By his plain, plodding and highly instructed industry he had reduced to system and order our administration of the common law, and he had laid deep and everlasting the foundations upon which have been built up the great, merciful and life-giving system of American equity jurisprudence; and he had at the same time given to the world a statement of and a commentary upon American law which had already challenged the admiration of men not only in his own country but the world over, and which has since become daily more and more recognized as an immortal monument.

As we have seen, Chancellor Kent had been appointed an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the State of New York on February 6, 1798, when of the age of only thirty-five years. From that time, for more than 25 years, until July 31, 1823, he continued his distinguished service upon the Bench. In 1804, he was promoted to the position of Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and ten years later, in 1814, he was appointed Chancellor, a station which Chancellor Walworth afterwards said was "at the head of the Judiciary of the State, and continued in that high office for nine years until in 1823, when as we already know, having reached the age of sixty years, he was, by operation of the then existing constitution of the State, compelled to lay down the duties he had performed so well.

One incident of Judge Kent's promotion to the Chief Justiceship of the Supreme Court is well worth dwelling upon. The vacancy in the Chief Justiceship was created by the nomination of the Chief Justice himself, the Honorable Morgan Lewis, to the office of Governor of the State. Justice Lewis was the nominee of the anti-Federalist party. Political passions were running high in the year 1804, and both parties were putting forth their best efforts to carry this election. Judge Lewis was himself a strong anti-Federalist while Judge Kent was a Federalist of a very ardent kind. The story is that on the eve of the election these two gentlemen met and fell into a discussion of the probable result of the election. In the course of the conversation Lewis said to Kent: "Judge Kent, if you will vote for me I will make you Chief Justice if I am elected Governor," to which Kent, recognizing, of course, the true spirit of the remark, promptly replied, "No, sir, personally

1. Supra, Vol. XVII, No. 5, p. 331 note. 2. Supra, Vol. XVII, No. 5, p. 331 note.

3. 1 Paige's Chancery Reports, address of Chancellor Watworth at the beginning of the Volume.

4. Constitution of the State of New York, adopted 1821, ratified by the people, January 17, 1822. Article V. Section 3.

I admire and respect your character and attainments; but I utterly detest your political principles!" Judge Lewis was elected, and one of his first acts as Governor was the appointment of Judge Kent to be Chief Justice. Would that more of this spirit in judicial appointments by the Executive might be abroad among us at this time!

Of his work upon the Bench of the Supreme Court Judge Kent himself has given us an account from which the following is an

extract:

In February, 1798, I was offered by Governor Jay, and accepted, the office of youngest judge of the Supreme Court. This was the summit of my ambition. My object was to return back to Poughkeepsie and resume my studies and ride the circuits and inhale country air and enjoy otium cum dignitate. I never dreamed of volumes of reports and written opinions. Such things were not then thought of. I retired back to Poughkeepsie, in the spring of 1798, and in that summer rode all over the western wilderness and was delighted. I returned home and began my Greek, and Latin, and French, and English, and law classics as formerly, and made wonderful progress in books that year. In 1799 I was obliged to remove to Albany in order that I might not be too much from home, and there I remained stationary for twenty-four years.

When I came to the Bench there were no reports or State precedents. The opinions from the Bench were delivered ore tenus. We had no law of our own, and nobody knew what it was. I first introduced a thorough examination of cases and written opinions. In January, T. 1799, the second case reported in first Johnson's cases, of Ludlow v. Dale, is a sample of the earliest. The judges, when we met, all assumed that foreign sentences were only good prima facie. I presented and read my written opinion that they were conclusive, and they all gave up to me, and so I read it in court as it stands. This was the commencement of a new plan, and then was laid the first stone in the subsequently erected temple of our jurisprudence.

Between that time and 1804 I rode my share of circuits, attended all the terms, and was never absent, and was always ready in every case by the day. I read in that time Valin and Emerigon, and completely abridged the latter, and made copious digests of all the English new reports and treatises as they came out. I made much use of the Corpus Juris and as the judges (Livingston excepted) knew nothing of French or civil law, I had immense advantage over them. I could generally put my Brethren to rout and carry my point by my mysterious wand of French and civil law. The judges were Republicans and very kindly disposed to everything that was French, and this enabled me, without exciting any alarm or jealousy, to make free use of such authorities and thereby enrich our commercial law. * * * * Many of the cases decided during the sixteen years I was in the Supreme Court were labored by me most unmercifully, but it was necessary under the circumstances, in order to subdue opposition."

1. Memoirs, p. 121.

2. A most interesting letter of Chancellor Kent to Thomas Washington, a lawyer of Nashville, Tennessee, dated Oct. 6, 1828. A copy of this letter in full may be found in the Green Bag for May, 1897, being Vol. IX, No. 5, page 207.

That this rather amusing sketch presents not an unfair estimate of the real condition of the Supreme Court at the time is not now lacking of ample corroboration. The Honorable John Duer in an address upon the life, character and public services of Chancellor Kent, has this to say of the condition of the Supreme Court at the time in question: "The condition of the Supreme Court at the time of his [Judge Kent's] accession to the Bench, was probably much the same as it had been, with little variation, from the close of the Revolution. It was not a condition that reflected credit on the jurisprudence of the State; it was not such as the character and the honor of the State and the interests of the public demanded." He then proceeds to show with what marked celerity and effectiveness this unhappy condition was remedied, largely by the labors of Judge Kent.1

But amid all these labors Judge Kent thoroughly enjoyed his work upon the Supreme Court Bench, and it was with reluctance that he left it to become Chancellor. The Court of Chancery in the State of New York at that time had not acquired the high authority which it afterwards attained, mainly, it may be said, through the work of Chancellor Kent himself, and the Chancellor was apprehensive that he would not be able to bring the Court up to the standard of authority and reputation which he had set for himself. How abundantly he was in error in this apprehension all the world now knows. As to Kent's work as Chancellor, the following is the estimate of Mr. Justice Story:

It required such a man with such a mind, at once liberal, comprehensive, exact and methodical; always reverencing authorities and bound by decisions; true to the spirit yet more true to the letter of the law; pursuing principles with a severe and scrupulous logic, yet blending with them the most persuasive equity; it required such a man, with such a mind, to unfold the doctrines of chancery in our country and to settle them upon immovable foundations.'

The temptation here to review some of the immortal and controlling decisions of Chancellor Kent is very great, but it must be withstood and overcome because the confines of this article will

1. A/Discourse/on the/Life, Character and Public Services/of/James Kent/Late Chancellor of the State of New York/Delivered by request/before the Judiciary and Bar of the City and State/of New York, April 12, 1848/by/John Duer/New York/D. Appleton & Company, 200 Broadway/ p. 33.

2. Article by Mr. Justice Story upon Johnson's Reports, written for the North American Review, in 1820. Life and Letters of Joseph Story, edited by his son, William W. Story, London, 1851. Vol. I, p. 232.