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 The Green Bag VOL. XX.

No. 5

BOSTON

MAY, 1908

CHARLES W. FAIRBANKS AS A LAWYER BY Hox JOHN C. CHANEY. THE Vice President was not the prover bially poor boy, yet he was not born with a silver spoon in his mouth. His eyes first saw the light in a prosperous community in Ohio, where schools and churches guided and guarded the youth of the neighborhood, and where sturdy man hood counted for much, consequently he did not know what the inside of a saloon looked like — never even smoked a cigar. His family were comfortably housed, though not elaborately. The elder Fairbanks be lieved in intellectual and moral education and practiced his belief. After the common school, therefore, young Fairbanks was sent to the country college, nearby, where practical education is prized above mere technique; where athletics do not go to seed; where the boy is in the midst of the strenuous life every day, riding, clearing, plowing, reaping; where the ball game is really played, where character is builded and manhood made. For the last forty years, no youth in Ohio, Indiana or Illinois — so much- alike in growth and enterprise — has been able to say he had not the opportunity of an edu cation, or that he had a limited chance to get on in the world. In these states, opportunity drives his car past every man's door every day. Books and teachers are at every elbow, and he who walks or runs may read, obtain knowledge, and reach success. After the college, young Fairbanks took up the study of the law and mastered its fundamental principles as he had solved the problems of algebra and geometry at

college. He came to the bar in 1874 and soon learned that a lawyer must "live like a hermit and work like a horse" if he would succeed among the men who then graced the profession. He soon came to Indiana polis and "hung out hjs shingle on his own hook." He found at the Indianapolis Bar, Thomas A. Hendricks, John M. Butler, John "H. Baker, Oscar B. Hord, Albert G. Porter, Benjamin Harrison, David Turpie, William H. H. Miller, and many others of their calibre in an established practice, but young Fairbanks courageously rented an office and went at it by himself. His first business was the collection of the outstanding accounts of a grocer at whose counter he found it convenient to munch crackers and cheese for his noon day luncheon. This service brought him into contact with a number of people some of whom, observing the young lawyer's aptness, courtesy and earnestness, after wards became his clients and his warm friends. Young Fairbanks came to Indian apolis bearing the best credentials in the world — namely, that of an honorable family, and letters from worthy men in Ohio. In Sunday-school and church he was welcomed, and every new acquain tance took an interest in the struggling "young lawyer who had just come to town." He entered into a general practice of the law and took whatever business was offered him. It was a part of the Elder Fairbanks' make-up to do .all things he undertook well; and this quality was transmitted to lawyer Fairbanks who always made sure of his facts before he applied the law; and then