The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1905-05-28
Leads ali North Carolina Dailios i'm Now and Circulation


to all the winds on - wn matchless
powers. He could measure his rapier
with any gentleman in any contest.
at the bar on the stump, i'm legisla-
tive hall and with pen no antagonist
quit the combat without a scar.
Richly endowed by nature, his
mind was q marvel in its capacity to
grasp, absorb, digest and retain. His
mental storehouse was overflowing.
Equally marvellous was his ready
power to marshall and employ every
resource in emergency. More marvel
lous still is the fact that emerging
from the war in 60 a physical wreck
and q sufferer to the end from an ag
gravated wound his intellectual equip
ment was the work of a
few years. In the COnstitu-
tional Convention of 1868 and there
after a Superior court judge for six
years, Code Commissioner the author
of two notable law books, "Toinette,
"a Fools Errand," Figs and This
ties" Bricks Without Straw" "Ghe
c. Letters and with the exception
of his term on the bench, sharing the
burden of mis- party i'm every political
campaign and attending a large law
practice this is an epitome of the
work Of his sixteen short years in
North Carolina. 1t was the late judge
Dillard who said of him that che went
on the bench the poorest judge and
came off the ablest judge in the
State" His name and fame will live
longer in connection with his great
work in '6S in having enacted and
placed in our organic law the Code
of Civil Procedure. This was an
other Northern idea, being copied
largely from the Codes of New York
and Ohio, and stubbornly opposed by
the older lawyers OF the State but
time and experience have vindicated
the wisdom of its enactment While
many of the older lawyers Of North
Carolina retired and refused to prac-
tice under the new Code, all thinking
men now concede that it was not
visionary experiment, but that with
all of it's wise provisions it has come
to stay. AS further proof of the sa-
gacity OF its author it may be noted
that the reformed procedure is now in
force in nearly every State of this
Union, in England Ireland, Wales.
India, Australia, in several provinces
of Canada and in many other English
colonies To Mr.. Tourgee, more than
to any other one man, is North Car
olina indebted for this new and SIM
pier Code Of Procedure and for re-
lief from the cumbersome and alb
surd forms OF action under the old
system.
Illustrative Of Tourgee's dominating
influence, as well as of the reckless
manner of using it to accomplish
desired end, and throwing LUMINOUS
ray of light on the subserviency or
the incompetency OF the Legislative
body of the reconstruction era, the
following story told the writer by the
late Chief Justice Pearson is apropos.
1t should be stated here that know
ing Mr. G.. S. Bradshaw, of this city,
q prominent attorney, began the prac-
tice of his profession with Judge
Tourgee, as partner. in 1881 was
interrogated as to whether he had
ever heard Judge Tourgee speak of
the incident, and he said, yes. Judge
Tourgee never liked Chief Justice
Pearson, and spoke of his refusal to
grant him a license to practice law
out of term time as one cause of
complaint" "Tourgee never told me
that the 500 law was passed to en-
able him to qualify as a lawyer, be-
fore taking his seat on the bench as
a Judge but he often remarked that
the best judges were those trained in
law on the bench before having by
long years of practice got set ia
their trend of thought or bias IN the
constant appearance for the prcsecu-
ton or defense in criminal, or plain
tiff or defendant in civil cases.
Chief Justice Pearson, with his epi-
granite style of lecture before his
law class was decrying the growing
modern habit among the legal profess
sion of becoming what he termed
ease" lawyers, attributing it to the
twenty dollar license law" where
many who had come to the bar with
out previous training in the funda
mentals of Jurisprudence and the
common law principles" relied on
Supreme court reports alone to guide
their practice or their Supreme court
arguments. So fixed was he in this
opinion, during the whole two years
course of his law students he never
permitted them to read Supreme court
reports, and in his lectures quoted
cases only of established leading ma
ture to emphasize or illustrate q prin-