Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 05.pdf/306

The Supreme Court of Tennessee. devoting himself wholly to the study of the law as an abstract science until this period of enforced leisure. Those years .were of incalculable benefit to him in fitting him for the great judicial work that lay before him; and his candid friends must say that Judge Cooper will be known to posterity as Chan cellor rather than as Supreme Judge. As Chancellor, he was not trammelled by the

views of associates. He could write opin ions in only such cases as he chose. The questions before him, sitting in the chief commercial city of the State, were more di verse and more inter esting than the cases allotted him as Su preme Judge. And this result was as well contributed to largely by the fact that while as Chancellor at home, he had his magnifi cent library, access to which was made easy by his methodical sys tem of indexing and collating, and as Su preme Judge, he was moved from town to WILLIAM town, and left de pendent on such books as he was able to carry with him. In him Tennessee can claim the greatest expounder of equity doctrines of modern times. As a judge, he loved to search out precedent and to strengthen his conclusions by an array of authorities that could not be met or overthrown. He had well-defined trends of thought, and he applied the prin ciples he believed to be the law regardless of the harshness of the rule in a particular case. In addition to the mass of decisions that he has left both as Chancellor and Supreme Judge, the State and profession have been

277

vastly benefited by the other results of his unremitting toil. Aside from the well-nigh perfect code he assisted in compiling, he prepared and published a new edition of Tennessee Reports, covering the period from the organization of the State to 1860. This work was rendered necessary by the scarcity of the earlier reports; but Judge Cooper availed himself of the opportunity to thor oughly re-edit the re ports, and by anno tations and crossreferences to much increase their value to the practitioner. He also edited an edition of Danielle's Chancery Practice. He was defeated for a re-election as Su preme Judge in 1886 by a narrow margin, though not an active candidate. It was the hope of the profession that his retirement to private life would mean that a great book on some branch of equity law would come from his pen, and many flattering offers have been made F. COOPER him by the leading law-publishers; but these he has put off, as he says, until he should be thoroughly rested. But after a life of labor, uninterrupted for forty-five years, he has found rest so grateful that six years have gone by and he is not yet rested. Some months ago he removed from Nashville, and is now making the city of New York his home. Waller C. Caldwell was born in Obion County, Tenn., May 14, 1849. He was but three years old when his father died. By his own labor, after he became old enough, Judge Caldwell supported his widowed