five
years or more. If any one wants to see the place he must search
for the town, for in spite of the fact that I was born there it has
never been put on the map.
But in truth, Kinsman is a quiet, peaceful and picturesque spot.
Almost any one living in its vicinity will inform the stranger that
it is well worth visiting, if one happens to be near. The
landscape is gently rolling, the soil is fertile, beautiful shade
trees line the streets, and a lazy stream winds its way into what
to us boys was the far-off unknown world. Years ago the deep
places of the stream were used for swimming-holes, and the shores
were favorite lounging-places for boys dangling their fishing-lines
above the shaded waters. There I spent many a day expectantly
waiting for a bite. I recall few fishes that ever rewarded my
patience; but this never prevented my haunting the famous pools and
watching where the line disappeared into the mysterious unfathomed
depths.
The dominating building in Kinsman was the Presbyterian Church,
which stood on a hill and towered high above all the rest. On
Sunday the great bell clanged across the surrounding country
calling all the people to come and worship under its sheltering
roof. Loudly it tolled at the death of every one who died in the
Lord. Its measured tones seemed cold and solemn while the funeral
procession was moving up the hillside where the departed was to be
forevermore protected under the shadow of the church.
If I had chosen to be born I probably should not have selected
Kinsman, Ohio, for that honor; instead, I would have started in a
hard and noisy city where the crowds surged back and forth as if
they knew where they were going, and why. And yet my mind
continuously returns to the old place, although not more than five
or six that were once my schoolmates are still outside the
churchyard gate. My mind goes back to Kinsman because I lived
there in childhood, and to me it was once the centre of the world,
and however far I have roamed since then it has never fully lost
that place in the storehouse of miscellaneous memories gathered
along the path of life.
I have never been able to visualize the early history of my
parents. Not only had they no money, but no occupation; and under
those conditions they began the accumulation of a family of
children which ultimately totalled eight. These were born about
two years apart. I was the fifth, but one before me died in
infancy; it is evident that my parents knew nothing of birth-
control, for they certainly could not afford so many doubtful
luxuries. Perhaps my own existence, as fifth in a family, is one
reason why I never have been especially enthusiastic about keeping
others from being born; whenever I hear people discussing birth-
control I always remember that I was the fifth.
All his life my father was a visionary and dreamer. Even when he
sorely needed money he would neglect his work to read some book.
My mother was more efficient and practical. She was the one who
saved the family from dire want. Her industry and intelligence
were evident in her household affairs and in my father's small
business, too. In spite of this, she kept abreast of the thought
of her day. She was an ardent woman's-rights advocate, as they
called the advanced woman seventy years ago. Both she and my
father were friends of all oppressed people, and every new and
humane and despised cause and ism.
Neither of my parents held any orthodox religious views. They were
both readers of Jefferson, Voltaire, and Paine; both looked at
revealed religion as these masters thought. And still, we children
not only went to Sunday school but were encouraged to attend.
Almost every Sunday our mother took us to the church, and our pew
was too near the minister to permit our slipping out while the
service was going on. I wonder why children are taken to church?
Or perhaps they are not, nowadays. I can never forget the horror
and torture of listening to an endless sermon when I was a child.
Of course I never understood a word of it, any more than did the
preacher who harangued to his afflicted audiences.
At Sunday school I learned endless verses from the Testaments. I
studied the lesson paper as though every word had a meaning and was
true. I sang hymns that I remember to this day. Among these was
one in which each child loudly shouted "I want to be an angel!--and
with the angels stand; a crown upon my forehead, a harp within my
hand!" Well do I remember that foolish hymn to this very day. As
a boy I sang it often and earnestly, but in spite of my stout and
steady insistence that I wanted to wear wings, here I am, at
seventy-five, still fighting to stay on earth.
On religious and social questions our family early learned to stand
alone. My father was the village infidel, and gradually came to
glory in his reputation. Within a radius of five miles were other
"infidels" as well, and these men formed a select group of their
own. We were not denied association with the church members; the
communicants of the smaller churches were our friends. For
instance, there was a Catholic society that met at the home of one
of its adherents once in two or three weeks, and between them and
our family there grew up a sort of kinship. We were alike
strangers in a more or less hostile land.
Although my father was a graduate of a theological seminary when he
settled in Kinsman, he could not and would not preach. He must
have been puzzled and perplexed at the growing brood that looked so
trustingly to the parents for food and clothes. He must have
wearily wondered which way to turn to be able to meet the demand.
He undertook the manufacture and sale of furniture. His neighbors
and the farmers round about were the customers with whom he dealt.
Even now when I go back to Kinsman I am shown chairs and bedsteads
that he made. He must have done honest work, for it has been more
than fifty years since he laid down his tools. Now and then some
old native shows me a bed or table or chair said to have been made
by me in those distant days, but though I never contradict the
statement, but rather encourage it instead, I am quite sure that
the claim is more than doubtful.
Besides being a furniture maker, my father was the undertaker of
the little town. I did not know it then, but I now suppose that
the two pursuits went together in small settlements in those days.
I know that the sale of a coffin meant much more to him and his
family than any piece of furniture that he could make. My father
was as kind and gentle as any one could possibly be, but I always
realized his financial needs and even when very young used to
wonder in a cynical way whether he felt more pain or pleasure over
the death of a neighbor or friend. Any pain he felt must have been
for himself, and the pleasure that he could not crowd aside must
have come for the large family that looked to him for bread. I
remember the coffins piled in one corner of the shop, and I always
stayed as far away from them as possible, which I have done ever
since. Neither did I ever want to visit the little shop after
dark.
All of us boys had a weird idea about darkness, anyhow. The night
was peopled with ghosts and the wandering spirits of those who were
dead. Along two sides of the graveyard was a substantial fence
between that and the road, and we always ran when we passed the
white stones after dusk. No doubt early teaching is responsible
for these foolish fears. Much of the terror of children would be
avoided under sane and proper training, free of all fable and
superstition.
My mother died when I was very young, and my remembrance of her is
not very clear. It is sixty years since she laid down the hard
burden that fate and fortune had placed upon her shoulders. Since
that far-off day this loving, kindly, tireless and almost nameless
mother has been slowly changed in Nature's laboratory into flowers
and weeds and trees and dust. Her gravestone stands inside the
white fence in the little country town where I was born, and beside
her lies a brother who died in youth. I have been back to the old
village and passed the yard where she rests forever, but only once
have gone inside the gate since I left my old home so long ago.
Somehow it is hard for me to lift the latch or go down the walk or
stand at the marble slab which marks the spot where she was laid
away. Still I know that in countless ways her work and teaching,
her mastering personality, and her infinite kindness and sympathy
have done much to shape my life.
My father died only twenty-five years ago. He is not buried in the
churchyard at Kinsman. The same process of the reduction of the
body to its elements has gone on with him as with my mother. But
in her case it has come about through accumulating years; with him
it was accomplished more quickly in the fiery furnace of the
crematorium and his ashes were given to his children and were
wafted to the winds.
Who am I--the man who has lived and retained this special form of
personality for so many years? Aside from the strength or weakness
of my structure, I am mainly the product of my mother, who helped
to shape the wanton instincts of the child, and of the gentle,
kindly, loving, human man whose presence was with me for so many
years that I could not change, and did not want to change.
Since then a brother and sister, Everett and Mary, have passed into
eternal sleep and have gone directly through the fiery furnace and
their ashes are strewn upon the sands. I know that it can be but a
short time until I shall go the way of all who live; I cannot
honestly say that I want to be cremated, but I am sure that I
prefer this method of losing my identity to any other I might
choose.
The memory pictures of the first fifteen years of life that drift
back to me now are a medley of all sorts of things, mainly play and
school. Never was there a time when I did not like to go to
school. I always welcomed the first day of the term and regretted
the last. The school life brought together all the children of the
town. These were in the main simple and democratic. The study
hours, from nine to four, were broken by two recesses of fifteen
minutes each and the "nooning" of one hour which provided an ideal
chance to play. It seems to me that one unalloyed joy in life,
whether in school or vacation time, was baseball. The noon time
gave us a fairly good game each day. The long summer evenings were
often utilized as well, but Saturday afternoon furnished the only
perfect pleasure we ever knew. Whether we grew proficient in our
studies or not, we enjoyed renown in our community for our skill in
playing ball. Saturday afternoons permitted us to visit
neighboring towns to play match games, and be visited by other
teams in return.
I have snatched my share of joys from the grudging hand of Fate as
I have jogged along, but never has life held for me anything quite
so entrancing as baseball; and this, at least, I learned at
district school. When we heard of the professional game in which
men cared nothing whatever for patriotism but only for money--games
in which rival towns would hire the best players from a natural
enemy--we could scarcely believe the tale was true. No Kinsman boy
would any more give aid and comfort to a rival town than would a
loyal soldier open a gate in the wall to let an enemy march in.
We could not play when the snow was on the ground, but Kinsman had
ponds and a river, and when the marvellous stream overran its banks
it made fine skating in the winter months. Then there were the
high hills; at any rate, they seemed high to me, and the spring was
slower in coming than in these degenerate days, it seemed. To aid
us in our sports there was a vast amount of snow and ice for the
lofty, swift slides downhill, and few experiences have brought
keener enjoyment, which easily repaid us for the tedious tug back
to the top. I am not at all sure about the lessons that I learned
in school, but I do know that we got a great deal of fun between
the study hours, and I have always been glad that I took all the
play I could as it came along.
But I am quite sure that I learned something, too. I know that I
began at the primer and read over and over the McGuffey readers, up
to the sixth, while at the district school. I have often wondered
if there was such a man as Mr. McGuffey and what he looked like.
To me his name suggested side-whiskers which, in Kinsman, meant
distinction. I never could understand how he learned so much and
how he could have been so good. I am sure that no set of books
ever came from any press that was so packed with love and
righteousness as were those readers. Their religious and ethical
stories seem silly now, but at that time it never occurred to me
that those tales were utterly impossible lies which average
children should easily have seen through.
McGuffey furnished us many choice and generally poetical
instructions on conduct and morals. And the same sort were found
in other books, also. I remember one that I used to declaim, but I
do not recall the book where it was found; this was an arraignment
of the tobacco habit. It is not unlikely that this gem had
something to do with the Methodist Church not permitting a man who
smokes to be ordained as a preacher. Anyhow, I haven't heard of or
seen this choice bit of literature and morals for sixty years, but
here it is, as I remember it:
"'I'll never chew tobacco;
No, it is a filthy weed.
I'll never put it in my mouth,'
Said little Robert Reed.
Why, there was idle Jerry Jones,
As dirty as a pig,
Who smoked when only ten years old,
And thought it made him big.
He'd puff along the open streets
As if he had no shame;
He'd sit beside the tavern door
And there he'd do the same."
The girls made their hatred of liquor just as clear, although I do
not recall their words, but I do know the title of one recitation.
The name carried a threat to all of us boys, declaring:
"The lips that touch liquor
Shall never touch mine."
From what I see and hear of the present generation I should guess
that Doctor McGuffey and his ilk lived in vain.
I am inclined to think that I had the advantage of most of the boys
and girls, for, as I have said, my home was well supplied with
books, and my father was eager that all of us should learn. He
watched our studies with the greatest care and diligently
elaborated and supplemented whatever we absorbed in school. No one
in town had an education anywhere near so thorough as his education
that hard work and rigorous self-denial had afforded him.
I am never certain whether I have accomplished much or little.
This depends entirely upon what comparisons I make. Judged with
relation to my father, who reared so large a family and gave us all
so good an education from the skimpy earnings of a little furniture
store in a country town, I feel that my life has been unproductive
indeed. How he did it I cannot understand. It must have been due
largely to the work and management of my mother, who died before I
was old enough to comprehend. But from the little that I remember,
and from all that my older brothers and sisters and the neighbors
have told me, I feel that it was her ability and devotion that kept
us together, that made so little go so far, and did so much to give
my father a chance for the study and contemplation that made up the
real world in which he lived. In all the practical affairs of our
life, my mother's hand and brain were the guiding force. Through
my mother's good sense my father was able to give his children a
glimpse into the realm of ideas and ideals in which he himself
really lived.
But I must linger no longer at the threshold of life, which has
such a magic hold on my conscious being.
In due time I finished my studies at the district school, and now,
grown to feel myself almost a man, was given newer and larger
clothes, and more books, along with which came a little larger
vision; and I went to the academy on the hill, and timorously
entered a new world.
My eldest brother, Everett, who was always the example for the
younger children, was then, by what saving and stinting I cannot
tell, pursuing his studies at the University of Michigan; and my
oldest sister, Mary, was following close behind. I have not the
faintest conception how my father and mother were able to
accomplish these miracles, working and planning, saving and
managing, to put us through.
Any one who desires to write a story of his ideas and philosophy
should omit childhood, for this is sacred ground, and when the old
man turns back to that fairyland he lingers until any other
undertaking seems in vain.
But the first bell in the academy tower has stopped ringing and I
must betake myself and my books up the hill.
CHAPTER 3
AT THE THRESHOLD OF LIFE
As I entered the academy I was at once aware that I had changed. I
had stepped out of childhood, where we were controlled by commands,
and had become a youth, where I had some rights. In all my years
at the district school our teachers were women. Now we had a man.
It took some time and trial to feel out just how far we dared to
run counter to his will, or to act on our own. But we learned, in
the true scientific manner, of trial and error, and trial and
success.
We had left arithmetic behind and had algebra in its place. And
instead of our English grammar we now made a bold effort at Latin.
We took McGuffey's with us, for the sixth reader was not used in
the primary grade. So we were still pursued by silly, fantastic
stories teaching what McGuffey must have thought were moral
precepts. But all this did not last long. Then, for the first
time, we studied history. Not for any special purpose, or,
seemingly, with any end in view, but it was necessary that we put
in the time.
We still had baseball. We now were older and stronger and more
fleet of foot, and took more pride in the way we played. Most of
the games in the district school were far beneath our dignity at
the academy, but baseball received all the former adoration, and
even more. We began to be self-conscious about the girls, but this
was quite easily and rapidly overcome.
As I look back at my days at the district school and the academy, I
cannot avoid a feeling of the appalling waste of time. Never since
those days have I had occasion to use much of the arithmetic that I
learned. In fact, only the merest fraction has ever been brought
into service. I am satisfied that this is the experience of almost
all the boys and girls who went to school when I was young; and as
near as I can tell this is true to-day. I began grammar in the
grades, and continued it in the high school, but it was a total
loss, not only to me but to all the rest. I would be the last to
deny the value of a good understanding of some language, but the
method of our public school was the poorest and the most expensive
for getting that understanding. For my part, I never could learn
grammar, at either the primary or the high school. I have used
language extensively all my life, and no doubt have misused it,
too; in a way, I have made a living from its use, but I am
convinced that I was rather hindered than helped in this direction
by the public schools. I am well aware of my own defects in the
use of language and have always tried, and still try, to correct my
shortcomings in this respect, but with only indifferent success.
Most of the rules for grammar and pronunciation are purely
arbitrary. Any one who makes any pretense of observation and
experience cannot fail to note the differences in the forms of
speech and pronunciation in different countries and in various
sections of each country. The correct use of words can only come
from environment and habit, and all of this must be learned in
childhood from the family or associates, otherwise it will not be
known. Committing rules represents only feats of memory that have
no effect on speech.
Memorizing history is likewise of no avail. We learned the names
of presidents and kings, of the generals, of the chief wars, and
those accidents that had been accepted as the great events of the
world; but none of it had any relation to our lives. We studied
Roman, Greek, and Egyptian histories, and then took English,
French, and German, too, but all of the happenings had a dreary far-
off setting that was no part of the world and time in which we
lived. As well might Cæsar and Hannibal and Napoleon have
inhabited Mars, so far as we students were concerned. To us they
meant nothing but dry and musty dates and proper names. Even dates
did not connect us with the events of their day. Ira Meacham, then
the oldest citizen in Kinsman, seemed as far away in the past and
as detached from us as Noah and his adventures with some kind of
boat and cargo of animals and equally alien to our time and place.
In youth, and probably in later life, everything back of our own
existence seems weird and unreal and far removed from the life that
we know. Attempting to store the brain with unrelated facts and
matters entirely irrelevant to the present is worse than useless,
for it confuses and distorts.
As I look back at the district school and the academy, I plainly
see the boys and girls that gathered at the ringing of the bell.
They were the children of the men and women of Kinsman and the
territory just outside. Most of these families were farmers. Next
in number were the small shop-keepers. There were two or three
blacksmiths, a stone-cutter, a tinner, a carpenter, a few laborers,
two doctors, two or three preachers, and a dentist. Few of these
had ever been far from home, and all knew next to nothing of the
outside world. Most of their children followed in their steps.
Very few of these laughing, boasting boys and girls ever left the
old village, and almost none were drawn into any broader or
different fields than their parents knew before. None of them ever
found any practical use for what they learned, or tried to learn at
school beyond ordinary reading and writing. The exceptions who
aspired to other avenues were moved by some inner or outer urge and
specially prepared for their future course of life.
Schools probably became general and popular because parents did not
want their children about the house all day. The school was a
place to send them to get them out of the way. If, perchance, they
could learn something it was so much to the good. Colleges
followed the schools for the same reason. These took charge of the
boy at a time when he could be of little or no use at home, and was
only a burden and a care.
All established institutions are very slow to change. The defects
of schools and colleges have been discussed for many years, and the
lines of a rational and worth-while education have been developed
to take their place, but still the old-time education with most of
the ancient methods persists and flourishes yet.
It is worse than useless to try to make scholars of the great
majority of boys and girls. In fact, scholarship as it is
understood is not so necessary to life as people have been taught
to believe. Man does not live by books alone. Indeed, they fill a
very small part of the life of even those who know how to read.
Schools were not established to teach and encourage the pupil to
think; beyond furnishing a place for keeping the children out of
the way, their effort was to cement the minds of pupils according
to certain moulds. The teachers were employed to teach the truth,
and the most important truth concerned the salvation of their
souls. From the first grade to the end of the college course they
were taught not to think, and the instructor who dared to utter
anything in conflict with ordinary beliefs and customs was promptly
dismissed, if not destroyed. Even now there are very few schools
that encourage the young or the old to think out questions for
themselves. And yet, life is a continuous problem for the living,
and first of all we should be equipped to think, if possible.
Then, too, education should be adjusted to the needs of the pupil
and his prospective future. Wise teachers and intelligent parents
can tell at an early age the trend and probable capacity of the
mind of the child. All learning should be adapted to making life
easier to be lived.
After finishing at the academy, I went one year to Allegheny
College, at Meadville, in the preparatory department. I still
found baseball an important adjunct to school life. Here I
continued my Latin and tried to add some Greek, with very poor
success. I found geometry far easier, but no more useful. I did
get something in zoology that remained with me; but I cannot to-day
find the slightest excuse for studying either Latin or Greek; both
are absolutely devoid of practical value. The college professor
who gives his life to Latin cannot speak it as well as the street
gamin who lived in Rome two thousand years ago; and all the
treasures of learning that were buried in ancient languages have
long since been better rendered into English and other languages
than any modern student could ever hope to do. If perchance some
untranslated manuscript should be unearthed, there is little need
that all boys and girls should learn Latin so that it may be
translated. There is no possible chance that the keys for
translating languages will again be lost. To spend years in
studying something that has nothing but what is called a cultural
value is most absurd. All knowledge that is useful has a cultural
value; the fact that it has some other value should make it more
desirable instead of less.
Since I left Allegheny College I have never opened the lids of
Virgil or any other Latin author, except in translation. Greek was
even more useless and wasteful of time and effort than Latin. I
never really attempted to do anything with either, excepting to
"get by," and it is hard to understand the apologists for the dead
languages of the dead. We live in a world full of unsolved
mysteries. Their real study has been but begun. Every fresh fact
that we master can add to the happiness of man, both by its use in
life and by the cultural value that worth-while knowledge brings.
I am inclined to believe that the age-long effort to keep the
classics in schools and colleges has been an effort not to get
knowledge but to preserve ignorance. The mythical soul really is
not worth so much consideration.
I spent one year at Allegheny College. I came back a better ball
player for my higher education. I learned to despise the study of
Latin and Greek, although I never told my father so. He believed
that there could be no education without Latin and Greek, and he
had added Hebrew to the list. I did learn something of geology,
and caught a glimpse of the wonders of natural science. Throughout
my life I have been industriously enlarging my view of what some
are pleased to call the "material" world, but what to me is the
only world.
I went home for my summer vacation, intending to return to college
the next autumn, but the panic of 1873 settled this matter for me.
Although my father was anxious that I should go back, I was certain
that I ought not to burden him longer. So I abandoned further
school life and began my education.
My mother died before I went away to school. My memory of her is
blurred and faded, although I was fourteen years old at the time.
I know that she had a long illness, and for months calmly looked
forward to swift and certain death. She had no religious beliefs.
Her life was given fully and freely to her home and children, and
she faced the future without hope or fear. On the day of her death
I was away from home, so I did not see her in her last moments,
though all the family were summoned. I never could tell whether I
was sorry or relieved that I was not there, but I still remember
the blank despair that settled over the home when we realized that
her tireless energy and devoted love were lost forever.
After I left Allegheny College I was set to work in the factory and
the little store. I was never fond of manual labor. I felt that I
was made for better things. I fancy all boys and girls harbor the
same delusion. I had no mechanical ability, and to this day have
none. I could do rather well at a turning lathe, and could handle
a paint brush, but I never bragged about it. But I still played
baseball. I don't know just when I gave up the game, but I think
that it forsook me when I was no longer valuable to my side.
During the winter I taught a district school in a country
community. I remember even the salary, or wages, that I received.
The pay was thirty dollars a month "and found"--the latter of which
I collected by going from house to house one night after another,
and then returning to my own home on Friday night. Boarding around
was not so bad. I was "company" wherever I arrived, and only the
best was set before me. I had pie and cake three times a day. I
taught in the same school three winters, which completed that part
of my career. I have been teaching more or less all my life, but
confining my activities to those who did not want to learn. In
this three years I had some fifty scholars, ranging from seven
years old to a year or two above my own age. On the whole, it was
a pleasant three years. I am not sure how much I taught the
pupils, but I am certain that they taught me. In most district
schools rods and switches were a part of the course. My school was
large and had caused much trouble to the teachers before I came,
but I determined that there should be no corporal punishment while
I was there, and of this the pupils were early informed. I told
them that I wanted no one to do anything through fear. I joined in
their games and sports, including, of course, baseball when the
snow was not on the ground. I lengthened the noon hours and
recesses, which made a hit with the pupils but brought criticism
from their parents. However, I managed to convince them that I was
right, and am still quite sure that I was. Whether they learned
much or little, they certainly enjoyed those winters. No matter
when I go back to my old home I am sure to meet some of the
thinning group whom I tried to make happy even if I could not make
them wise. I feel sure that if the same effort could be given to
making people happy that is devoted to making them get an education
which could not be accomplished this world would be a much better
home for the human race.
During my teaching days I began the study of law. I am not sure
what influenced me to make this choice. I knew that I never
intended to work with my hands, and no doubt I was attracted by the
show of the legal profession. When I was still quite young the
lawyers from the county seat always visited our town on all public
occasions. On the Fourth of July and on Decoration Day, in
political campaigns and on all holidays, they made speeches and
were altogether the most conspicuous of the locality. Then, too,
we lived across the street from a tin-shop, and the tinner was the
justice of the peace, and I never missed a chance to go over to his
shop when a case was on trial. I enjoyed the way the pettifoggers
abused each other, and as I grew toward maturity I developed a
desire to be a lawyer, too. Every Monday morning, as I started off
to teach my school, I took a law book with me, and having a good
deal of time improved it fairly well.
When my third term of teaching ended my eldest brother, Everett,
was teaching in high school, and my sister, Mary, in a grade
school. They were both as self-sacrificing and kind as any human
beings I have ever known; they and my father insisted that I should
go to Ann Arbor in the law department, which I did for one year.
At that time the full course was two years. At the end of one year
I was positive that I could make my preparation in another year in
an office, which would cost much less money and give a chance to be
admitted to the bar at twenty-one. So I went to work in a law
office in Youngstown, Ohio, until I was ready for examination for
admission to the bar. In those days a committee of lawyers were
chosen to examine applicants. They were all good fellows and
wanted to help us through. The bar association of to-day lay down
every conceivable condition; they require a longer preliminary
study, and exact a college education and long courses in law
schools, to keep new members out of the closed circle. The
Lawyers' Union is about as anxious to encourage competition as the
Plumbers' Union is, or the United States Steel Co., or the American
Medical Association.
When I considered that I was ready for the test I presented myself,
with some dozen other ambitious young men, for the examination. A
committee of lawyers was appointed to try us out. That committee
did not seem to take it as seriously as examiners do to-day. I was
not made to feel that the safety of the government or the destiny
of the universe was hanging on their verdict. As I remember it
now, the whole class was passed, and I became a member of the Ohio
Bar. Youngstown was then a promising manufacturing town and county
seat. It was about twenty miles from the place of my birth. I
would have been glad to open an office there, but it was a city of
twenty thousand people, and I felt awed by its size and importance;
so I went back home and reported my success to my father. He was
delighted, and possibly surprised, at my good luck. Poor man, he
was probably thinking what he could have done had Fortune been so
kind to him. But, like most parents, the success of the son was
his success. My neighbors and friends warmly congratulated me, but
it was some time before they encouraged me with any employment.
They could not conceive that a boy whom they knew, and who was
brought up in their town, could possibly have the ability and
learning that they thought was necessary to the practice of law.
CHAPTER 4
CALLED TO THE BAR
In the English expression, I had now been "called" to the bar.
Lawyers are very fond of fiction; especially the English lawyers.
Working a long time on obscure subjects, spending all your money,
and as much of your family's as you can get, and finally passing
examinations against the will and best efforts of the inquisitors,
means getting "called to the bar." I now had a license to practice
law, but no one had called me to practice on him. Perhaps I might
digress on the brink of a new and untried world to take account of
stock, as one might say.
I had no money and no influential friends. I had a rather meagre
education. I had never been carefully and methodically trained,
and I have felt the lack of it all my life. My law education came
from a year's study at a good law school and from a year's reading
under a lawyer's direction. I had never had any experience in
court work or in the preparation of cases. I then knew, and have
ever since been aware, that I needed specific training which I
could not get. I was none too industrious, and I have never loved
to work. In fact, strange as it may seem, I have never wanted to
do the things that I did not want to do. These activities are what
I call work. I liked to do certain things no matter how much
exertion they required; I liked to play baseball, no matter how hot
the day. I liked to read books that I liked to read. I liked
debating in school and out of school. I liked to "speak pieces"
and was always keen to make due preparation for that, no matter
what the subject might be. I always preferred diversions to
duties, and this strange taste has clung to me all through life.
Again and again these tendencies have kept me from turning to
things that my parents and teachers have felt that I should do. In
this, the parents and teachers have doubtless often been right.
Doing something that one ought to do means foregoing pleasure and
enduring pain, or at least boredom, in the hope and belief that one
will all the more enjoy a thing in the future by abstaining from it
now. Undoubtedly often this is true.
I was strong and healthy. I seemed to have a good mind. I really
had a rather good education. While this education was not detailed
and explicit, still it was broad and comprehensive for one of my
years. I had a strongly emotional nature which has caused me
boundless joy and infinite pain. I had a vivid imagination. Not
only could I put myself in the other person's place, but I could
not avoid doing so. My sympathies always went out to the weak, the
suffering, and the poor. Realizing their sorrows I tried to
relieve them in order that I myself might be relieved. I had a
thoroughly independent, perhaps individual, way of looking at
things, and was never influenced by the views of others unless I
could be convinced that they were nearly right. I had little
respect for the opinion of the crowd. My instinct was to doubt the
majority view. My father had directed my thought and reading. He
had taught me to question rather than accept. He never thought
that the fear of God was the beginning of wisdom. I have always
felt that doubt was the beginning of wisdom, and the fear of God
was the end of wisdom.
I took a little office in the village of Andover, ten miles from
Kinsman, borrowed some money to buy some books, and flung my
shingle to the breeze. I did not succeed at first. I am not
certain that I ever did. In fact, I don't know the meaning of the
word "success." To some--perhaps to most--it means "money." I
never cared much for it nor tried to get much of it or ever had a
great deal, but still most of my life I have had what I needed. To
some, success means political preferment; this I never wanted. It
is hard enough to maintain an independent stand and freely express
one's self without being handicapped by the desire for office or
money. Most people who follow a political career grow to be
cowards and slaves; for that matter, so do men who sell prunes. In
life one cannot eat his cake and have it, too; he must make his
choice and then do the best he can to be content to go the way his
judgment leads. Whether he really has anything to do with the
making of a choice is still another question for which I have
plenty of time and space later on.
Soon after I was twenty-one years old, while I was living in
Ashtabula, Ohio, I married Miss Jessie Ohl, whose parents were
neighbors and friends of our family. Of this marriage my son Paul
was born. Later in life we were divorced--in 1897. This was done
without contest or disagreement and without any bitterness on
either side, and our son has always been attached to both of us,
and she and I have always had full confidence and respect toward
each other.
It would not have been possible to build up what lawyers call "a
good practice" where my name was first posted on an office door.
The part of Ohio where I lived and dreamed was of course a farming
section, with farmers' ideas, if farmers can be said to have ideas.
There were some things that they did not merely believe. These
they knew. They knew that Protestantism was inspired and that all
of its creeds, however conflicting, were true. They knew that the
Republican party and all of its doctrines came as a divine
revelation. They knew that the farmers were the backbone of the
country and the most intelligent people in the world. They knew
that all pleasure was sinful, and suffering was righteous; that the
cities were evil and the country was good. Of course there were no
saloons in the place.
The main industry of the farmers was the dairy business. This was
carried on by taking milk to the cheese factories to be converted
into butter and cheese; and then each farmer would receive his
portion of the money coming from the sale of the output.
My business, as it slowly opened up, grew out of the horse trades,
boundary lines, fraudulent representations, private quarrels and
grudges, with which the world everywhere is rife. There were
actions of debt, actions of replevin, cases of tort, and now and
then a criminal complaint. Nearly all of the last mentioned grew
out of the sale of liquor or watering milk before it was sent to
the factory. The liquor prosecutions generally came from the
villages, although here and there a farmer was fined for selling
hard cider. The whole community was always against the defendant
in the liquor cases, but not so in those pertaining to watering
milk. Membership in a church in no way affected these cases of
dilution. It was so easy to pour a bucketful of water into a milk
can that many otherwise upright men could not resist.
In about two years of steady growth I was convinced that I was too
big for that place, whereupon I moved to Ashtabula, twenty-five
miles away, a town of about five thousand people and then the
largest in that part of the country. Soon after my arrival I was
elected city solicitor, with a salary of seventy-five dollars a
month and the right to take cases on my own account, which salary
and perquisites to me seemed all that I was worth.
Ashtabula furnished a somewhat broader field, but was not
especially exciting. With me, as with most lawyers, a case became
a personal matter, and my side was right. My feelings were always
so strong that fees were a secondary matter.
The most important case I had in Ohio was an action of replevin for
a harness worth fifteen dollars. There were other cases that
involved more money, but this concerned the ownership of a harness
which my client, a boy, had been given for attending a wealthy man
in a case of illness. The suit was commenced before a justice of
the peace ten miles away. I received five dollars for the first
trial, but the jury disagreed. It was set for a second trial, but
my client had no more five-dollar bills, so I tried it again at my
own expense. My client lost the case, but I persuaded a friend of
mine to sign a bond to appeal it to the Court of Common Pleas. By
that time I had moved to Ashtabula, but went to the adjoining
county to try the case, although after the first five-dollar bill I
never got a cent, always paying my own expenses and those of my
client, too. I won the case before the jury, but it was taken to
the Court of Appeals, where the verdict was reversed. Again it was
tried by the jury, who again decided in favor of my client. Once
more it was carried to the Court of Appeals, which again reversed
the case--the result hinged on a question of law. So I decided to
appeal to the Supreme Court, although, in the meantime, I had moved
to Chicago. I wrote the brief, argued the case, paid all expenses,
and the court decided in my favor. It was seven or eight years
from the time the case was commenced before it ended. I had spent
money that I could not afford to spare, but I was determined to see
it through.
This was long ago. There was no money involved, and not much
principle, as I see it now, but then it seemed as if my life
depended upon the result. Outside of the immediate jurisdiction it
was not a famous case, but there are still living in Trumbull
County, Ohio, a number of people who remember the case of "Jewell
versus Brockway"--which involved the title to a harness.
A country law-business, in those days, had some interest and much
excitement, although almost anything attracts attention in a little
village. If a horse fell down on the street it drew a great
audience. If a safe was lowered from the second story, the entire
Main Street came to a standstill to watch it swung by ropes and
pulleys to the sidewalk below. After that, we eagerly looked for
something else to satisfy our curiosity and interest.
Fortunately, there was usually a poker game in progress somewhere,
almost any time of the day or night. The limit was small, to be
sure, as befitted a community of slender means, but none the less
inspiring. After baseball, the next game to fascinate me was
poker. With congenial companions, a deck of cards and a box of
chips, and a little something to drink, I could forget the rest of
the world until the last white bone had been tossed into the
yawning jack pot. I don't know whether I would recommend the sport
or not; I doubt if I would recommend anything if I thought my
advice was to be followed. Everything depends on one's point of
view of life. I am inclined to believe that the most satisfactory
part of life is the time spent in sleep, when one is utterly
oblivious to existence; next best is when one is so absorbed in
activities that one is altogether unmindful of self. Poker is able
to supply this for many, in all ranks of life; yet I would not
advise any one to play, or not play, but do most emphatically
advise them to keep the limit down.
But poker cannot be said to bear any kinship to the profession of
law, excepting that in both games you are dealing with chances,
which always helps somewhat to relieve one from the tedium and
boredom of life. But law practice itself in a country town had its
interesting sides. Necessarily, the cases were small; that is, the
amount of cash involved was not great. But here, again, what is
the difference whether one plays with a blue chip or a white one?
The important thing is to play. And habit has much to do with the
way one views the importance of the game. I am satisfied that no
one with a moderate amount of intelligence can tolerate life, if he
looks it squarely in the face, without welcoming whatever soothes
and solaces, and makes one forget. Every one instinctively,
automatically, seeks satisfaction from the annoyances and
banalities of existence. Some resort to play, some to work, others
to alcohol or opiates, and even to religion. But, whatever one
takes, and quite regardless of relative values, we all seek
something and accept something that gives rest and allays the
tension of strenuous living.
Much of the business of the country lawyer in my day was the trial
of cases before justices of the peace. These often seemed to be
exciting events. And right now I am not so sure but that the old-
time country lawyers fighting over the title to a cow were as
clever, and sometimes as learned, as lawyers now whose cases
involve millions of dollars, or human lives. The trials then were
not so much a matter of rote. A lawsuit, then, before a justice of
the peace, was filled with color and life and wits. Nor was the
country lawsuit a dry and formal affair. Every one, for miles
around, had heard of the case and taken sides between the
contending parties or their lawyers. Neighborhoods, churches,
lodges, and entire communities were divided as if in war. Often
the cases were tried in the town halls, and audiences assembled
from far and near. An old-time lawsuit was like a great
tournament, as described by Walter Scott. The combatants on both
sides were always seeking the weakest spots in the enemy's armor,
and doing their utmost to unhorse him or to draw blood.
A country lawsuit not only gave the farmers and others not employed
somewhere to go, but it left in its wake a chain of hatreds and
scars that never healed.
In Ashtabula I was quite content, as I had been before in Andover.
I had my friends and enemies, my cronies and critics; my arenas in
which to fight, and my poker games at night. And, after all, even
though now that life may appear small and superficial, and wasteful
of time and opportunity--what does it matter? I am now so near the
end of the trail that I can look back and contemplate and compare.
Would it have made the slightest difference whether I had remained
in Ashtabula, or even in Andover, instead of coming to Chicago,
whether the stage was larger; or, whether I had been born at all?
CHAPTER 5
I MAKE A HIT
Considering my age and the town, I was prospering in Ashtabula, and
would doubtless be there now except for an important event for
which I was no more responsible than I am for the course of the
earth around the sun.
I was married when still a youth and was living there with my wife
and son Paul, then four or five years old. I had been practicing
law since I came of age, and was nearing my twenty-ninth birthday.
Like most other young men I concluded to buy a home, and found one
that I thought would do. I had five hundred dollars in the bank,
and I bought the place for thirty-five hundred. The five hundred
was to be paid down and the balance over a series of years. The
owner was to deliver the deed to my office the next day. He
appeared at the appointed time only to tell me that his wife
refused to sign the document, so he could not sell the house. As I
had made up my mind to buy this home I was peeved, to put it
mildly, but managed to control my temper and answered bluntly, "All
right, I don't believe I want your house because--because--I'm
going to move away from here."
It is perfectly plain that the wish or whim of the woman shaped my
whole future, and perhaps hers and her family's as well. Had I
bought the house I would probably be in Ashtabula now trying to
meet overdue payments. Perhaps I would be in the graveyard,
perhaps in a little law office. No one can possibly guess. But
certain it is, whether for better or worse, my life would have been
a radically different one. It was easy enough to decide to leave
Ashtabula when the woman refused to sign the deed, but where should
I go? The world looked big and lonely, and my savings very small.
My brother Everett was teaching in Chicago, and this doubtless had
something to do with choosing that city for my new venture.
Because of Everett's age and intelligence and kindliness all the
family, including myself, always respected him and went to him for
advice and assistance; and up to the time of his death, a few years
ago, none of us ever looked to him in vain.
From my youth I was always interested in political questions. My
father, like many others in northern Ohio, had early come under the
spell of Horace Greeley, and, as far back as I can remember, the
New York Weekly Tribune was the political and social Bible of our
home. I was fifteen years old when Horace Greeley ran for the
presidency. My father was an enthusiastic supporter of Greeley and
I joined with him; and well do I remember the gloom and despair
that clouded our home when we received the news of his defeat.
From Greeley our family went to Tilden in 1876, but I was not old
enough to vote. Of course most of the people in our neighborhood
were for Hayes. In our town it was hard to tell which was the
chief bulwark, Republicanism or religion. Both were sacred; but
not to my family, who always lined up against the great majority.
Our candidate, Samuel J. Tilden, was elected in 1876, but was not
allowed to take his seat. The Civil War was not then so far in the
background as it is now, and any sort of political larceny was
justifiable to save the country from the party that had tried to
destroy the Union. So, though Tilden was elected, Rutherford B.
Hayes was inaugurated and served Tilden's term.
The Tilden campaign stimulated me to find out all I could about
political questions, and I tried to carefully form an opinion on
the issues of the day. My reading of history and political economy
convinced me that states' rights and free trade were both sound
doctrines. When the campaign between Blaine and Cleveland
disturbed the political life of the Republic, I was for Cleveland.
As political questions have come and gone I have clung in my
political allegiance to the doctrines of states' rights and free
trade. To me they are as true and almost as important as they were
in the historical campaign of 1884, when Cleveland was elected
President of the United States. While I have always been
interested in the political situation, I have never wanted a
political career. The scheming and dickering and trading for
political place never appealed to me, and I concluded early in life
that if one entered a political course he must leave his
independence behind, and this I could never abide. For a young man
I took a considerable part in each of the three campaigns for
Grover Cleveland, and then, and ever since, this President has been
one of my idols. His courage, independence and honesty have always
seemed far above those of most of the political figures of his
time, or since his day.
Strange as it may seem, a banker in Ashtabula, Amos Hubbard, was
the first man to give me some insight into radical political
doctrines. He, like many others in that period, had been greatly
influenced by Henry George's "Progress and Poverty." On his advice
I read the book and felt that I had found a new political gospel
that bade fair to bring about the social equality and opportunity
that has always been the dream of the idealist. While Mr. Hubbard
gave me a first insight into advanced political economy, Judge
Richards, a police judge in Ashtabula, gave me my first sane idea
of crime and criminals. He gave me a little book, "Our Penal Code
and Its Victims," by Judge John P. Altgeld, of Chicago, which was a
revelation to me. This book and the author came to have a marked
influence upon me and my future.
I came to Chicago in 1888. Soon after my arrival I joined the
Single Tax Club, and took part in the second Grover Cleveland
campaign, then going on. This club met regularly every week for
several years. In due time I realized that at every meeting the
same faces appeared and reappeared, week after week, and that none
of them cared to hear anything but a gospel which they all
believed. It did not take long for Single Tax to become a
religious doctrine necessary to salvation. But, the Single Tax
Club furnished a forum for ambitious young lawyers to win a hearing
in; and I generally participated in the debates, which led to my
speaking at ward meetings and other public gatherings from time to
time.
In those days I was rather oratorical. Like many other young men
of that day, I did the best, or worst, I could to cover up such
ideas as I had in a cloud of sounding metrical phrases. In later
years nothing has disturbed my taste along that line more than
being called an "orator," and I strive to use simpler words and
shorter sentences, to make my statements plain and direct and, for
me, at least, I find this the better manner of expression.
When I arrived in Chicago I rented a very modest apartment and took
desk room in an office. I had no money to waste and never liked to
borrow or be in debt, so I tried to live within my means, but in
this I did not fully succeed in that first year in Chicago. I had
few friends and acquaintances, and these did not have enough money
to indulge in the extravagance of litigation. In that first year,
all told, I did not receive in fees, or any other way, more than
about three hundred dollars. I began to feel discouraged. From
the very first a cloud of homesickness always hung over me. There
is no place so lonely to a young man as a great city where he has
no intimates or companions. When I walked along the street I
scanned every face I met to see if I could not perchance discover
some one from Ohio. Sometimes I would stand on the corner of
Madison and State Streets--"Chicago's busiest corner"--watching the
passers-by for some familiar face; as well might I have hunted in
the depths of the Brazilian forest. Had all my associates in Ohio
suddenly come to Chicago en masse it would not have been possible
to detect them there in the solid, surging sea of human units, each
intent upon hurrying by and attending to his own small affairs.
At the Henry George Club I formed some congenial friendships and
never missed one of their meetings; here I found a chance to talk
so that I would not completely forget how to form sentences and
feel at home on my feet. As the election of 1888 approached I was
invited to make some speeches for the Democratic party in various
halls throughout the city. When I appeared at a meeting it was
with a long line of other ambitious young lawyers, each of us eager
to make his voice heard in the general palaver; I was usually put
down toward the end of the list, by which time I had little chance
for attracting attention even if any one cared to listen. If by
any luck I seemed to be getting the ear of the audience, I was soon
interrupted by a string of candidates entering the hall anxious for
their turn. The audience would rise and cheer and call for their
favorite leaders, and the opportunity of the evening would be gone
in the all-around din. Yet, in spite of all handicaps, I did make
some acquaintances. Gradually it came to pass that some member of
an audience would call for me, and I would respond without any
pretense at reluctance. I knew that if I waited some other
favorite would appropriate my chance. Now and then I was invited
to make a talk at some civic meeting, but I did not seem to make a
hit. Generally there were others whose faces were better known to
the listeners. Then, my training had been neglected. My father
had directed my reading, and had insisted that I study political
economy, and speak only if I had something worth saying; at a
political hubbub this was the worst thing one could do, and the
last thing the audience expected or wished.
One night I was asked to speak at a West Side meeting, called to
discuss some civic problem. The leading speaker was William B.
Mason, who was at that time a State senator, and afterwards became
a United States senator. I had long wanted the newspapers to
notice my existence, but the reporters refused to even look at me.
I entered the theatre through the back door and noted with joy that
the place was packed. In front of the stage were a half-dozen or
more newspaper reporters that gladdened my heart. Easily I sized
up the situation and felt that my time had come. After a few
preliminaries I was introduced amidst loud calls for Mason. I
looked around and over at the audience, trying to gain their
attention. The eyes can be very useful for quelling an audience or
forcing people to focus on a speaker. I made my speech. I feel
sure that it was not very bad. Probably not bad enough. I could
see that the audience was waiting for William B. Mason, so I took
no chances in delaying them too long. But the one thing that
forcibly impressed me while I spoke was that not one of the
newspaper men wrote a single line. They leaned back in their
chairs and glanced at me with the complacent and sophisticated
countenances of newspaper men. They knew why they were there, and
whom their editors and the public would want to read about the next
day. When I sat down there was slight applause. No speaker can
get along without at least a little of that. Such approval as was
manifested by the politest and kindliest there was drowned in the
cries for "Mason!" They had come to hear him and were not
interested in waiting. When he arose and stepped to the front of
the platform, the entire audience stood up and wildly cheered; the
newspaper men grabbed their books and pencils and began to write.
The next morning I hopefully looked over the newspapers. The front
pages were covered with Senator Mason, but not a word about me. It
was very discouraging for an energetic young man with the world
before him. It began to look as though the world would always be
before me. I had no envy for Mr. Mason, but what would I not have
given for just a few lines of all that space devoted to him! After
that evening I came to know Senator Mason very well, and never have
I known a more kindly, humane and genial fellow. He, also, was an
idealist, but not too far ahead of the crowd. He was a man of
ability, filled with gentleness and good will toward all the world.
I was disappointed and discouraged, especially because the
newspapers had made no mention of my speech. I did not know the
press so well then as I do to-day. Since then they have given me
more attention than I deserved, and often much more than I wanted.
Through the first half of my life I was anxious to get into the
papers; in the last half I have often been eager to keep out. In
neither case have I had much success. Often I have felt that
newspapers were unkind and unfair to me; and sometimes they have
been. But, when I reflect that I have never been on the popular
side of any issue, that I have always seemed to court opposition,
that I have always stood with the minority against all popular
causes and mass hysteria--that I have always voted "No" and been
independent to the point of recklessness, I feel that I have gotten
off easily. After all is said and done I am inclined to think that
they have treated me very well. I always, really, have had many
warm friends among newspaper men; a good many who were also
minority men. Every large office has a number of this sort, and
they have never failed to be as considerate as it was possible for
them to be.
After the meeting at the West Side hall I was in gloom amounting
almost to despair. If it had been possible I would have gone back
to Ohio; but I didn't want to borrow the money, and I dreaded to
confess defeat. I did not then know the ways of Fate. I did not
know that Fortune comes like the day, sometimes filled with
sunshine, sometimes hidden in gloom. I had not then learned that
one must accept whatever comes along without regret; that he must
not take either gratification or disappointment too seriously. I
did not know, as Bret Harte put it, that the only sure thing about
luck is that it will change. And luck can change as suddenly as
daylight and darkness in a tropical land.
Soon after the blow in connection with the West Side meeting a
"Free Trade Convention" was staged in Chicago. The closing session
was held in Central Music Hall, at that time the most popular
auditorium in the city; Henry George was to be the big drawing-
card. Mr. George was then in the zenith of his power. I was
invited to appear on the same programme. The great auditorium was
packed, to my satisfaction. I looked out upon the audience with
renewed hope. Every Single Taxer in Chicago seemed to be present,
and a great throng besides. Mr. George was the first speaker,
which looked ominous to me. I was afraid of either the first or
last place; either one seemed fraught with peril. No one knew the
tariff question better than Henry George. More than this, he was a
strong idealist, and had the audience in his grasp from the first
moment to the last. Every one but me was carried away with his
able address. I was disappointed. I was sorry that it was so
good. I twitched nervously in my chair until he had finished and
the applause began to die away. I felt that after his wonderful
address I would not be able to hold the audience. I realized that
the crowd had come to hear him, and that but a few among them had
ever heard of me.
When the applause subsided people began getting up and going away.
The show was over. I said to the chairman, "For goodness sake get
busy before every one leaves the house!" Quickly he introduced me,
and my friends paused and did their best to give me a good
reception. I had discovered enough about public speaking to sense
that unless a speaker can interest his audience at once, his effort
will be a failure. This was particularly true when following a
speaker like Henry George, so I began with the most striking
phrases that I could conjure from my harried, worried brain. The
audience hesitated and began to sit down. They seemed willing to
give me a chance. I had at least one advantage; nothing was
expected of me; if I could get their attention it would be easier
than if too much was expected. Not one in twenty of the audience
knew much about me. As a matter of fact, I had taken great pains
to prepare my speech. The subject was one that had deeply
interested me for many years, one that I really understood. In a
short time I had the attention of the entire audience, to my
surprise. Then came the full self-confidence which only a speaker
can understand; that confidence that is felt as one visits by the
fireside, when he can say what he pleases and as he pleases; when
the speaker can, in fact, visit with the audience as with an old-
time friend. I have no desire to elaborate on my talk, but I know
that I had the people with me, and that I could sway those
listeners as I wished.
But the crowning triumph had come as I warmed to my subject and
waxed earnest in what I had to say, and became aware that the
newspaper men down in front were listening, and were plying their
pencils, recording my words, or seeming to record them, as fast as
they shot past. When I finally finished, the audience was indeed
generous and encouraging with its applause and appreciation. Henry
George warmly grasped my hand. My friends and others came around
me, and it was some time before I could leave the stage.
I have talked from platforms countless times since then, but never
again have I felt that exquisite thrill of triumph after a speech.
This was forty years ago, and even now I occasionally meet some one
who tells me that he heard my speech at Central Music Hall the
night I was there with Henry George. I know that at least a part
of this enthusiasm came because I was unknown, and nothing was
expected of me.
The next morning I was awake early and went out and bought all the
papers. This time my name was all over the front page. The
reporters had certainly done their best. I read them all
carefully, and then I read them all over again. It was exceedingly
pleasant to my senses. Since that day I have often seen my name
prominently featured on the outsides and insides of newspapers;
often I have refrained from reading what was said, and have felt
that only by closing my eyes and steeling my heart could I go on
with the work on which I had set my mind.
I went to my office earlier than usual the next morning. No
customers were there. Soon some of my Single Tax friends and
Socialist companions began coming in to congratulate me on my
speech. This was pleasing but not profitable. Single Taxers and
Socialists never come for business; they come to use your telephone
and tell you how the world should be organized so that every one
could have his own telephone. But of course I enjoyed their visit
and appreciated their good will, and began to feel more hopeful.
The city did not look so big, nor feel so cold now. All through
the day I received some real invitations to speak at good meetings
in the campaign then in progress. DeWitt C. Cregier was running
for mayor of Chicago on the Democratic ticket. I had been asked to
speak at various meetings before, but never until then had I been
invited to choose my hall and colleagues. This time I was asked to
do both. I named my hall, but I took no chances, and said that I
would speak alone. And I did.
CHAPTER 6
GETTING ON
In spite of my fond hopes, business did not come with a rush.
Strange to say, the meeting did not bring clients, and these were
what I needed most. A few weeks after Henry George and I had
spoken at Central Music Hall, DeWitt C. Cregier was elected mayor
of Chicago. Although I had taken part in his campaign I had never
met him, and did not even try to make his acquaintance. I knew
that almost every one who had voted for him would expect some favor
in return, and I had no ambition to enter into that sort of
contest.
It was perhaps two months after the election that I was wearily
sitting in my office when a messenger brought me a letter. It was
from DeWitt C. Cregier, asking me to come over and see him when I
had time. The latter part of the sentence sounded like a joke. I
had time right then. So I put the letter into my pocket and went
to see the mayor. The hall and the offices were crowded with
politicians looking for jobs. I sent in my name and was not kept
waiting. After a little preliminary conversation Mr. Cregier asked
me if I would take the position of special assessment attorney.
I had very little idea of the duties of a special assessment
attorney. I was told that the salary was three thousand dollars
for only a year's time, and this seemed to me a fabulous sum, so I
told him that I would be glad to take it and do the best I could.
He asked me when I could be ready to begin. I answered that I saw
no reason why I should not begin right now. So I was placed on the
pay roll before I left the office, and immediately and recklessly
started in.
Very soon I grew familiar with the work. Of course many questions
came up for immediate answers which I did not fully understand, but
I used the best judgment I had and always answered promptly.
Seldom did I find that I had guessed wrong. I thought, then, that
it was my natural judgment and wisdom that led me to always answer
right. Since that time I have modified my opinion. I was working
for the city of Chicago. I had all the strength of a large city
behind my decision; few were able to contest my opinion, and even
if they did, the tendency of the courts was always to decide for
the city. All my experience in life has strengthened this
conclusion. Every advantage in the world goes with power. The
city, the State, the county, the nation can scarcely be wrong.
Behind them is organized society, and the individual who is obliged
to contest for his rights against these forces in either civil or
criminal courts is fighting against dreadful odds.
When I had been special assessment attorney for about three months
some political complication compelled the resignation of the
assistant corporation counsel and I was given his place. My salary
then became five thousand dollars a year. My duties were more
strenuous and I gave them all my time and attention. This position
kept me in court a great deal in contested cases. At the same time
every alderman and city official had the right to ask my advice,
which I learned to give as promptly as possible, often simply
making the best guess I could, and almost invariably finding that
my advice settled the whole controversy. For about ten months I
remained in this office, and then the corporation counsel was
stricken with an illness that compelled him to go south to a warmer
climate, whereupon I became acting corporation counsel, and was the
head of the law department of the city of Chicago. When luck began
to change everything seemed rapidly to come my way. As acting
corporation counsel I was in daily conference with the Mayor, and
we came to be good friends. In one of my interviews I asked him
how he happened to send for me and ask me to be special assessment
attorney, never having met me before. He replied, "Don't you know?
Why, I heard you make that speech that night with Henry George."
How much had I to do with all this? I had nothing whatever to do
with my birth, which was a rather important event in the whole
scheme. It seemed that in the infinite chances that bring forth
life I was to be I. Nor had I the slightest thing to do with the
sort of being that was spawned out with all the rest; nor the
environment in which I found myself. Every turn of the development
came from a cause that was controlling to me. Had I been able to
deliberate, I could only have considered the arguments for and
against each step, and my answer would necessarily have been in the
way that seemed best to me in view of all circumstances, including
my structure. Passing by an endless number of influences of equal
import that determined my destiny, I had nothing to do with the
woman refusing to sign the deed that drove me to Chicago. Had she
signed that deed I should not have left Ashtabula, Ohio. I had
nothing to do with being invited to speak at the Henry George
meeting. I had nothing to do with a man being in the audience who
afterward became mayor. I had nothing to do with being invited to
become special assessment attorney. I had nothing to do with
political differences that made me assistant corporation counsel.
I had nothing to do with illness coming upon the corporation
counsel, which placed me at the head of the department for the
time. But, while I did not make the corporation counsel ill, I am
afraid that I fully approved it. His sickness seemed to be what is
generally called "an act of Providence." If it was such an act, it
is plain that Providence was thinking of me and not of him.
For the following two years I was very busy with the affairs of the
city of Chicago. Every man was my client; that is, every one who
had any business with the city of Chicago. I found most of the
officials, like the average office-holders, anxious to shirk
responsibility. Nothing could be done without the advice of the
Corporation Counsel's office. It was my business to assume the
responsibility. I always took my share of the burden, and made no
attempt to dodge. In cases of doubt I resolved the doubt in favor
of the city, as all officials do, but I never let this rule prevent
me from deciding in favor of the property holder and the citizen
when I was satisfied that he was right.
In this place I made the acquaintance of all the aldermen and most
of the politicians of Chicago. I never admired politicians, though
they are generally kindly and genial, and often very intelligent;
but seldom is there one with real courage. Their constituency is
that mysterious entity known as "the people"--with all its
ignorance, its prejudices, its selfishness, and, worst of all, its
insincerity as to either men or principles. This is the despair of
ever accomplishing anything of real value in the affairs of state.
While I liked political questions, I did not like politicians, as
such, and never wanted political office.
During these early years in Chicago I was very much interested in
what passes under the name of "radicalism" and at one time was a
pronounced disciple of Henry George. But as I read and pondered
about the history of man, as I learned more about the motives that
move individuals and communities, I became doubtful of his
philosophy. I never believed that land should be reduced to
private ownership, and I never felt that any important social
readjustment could come while any one could claim the unconditional
right to any part of the earth and "the fulness thereof." The
error I found in the philosophy of Henry George was its
cocksureness, its simplicity, and the small value that it placed
upon the selfish motives of men. I grew weary of its everlasting
talk of "natural rights." The doctrine was a hang-over from the
seventeenth century in France, when the philosophers had given up
the idea of God, but still thought that there must be some
immovable basis for man's conduct and ideas. In this dilemma they
evolved the theory of natural rights. If "natural rights" means
anything it means that the individual rights are to be determined
by the conduct of Nature. But Nature knows nothing about rights in
the sense of human conception. Nothing is so cruel, so wanton, so
unfeeling as Nature; she moves with the weight of a glacier
carrying everything before her. In the eyes of Nature, neither man
nor any of the other animals mean anything whatever. The rock-
ribbed mountains, the tempestuous sea, the scorching desert, the
myriad weeds and insects and wild beasts that infest the earth, and
the noblest man, are all one. Each and all are helpless against
the cruelty and immutability of the resistless processes of Nature.
Socialism seemed to me much more logical and profound; Socialism at
least recognized that if man was to make a better world it must be
through the mutual effort of human units; that it must be by some
sort of co-operation that would include all the units of the state.
Still, while I was in sympathy with its purposes, I could never
find myself agreeing with its methods. I had too little faith in
men to want to place myself entirely in the hands of the mass. And
I never could convince myself that any theory of Socialism so far
elaborated was consistent with individual liberty. To me liberty
meant only power to do what one wished to do. Free will had
nothing to do with the wanting. Man did not create the wishes; he
simply struggled to carry them out. I never could imagine life
being worth while without the opportunity to carry out individual
desires. I always have had sympathy for the Socialistic view of
life, and still have sympathy with it, but could never find myself
working for the party.
Anarchism, as taught by Kropotkin, Recluse and Tolstoy, impressed
me more, but it impressed me only as the vision of heaven held by
the elect, a far-off dream that had no relation to life. So,
without having any specific radical faith, I always was friendly
toward its ideals and aims, and could feel and see the injustice of
the present system, and generally found myself in conflict with it.
This is still my attitude on social and political questions. I
believed in keeping society flexible and mobile, and embracing what
seemed like opportunity to bring about a fairer distribution of
this world's goods. Living in the North, and holding these views,
I have always been driven to the support of the Democratic party,
with few illusions as to what it meant.
Neither government nor political economy is an exact science. They
concern the arrangement of human units. If it were possible to
demonstrate what sort of an arrangement would be best for the
individuals of the state, it would be of no avail. Humans cannot
be controlled like inanimate objects, or even like the lower
animals. Each human unit is in some regard an independent entity
with his own ideas, his hopes and fears, loves and hates. These
attitudes are constantly changing from day to day, and year to
year. They are played upon by shrewd men, by influential
newspapers, by all sorts of schemes and devices which make human
government only trial and success, and trial and failure. Human
organizations are simply collections of individuals always in
motion and always seeking for easier and more harmonious
adjustment, and never static.
I could see but one way toward any general betterment of social
organization, and that was by teaching sympathy and tolerance.
This in itself is so hopeless a task that every one despairs of any
result worth the effort. Sympathy or its lack is so entirely due
to the character of the physical organism that teaching is of
little help. Sympathy is the child of imagination, and possibly
this can be cultivated if the effort is begun in childhood.
Imagination gives one power to put oneself in another's place. It
does more; it compels him to rejoice and suffer with the joys and
sorrows of those about him. Like almost everything else, it brings
both pain and pleasure, and whether it adds to the happiness of the
individual or increases his misery, cannot be told; of course it
does both, but I know no way of finding out the net result.
In politics, political economy, and human institutions, men make
the great mistake of thinking that any special adjustment of
individual units is perfect or sacred. Probably no organization or
any part of one is wholly either good or bad. Even if at some time
it seemed to conduce to man's highest good it would not follow that
it would have the same effect at all times or places. I could
never be convinced that any institution was wholly good or wholly
evil. This feeling has prevented me from obeying orders or being a
bitter partisan on any question. Instinctively I lean toward the
integrity of the individual unit, and am impatient with any
interference with personal freedom. However, I know that society
can not exist without recognizing the necessity of some control of
the individual. If men could be taught to understand that the
object sought should be to produce happiness, satisfaction, and
general well-being for all, I believe the conditions of life could
be made much easier and human beings made happier than they now
are. This is a changing world, and still it must maintain a
certain amount of consistency and stability or the individual units
would separate, and chaos would make any co-operation impossible.
Naturally my connection with the city administration broadened my
acquaintance and called me often to the discussion of social
problems in all sorts of clubs and organizations. Every large city
has many different cliques, societies and groups, and these are
constantly on the lookout for new attractions to keep alive the
interests of their members. Generally this becomes a burden to
those who are more or less widely known; which is one reason why so
few of the addresses are worth while. The speaker who talks at all
sorts of meetings is apt to form hasty opinions, grow careless
about what he says, and place too great an estimate upon his ideas
and those picked up from others and passed along without proper
consideration. One thing, however, is almost certain: clubs and
societies are always looking for some one new, and just as surely
they readily cast the old one out. This process gives the student
a chance to test all opinions and explore fresh fields of thought.
No writer or speaker should ever be satisfied that his view of
things is sound. Only by constant trials and tests can one arrive
at the truth, and there is no certainty that even these efforts
will determine it.
CHAPTER 7
THE RAILROAD STRIKE
After two or three years of service in the city law department, I
resigned my position and became the general attorney of the Chicago
and North-Western Railway Company. It was with a good deal of
hesitation and consideration, and after all sorts of advice, that I
undertook that position. I was aware that my general views of life
were not such as fitted me for this kind of career. Every one
connected with the offices of the company knew my opinions and
attitudes, but gave me no cause for concern or uneasiness. I was
treated with respect and all were most friendly.
This position with the company brought me into a new and varied
field. All sorts of questions were submitted to me. I rendered
opinions on the liability of the company, in cases of personal
injuries, in claims for lost freight, in the construction of the
statutes and ordinances, and all the numerous matters that affect
the interests of railroads. I also tried a considerable number of
cases, some of them involving my old employer, the city of Chicago.
In spite of the kindness and consideration of all my associates, I
knew that the position was one that I should never really like. It
was hard for me to take the side of the railroad company against
one who had been injured in their service or against a passenger.
I was aware that I always wanted the company to help them, and in
this my services were made easier by the general claim agent, Mr.
Ralph C. Richards, whose sympathies were the same. I am sure that
both he and I were able to help a great many people without serious
cost to the road. Later, Mr. Richards practically gave up his
position to inaugurate a great work for the prevention of
accidents. The policy that he brought about saved many lives and
limbs, and has now been largely incorporated into the law.
It was during my services for the Chicago and North-Western
Railroad Company that the strike of the American Railway Union
occurred, in 1894. Neither before nor since has any such railroad
strike happened in America. Mr. Eugene Debs was the head of that
organization. He was an intelligent, alert, and fearless man. The
strike grew out of a demand for better wages and conditions. The
railroads refused to grant the demands. I had then been in my new
position about two years, as I now recall it.
When I was sure that there was no chance to settle the
difficulties, I realized my anomalous position. I really wanted
the men to win, and believed that they should. This had for years
been my attitude in cases of strike. I had no feeling that the
members of labor unions were better than employers; I knew that
like all other men they were often selfish and unreasonable, but I
believed that the distribution of wealth was grossly unjust, and I
sympathized with almost all efforts to get higher wages and to
improve general conditions for the masses.
Still, my duty was to the road, and as the strike loomed it seemed
sure that in some way I should be put in positions where one side
or the other would doubt my loyalty. Within a few days I found
that I had been placed on a committee of all the roads to assist in
the management of the strike. I at once went to both the general
counsel and the president of the railway company. Both were
friends and had full confidence in me. I told them of the
situation, and that I could not act on the committee. I made them
understand my general feelings and my peculiar position. They
recognized it and said that they would not insist upon my being on
the committee, that they were perfectly willing to trust me to be
neutral, and knew that I would be loyal. I felt then that I should
resign my position, that the road had the right to men who were in
full accord with their policy; but they urged me to stay, and, of
course, their confidence and fairness made a strong appeal to me.
So I told them that I would remain, and that if it ever came to a
point where either they or I should feel any embarrassment we would
take up the question again.
Day after day conditions grew more serious. There was a general
interruption of railroad traffic from one end of the country to the
other. In many of the great railroads the yards were crowded with
idle freight cars. Deputy sheriffs and marshals were called out in
all the large cities and many of the smaller ones. I watched the
situation with anxiety. I preferred to stay with the North-Western
Railway Company, but I could not avoid being in sympathy with the
strikers. The Chicago and North-Western Railway Company was
involved with all the rest of the roads, and all who came to the
offices thought and talked of little else besides the strike. John
P. Hopkins was then mayor of Chicago, and John P. Altgeld was
governor of the State. These men were both Democrats, and the
sheriff of the county was a Republican. Under the laws of the
State it was the duty of the mayor in the city and the sheriff in
the county to preserve peace. The governor had the right to call
out the troops, but only on request of the sheriff or the mayor,
when the legislature was not in session. Grover Cleveland was then
President of the United States.
A great many cars were burned in the yards of Chicago and other
cities. As in most cases, each side claimed that their enemies
were responsible for the fires. One night I went to one of the
railroad yards and saw many cars in flames. Crowds of people were
gathered around to see the destruction; most of them were boys and
young men. A number of them were deputies who had been sworn in to
preserve the peace. The crowd was quiet and attempted no
demonstration. They only stood and looked at the burning cars; and
little, if any, effort was made to quench the flames. I presume
that it was not possible to get much water so far from the city
supply, but of this I am not certain.
I had no knowledge as to who started the fires, but I was satisfied
that most of all those in the yards were sympathetic toward the
strikers. They were working men and their families, who are always
automatically on the side of the strikers, just as the wealthy are
on the other side. I have no doubt that many of the deputies who
were sworn in were friendly toward the strikers. I have observed
many deputies and other officials in times of strikes, and also the
militia, and have found that generally they were really in sympathy
with the strikers. Most of them were poor, and so without taking
any thought about the situation they sided with their class. This
has been the case since man evolved. It was clearly the case in
the French Revolution, and in all lesser political and social
upheavals that ever came to my attention, either through experience
or study.
Industrial contests take on all the attitudes and psychology of
war, and both parties do many things that they should never dream
of doing in times of peace. Whatever may be said, the fact is that
all strikes and all resistance to strikes take on the psychology of
warfare, and all parties in interest must be judged from that
standpoint. As I stood on the prairie watching the burning cars I
had no feeling of enmity toward either side. I was only sad to
realize how little pressure man could stand before he reverted to
the primitive. This I have thought many times since that eventful
night.
The strike was hardly well under way before the railroads applied
to the Federal Courts to get injunctions against the strikers.
Neither then nor since have I ever believed in labor injunctions.
Preserving peace is a part of the police power of the State, and
men should be left free to strike or not, as they see fit. When
violence occurs this is for the police department and not for a
court of chancery. I had never been connected with a case
involving strikes, but both by education and natural tendency I had
a deep-rooted feeling for the men against whom injunctions were
issued.
A short time before I had stood on the prairie watching the cars in
a cloud of smoke, the railroads asked the Federal Court for
injunctions. The General Managers' Association, including all the
roads, had appointed Mr. Edwin Walker their attorney in these
cases. Mr. Walker was a clever and very astute lawyer. For years
he had been the general counsel for the Chicago, Milwaukee and St.
Paul Railroad Company, and had also represented large interests in
Chicago and other parts of the United States.
When the interference in train schedules became general there was,
of course, delay in carrying the mails. The railroads put mail
cars on every train where there was any possible chance of sending
them out. The strike leaders were always advised by their lawyers
to try to let mail trains through, but the general stoppage of work
nevertheless caused delay.
The injunction cases were commenced by the United States
Government. Mr. Edwin Walker was regularly appointed special
attorney for the government in the prosecution of these cases. So,
in this matter, Mr. Walker was general counsel for the Chicago,
Milwaukee and St. Paul Railway Company, for the General Managers'
Association, and a special attorney for the United States. I did
not regard this as fair. The government might with as good grace
have appointed the attorney for the American Railway Union to
represent the United States. The A. R. U. had thus far been
represented by their regular attorney from Indiana, and Mr. William
Irwin, a well-known lawyer from Minneapolis. Soon after the
injunctions were issued, Mr. Debs and a good many of my friends
came to ask me to go into the case. I did not want to take it up,
knowing about what would be involved. I knew that it would take
all my time for a long period, with no compensation; but I was on
their side, and when I saw poor men giving up their jobs for a
cause, I could find no sufficient excuse, except my selfish
interest, for refusing. So, again I went to the president of the
company and told him that I felt that I should go into the case,
although it would mean giving up my position; and I told him that I
believed some one whose political views were more in keeping with
their interests would be a much better man for the company. He was
most cordial and attentive. He agreed that I must do whatever I
considered right, but asked me to continue my connection with the
road when I went into private practice and take such matters as we
agreed upon, at about half the salary I had been receiving. This
connection was thus kept up for a number of years. The president
of the road was Mr. Marvin Hewitt. We remained the best of friends
to the end of his life. He died about 1920, I believe.
And so I gave up my position and became one of the attorneys for
Mr. Debs in the great strike of the American Railway Union. I did
not want to take the position, and felt that I should not, but I
had not been able to justify my strong convictions with a refusal
to aid them in their contest. About the time of the issuing of the
injunctions, and before I left the North-Western Company, Mr. Edwin
Walker, as special government attorney, wired the President of the
United States, Grover Cleveland, to send Federal troops to Chicago.
He did this against the protest of the governor and the mayor, and
clearly without legal rights. The Constitution of the United
States provided that the President could send troops to a State on
request of the legislature, or of the governor, when the
legislature was not in session, but no one seemed to care for the
Constitution, as no one does when an occasion seems important. I
no longer get so excited over such acts as I once did. I know that
when men are sufficiently aroused they ignore laws and customs and
precedents, and try to get their way. The great World War
demonstrates the impotency of human restraints and arrangements in
the face of an overwhelming passion. Governor Altgeld asserted
that there was no authority for sending the troops to Chicago; as
clearly there was none. As a matter of fact, there was no need
whatever of Federal troops, even had the President a legal right to
send them. There was no rioting or uncontrollable disorder, no
open defiance of the law. Here and there a few men might gather
and some discussion might lead to a fight, but that is always a
common occurrence in such cases.
It is true that a large number of cars in outlying districts were
burned, but no military force could have averted that. This did
not result from any uncontrollable disorder. The police at all
times had the situation fully in their hands, and there was no sign
or chance of disturbance. The Federal troops were really brought
as a gesture, but an unfriendly one against the Constitution and
the laws and the liberties of the people. When the troops arrived
they stood around like the policemen and officers and citizens,
until their presence was so obviously useless that they were
recalled.
Mr. Debs and all the members of his board were enjoined--enjoined
from what? Of course no one could tell. It depended upon how many
inferences could be drawn from other inferences, and to what
degree. But the injunction and the troops and the press made it
impossible to win the strike. I do not mean to discuss the
original merits of the strike. The men left the railroads en masse
to keep their wages from being cut and working conditions lowered.
The railroads resisted because to yield meant greater cost in the
running of trains. Both sides were right, but I wanted to see the
workers win. I knew of no way to determine what a workman should
be paid; what he should have in a way is determined by what he can
get, and, so far as we can see, every one's compensation is settled
the same way.
In addition to the injunctions, Mr. Debs and all his executive
board were indicted by the Federal grand jury for conspiracy. Like
all such indictments, these were framed in general terms, to cover
anything that by fact or construction might justify a conviction.
If there are still any citizens interested in protecting human
liberty, let them study the conspiracy laws of the United States.
They have grown apace in the last forty years until to-day no one's
liberty is safe. The conspiracy laws magnify misdemeanors into
serious felonies. If a boy should steal a dime a small fine would
cover the offense; he could not be sent to the penitentiary. But
if two boys by agreement steal a dime then both of them could be
sent to the penitentiary as conspirators. Not only could they be,
but boys are constantly being sent under similar circumstances.
If A is indicted and a conspiracy is charged, or even if it is not
charged, the state's attorney is allowed to prove what A said to B
and what B said to C while the defendant was not present. Then he
can prove what C said to D and what D said to E, and so on, to the
end of the alphabet, and after the letters are used up the state's
attorney can resort to figures for as long a stretch as he cares to
continue. To make this hearsay or gossip competent, the state's
attorney informs the court that later he will connect it up by
showing that the defendant was informed of the various conversations,
or that he otherwise had knowledge of them. Thereupon the
complaisant judge holds that the evidence is admissible, but if it
is not connected up it will be stricken out. A week or a month may
pass by, and then a motion is made to strike it out. By that time
it is of no consequence whether it is stricken out or not; it has
entered the jurors' consciousness with a mass of other matter, and
altogether it has made an impression on his mind. What particular
thing made the impression, neither the juror nor any one else can
know.
These conspiracy laws, made by the courts, have gone so far that
they can never be changed except through a general protest by
liberty-loving men and women, if any such there be, against the
spirit of tyranny that has battered down the ordinary safeguards
that laws and institutions have made to protect individual rights.
In that event, any degree of freedom cannot be established except
by statutes of the Federal government and of the several States.
In this event, these laws will be chipped away by courts through
sophistry and tyranny, as they always have been destroyed. Liberty
cannot prevail unless the feeling is in the hearts of the people;
and wealth, and the hope of it, have taken this away.
CHAPTER 8
EUGENE V. DEBS
In due time, the strike ran its course, as strikes always do. The
A. R. U. was destroyed. For many years its members were boycotted;
they changed their names and wandered over the land looking for a
chance to work. After the strike was over, the cases of Mr. Debs
and his associates were called in court. Mr. S. S. Gregory
consented to go into the trial of these cases with me. Mr. Gregory
was one of the best lawyers I have ever known. He was emotional
and sympathetic, he was devoted to the principles of liberty and
always fought for the poor and oppressed. In spite of all this, he
had a fine practice, and his ability and learning were thoroughly
recognized. He at one time was president of the American Bar
Association, and his legal attainments were everywhere acknowledged.