The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1910-06-30
Senator John W. Daniel

The death of John Warwick Daniel
United states senator from Virginia and
the dean of the democratic side in the
Senate. will be felt as distinctive loss
not only to the democratic party but to
the entire nation. Few men who nave
lived since the war have been so well
equipped for high public life as senator
Daniel. He was an able lawyer, student
of government, a man of uncommon elo-
ouenoe and a keen and ready debater
While he may have held views on national
finance afterward abandoned as imprae-
tical. he was a democrat of the Jefferson
ian TYNE and the measures which he
advocated were usually based on SOUND
democratic doctrine He cared nothing for
notifies in the smaller sense, but he loved
the democracy from principle. He was
lofty minded and chivalrous, and no one
over questioned the purity of his mo-
tives. He had nearly completed his fourth
term in the Senate, and only few months
ago the Virginia Legislature reelected
him by a unanimous vote for a fifth term
He was not 10 years of age, but when he
was first chosen to succeed William Ma
hone. it was regarded as almost GER
tainty that he was senator for life. Men
in office who are merely politicians Often
irtrench themselves either by intrigue or
by tyrannical methods, but Senator Daniel
was esteemed for his fitness and his 10y
atty to duty, and his people were bound
TO him by hooks of steel.
Senator Daniel was a great orator. He
belonged to the old school of silver
tongued statesmen, but If his style was
forid and impassioned his mind was
so orderly and the matter of his discourse
so fresh and illuminating that no man,
not even the most affectedy modern, could
Jennings Bryan has always captivated
audiences by his eloquence, and he and
Senator Daniel were often compared; but
hot in ma u
respects the Virginia senator even excelled
the distinguished commoner. Daniels
voice WAS music ana In his oratory there
was a compelling charm which will as
sure his forensic gift place in our best
and most cherished tradition. But had
the dead senator been less magnetic in
his personality than he was and less i'm
pressive on the rostrum, his reputation as
masterful man would have rested Sc
curely on his printed speeches. Whether
in a prepared grafton or in an off-hand
address or debate reported stenogra phi
cally, his English was clean cut and lu-
minous. His grafton on Robert E. Lee is
a classic, unsurpassed, perhaps, by any,
thing of its kind extant.
Senator Daniel had a splendid Con-
federate war record. He entered the Con-
federate service while only a youth as
a second lieutenant in the famous Stone
wall brigade, and was wounded at the
first battle of Manassas. He was wound
ed again near Boonsboro, in Maryland,
He was promoted to be major and chief
of Gen Jubal A. Early's staff and served
in that capacity until he was severely
crippled in the battle of the Wilderness,
in May, 1854 Senator Daniel was the
orator at the Confederate Veterans re-
union at Richmond in 1907, and it had been
hoped that he would attend the reunion
at Mobile in April and consent to make
the principal address there. His old
comrades in arms will lament his taking
off, and the people whom he had served so
well in war and peace will keep green
his memory. Virginia will not soon look
upon his like again.
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