Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 09.pdf/134

 Presidential Lawyers. plea to his jury of constituents against the duplicities of French witnesses and British aggressions upon his Brother Jonathan clients. John Quincy Adams' inaugural instanced the ambitious lawyer addressing his jury in ornate phrases with oratorical effort to the exclusion of convincing argument. That of General Jackson was pitched in the aggres sive note of a young lawyer opening his case and too manifestly exposing the weak points of his contention. When Martin Van Buren was inaugurated, declaring, " I follow in the footsteps of my illustrious predecessor," his address was of the cautious lawyer who opens his case with out promises and leaves his jurymen free to form their own conclusions upon his evidence as it progresses. Folk's inaugural was an exceedingly law yer-like summing up of the pending inter national contentions of England regarding the Northeastern boundary questions and of the suit of Texas versus Mexico. The inaugural address of Pierce sounded, and reads now, like the apologetic opening of a lawyer who has been assigned by the court and who is not fully retained by a client; or one who feels unprepared because untimely forced upon trial. A method which was, perhaps, in the case of Pierce, natural, be cause the presidential honor had been fairly thrust upon him ab initia. Buchanan's address to his jury of constit uents smacked of the adroitness of some veteran Q. C. who appreciated how puzzling

109

were the questions of the pending cases, and that it was more prudent to deal with glittering generalities. In truth his treat ment of formidable national questions then pending before his forum was a masterful petitio principii borrowed from shrewd bar methods. In marked contrast the two inaugural ad dresses of Lincoln are to be read. Fearless as an Erskine, a Brougham, or a Rufus Choate, he dissected pending contentions; and having the cause of the Union for a client, vivisected with the scalpel of patriotic indig nation the festering body of secession. In American literature that inaugural of the saviour of the Union will ever hold place beside that of the creator of the Union, George Washington. Each inaugural address of the sextette of presidential lawyers before referred to takes its keynote from the most approved bar methods; and when contrasted with the in augural addresses of all the laymen presidents (excepting that of the first incumbent) exhibits those methods in yet stronger approving light. Every barrister of the London Inns who takes oath of office thinks, perhaps, that the prize of a Lord Chancellorship lies in his future grasp. Similarly, every new Bachelor of the Law admitted to any court of the Union as practitioner may well, under our array of presidential lawyers, feel that the prize of successorship to Washington and Lincoln may become some day equally within his own grasp.