Helena weekly herald. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1867-1900, 1883-09-20
Helena, Montana, Thursday, September 20, 1883
JERE BLACK ON JUDGE GIBSON.
An Interesting Chapter from the Dis.
tant Past.

An Interesting Chapter from the Dis.
tant Past.
The following eulogium pronounced before
the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, by the
Hon. jeremiah S. Black, when he was chief
justice, upon the death Of John Bannister
Gibson, also ajustice of the Supreme Court
of Penna., at the time OF his death, and for
twenty-five years chief justice Of Penna,
will be read with great appropriateness just
now, as we'll for the interest that attaches
to the memory Of the two great jurists, as
for the merits of the panegyric itself, which
in style, purity and power of the English
language, is considered one of the strongest
forensic productions of the great jurist, late
ly deceased:
1t is unnecessary to say that every surviv
ing member of the Court is deeply grieved
by the death of Mr.. Justice Gibson. In the
course of nature it was not to be expected
that he could live much longer, for he had
attained the ripe age of seventy-six. But
the blow, though sudden, was severe one.
The intimate relations, personal and official,
which we all bore to him, would have been
sufficient to account for some emotion even
if he had been an ordinary man. But he was
the Nester of the Bench, whose wisdom in
spired the public mind with confidence in
our decisions. By this bereavement the
Court has lost what no time can repair for
we shall never look upon his like again.
We regarded him more as father than a
brother. None Of us ever saw the Supreme
Court before he was in ; and to some of us
his character as great Judge was familiar
even in childhood. The earliest knowledge
of the law we had was derived in part from
his luminous expositions of it. He was a
Judge OF the Common Pleas before the
youngest of us was born, and was member
of this Court long before the Oldest was ad-
mitted to the bar. For nearly quarter of a
century he was Chief Justice, and when he
was nominally superseded by another, as the
head Of the Court, his great learning, yener-
able character and overshadowing reputation
still made him the only Chief whom the
hearts of the people would know. In the
course of his long service he discussed and
decided innumerable questions. His Opln-
ions are found in no less than seventy vol
umes of the regular reports, from Sergeant
and Rawle to Harris.
At the time of his death he had been
longer in Office than any contemporary judge
in the world and in some points of charac-
ter he had not his equal on the earth Such
vigor, clearness and precision of thought were
never before united with the same felicity Of
diction. Brougham has sketched Lord Stow
ell Justly enough as the greatest judicial
writer that England could boast of, for force
and beauty of style. He selects a sentence
and calls on the reader to admire the re-
markable elegance OF its structure / believe
that Judge Gibson never wrote an opinion
in his life from which passage might not
be taken stronger, as we'll as more graceful
in its turn of expression, than this which is
selected with so much care by most Jealous
friend, from all of Lord Stowell's.
His written languages was transcript of
his mind. 1t gave the world the very form
and pressure of his thoughts. 1t was accurate,
because he knew the exact boundaries of the
principles he discussed. His mental vision
took in the whole outline and all the details
of his case, and with bold and steady hand
he painted what he saw. He made others
understand him because he understood him
self
CHI iectd p0tenter crit res,
Nee tdcundia deseseret hunc nee lacidus ord
His style was rich, but he never turned
out of his way for figures of speech. He
never sacrificed sense to sound, or preferred
ornament to substance. If he reasoned
much by comparison it was not to make his
composition brilliant, but clear. He spoke
in metaphors often, not because they were
sought, but because they came to his mind
unbidden. The same vein of happy illus
tration ran through his conversation and his
private letters. / was most of all struck
with it in careless memorandum intended
when it was penned for no eye but his own.
He never thought of display, and seemed
totally unconscious that he had the power to
make any.
His words were always precisely adapted to
the subject He said neither more nor less
than just the thing he ought. He had one
faculty of a great poet that of expressing a
thought in language, which could never af
terwards be paraphrased. When legal
principle passed through his hands he sent
it forth clothed in dress which fitted it so
exactly that nobody ever presumed to give
in any other. Almost universally the syl-
labus of his opinion is sentence from itself;
and the most needless student, in looking
over Whartons Digest, can select the cases
in which Gibson delivered the judgment, as
readily as he would pick gold coins out from
among coppers. For this reason it is, that
though he was the least voluminus writer of
the court, the citations from him at the bar
are more numerous than from all the rest
put together
The dignity, purity and richness of his
written opinions were by no means his high
est titles to admiration. The movements of
his mind were as strong as they were grace
ful. His periods not only pleased the ear
but sunk into the mind. He never wearied
the reader, but he always exhausted the sub
ect An opinion of his was an unbroken
chain of logic, from beginning to end. His
augmentation was always characterized by
great power, and some times it rose into ir-
energy, dashing opposition to pieces
with force like that of battering ram.
He never missed the point even of a
,ause which had been badly argued. He
separated the chaff from the wheat almost
Is soon as he got possession of it. The most
complicated ENHANCEMENT of facts and law '
would be reduced to harmony under his
lands. His argument was so lucid that the {
fullest mind could follow him with that in {
ense pleasure which we all feel in being I
ble to comprehend the workings of an in t
elect so manifestly superior.
Yet he committed errors. 1t is wonderful
hat in the course of his long service he did q
lot commit more. A few were caused by a
nattention few by want of time q few c