The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1869-09-17
The Death of Senator Fesscndeu.

and his name has been aSSocidtcu VIII SO
many great events, that ms deatn seems al |
most to close chapter in the nations history.
Fifteen wears ago he entered the United States |
Senate and almost Immediately became one
of the marked men in body which counted
Everett, Seward, Clayton, COllamer. Chase
and Douglas, and remarkably brilliant
galaxy Of shareholders, among its members
Mr.. Summer and Mr. Hamlin are now the
only members who were also members when
Mr.. Fessenden first took his seat. During
his term OF service many revolutions have
taken place. The Wing party ceased to exist
as national organization; the Missouri Com
promise was repealed; the Kansas Nebraska
struggle took place the Southern States Sc
coded; the rebellion was overthrow, slave
~ abolished, and reconstruction effected. In
all these great events Mr.. Fessenden has
been a CONSPICUOUS figure, and in some OF them
the most conspicuous. During late years he
has borne so distinguished and useful part
that to many people the Senate OF the United
States will seem to be an essentially changed
body when it meets without him.
In December next that body will re.assem-
BILE to mourn the vacant chair of its most acute
debater, most Thorough and mastery lawyer,
most commandingand judicious leader, most
accomplished and persuasive orator. Mr..
Fessenden has for years been the model SEN
ator of the United States. His character was
Roman in the highest sense: infleXible, yet
courteous; pure, without ostentation; too
proud in the consciousness of its superiority
to ask for power, either from individuals in
authority or from the multitude. Through
out his long public life SANDER has scrupu-
lousy avoided him. Political opponents have
united with party friends in a lifelong tribute
ofrespect for his integrity, sagacity, consist
ency, and judgment. However they might
rail at those who acted with him, there seemed
to be no crevices in his armor into which the
lance ofdetraction could enter. None of those
things could, with color of truth, be said of
Fessenden which it would please an enemy
to say. While his mastery Of the rules of de-
bate and parliamentary precedent, his calm
intensity and well-posed power reminded the
the Senate Of Clay, his private and personal
life was never dimmed bv the great Kentuck-
ian's vices. He welded keen and biting
invective, but not, like Randolph, SO
unjustly that the rebound injured himself
| Satire was to him means of saving time, by
| conscientiously pricking bubbles that were
| too numerous and trivial for argument. No
one ever asked, concerning Fessenden, that
previous question which was fatal to the pow
er of some of Webster's most brilliant argu-
ments, viz: "How came he to be on that
side OF the question p if Mr.. Fessenden must be
thus strongly compared with his earlier CO.
temporaries, his precedence during the later
years OF his Senatorial service cannot be
questioned. 1t was precedence which did
not rest on some one spasmodic effort, but on
the continued influence of o heightened and
vigorous personality. He did not alternate
between classical illusions that were sublime
and legislative plumbers that made scholar
| ship seem ridiculous. He did not send out
| his feelers to test the public pulse before he
| knew his own duty. lie did not bow blandly
low to his opponents, by way of conciliating
their friendship, not knowing how soon he
mint become the standard-bearer of his en-
emies. He did not purchase population for
judicial impartiality by the cheap expedient
OF casting every other vote on the wrong side.
Though the leader of the Senate, he was never
charged with aspiring to be President Though
| enjoying most of the rewards of ambition, he
| was not guilty of ambition ITSELF Though he
| did not seek popularity, the people believed
in him. Though he preferred professional to
| public life, the unanimous vote of his State
| Legislature, and the exigencies of the coun-
try continually kept upon him the robes of the
| most dignified office in the world-which
none ever wore more gracefully Or nobly.
William Pitt Fessenden, son of the Hon.
Samuel Fessenden, was born in Boscawen,
| Merrimack county, N. H., October 16, 1906
and at his death had not quite reached the
| close of his 63d year. He inherited in no
small degree his mental qualities-his father
having been scholar, lawyer and legislator
OF State reputation, remarkable for readiness
and wit His very name indicates the poll
tics OF his father, as at that day none but the
Federalists believed in Pitt, the Jeffersonian
Democracy being wild in their devotion to
Napoleon and France. Endowed with fine
nervous temperament, and studious in his in
fancy, at IL he entered Bowdoin College, and
| graduated with high honors at II. Such pre-
| cocity finds few parallels. One is that of Ed
ward Everett, another that of the great Pre-
mier OF England, then in the height of his
power, for whom he was named. After spend
ing four years in the study of law, he was adj
mitted to the bar at 21, and practiced at
Bridston, Maine. At the age Of 25, having
already been offered and declined the Wing
nomination to Congress, he entered the State
Legislature, its youngest, but straightway its
Leading member, distinguishing himself from
the first, both as an orator and legislator.
1t 1oreshadowed the later leaning of his mind
| toward the questions of finance that his prin-
clpal speech was made upon the United States
Bank, and, though we are not told its pur-
port, all his antecedents and affiliations show
| That he must have stood with Alexander
Hamilton and the Federalists, in bitter hos
tIHty to JackSon's anti-bank warfare. Not
the least OF the triumphs of the long-reved
Federalist school of statesmen, brought about
during the past ten years, has been the es-
tablishment of a National Banking system,
such as would have formed the goal of their
financial theories. From 1882 to 1889 Mr..
Fessenden declined all Office, and rose rapidly
TO the hrst rank as lawyer. In 1888 he
again declined to go to Congress, but in 1889
consented to sit again in the Legislature
Though he was an uncompromising Wing,
while the Legislature was strongly Democrat
ic, he was made Chairman of the Judiciary
Committee and President of Special Com
mission to revise and codify the statutes of
the State. Ii there are any other instances
In our history wherein young statesman
has, before reaching his 34th year, twice re-
FUSED to 60 to Congress, while yetconsenting
to sit In the State Legislature, we are not ac-
quainted with them. Whether this reluc-
lance arose from a too modest estimate of his
actual powers, or from a desire to make fuller
preparation for the national arena on which
he was to enter, he could not long withhold
bis presence from the National Capital. In
lS4o ne was nominated by reclamation by
the wings for Congress, and, running far
ahead of his ticket, was elected. Though he
distinguished himself in the the current de-
bates OF the period, making important speech
es on the Bankrupt bill, which threw him in
to successful debate with Caleb Cushing, and
on the Loan bill and Army Approximation
bill, and though renominated at the end of
his term, he resolutely declined, prelerring to
return to the practice of his profession. Yet,
two years after, in 1915, to secure the passage
of certain local measures in which his con
stituents were interested, he consented to
sit in the Maine Legislature! In 1913 he re-
ceived the vote of his party in the Legisla-
ture for the United States Senate, as he did
again in 1915 while he was a member of the
former body. From 1S45 to 1852 he practised
at the bar, with rapidly-rsing reputation,
being engaged in some of the most important
cases in New England. The incident is not
ed that, in one case before the Supreme Court
at Washington, in association with Daniel
WEBSTER, he succeeded in reversing decision
of Judge Story, relative to the responsibility
of an innocent owner of real estate sold at
auction, for frauds committed without his.
knowledge, by the auctioneer. His argument
on this, as on all forensic occasions, was re-
markable for logical force and legal acuteness,
In 1850 Mr.. Fessenden was elected to Con-
gress, but his seat, through an error in the
returns, was given to his competitor Mr..
Fessenden refused to contest the case before
Congress; apparently from the principle
which had marked his previous course, that
he would not even ask for Office, still less con-
tend for 1t. He had, moreover, disclination
to serve in the House of Representatives,
which he had decidedly expressed in advance
to the conventions which nominated him.
Those who have observed how often that
House assumes the appearance of a board of
brokers or bear garden, and how seldom it
rises to the dignity of deliberative assembly,
will be at no loss to understand the grounds
of Mr.. Fessenden's preference for other spheres
of usefulness.