CHAPTER XXVI.

Elections-Eighth General Assembly-Receipts and Expenditures-Commercial Progress-Social Changes.

HE Black-Hawk War made the political fortune of a large number of aspiring statesmen. Although it did not close in time for many of them to participate personally in the election held on the first Monday in August (6), they were represented by their friends, and met with but little difficulty in securing the positions sought.

Charles Slade, Zadoc Casey, and Joseph Duncan, all of them pronounced. Jackson men, were elected to congress from the first, second, and third (new) districts respectively.

The eighth general assembly convened Dec. 3, 1832. The senate, numbering twenty-six, was divided about equally between old and new members. Among the former were Wm. B. Archer, Joseph Conway, James Evans, Elijah Iles, Adam W. Snyder, and Conrad Will; among the latter were Wm. H. Davidson, Henry I. Mills, James M. Strode, and Archibald Williams. Wm. L. D. Ewing, Thomas Mather, George Forquer, and Thos. Rattan had been transferred from the lower to the upper housc The house of representatives was composed almost entirely of new members. Peter Cartwright, Michael Jones, formerly of the senate, Edmund D. Taylor, James A. and John D. Whiteside, were among the old ones; and John Dougherty, Cyrus Edwards, Gurdon S. Hubbard, Benjamin Mills, Wm. A. Minshall, James Semple, John Todd Stuart, and Murray McConnell-all of them wearing laurels won in the late war—were among the new.

Alexander M. Jenkins was elected speaker of the house, and David Prickett reëlected clerk. Jesse B. Thomas, jr., was chosen secretary of the senate, and Wm. Weatherford, sergeant

at-arms.

The governor, in his message to the legislature, after congratulating the people on the satisfactory termination of the late war, made the following recommendations: 1. The establishment

of a system of common schools; 2. The improvement of the Chicago harbor-"that it be made a good one"; 3. The connection of the waters of the Illinois River with Lake Michigan, either by a railroad or canal, his own preference being in favor of the former. He closed with a strong appeal to support the president in his controversy with South Carolina-in favor of the union of the states "as the pride and support of every American," and denouncing the "dangerous doctrine of nullification."

The first general acts of incorporation were passed at this session, providing for the organization of towns, and public libraries. The subject of building railroads, also, for the first time received attention, among the routes proposed being one from Lake Michigan to the Illinois River, instead of the canal; one across the centre of the State through Springfield, and anticipating the Illinois-Central, one from Peru to Cairo. Several charters authorizing the incorporation of railroad companies were granted, but no organizations under them were ever perfected. It is a significant fact, however, that the attention of the people of Illinois was thus early directed to the adoption of this improved, but yet tentative, method of transportation.

The distinguishing feature of this general assembly, however, was the impeachment of Theophilus W. Smith, one of the justices of the supreme court. Five distinct charges were preferred against him by the house, involving oppressive conduct, corruption, and other misdemeanors. The senate resolved itself into a high court of impeachment, and the proceedings were characterized "by great decorum and solemnity." The managers, on the part of the house, were Benjamin Mills, John T. Stuart, James Semple, Murray McConnell, and John Dougherty; the accused was defended by Sidney Breese, Richard M. Young, and Thomas Ford. The trial lasted from January 9 to Feb. 7, 1833. The specifications were: selling a circuit-clerk's office; swearing out vexatious writs, returnable before himself, for the purpose of oppressing innocent men by holding them to bail; imprisoning a Quaker for not taking off his hat in court; and suspending a lawyer from practice because he had advised his client to apply for a change of venue from his circuit.

IMPEACHMENT OF JUDGE SMITH.

381

The trial was conducted with marked ability on both sides. The speech of Mr. Mills, especially, which occupied three days in its delivery, was pronounced unsurpassed for its finished and scholarly eloquence-brilliant passages from which-gems of thought—were for a long time after quoted upon the streets of Vandalia.*

The protracted trial resulted in a negative acquittal of the accused that is, twelve senators concurred in believing him guilty of some of the specifications, ten were in favor of an acquittal, while four were excused from voting, it requiring twothirds to convict.

The prosecution having failed, the house of representatives adopted a resolution for the removal of the judge by address, but in this also the senate refused to concur. And thus ended the first and last impeachment trial in this State.

The first law providing for a mechanics' lien was passed at this session; also that concerning the "right of way" for "public roads, canals, or other public works."

The general assembly adjourned March 2.

The receipts and expenditures during Gov. Reynold's administration, are shown in the annexed table.+

* Gillespie's Recollections, in "Fergus' Historical Series," No. 13. Benjamin Mills enjoyed the reputation of being one of the most able lawyers and polished orators in the State at this time. His father was an eminent Presbyterian minister in Massachusetts, from whence the son immigrated to Illinois in 1819, locating first at Greenville, and later at Galena. The celebrated Felix Grundy, who was pitted against him in a noted murder case, said that it was inhuman to employ a man of such transcendent ability in the prosecution-that it was not giving the accused a fair chance. He was witty and as a conversationalist was the very life and soul of convivial gatherings. As a specimen of his ready humor, it was told of him that having joined a temperance society and being found soon after in a grocery drinking out of a wineglass, instead of a tumbler, a friend said to him "Mills, I thought you had quit drinking?" "So I have," said he, holding up the wineglass, "in a great measure.

He ran for congress, as a whig, against Wm. L. May in 1834, but was unsuccessful. He was said to bear a striking resemblance to the great Irish orator Curran. He died in 1835.

+ Receipts during 1831–2, ordinary revenue

From sales of Vandalia lots

From sales of saline lands

From sales by sheriffs

From sales of seminary lands

Ordinary expenditures

$88,218

2,316

5,312

6,783

400

$103,024

$77,979

Before the expiration of Gov. Reynolds' term, he decided to become a candidate for congress. He had already filled the highest offices in both the executive and judicial departments of the State government, and now again became possessed by an ambition to sit in the national councils at Washington. His principal opponent was Col. Adam Wilson Snyder, who was a member of the legislature, an able and popular lawyer, and who had brought home with him from the war the scars of battle. He was a fine speaker, of an ardent temperament, and ambitious. Col. Edward Humphries was also a candidate; but the superior tactics of the governor secured him the victory. He was also elected to fill the unexpired term of Charles Slade, who had recently died of cholera.

At the next general election, the ex-governor being too busily engaged in congress to make a personal canvass, Snyder again became a candidate, and secured the prize.

Reynolds and Snyder both resided in Belleville, both were democrats, and rivals for popular favor. Being generally aspirants for the same place, they were very much in each other's way; an antagonism which continued for many years.*

The complete statement for 1833-4 is as follows:

Receipts from ordinary revenue

From sales of Vandalia lots, canal, and seminary lands

From sale of saline lands

School fund received

State-bank paper funded

From James Hall

From debts due state bank

Redemption money

$76,864

5,708

14,833

32,088

3,790 571 6,895

878

$141,627

Paid for ordinary expenses general assembly, legislature, and executive

Special appropriations, including $6161 for the

penitentiary

Miscellaneous

Funded stock, redeemed

Interest on $100,000, 2 years

$50,748

24,914

32,728

16,362

15,090

State-bank paper burned

Sundry items

* Snyder being applied to to obtain some testimony with a view to its perpetua

But Col. Snyder was forced in turn to give way to Reynolds, who was elected to the 26th and also the 27th congress.

In 1839, the ex-governor was appointed the financial agent of the State to effect a loan in England under the internalimprovement system.

He closed his congressional career in 1843, and in 1846 was again elected to the legislature, and reëlected in 1852, when he was made speaker of the house.

Perhaps no man better understood the people of Illinois from 1818 to 1848 than did Gov. John Reynolds. He was a close observer of their needs, wishes, and tastes, and was accordingly able to adopt a policy which commanded popular support and approval.

To use his own expression, there were but few offices in sight which he did not "go for;" and while not invariably successful, no public man of his day received a more generous support, or more acceptably served the people in a greater diversity of fields. He was quick to discern on which side of every vital issue stood the common people, to whom he appealed and the champion of whose interests he always assumed to be. In his relations to other public men of his time he seems unconsciously to have adopted and made his own the suggestion offered by William Wirt to Gov. Ninian Edwardsthat the triumph of a politician is "to convert his opposers into instruments for his own higher elevation."

As a speaker he was not fluent and made no pretensions to oratory, yet he always managed to interest and influence large audiences, because he had carefully studied their pecularities no less than their wants and sectional predelictions. Although® a good Greek, Latin, and French scholar, knowing the contempt of the early settlers for "book larnin'," he was careful to avoid anything like a parade of higher education, employing the homely language of the common people in conversation, and affecting an ignorance which was wholly feigned.

tion, on being informed that Gov. Reynolds was the witness required, broke out with an exclamation that he never heard of such nonsense as to go to the expense and trouble of perpetuating his testimony. "Why, confound him, he'll never die,” said he, "I have been waiting a quarter of a century for him to kick the bucket, and his hold on life is stronger than it ever was. I will not make a fool of myself by seeking to perpetuate the testimony of a man who will outlive any record in existence."