Part 25 (2/2)
Of course the mere announcement, in 1786, that Patrick Henry was then ready once h to excite the attention of all persons in Virginia who reat renown throughout the country, his high personal character, his overwhelifts in persuasion, were such as to ensure an ale to any cause which he should espouse before any tribunal Confining hi only such cases as orth his attention, he was immediately called to appear in the courts in all parts of the State
It is not necessary for us to try to follow this veteran and brilliant advocate in his triuive the detail of the innuht years of his practice at the bar Of all the causes, however, in which he ever took part as a lawyer, in any period of his career, probably the al aspect, was the one coued by him in the Circuit Court of the United States at Richain, in the sain of this fanificance of his relation to it By the treaty with Great Britain in 1783, British subjects were empowered ”to recover debts previously contracted to the a pay the war, under the authority of a state law of sequestration” According to this provision a British subject, one Williaht an action of debt in the federal court at Richinia, Thomas Walker, on a bond dated May, 1772 The real question hether payment of a debt due before the war of the Revolution, froinia to British subjects, into the loan office of Virginia, pursuant to a law of that State, discharged the debtor”
The case, as will readily be seen, involved many subtle and difficult points of law, municipal, national, and international; and the defence was contained in the following five pleas: (1) That of payinia act of sequestration, October 20, 1777; (3) That of the Virginia act of forfeiture, May 3, 1779; (4) That of British violations of the treaty of 1783; (5) That of the necessary annulment of the debt, in consequence of the dissolution of the co-allegiance of the two parties, on the declaration of independence[418]
Some idea of the importance attached to the case may be inferred from the assertion of Wirt, that ”the whole power of the bar of Virginia was eument, and eloquence”
exhibited in the discussion were such ”as to have placed that bar, in the esties,above all others in the United States”[419] associated with Patrick Henry, for the defendant, were John Marshall, Alexander Campbell, and James Innes
For several weeks before the trial of this cause in 1791, Patrick Henry secluded hiements, and settled down to intense study in the retirerandson of the orator, Patrick Henry Fontaine, as there as a student of the law, relates that he himself was sent off on a journey of sixty miles to procure a copy of Vattel's Law of Nations From this and other works of international law, the old lawyer ”made many quotations; and with the whole syllabus of notes and heads of arguments, he filled a manuscript volume more than an inch thick, and closely written; a bookbound with leather, and convenient for carrying in his pocket He had in his yardan office, built at so, and an avenue of fine black locusts shaded a walk in front of it He usually walked and meditated, when the weather permitted, in this shaded avenue For several days in succession, before his departure to Rich frequently in this avenue, with his note-book in his hand, which he often opened and read; and fro alone in the shade of the locusts,” it was supposed that he was co to another account, so eager was his application to this labor that, in one stage of it, ”he shut hi which he did not see his fah the office door”[421] Of all this preparation, not unworthy to be called Demosthenic, the result was, if we may accept the opinion of one eminent lawyer, that Patrick Henry ”came forth, on this occasion, a perfect master of every law, national and ation in the most distant point”[422]
It was on the 14th of Noveued in the court-house at Riches Johnson and Blair of the Supree Griffin of that district The case of the plaintiff was opened by Mr Counsellor Baker, whose argu of that day Patrick Henry was to begin his arguislature was then in session; but when eleven o'clock, the hour for theof the court, arrived, the speaker found himself without a house to do business All his authority and that of his sergeant at ar to keep the members in their seats: every consideration of public duty yielded to the anxiety which they felt, in coreatquestion Accordingly, when the court was ready to proceed to business, the court-rooe as it is, was insufficient to contain the vast concourse that was pressing to enter it The portico, and the area in which the statue of Washi+ngton stands, were filled with a disappointed croho nevertheless maintained their stand without In the court-rooh condescension to the public anxiety, relaxed the rigor of respect which they were in the habit of exacting, and permitted the vacant seats of the bench, and even the s behind it, to be occupied by the impatienta th hushed, and the profound silence which reigned within the rooave notice to those without that the orator had risen, or was on the point of rising Every eye in front of the bar was riveted upon hier attention; and so still and deep was the silence that every oneof his own heart Mr Henry, however, appeared wholly unconscious that all this preparation was on his account, and rose with as much simplicity and composure as if the occasion had been one of ordinary occurrence It ued three days successively in its delivery; and some faint conception of the enchanth it turned entirely on questions of law, yet the audience,wearied, that they followed hihout with increased enjoyment The roo silence' hich he was heard, that not a syllable that he uttered is believed to have been lost When he finally sat down, the concourse rose, with a generalup and dispersion of a great theatrical asse, for the first time, the exhibition of soates was at length able to command a quoruth every part of the State, was filled with the echoes of Mr Henry's eloquent speech”[423]
In the spring of 1793 this cause was argued a second tie, and, in addition, before Mr Chief Justice Jay, and Mr Justice Iredell of the Supreerness to hear Patrick Henry as before,--an eagerness which was shared in by the two visiting judges, as is indicated in part by a letter froe Iredell, who, on the 27th of May, thus wrote to his wife: ”We began on the great British causes the second day of the court, and are now in the reat Patrick Henry is to speak to-day”[424] A of people who then poured into the court-roo of twenty years, who, having got a position very close to the judges, was made aware of their conversation with one another as the case proceeded He describes the orator as not expecting to speak at that ti his head on the bar” Meanwhile the chief justice, who, in earlier days, had often heard Henry in the Continental Congress, told Iredell that that feeble old gentleman in mufflers, with his head boearily down upon the bar, was ”the greatest of orators”
”Iredell doubted it; and, beco impatient to hear hiuan to coreat, to put the laboring oar into the hands of a decrepit old rave, weak in his best days, and far inferior to the able associate by hih the earlier and so his movement to the exercise ”of a first-rate, four- his whole power and speed for a few leaps, and then taking up again” ”At last,”
according to Randolph, the orator ”got up to full speed; and took a rapid viehat England had done, when she had been successful in arms; and ould have been our fate, had we been unsuccessful The color began to coo in the face of the chief justice; while Iredell sat with his mouth and eyes stretched open, in perfect wonder
Finally, Henry arrived at his utrand and solemn pauses There was a tue Iredell exclaimed, 'Gracious God! he is an orator indeed!'”[425] It is said, also, by another witness, that Henry happened that day to wear on his finger a dia; and that in the uished English visitor who had been given a seat on the bench, said with significant e!”[426]
As exareat and a fit assee, his several speeches in the case of the British debts were, according to all the testihest order of al argue for hi, if he so pleases, the copious extracts which have been preserved froraphic reports of these speeches, as taken by Robertson Even from that point of view, they appear not to have suffered by comparison with the efforts made, in that cause, on the same side, by John Marshall himself No inconsiderable portion of his auditors were members of the bar; and those keen and coed themselves as impressed ”not less by the h not expressly uh co his opinion in this case:--
”The cause has been spoken to, at the bar, with a degree of ability equal to any occasion I shall, as long as I live, reuments which I have heard in this case They have discovered an ingenuity, a depth of investigation, and a power of reasoning fully equal to anything I have ever witnessed; and some of the what I have ever felt before Fatigue has given way under its influence, and the heart has been war has been instructed”[428]
It will be readily understood, however, that while Patrick Henry's practice included i, like the one just described, on propositions of law, and argued by hier part of the practice to be had in Virginia at that time must have been in actions tried before juries, in which his success was chiefly due to his aination, tact, and eloquence The testi his power in this direction is ; and, for obvious reasons, such portions of it as are now to be reproduced should be given in the very language of the persons who thus heard hi him
First of all, in the way of prelienius and methods as an advocate before juries, may be cited a few sentences of Wirt, who, indeed, never heard hiifted and a very aerly collected and keenly scanned the accounts of many who had heard him:--
”He adapted himself, without effort, to the character of the cause; seized with the quickness of intuition its defensible point, and never perht of it Sir Joshua Reynolds has said of titian, that, by a few strokes of his pencil, he kne to e and character of whatever object he attempted; and produced by this means a truer representation than any of his predecessors, who finished every hair In like manner Mr Henry, by a few eneral stae or character he pleased; and convert it into tragedy or con will, and with a pohich no efforts of his adversary could counteract He never wearied the jury by a dry and minute analysis of the evidence; he did not expend his strength in finishi+ng the hairs; he produced all his high effect by those rare master-touches, and by the resistless skill hich, in a very feords, he could mould and color the prominent facts of a cause to his purpose He had wonderful address, too, in leading off the minds of his hearers from the contemplation of unfavorable points, if at any time they were too stubborn to yield to his power of transforilance, and most intractable temper, to resist this charm hich he decoyed away his hearers; it demanded a rapidity of penetration, which is rarely, if ever, to be found in the jury-box, to detect the intellectual juggle by which he spread his nets around them; it called for a stubbornness and obduracy of soul which does not exist, to sit unmoved under the pictures of horror or of pity which started froht resolve, if they pleased, to decide the cause against hie in the defence of his client But it was all in vain Souard, and they were gone; soe fresh froenuine ihtful surprise, and melted them into conciliation; and conciliation towards Mr Henry was victory inevitable
In short, he understood the huth and all its weaknesses, together with every path and by-hich winds around the citadel of the best fortified heart and em or storm”[429]
Still further, in the way of critical analysis, should be cited the opinion of a distinguished student and master of eloquence, the Rev
Archibald Alexander of Princeton, who, having more than once heard Patrick Henry, wrote out, with a scholar's precision, the results of his own keen study into the great advocate's success in subduing men, and especially jurymen:--
”The power of Henry's eloquence was due, first, to the greatness of his emotion and passion, accompanied with a versatility which enabled him to assume at once any emotion or passion which was suited to his ends Not less indispensable, secondly, was athe entire apparatus of voice, intonation, pause, gesture, attitude, and indescribable play of countenance In no instance did he ever indulge in an expression that was not instantly recognized as nature itself; yet so tones were absolutely peculiar, and as inimitable as they were indescribable These were felt by every hearer, in all their force His s were so pause, aided by an eloquent aspect, and soer The sympathy between mind and mind is inexplicable Where the channels of co inward passion great, and the expression of it sudden and visible, the effects are extraordinary Let these shocks of influence be repeated again and again, and all other opinions and ideas are for the ht into unison with that of the speaker; and the spell-bound listener, till the cause ceases, is under an entire fascination Then perhaps the charm ceases, upon reflection, and the infatuated hearer resumes his ordinary state
”Patrick Henry, of course, owed s of the coreat cases he scanned his jury, and formed his mental estimate; on this basis he founded his appeals to their predilections and character It is what other advocates do, in a lesser degree When he knew that there were conscientious or religiousthe jury, he would ht, and would adroitly bring in scriptural citations If this handle was not offered, he would lay bare the sensibility of patriotis the hbor; whoa Tory, and as proved to have refused supplies to a brigade of the Aeneral descriptions to particular instances, we er in the witness-stand, and to give us, in detail, some of his own recollections of Patrick Henry His testily, is in these words:--
”From my earliest childhood I had been accustomed to hear of the eloquence of Patrick Henry On this subject there existed but one opinion in the country The power of his eloquence was felt equally by the learned and the unlearned
No man who ever heard him speak, on any important occasion, could fail to ad then a youngwas very important, it was natural for me to observe the oratory of celebrated men I was anxious to ascertain the true secret of their power; or what it hich enabled them to sway the minds of hearers, almost at their will