Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 02.pdf/422

Rh he had associates whom it would be at least polite to consult occasionally.

It is a notable fact that all four of the judges appointed by Governor Mason became Chief Justices. After Ransom was made Governor, Whipple presided, and continued to do so until the Constitution of 1850 was adopted and the whole judicial system was changed. Whipple was born



in 1805 at Fort Wayne, Ind., and was a son of Major John Whipple. One of the scandals of Woodward's administration was that the Major, in his irritation at one of Woodward's decisions, used some very cursory language to him on the street, and called him a rascal, whereupon Woodward, whose theory seemed to be that he was at all times liable to contempt, fined Whipple fifty dollars; and when Governor Hull exercised his pardoning power by remitting the fine, as he did shortly afterward, the grand jury presented the Governor for his illegal conduct in doing so. This was in 1809, and is a specimen of the kind of cat-hauling that was common at that stage of our political history. The younger Whipple was a West-Pointer, but he studied law and sat through three sessions of the Legislature, being Speaker at that of 1837; he was also secretary of the Constitutional Convention of 1835, and a member of that of 1850.

Alpheus Felch was born in Limerick, Me., Sept. 28, 1806, and having lost both parents before he was three years old, grew up in the family of his grandfather, Abijah Felch, who seems to have seen to it that he lacked nothing in the way of educational opportunities, for he was sent to the famous Phillips Exeter Academy, and was graduated from Bowdoin in 1827, in the same class with John P. Hale. His coming to Michigan was rather accidental; he had begun to practise law in Maine, but finding the climate too hard for him, he started in 1833 for Vicksburg, where his friend Sargent S. Prentiss was living. At Cincinnati the cholera, which raged that year, seized him; and when he recovered he thought Michigan a safer destination than Mississippi. He must have made his mark at once, for he was sent to the first three Legislatures, and in them fought the wildcat banks. As a bank commissioner in 1838, he continued his pursuit of these institutions, brought their frauds to light and shut many of them up. He was Auditor-General for a few weeks in 1842, and then took Judge Fletcher's place. In 1845 the Democrats made him Governor, and in 1847 sent him to the United States Senate. From 1853 to 1856 he was president of that commission which had to adjust the Spanish and Mexican land-claims in California. When he was long past seventy, he became one of the law professors in the State University. His son-in-law, Colonel Grant, is one of the present judges.

Daniel Goodwin was born at Geneva, N. Y.. Nov. 24, 1799, and died at the great