Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1889-03-23
STANLEY MATTHEWS.


The death of Stanley Matthews, AS
soeiate Justice of the Supreme Court of
the United States, is announced. The
country loses by this removal from the
stage of human activity, one of the strong
men of the nation-a typical American, a
patriot and respected jurist. Justice
Matthews was born in Cincinnati in 1924,
lie was graduated from Kenyon College
in 1916, studied law and was admitted to
the bar, removing at once to Tennessee,
where he pursued the business Of his pro-
fesslon. But the institution of slavery
was obnoxious to his sense of right, and
he returned in a short time to free soil,
and located in the city of his nativity. He
was an early and pronounced anti-slavery
disciple and became assistant editor of
the Cincinnati Herald, the first daily anti
slavery paper of the West. In 1851 he
was chosen Judge of the Court of Com
mon Pleas for Hanover county, Ohio, and
was elected a State Senator in 1855. In
1858 he was appointed United States
District Attorney for the Southern Dis
trict of Ohio, filling that office until late
in 1861. 1t was in this capacity that he
first developed the real strength of his
character, for he served in a troublous
time, when questions of the gravest i'm
portanee were to be handled, and his ac-
ton was exposed to the white heat of criti-
cism and the fire of bitter partisan conten-
ton. He left that responsible post, how
ever, to take arms in the defense of the
union of States, becoming Lieutenant Col
onel of the Twenty-third Ohio Volunteers
He was put to service at once in West
Virginia, and in October, 1861, he was
made Colonel of the Fifty-seventh Ohio,
and in that capacity commanded a
brigade in the army of the Cum
berland, winning distinction at the
battles of Dobbs' Ferry, Murfreesborough,
Chickamauga and Lookout Mountain. In
1865 he resigned his commission and ac-
cepted the Office of Judge of the Superior
Court of Cincinnati. In 1864, and again
in 1868, he was Presidential Elector on
the Republican ticket. He was one of the
committee in the General Assembly of the
Presbyterian Church that reported the
celebrated slavery resolutions that deter
mined the position of that church upon the
slavery question beyond peradventure. In
1876 he ran for Congress in his district
and was defeated In the following year
he was one of the counsel before the Elec-
toral Commission, and made the leading
argument in behalf of the Republican
Electors from Florida, and likewise in be-
half of the Republican Electors from
Oregon. In March, 1877, he was elected
to the United States Senate to succeed
John Sherman, who resigned to take the
position of Secretary of the Treasury under
President Hayes. In May, 1881, Mr.
Matthews was confirmed as Justice of the
Supreme Court of the United States, hav-
ing been nominated to that exalted posi-
tion by President Garfield. He was dis
tineuished more for the strength of his
mental powers, the elearness of his intel
lectuality, than for the profundity of his
legal learning. Nevertheless, he was
recognized as careful jurist and a
superior advocate. No one of our pub
lie men was more fearless in the enuucia-
ton of his convictions or drawer in de-
fending positions assumed.