The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1912-10-20

short notice, deliver the best sermon
likewise, and is also the best parlia-
mentarian and presiding officer that
you would meet in many a days
travel.
took occasion once to ask him
something about his personal history
and as near as can now recall the
following is an outline:
He was born in Philadelphia and
reared by white family in that city
Quakers, If my recollection is right.
He was born long enough before the
war to be old enough, he told me, to
remember seeing Abraham Lincoln
when he was passing through Phila-
dephia some time during the war. I
remember he told me that he climbed
up lamp post to enable him to get a
good view of the man who freed the
slaves.
The white family gave him good
education, and in due course he went
to Washington and there entered How
ard University, the leading negro in
stitution for learning in the country,
and studied law and ministry, gradu-
ating in both.
He was now ready for business and
decided on political career.
Lee Picked Florida.
Taking down a map of the United
States he. looked 1t over carefully with
the view of selecting the best location
in his judgment for such career.
The city that he finally decided to
favor with his citizenship was Jack
sonville and the state was Florida
and that is where he came, along, I
think, in the early seventies.
And he has done well in his chosen
career for himself.
He can say after Caesar: veni,
Vidi, Wei
1t almost makes ones blood run cold
to go back and consider this little
black man in his young manhood, de-
liberately selecting the place of action,
and especially when one further con-
siders what his decision meant to
what promised at one time to be an
oasis in the desert, that is a decent
respectable Republican party in the
south, and if not a white party one
with white leadership.
For the material and conditions
| were there in East and South Florida
for such party, but for the blight
that this superior black man put upon
| 1t, in carrying out his ambitions as
he had planned them for himself in
his earlier years.
He preached some and he practised
| law some, and away back in the
| seventies he was elected to the Flor
| ida legislature, for l have heard Sen
| ator Mallory speak of him as being in
| the same legislature with him, and of
| the favorable impression he had then
| formed of Lees ability.
| In 1884 or 1886 he was elected mu-
nicipai judge of Jacksonville and
served two or four years, for I know
| he was serving in that capacity in
1888 during the yellow fever, and he
! was regarded as an able officer
! In 1888 he was elected clerk of the
| circuit court for Duval county This
| of itself was not specially remark
able.
There Was Loophoe.
But there was loophole by which
/ the governor could deprive him of the
benefits of the election.
| The law then, at least, gave to the
| governor the absolute power to say
that an officials bond was not good
no matter what the county commits
| sioners and state comptroller had said
about it. The amount of bond re-
| quired for this Office was $4,000.
1t has been told to me and I dc
not doubt it that Lee was able te
secure bond and did do So signed
by many of the best citizens of Jack
/ sonyille, in the sum of 100000.
! Governor Fleming, however, decided
| the bond was not good and Lee did
not discharge the duties OF that office
! Harrison, however, was elected presi
dent that year and Lee received the
| appointment of collector of customs
for the Jacksonville port and served
| until Cleveland was elected.
He was again appointed in 1897 tc
the same office and held it for year
| or more until after the Leng-Lee.
| Chubb combination was effected il
September. 1898, when he was pro.
NOTED to the position Of collector o.