Page:Reminiscences of Sixty Years in Public Affairs (Volume One).djvu/116

Rh State, but his career in Congress was a failure. He was a member of the Thirty-seventh Congress, and he failed to realize the issues and to comprehend the duties of a public man in an hour of peril. In 1862 he abandoned the Republican Party, and joined himself to a temporary organization in the State, called the People’s Party.

The party disappeared upon its defeat in November, 1862, and Judge Thomas disappeared from politics.

Mr. Kinnicutt, the Speaker, in 1842, was a gentleman of agreeable manners, fair presence, and respectable, moderate abilities. He administered the office with entire fairness. His elevation to the post of Speaker, then thought to be one of great importance, may have been due to his residence at Worcester. In those days, as in these, Worcester was a center of political power and its leading men were able always to command consideration. When, in 1840, it was an urgency in party politics to defeat Governor Morton, John Davis, of Worcester, called “Honest John,” was selected as the candidate, although he was then a member of the United State Senate.

In the sessions of 1843 and 1844, I originated three measures and introduced bills designed to give legal form to the measures.

1. A bill requiring cashiers of banks and treasurers of all other corporations to return to the assessors of each city and town the names of stockholders residing in each such city or town, the shares held by each and the par value of the shares. The bill was passed. The holders of stock who had theretofore escaped taxation were enraged, and a meeting to denounce the measure was held in Boston.

2. A bill to require the mortgagee to pay the tax on mortgaged real estate. The bill was then defeated, but recently the measure has become a law.

3. The reduction of the poll tax.