Part 5 (1/2)
He was for a number of years devoted to the practice of his profession before he entered public life. At the age of thirty-four he represented Greene county in the state legislature. He brought to the office of a legislator an experience seasoned by years of study and court practice, with a native courage and coolness, coupled with a force of boldness of view that gave him one of the first places in the able body which const.i.tuted the legislature of 1840. Three marked elements of strength were his--great ability in debate, remarkable oratorical strength, and the tact of leaders.h.i.+p. These at once won the station of the heads.h.i.+p of his party.
At that particular time, the whig party in the house stood in the need of a strong champion. The Hon. James E. Saunders, of Lawrence county, was the leader of the democratic forces, and it never had an abler. Himself a remarkable man, he was regarded by no little degree of fear by his whig opponents, but he found in William M. Murphy a knight worthy of his steel.
Mr. Murphy met the giant of the mountains in debate, was amply able to parry his well-directed blows, and was entirely equal as an advocate. His elements of oratory were noted, while he would deal his heaviest blows. It was a battle royal between the champions, the one from the hill districts and the other from the black belt. The sparring of these mighty men was a matter of interest, and became memorable for many years. They were equally matched, yet very dissimilar in a number of respects. Later, Mr. Murphy was the choice of his party for congress, but was defeated, after a remarkable campaign, by his kinsman, Hon. Samuel W. Inge.
In 1849, Mr. Murphy represented his district in the senate of the state, and three years afterwards removed to Texas, but his stay in the state of the Lone Star was brief, for he returned to Alabama, and located as a lawyer at Selma. While never recognized as a profound jurist, he was without an equal as an advocate. His elements of oratory were singularly unique. His initial approach to a cause in the court was usually attended with a rugged and somewhat incoherent method, and it seemed that he had some difficulty in getting under full way, but when he did finally reach the point where his words would begin to warm by the friction of his own thought, his was as overpowering oratory as was ever heard in an Alabama court. Roused to a pitch where the cause came to possess the man, it was like a tempest cras.h.i.+ng through a forest. Absolutely transformed in appearance, his manner, his voice, his logic would seem to catch on fire, and all the elements of the great orator would respond to his bidding with electrical facility. A series of thunderbolts could not have been more terrible, and the cogency of logic more overwhelming than when this remarkable man was at his best. It did not in the least savor of the rant, but the combination of the terrible and overwhelming with the utmost self-possession was that which made him inimitable. Invective, sarcasm, irony, ridicule, persuasion--all lent their quota to the torrent which swept like a Niagara. Nor could it be withstood. It was as irresistible as the flow of a mighty river. Men listened to him entranced, sometimes terror-stricken, at intervals pleased even unto delight, and always with interest. His cast of oratory was peculiarly his own. He imitated no one, nor was it possible to imitate him.
Mr. Murphy was cut down by a stroke of apoplexy at a period of life when he was just fruiting into great usefulness and power. He was only forty-nine years of age when the fatal stroke came. He died at his home in Selma in 1855. Few men who have lived in the state have left a profounder impress, in some respects, than William M. Murphy. His towering courage was equalled alone by his uniform generosity of spirit. There was not a small quality that entered into his character. Open, frank, n.o.ble, brave, bold, gentle, courteous, and tender, he was all of these. His sympathy once enlisted made him one of the most loyal and devoted of friends and supporters. On the other hand, his opposition when once stirred was the invitation of a storm. But he never forgot to be generous even to the sternest of foes.
This galaxy of virtues with which his character was adorned awoke universal confidence and won him popularity not infrequently among his opponents. Set over against every stern or strong quality was a check or balance that held his character well in poise. This gave him a ponderous influence among those who knew him, as he was regarded as fair at any cost of advantage to himself.
JAMES E. SAUNDERS
For quietness of force and reservation of power, Honorable James E.
Saunders was noteworthy. With a breadth of vision far above the ordinary, a remarkable insightedness, and absolutely calm in his poise, never disturbed by the clash or clamor of contest, he meted out his strength in proportion to the demand of the occasion which elicited it, and invariably left the impression that a fund of power was held in reserve for whatever emergency might arise. He enjoyed the advantage of all self-collected men.
Never betrayed into warmth of feeling, he was oftener in position to disarm the opposition than he would have been under the sway of pa.s.sion.
There was an undertow of inherent force the seeming consciousness of the possession of which made Mr. Saunders perennially serene.
His qualities soon marked him for distinguished leaders.h.i.+p in the legislature to the attainment of which leaders.h.i.+p he came, not by self-seeking, but by dint of his recognized power. He had served as a legislator before 1840, but at that time, he rose to the first place in the ranks of his party.
There was necessarily inseparable from his bearing the consciousness of that which would have affected any man, with the sway of a strong political organization of which he was the recognized leader.
Self-a.s.sertion becomes easy when there is little to be apprehended from opposition. The dominant democracy in the lower house of the Alabama legislature might have occasioned tranquility in the leader, even though it had not been natural. Mr. Saunders not only held the whigs at bay, but in awe. Nor was this the result of a hectoring spirit from which none was freer, but because of his quiet ability to dispose of obstruction which lay in his way.
This condition continued till there appeared on the scene William M.
Murphy of Greene. A trained lawyer accustomed to the rough and tumble of the court room, naturally endowed with many strong points needed in an emergency like that which confronted his party in the legislature, as fully conscious of power as the leader of the opposition, and more disposed to yearn for a gladiatorial combat than to spurn it, Mr. Murphy was full panoplied as a leader of the whig party.
Unknown at first as to his qualifications, even to those of his own party affiliation, he was hailed with delight after that the first issue was joined. The two leaders were entirely dissimilar save in one particular--in courtesy and fairness. In these they were at par. But when met in combat Mr. Saunders was deliberate, plain, matter of fact, clear, cool, divesting a proposition of every seeming objection, and investing it with an atmosphere of transparency that seemed to place it quite beyond the pale of doubt.
Altogether different it was when Mr. Murphy arose to combat it. With a rugged sort of oratory he would seem to struggle with himself for the gain of a substantial footing, which when once obtained, an avalanche was turned loose, and under the thunder of its descent, gathered momentum as it proceeded, the old hall seemed fairly to quake. Meanwhile his opponent sat as stolid as a Stoic. By interruptions blows were given in the calmness of his power, but they were parried with the roar of a stentor.
Thus surged the battle along partisan lines, the democrats possessing themselves in complacent consciousness of strength, while the whigs would catch inspiration under the demonstration of a leaders.h.i.+p so splendid.
In all this never was Mr. Saunders in the least daunted nor was his masked power the least exposed. His coolness was equalled only by the vigor of his opponent. In nothing pa.s.sive but always forceful and brave, he lent mightiness of strength by a serenity that challenged the admiration of the st.u.r.diest opponent. In the gage and stress of conflict his thought flowed without the least break in its coherency and without the slightest disconcertedness. His equable temper never forsook him. To each contest he would bring the same tranquil poise and it was maintained throughout.
Without hesitation he would face unblinking the severe ordeals to which he was subjected in the stormy legislative days when he moved a giant among the giants of Alabama. To be a legislator in those days meant much, for the people filled the seats of legislation with their choicest spirits.
Mr. Saunders was not of a bantering mien, but he relied on the strength of his logic into which he quietly injected a personal conviction so overpowering that it would seem that no position could be more impregnable, and thus it would look till it came to fall under the iconoclastic manipulation of his formidable opponent. To be able to have those days of partisan tempest reproduced in type would be to thrill thousands at this late time.
As chairman of the judiciary committee in the house, the service rendered by Mr. Saunders was fundamental to the interests of the state. Nor was any one more profoundly interested in the educational affairs of the state as was shown by his share in the establishment of the state university on a solider basis, of the board of trustees of which inst.i.tution he was a prominent member. Mr. Saunders would have graced a higher station in the affairs of statecraft than that which he held, and in a wider orbit would have afforded an easier play of his strength. Dropping out of politics for a short while, he became a commission merchant in Mobile, but in 1845 he was appointed to the post of the port of Mobile, by President Polk, and after an expiration of his term of office he was on the electoral ticket in the campaign which resulted in the election of Pierce and King. Wealthy and hospitable, his was a typical southern home of the long ago.
A devout Christian philosopher and a sedate statesman to which were added the qualities of a superior man of business, the usefulness of Honorable James E. Saunders was incalculable.
W. P. CHILTON
For numerous reasons the name of Judge William P. Chilton is worthy of a conspicuous place in the annals of the great men who have made Alabama. He was a learned and incorruptible public servant, a patriot of the highest mold, a patient and manly gentleman in all his relations, and a typical Christian. He moved among his peers with universal esteem, and amidst the temptations of public life preserved a reputation untarnished even by a breath of suspicion.