[Speech of David Dudley Field at a complimentary dinner given by the
Saturday Night Club to the judges of the Supreme Court, New York City,
April 5, 1890. Clark Bell, President of the Club, said in the course
of his introductory remarks: "It is our grand good fortune to have
with us to-night the Nestor of the American bar, who was born in
Connecticut, and whose useful life has covered nearly all the years of
our present century. His eye has seen much that is far in the past,
and beside that love and affection he bears to his birthplace are the
reminiscences of the men conspicuous in the judicial annals of his
native State, who have been upon the stage of action during the
eventful years of the present century. When we shall have separated,
when this banquet shall be but a memory and a reminiscence, that which
will give us most pleasure, the reminiscence we shall prize among the
highest, will be that of the presence of the Hon. David Dudley Field,
whose illustrious name I will connect with the toast--'Reminiscences
of the Bench and Bar of Connecticut'"]
MR. PRESIDENT:--When you did me the honor to invite me to this
banquet, I was quick to accept the invitation, because I expected to
meet the judges of my native State, of which I bear so pleasant a
remembrance. I find, however, representatives from other seats of
justice come to greet the judges of Connecticut. You have here a judge
from the Dominion of Canada, over which shines the mild light of
Arcturus, and on the other side a representative from Texas where glows,
not the Lone Star of other days, but the bright constellation of the
Southern Cross. You have judges from the neighboring State of New
Jersey, from the further State of Pennsylvania, and from Delaware, about
which I may use the language of John Quincy Adams, speaking of Rhode
Island: "She is to be measured, not by the smallness of her stature, but
by the loftiness of her principles." All these eminent judges are here
to join in the salutation to the judges of Connecticut, and to them
therefore our attention is to be chiefly directed.
I am old enough to remember the judges of Connecticut when they sat
under the authority of the Colonial charter, that charter which was
hidden in the famous oak of Hartford to escape seizure by an emissary of
the King of England. I was present at the trial in Haddam, my native
town, of a man for murder. Trumbull was the judge, that Trumbull who
wrote "McFingal," and who, being elected for a single year, as was
then the rule, was re-elected as long as he lived. He was neatly
dressed, wearing ruffles in the bosom, and at the wrists, and was in
trim knee-breeches.
I remember this incident of the trial. The crowd was so great that the
court was adjourned from the court house to the church, then called the
meeting-house. The jurors sat in the square pews. One of the jurors, a
respectable farmer of the neighborhood, thinking that he had detected
some mistake of the counsel rose to correct him, when the counsel
retorted that the juror was the one mistaken, and added: "Let him that
thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall." The prisoner was convicted
and was hanged at Middletown. I went up to see the execution, and when I
reached the place trained bands were marching through the streets,
playing their music as if for a great festivity. A sermon was preached
to a crowded house, and the prisoner was then taken, dressed in a
shroud, to a hill near by, and in the presence of thousands of
spectators was executed. These scenes were of course impressed strongly
on the memory of a boy. I remember the session of the county court at
Haddam, when the judges, headed by the sheriff, marched in order from
the tavern to the court house. I remember seeing in court David Daggett,
wearing white top boots, and I met Roger Minot Sherman, driving into the
village in a sulky. I remember Staples and Hungerford. The latter went
into court one day with a Bible under his arm, to show from the first
chapter of Genesis, as authority in an insurance case, that the day
began at sunset, "and the evening and the morning were the first day."
In those days party feeling ran high in Connecticut, between the
Democrats and the Federalists--"Demos" and "Feds," as they were called
for shortness--and contempt as well. Let me recount two anecdotes: The
Rev. Dr. Backus, riding along the highway, stopped at a brook to water
his horse, when another rider came up from the opposite side, and thus
addressed the good man: "Good-morning, Mr. Minister." The latter
replied, "Good-morning, Mr. Democrat. How did you know that I was a
minister?" "By your dress. How did you know that I was a Democrat?" "By
your address."
At another time Dr. Backus, being prosecuted for a libel upon Mr.
Jefferson, was taken from his home to Hartford to be bailed. The
minister and the marshal rode of course, for that was not the heyday of
vehicles. The minister rode very fast, so fast that the marshal called
out after him: "Dr. Backus, Dr. Backus, you ride as if the devil were
after you." The Doctor turning his head replied, "Just so!"
Mr. President, Connecticut has been often abused for the frugality and
thrift of its people, and called in derision the Nutmeg State. I
remember hearing that a New Yorker once put into his will an injunction
against any child of his being educated in Connecticut.
An Episcopal clergyman removing from New York into a Connecticut town
was actually boycotted. The people would not sell him anything to eat,
and I believe he returned for food and shelter to the hither side of
Byram River. I remember such a joke as this current in New York; that
they had a singular habit in Connecticut, when a man cast up his
accounts with his neighbor and gave him a note for the balance, he used
to exclaim: "Thank God, that debt is paid." Some of the people have
singular tastes now and then; as for example there is a hill behind East
Haddam that used to be called "Stagger-all-hill," but inquiring the
other day, I was told its name was now "Mount Parnassus."
They may say all these things if they please, but Connecticut has no
public debt, or a very small one at most, and her people are
industrious, educated, polite to strangers, jealous of their rights and
brave enough to defend them. I remember hearing Mrs. Fanny Kemble say,
some years ago, of the twelve hundred thousand people then inhabiting
Massachusetts, that, taking them all in all, she thought they were the
foremost twelve hundred thousand people living together in the world,
and I can speak in similar terms of the inhabitants of Connecticut, as
really a part of the same people.
In conclusion, Mr. President, may I without affectation utter these
words of love for my native State, its scenery and its people. Flow on,
gentle river, shine on, rugged and wooded hills, smile on, green meadows
basking in the sun, and you, brave people, who dwell amid these scenes,
prove yourselves ever worthy of your progenitors, and flaunt high as you
will, the old banner with its hopeful and trustful motto--_qui
transtulit sustinet_.