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The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. new State settled down to develop itself, he was its Chief-Justice three times, and three times its Governor, — elected in 1799 as the anti-Federalist candidate, and in 1805 by a united following from both parties, or (to use his own pithy synopsis of the matter, which tradition has preserved) elected " at first by the blackguards and at last by the gentle men." The phrase "settled down," that was just now employed

with reference to Penn sylvania, does not in dicate the condition of the Commonwealth at this period, but its aim only. The good old days of David Lloyd would seem compara tively untroubled be side the violent times that followed immedi ately upon the Revo lution; and no settling down could occur until the community had passed through the disturbed process in evitable when acids and alkalies encounter each other in solution. Through the lengthy and searching ordeal of those years, Thomas THOMAS McKean passed with perpetually assailed and never tarnished honor; riding rough shod over every one who opposed him, haughty and uncompromising, hated by many, respected by most, and feared by all. But whatever high-handed act he did was invariably done above-board, and as invari ably plainly prompted by his sincere and ferocious belief in himself, — a belief, be it said, more often justified than not. And when we read of hostile manifestoes in 1805, setting forth his " austerity and aristocratic habits," his " years of professional conten tion and dominion in courts," and that

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"under McKean the legislature was bullied and abused; under Snyder it was caucussed and corrupted," it is plain that the charges his enemies could bring against him were remote from anything in the nature of dis honor. The gravest accusation to be found (and there does seem some ground for it) is of nepotism, — a practice that this nation began by thinking an abuse of trust in a public office-holder, and a few private per sons think so still. His biographer, Mr. Buchanan, quotes a diverting extract from a journal of the time, in which under the title of "The Royal Family," a list of such appointments is given as follows : — "Thomas McKean, — Governor. Joseph B. McKean, son, — Attorney-General. Thomas McKean, Jr., son, — Private Secretary. Thomas McKean Thompson, nephew, — Secretary of Common wealth. Andrew Pettit, son-inlaw, — Flour-inspector. Andrew Bayard, McKEAN brother-in-law to Pettit, — Auctioneer. Dr. George Buchanan, son-in-law, — Lazaretto Physician. (This last appointment was pretty well open to criticism, as the appointee had been living in Baltimore for seventeen years, and was preferred immediately upon his arrival in Phila delphia.) William McKennan, brother-in-law of T. Mc Kean Thompson, — Prothonotary of Washington County." There are several more on this list; and it certainly looks a little as if the Governor had been of the opinion that blood was thicker than water. If he was one of the