St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1888-06-05
GEN. PAT COLLINS.
"A Sketch of the Man Who Is
BE Chairman Of the ConYentio,

the spring of 1871, he sat down beside a
young man who was occupying corner
of one of the leather sofas. The young
man had a bright face, with quizzical
look to his mouth, and now and then a
twinkle came to his eye as he talked.
The marquis talked little cOndeScend-
ingly to the young man at first, and in
moment he let out question that he
thought his companion was page.
but l am SENATOR" said the young
man, smiling.
"What?' said the nobleman in aston
ishment, looking at the smooth face of
the young man.
81 am senator, elected from a dis
trlct in the city of Boston," was the re-
ply again.
"Were you born in the city, too?" said
the marquis.
"No."
"Where, then?'
sin the island next to yours" with a
sharp look and laugh in his eye. The
marquis laughed heartily too, and he
remembered young Patrick A. Collins
name and face, and when the two met
in England last summer Collins had a
warm welcome from the man who took
him for page in the state senate six
teen years before.
Ripon has probably lost track of him
since, but if the English newspapers
took anything like as good care of
American news as ours do of
GETTING EUROPEAN NEWS,
he would note his old acquaintance
again and in a place of new prominence,
as chairman Of the national convention
in st. Louis.
But how many men, even in his own
district, remember now that twenty
years ago Patrick A. Collins was the
foreman of big upholstering shop,
earning S25 week? That was big pay
for young man of twenty-fOur work.
ing as a mechanic in 1868. He was
earning and saving then, and has been
ever since he was appointed foreman
in another shop, nineteen years old, at
$1S week.
He had knocked about a good deal
four he was then, and he and his par
ents went to Chelsea. They lived there
for time and then went to Ohio. Col
Inns, the youngSter, got schooling, COM
mon schooling, in Ohio, and worked
hard there besides on a farm and in the
coal mines. But he wanted to go back
to the East when he got to be slip of a
boy, and at sixteen he went back as an
apprentice. He served his time and be-
gan saving money. When he was
twenty-four he had 81, 100 laid up, and
in one and the same week he was elected
to the lower house of the state legisla-
ture and matriculated at Harvard law
school. The two went together. The
pay he got from helping to make laws
helped him to study law. But he was
not the youngest man in the house then,
nor so young as many who have been
there before or since. His two colleagues
from 'Old Ward - in South Boston
originally Fort Hill-were younger
than he.
Two years he stayed in the house and
two in the senate. In 10 he went into
the senate, and it was not, after all, sur
prising that RipOn took him for page.
He was elected senator at an age
younger than any man who ever entered
that body. He was twenty-SiX. A rec
ord never broken. Josiah Quincy first
called Mr.. Collins attention to that.
His course of law on Beacon Hill and
law under the elms at Cambridge ended
together, and the day after the senate of
~ adjourned his law
SINGLE WAS HUNG
out and his Office opened. He had made
more friends than ever. He had been
the only Democratic committee chair
man in the body. and he had added to
his resources by making lectures, clear
ing $1,000 one winter. The lectures
Rhode Island and throughout his own
state, and were on Irish history and
politics. 1t was considerably before
the Irish question was agitated in this
country, and the lecturer found his
audiences interested and attentive. 1t
was good thing for him as speaker.
1t cultivated sort of talking which he
did not get on Beacon Hill, though off
hand talk Oh subject where debate is
earnest is what he enjoys most to-
day, and is what he feels most at
home in.
When Mr.. Collins went out of the
would not be candidate for any elect
i've Office for ten years. He kept his
word, being just after the end of it
defeated by forty-three votes as candi-
date for state senator in the South Bos-
ton district once more. That was the
year of the state cOnStables and the
liquor trouble.
In the meantime, however, he got his
title, to which he firmly objects and dis
likes. He was judge advocate general,
with the rank of brigadier, on Gov. Gas
martials in those days!
sorry that he got the title. 1t would
have saved answering so many hundred
times that he did not belong to any
corps or division in the army. If there
is any one person who dislikes the title
it is Mrs. Collins. So much so is it true
that her letters can always be picked
out of basketful. They are usually
(once in long time there is another)
the only ones directed ''Mr. Patrick A.
Collins But even the postman does
not let these escape. For time the ad-
dress puzzled the poStoffice folks and
Riggs house people; but now IN. CO.
Washington office and it goes straight
to its destination. So l have endeavored
to regard his wishes here
MIR. Collins has kept straight to the
law since he entered congress. He
voted for Sunset Cox in the Forty
eighth. but Mr.. Carlisle paid him the
compliment of asking his preference
and he got place on the Judiciary COM
mittee. Here he
HAS STAID EVER SINCE,
and undoubtedly would have had the
Craftsmanship in this congress had not
tradition in the shape of slow old Judge
the committee ten years and been i'm
congress much longer, stood in the way.
In the Forty-ninth congress Collins
could have had almost any one of the
chairmanships outside those of the ways
and means, appropriations, and one OF
two others. He was offered place Oh
the ways and means committee, but still
kept to the judiciary.
Congressman and Chairman-to-be Col
Inns hasn't touched pen to paper for his