The Savannah morning news., 1904-06-19
STATESMAN WHO
\ SOUGHT NOT FAME.

week one or the dDleSti one OF IHt IllpSt
accomplished, and one of the purest
men who have graced public life in our
country within half a century-Henry
G. Turner Of Georgia. He was sixteen
years member of CO lgress, and he
would have made a place ON that thea
ter as great as that achieved by John
G. Carlisle or Thomas B. Reed If he
had only put forth the effort. He was
as modest as a woman, though ne had
been a brave soldier of one of the brav-
est armies the world ever saw. and he
was the freest from vanity of any pub
lie man of his day and generation. He
was less of a self-seeker than any OF
his fellows, and his proper place was
the Supreme Court bench or the Unit
ed States Senate. The House Of Repre-
sentatives is the theater where the fit
test survive; but Henry G. Turner
never had 10 fight for distinction there.
1t came to him, in search of him 1t
sought. The same was true of mis- fell
w-DemOcrat, David b. Culberson.
These two were giants, but it was a
rare occasion when either put forth
giants strength. Both were friends Of
young men struggling for place. Gull
berson was made for the bar; Turner
was made for the United States Sen
ate. Cutberson would have made
mincemeat of one of Spooner's consti-
tutional arguments. and Turner could
have made shreds of much of Lodge 5
transcendant craftsmanship. What
pity it is that these two did not rein
force Beck, Lamar Vest, Ben Hin,
Thurman, Eustis, German and others
in the Senates Of a quarter Of a CEN
fury ago.
Judge Turner first appeared in Con-
gress in 1881, and Immediately took
high rank as jurist and states
man. In debate, test of Intellectual
superiority, extent and accuracy OF
knowledge, and candor and integrity
of mind, he was the equal of the great
est In the Forty-ninth Congress he
was chairman of the Committee of
Elections, before which came the cele-
brated case of Hurd VS.. Romeis, from
the Toledo, o., district. 1t was almost
a national issue, and all the political
eyes in the Union were on the Com
mittee of Elections. Speaker Carlisle
and Col Morrison took great interest
in the case, and Mills, Tucker, Brock
inridge, Wilson, Cox, Bland, McMillin,
and all the other leading tariff reform
ers were anxious that the seat be Civ
en- the contestant. Frank Hurd was
then conspicuous man, and a ma
tional figure. Not only was he a brill
liant orator, but he was a deep think
er and a profound lawyer, a man of
powerful character and strong convic-
tons that he was ready to maintain
against the world in thought. Il
would vote for It. though every man,
woman, and child in Ohio, on their
knees, duplicated me to vote against
it," was his answer to a petition ask
ing him to oppose a bill providing for
free wool, and Ohio was then the
greatest wool state. He had distin-
guished himself in Congress, and was
the most eloquent of the free traders.
The Republicans resolved to beat him.
and to that end they nominated an old
German with no fitness in the world
for seat in Congress other than
capacity to get votes. James G. Blaine
stumped the district because 1t was
Hurds district, and Hurd was a cam
didate. There was campaign ammuni-
ton from the kitchen of the fat-fryer
Hurd charged that there were intimi-
dation and fraud in two precincts of
Toledo, and that with these thrown
out Romeis' majority would be extin-
guished and himself elected.
Hurd's speech in his own behalf was
a specimen of magnificent oratory and
a powerful legal argument. There has
been nothing like it in a contested cleo
tion case since Sergeant s. Prentiss,
before that same tribunal, pleaded his
own cause fifty years before. When
Hurd closed the House was in a tu-
multi, and the galleries in an ecstasy.
Romeis' case was not worth shucks.
Turner had tried every way to find
the law and the facts for Hurd, but he
could only find them for Romeis. Had
he been a weak man or an unfair man
Hurd would have been seated before
the House adjourned that day. He was
a Democrat; he was also a Judge. He
was a tariff reformer, but he was also
an honest man, and thus he rose to
the most thankless task that comes to
a congressman-oppo to the ma
Jority of his party in an election case.
it is become common; 1t was
rare indeed in 1886.
When the House regained it's COM
posure after the brilliant effort of Hurd
in his own behalf Judge Turner rose to
answer him and began with these
words:
"dr. Speaker, in his great speech on
the motion made to expel John Wilkes
from the House of Commons Mr.. Gre
Vile said that he proposed to execute
an office higher than any the King
could bestow. the honorable and noble
office of speaking the truth and doing
impartial justice. ."
Judge Turner then proceeded to dis
cuss the case as a judge giving an
opinion from the bench, and before he
was half through Romeis was as Sc
cure in his seat as Morrison or Ran
dali. The roll-call gave him a pro-
nounced majority.
A rather dramatic scene occurred in
the succeeding Congress when King
Bob" Kennedy made a rabid assault
on the South for partisanship, and
Judge Turner became involved in the
discussion. The House was hushed
as the Georgian summoned" Romeis,
who had been reelected, to testify He
did so. and much to the confusion of
his colleague, the turbulent and srre-
concilable bloody shirter from Belle
fontaine.
So far as I recall. Henry G. Turner
and Oliver Cromwell were the only
men Thomas B. Reed complimented in
his speeches in the House of Repre-
sentatives, and Judge Turner was, per-
haps, the only man who ever seriously
discounted Mr.. Reed in a debate on
the floor OF the House. 1t was when
the Supreme Court adtudicated that
the House of Representatives was au-
thorized by the constitution of the
United States to clothe the Speaker Of
that body with the right to count a
quorum" Reed made an exulting
speech on the occasion, and the Demo-
Gratis were meek enough under his lash
and felt themselves duly rebuked and
soundly spanked. Turner replied to
the big fellow, and all was changed.
He gave mis- construction of the de-
cision, and he was a better lawyer than
Reed. He showed that the matter in
volved in Reeds original act of count
ing a quorum was not before the court