File:Lincoln, the lawyer (1912) (14581118949).jpg

Identifier: lincolnlawye00hill (find matches)
Title: Lincoln, the lawyer
Year: 1912 (1910s)
Authors: Hill, Frederick Trevor, 1866-1930
Subjects: Lincoln, Abraham, 1809-1865 Lawyers Presidents
Publisher: New York : Century Co.
Contributing Library: Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection
Digitizing Sponsor: State of Indiana through the Indiana State Library

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andthe most important individual influence on hisfuture may be fairly ascribed to the judge beforewhom he practised and with whom he virtuallylived for ten successive years. 177 XVII JUDGE DAVIS AND LINCOLN JUDGE DAVID DAVIS was a lawyer ofmarked ability and strong individuality,a shrewd business man, a loyal friend, a violentpartizan of generous impulses and deep-rootedprejudices, an arbitrary and even despotic rulerof his own domain, but a fearless administratorof the law and an absolutely honest and capablejudge. He and Lincoln had met as lawyers inSpringfield, but there does not appear to havebeen any intimacy between them until Lincolnresumed practice at the close of his congressionalterm, when their acquaintance speedily devel-oped into a friendship of enduring quality andhistoric importance. The relations of the bench and bar were neces-sarily much closer in the early fifties than theyare to-day, and the lawyers of the Eighth Cir-cuit were practically a big family of which 178
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V Hon. David Davis Judge of old 8th Illinois Circuit. Later an Associate Justice of the Supreme Courtof the United States JUDGE DAVIS AND LINCOLN Davis was the official head, and over which heexerted a really parental influence. Not onlydid his Honors ample girth and other physicalproportions suggest a paterfamilias, but hismental attitude toward the bar was at once dom-ineering and fatherly, with the domineering ele-ment always prominent. He used to remindme of a big schoolmaster with a lot of little boysat his heels whenever I saw him stumping towardthe court-house, remarks a now distinguishedlawyer, and it cannot be denied that there wasa good deal of the pedagogue about the judge.Certainly he knew how to maintain order in hiscourt, but there was always more tact than sever-ity in his enforcement of discipline. Mr. Sher-iff, you will see that nobody except General Lin-der is allowed to smoke in my court, was hismethod of administering a rebuke to the Attor-ney-General of Illinois,

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