The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1877-03-15
THE NEW CABINET.
WIN. NJ. EvARrs, SECRETARY OF STATE.


wM. NJ. EvARTs, SECRETARY OF STATE.
William Maxwell Eyarts, whom Presi-
dent Hayes has chosen to be his Secretary
of State, is, like his predecessor in that
Office, resident of Second avenue in this
city, and is the peer in every way, and
in legal learning aud ability more than
the peer, of his distinguished neighbor.
1t is little more than quarter of CEN
tury since Mr.. Evarts came to this city
and was admitted to practice in the
courts of this State, but in that time,
short as it is, he has earned the first
place, not only at the Bar of New York
but of the country. He was born in
Boston, February 6, 1918, his father,
Jeremiah Evarts, being lawyer of fair
practice and good ability. He entered
Yale College at an early age and was
graduated in 1887. Subsequently he
studied for two years at the Harvard Law
School, and in ls41 he came to this city,
where he Immediately entered upon the
practice of his profession. In few years
his industry and fidelity, as we'll as his
ability as an advocate, gained him large
clientage, and before he was thirty years
of age he held a high position in his pro
fession. In 1851 he was appointed Uni
ted States District Attorney for this dis
trict, and the same year he was also one
of the commissioners of the Almshouse,
now known as the Commissioners Of
Charities and Correction. He was perm
aneatly urged for United States Senator
in 1861, but was defeated by Ira Harris,
who was made the compromise candidate.
From July Is, 1868, until the close OF
President Johnson's administration he
was Attorney General of the United
States, and in 1871 he was selected by
President Grant as the leading counsel
of the United States at the Geneva arbi-
tration. Last year he was prominently
advocated for the Republican nomination
for Governor of this State, but the same
spirit of compromise which defeated him
for the United States Senate in 1861 con-
tributed to deprive him of the nomina-
ton for Governor in 1876. These are the
only public positions which he has ever
held; or to which he was supposed to as
pire, and it is at the Bar where he gained
his most conspicuous and distinguished
honors. When Mr.. Evarts retired from
the District Attorneys Office in 1853 was
formed the law firm of Butler, Evarts q
Southmayd, now known as Evarts, South
mayd & Choate, and it was as member
of this firm that he gained his high place
as lawyer and publicist. While he was
United States District Attorney his most
prominent case was that which grew out
of the Cuban or Cleopatra expedition:
Early in6lS5l an expedition was fitted
out by John I. Sullivan, we'll known
journalist, which was to sail in the Cleo
patra to aid in an insurrection to be begun
in Cuba. Warrants of arrest were issued
to prevent the sailing of the expedition,
and were served when the Cleopatra had
steam up ready to sail. The trial of the
filibusterers lasted month, but the jury
failed to agree. Mr.. Evarts' next famous
case was the celebrated Lennon slave
case. in 1858. A vessel containing slaves
belonging to Mr.. Lennon was driven by
storm into this harbor, and thereupon
writs of kabeGs corpus were obtained to
have cause shown why the slaves should
not be released, being in free State.
Mr.. Evarts appeared to represent the
State of New York, and the case was
carried to the Supreme Court of the
United States, where he finally succeeded
in obtaining verdict against the claim
ant. He was counsel in the great Parish
will case, in which an attempt was made
to break the will of Henry Parish on the
ground of the mental incapacity of the
testator. A still later case in which Mr..
Evarts was engaged was one in which the
will of Mrs. Gardner, the mother of the
widow of ex-President Tyler, was contes-
ted on the ground of undue influence on
the part of Mrs. Tyler to obtain the max
ing of the will. Although Staten Is
land Jury found against the will MIR.
Evarts finally gained his case before the
Court of Appeals. When articles of i'm
peachment were brought by the House
of Representatives against the late Presi-
dent johnson Mr.. Evarts was called to
Washington as counsel for the defence,
and his effort on that occasion is almost
as fresh in the minds of the people as
his arguments in the Tilton-Beecher case
two years ago. For his legal champion
ship of President johnson he was re-
warded with place in the Cabinet, as
his recent championship of Hayes before
the electoral tribunal gives him the first
place in the Cabinet Of the new Presi-
dent. In person Mr.. Evarts is tall and
slender; he is fragile almost to attenua-
tion, and so far from suggesting the idea
of vehement orator, he impresses one
as man of retired scholarly tastes, gen.
tie manners and academic belongings.
Tall, thin, angular, long headed, with a
square and prominent forehead, dark
haired and dark skinned, with face per-
fectly smooth but thin, cadaverouss,
shrunken, deep-set gray eyes, proml-
nent nose, and square, decisive, hneiy
chiselled chin-such is VIM. NJ. Erarts,
the new Secretary of State. In none OF
his ways has he the magnetism OF a great
speaker. He has clear, sharp, ringing
voice, though it is not powerful or musi-
cal. Hisaction is sparing, but effective.
In making his points he is lucid, precise
and cogent, seldom rhetorical or orna-
mental. He has an easy, colloquia! way
he is never in haste and never hesitates.
His style is classic in its correctness.
His sentences are long and faultless, and
freighted with words which show that
profound thought is selecting felicitous
vocabulary as it goes along. He has
fine humor, but it is the humor of Guilt
walton, not the coarse fun of the vulgar
His appeals to the intelligence of juries
are the highest in their tone, the broad
est in their scope and the deepest in their
power of any made in modern times
Webster was not more logical, Story was
not more thorough lawyer, Choate not
more billiant verbalist, nor Sumner a
firmer believer in pure moral power
His argument in behalf of the election
of Hayes was the strongest in the late
campaign, and to his subtlety OF intellect
his strength of character and his hrmnes'
and rectitude of purpose will the ne"
administration owe much OF Whatever
success it attains.