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The Green Bag

collected by way of tribute from the salaries of the city employees. In the patronage ofﬁces, no one was eligible to employment unless indorsed by the bosses. The city was steeped to its eyelids in shame; the governing body, the Board of Supervisors, was subject to the control of these robbers-and hence all manner of mischief could be perpetrated. But it must not be inferred from these facts that all selec

tions for public position were unworthy;

hostile,

vindictive

and

resourceful

agencies with whom he would be challenged to do battle; but these impending terrors failed to stop the man —because as I heard a gentleman say

of him “You would as well attempt to swerve the sun from his course through the sky as to divert Wallace from the

pathway of public duty.”

His sole

and only aim was to vindicate the law. The grand jury being organized and consisting of some of the most dis

those positions having no patronage were frequently bestowed upon reputable citizensﬂthis to popularize and give

tinguished men in the city, their in~

respectability to a ticket. Unless black

to be ominous of disaster to persons in

mail were yielded up, such rates of charges were threatened as would drive public service corporations from busi ness. In such circumstances, looking over the ﬁeld, Judge Wallace concluded to impanel a grand jury, delivering to that body a charge that emphasized

the community of power and inﬂuence.

the demand for an overthrow of these malign influences. The task for any one man to undertake was a mighty one; but in that man's blood and nature there was an uncon querable abhorrence of wrongdoing

and of all of the Protean forms which dishonesty assumes; his soul was in stern and indignant revolt against it. Therefore it was that, being face to face

with this state of affairs, without con sultation with any one so far as I know,

ﬁnding

himself

in

the

position

vestigations commenced; indictments were presented and the prospect seemed

After considerable satisfactory pro gress had been made, a proceeding was

instituted in our Supreme Court charg ing the invalidity of the grand jury, which resulted in a decision by the Court, by a vote of four to three, ad judging the creation of that body to be invalid. When the remittitur was sent down the grand jury received its dis charge. It was then that a somewhat memor able scene was witnessed. Now it must be borne in mind that before entering upon this scheme for the overthrowing

of triumphant villainy, it is well known that Judge Wallace had made exhaus tive investigation of the various legal

questions that were likely to arise and

of

was fully convinced of the soundness of Presiding Judge of the Superior Bench, the conclusion that he had reached. charged with the duty of impaneling ‘Hence upon the discharge of the grand a grand jury, he resolved to employ jury he read an opinion which amounted every instrumentality at hand consistent to a legal disquisition upon the questions

with his position, to the end that crimi nals should be punished. It took the loftiest courage to do it. It took an invincible determination to proceed with this crusade to the end—because, of course, he had a foreknowledge that the eﬂort would turn loose myriads of

treated by the Supreme Court and upon which were based the grounds of im peachment of the validity of the grand jury. Of course Judge Wallace was too well disciplined as a lawyer and too

mindful of the obedience due a decision of the Supreme Court to undertake to