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 Morrison Remick IVaite. cases which were adjudged during the four teen years that he sat upon the bench. In the first place those cases are too numerous even for cursory mention here. In the sec ond place the opinions in many of the most important were written by other members of the court. In the third place the opinions delivered by the Chief Justice, although al most always terse and logical, certainly do not rise to any high level. And in the fourth place it would be impossible to select the cases in which the Chief Justice delivered opinions, isolate them from the woof which the whole court were weaving, and give an adequate or just impression of his individual work and influence. For he was only an integral part of what proved to be, in the aggregate, an able and satisfactory court. The whole course of decisions by the Su preme Court during the fourteen years from 1874 to 1888 must be reviewed before any true conception of Mr. Chief Justice Wake's place in our judiciary can be rightly deter mined. Such an exposition would be both important and interesting, but it lies beyond the scope of this article. Mr. Chief Justice Waite's career on the bench justifies and illustrates Mr. Charles A. Kent's remarks : "A judge can give his entire time and all his strength to the duties of the place. A man who, with such opportunities for edu cation, does not make an able judge, must be poorly endowed by nature with legal ability. The highest judicial capacity is of course rare, but the lawyers are numerous who can fill respectably seats in our highest judicial tribunal." Mr. Chief Justice Waite's personality was uninspiring. He was thickset and not above medium height. His head was massive and set upon massive shoulders. Although cour teous he was prompt in the dispatch of busi ness. This in itself was a peculiar virtue, for with the Supreme Court four years be

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hind its docket and constantly increasing business, an administrative ability was of the highest importance. Happily the Court of Appeals Act has now relieved this tension. The Chief Justice by his kindliness and fair ness won golden opinions upon the circuit from a bar, the leaders of which for the most part had been arrayed in arms against their country's authority, and were in a sul len temper, aggravated by the disgraceful episodes of the reconstruction period. His mind, which carefully weighed both sides of an argument and never jumped at conclu sions, was eminently judicial, although it is safe to say that he never mastered the tech nicalities of practice in the Supreme Court. He was a man to win public respect and confidence by his domestic virtues and his unselfish singleness of purpose. With char acteristic humility he entered upon his ex alted duties with no illusions of greatness, and when within a few months his name be gan to be mentioned for the nomination to the Presidency. he quietly- and firmly let it be known that he considered any such am bition derogatory to his high office, saying that a man who tried to make the Chief Justiceship a stepping-stone to the Presi dency was unworthy of either office. To his most creditable stand upon this question is undoubtedly due the permanent taking out of politics of the members of the Supreme Court; for the unfortunate ambition and conduct of Mr. Chief Justice Chase had tended much to accustom the public to the unhappy contingency of seeing the Justices plunged in factional struggles for political office. It is a curious and interesting coincidence that the first case in which Mr. Chief Jus tice Waite delivered an opinion, Tappan v. Merchants' National Bank, 19 Wall. 490, Mr. Chief Justice Fuller, then at the bar, unsuccessfully argued for the appellee. An