Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 04.pdf/190

The Supreme Court of Minnesota.

F. R. E. CORNELL. "My opportunities for forming a correct esti mate of his character and talents I believe to have been unusual, meeting him at the bar, first as pros ecuting officer while he was engaged in the defence, afterwards when he had become Attorney-General and prosecutor, and I was employed for the de fence. In later years I had the good fortune to be associated with him in a very important civil case in the Federal courts, until, at the close of the liti gation in the trial court, he was removed from the case by his appointment to the Supreme Bench. In the subsequent progress of the cause in the Supreme Court of the United States, he was suc ceeded by a gentleman who then stood, and still stands, at the head of the bar of the country, with a reputation and fame only circumscribed by the territorial boundaries of the nation. The oppor tunities of measuring Judge Cornell's powers by contrast with those of the highest, I believe I did not abuse. I do not think that my judgment was swayed by personal friendship. At any rate, it was deliberately formed, and has been since care fully reviewed; and I then thought, and still think, that in every attribute which contributes to form the character of a great lawyer, Judge Cornell was the peer of his successor, and that a reversal of 22

169

opportunities would have produced a correspond ing reversal of station, fame, and reputation. The salient feature of Judge Cornell's character as a lawyer was the unerring certainty with which his mind glided from premise to conclusion. I have often had occasion to note and to admire the ra pidity with which, with almost the precision of in tuition, he would arrive at the coirect solution of a difficult legal problem then first submitted to his attention; the comprehensive glance with which he would instantly sweep the entire subject, and grasp all its qualifications and limitations. W hile his high character and standing in the State made him the constant recipient of civil honors, . . . and his position was always conspicuous, yet a marked characteristic of the man was his innate modesty. In self-conceit he seemed absolutely wanting, and yet no man that I ever knew had a more constant and abiding confidence in himself. No man who has ever embellished and adorned the bench or official position in this State was ever more conspicuously distinguished for the perfect purity of his public and private character than our lamented friend." Greenleaf Clark was appointed one of the additional Associate Justices for which pro-

D. A. DICKINSON.