cut a bullet-patching found near the dead men. The elder Watson was convicted and executed. The younger was released on bail, and after the conviction of his father fled the country. Although, subsequently, convinced of the guilt of both, Mr. Hardin said he could have so managed as to prevent conviction if he had not been misled by the elder Watson's assertions of innocence. He practiced the case on that theory alone, and was wholly unprepared to meet or parry the facts showing guilt, which he thought he could have done if he had known it to be necessary.

It sometimes happened to Mr. Hardin, as it has happened to all the members of the worthy guild to which he belonged, that he had a bad case. As death approaches, nature kindly blinds the faculties and dulls the sensibilities. Similarly, the lawyer with the most wretched of bad cases, is usually blissfully unconscious of his dilemma and the shock of defeat only arouses him for the first time to absolute consciousness. When hard beset in a bad case, few were better supplied with expedients than Mr. Hardin. If the contemplation of his own side of the case afforded no consolation, he carefully inspected that of his adversary, and took pleasure in ridiculing the very strength of the latter.

R— was a young lawyer at Bardstown, who had been employed by his uncle to bring an ejectment suit against a mere "squatter," who, without any sort of claim had entered upon his land. R― was inexperienced and diffident. The case was called for trial, and Mr. Hardin announced that he appeared for defendant. The plaintiff was wholly unprepared to prove title, nevertheless, the trial proceeded. Plaintiff's case was stated by his counsel. He explained to the jury that the defendant had entered on the land with no claim of right, whatever. He did not claim to have bought it from any one or to have paid anything for it. He then proceeded to state how plaintiff had derived title by grant from the Commonwealth to those under whom he claimed and by subsequent regular conveyances. When Mr. Hardin came to reply, he said: "The gentleman is mistaken in supposing that defendant does not claim title to the land. On the contrary, he does claim title. It was true he did not have a paper title, like plaintiff pretended to have, but which he would not be able to show, but defendant traced his title to a far higher source. He claimed title direct from Almighty God." As plaintiff failed to make out a case, Mr. Hardin's client was not called on to exhibit his title papers.

"I first heard Mr. Hardin argue a case before Chancellor Bibb, at Louisville," said the late Andrew J. Ballard. "Hite and Ferguson were names involved in the controversy. He was notably clear in presenting his side of the case. Occasionally his remarks assumed a humorous character. I recall an anecdote he used to illustrate a point in argument. A farmer had rented land to a tenant to cultivate in After the corn matured, the landlord suggested a division, that the tenant gather it, and, retaining every two loads himself, deliver the third to him, the agreement being that the landlord was entitled to a third of the crop for rent. Sometime afterward the landlord, receiving no corn, called on the tenant to know the cause of failure. The tenant explained that when he came to gather the corn, that there was only two-thirds of a crop, so none was left for the landlord."

corn.

The gentleman alluded to in the following incident yet lives, wearing years and honors alike gracefully:

"The first time I ever saw Ben Hardin," says Attorney-General Garland, " was, as I now remember, in February or March, 1847, at the trial of Wilson for killing Pottinger, in the Nelson circuit courtMr. Hardin, with others, being for defense. The trial was an interesting one, both Wilson and Pottinger having many friends and relations of influence. It lasted several days. Mr. Hardin, as leading counsel, made a powerful speech. Clement S. Hill, of Lebanon, was retained to prosecute, and he closed the case with one of the finest speeches to which I ever listened. After he had finished, his friends most warmly congratulated him on his effort. At this juncture, Mr. Hardin came up and said: 'Clem, d-n it, I knew you could do it, but I did not think you had the audacity to do it.

Mr. Hardin, when the notion seized him, could lay aside dignity, and impersonate any character he chose. Garrick had not greater art in personal transformation. His mimetic and histrionic powers would have assured him success and renown in another sphere than the law. The reader is indebted to Governor William Johnson, of Bardstown, for an illustration of this trait. Mr. Hardin appeared for defendant in an action of detinue, involving title to some corn, in which Thomas W. Riley and William R. Grigsby represented the plaintiff. The case turned on the testimony of a single witness, one W, who manifested an extreme willingness to aid the plaintiff. On the conclusion of the plaintiff's testimony, Mr. Hardin moved a non suit, on the ground that plaintiff had failed to prove demand. The point was well taken, but plaintiff's counsel besought the court

to open the case again, as they were, as they said, prepared to prove demand by the witness who had already testified, and that his failure to so testify had been through their own oversight. This Mr. Hardin strenuously resisted, insisting that W had shown a willingness to recklessly testify to anything for the plaintiff, and should not be heard again. While plaintiff's counsel prolonged the debate, the witness himself unconsciously manifested his interest in the result by hanging over the bar, with fixed gaze and gaping mouth, an attentive listener to all that transpired. Mr. Hardin, from his seat within the bar, discovering this, turned his eyes to the witness and gazed at him with such intentness as to excite general attention. The eyes of the witness finally met those of Mr. Hardin, and for a few moments it seemed a contest as to which should look most searchingly at the other. An amused feeling began to steal over the spectators, when suddenly Mr. Hardin's eyes took on an idiotic expression that seemed more than ever to puzzle his competitor. At this point, Mr. Hardin sprang to his feet, and offering his hand to the astonished witness still more astonished him, and at the same time convulsed the spectators, by the cordiality of his greeting-"Good morning, Mr. W-!” The non suit was granted.

CHAPTER XXX.

Τ

THE COUR DE LION OF REFORM.

HE first Constitution of Kentucky was framed in 1792, the year she was received into the sisterhood of States. It was soon discovered to be decidedly defective, and to contain provisions exceedingly obnoxious to public sentiment. Among other things, it allowed free negroes to vote, which of itself was sufficient, according to the opinion of that day and long afterward, to warrant a new one. But other defects existed of a more substantial character. In 1799, after an exciting struggle, a convention was called and the second Constitution adopted. It continued the fundamental law for fifty years.

not been long in force, however, before reformers proposed another or a revision of the one existing. As early as 1803 a member of the Legislature moved the subject of calling a constitutional convention, but the motion met with no favor, and did not even receive a second.

"I was myself," said Mr. Hardin in a public speech in 1850 at Frankfort, one of your representatives in one house or the other during a period commencing in 1810 and ending in 1833. I have no doubt that during that whole period I voted every year against a bill to take the sense of the people on the proposition to call a convention." The efforts for a convention did not cease after 1833. In 1838 the Legislature, at length, submitted the question to a vote. There is no doubt that the result of the Old and New Court contest in 1825 had imparted fresh vigor to the constitutional reformers of that period. If a Legislature was impotent to remove obnoxious members of a court, not so (it was argued) was the strong arm of a constitutional convention. "Sir," said Charles A. Wickliffe in a speech in 1837, opposing this proposition, "this convention project, disguise it as you may, is the warfare commenced in 1824 against the independence of the judiciary."

Indeed, the chief argument for constitutional change in 1838 was to deprive the judges of their irresponsible life tenure by making them elective by the people. Objections were made to the county court system; to the life tenure of sheriffs, clerks, etc.; to the uncertainty

of succession, if the governor and lieutenant-governor both died in office; the location of the seat of government at Frankfort-but, after all, the chief grievance was the "irresponsible" judiciary. The result of the vote in 1838 was overwhelmingly against the convention. The New Court party before that time had become the Democratic party. The Democratic party in turn had become the party of constitutional reform. From 1838 to 1847 the State was divided into two great parties-Whig and Democratic. The former maintained its uninterrupted ascendancy in State affairs. It regularly elected the governor and maintained a working majority in both houses of the Legislature. Under the Constitution of 1799 nearly all offices of honor and profit in the State were appointive, either by the governor, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, or by those whom the governor appointed. These appointments fell exclusively on the faithful. The Whig was the office-holding party of the State, and undoubtedly came to regard itself as having prescriptive rights, which it was little less than audacious for a Democrat to contest.

Despite local defeat,
Federal patronage

But the Democratic party did not despair. yet in national elections it was more fortunate. was some solace for State proscription. It was in the minority, but a reliable and respectable minority. It was diligent, well-disciplined, compact, strong in its convictions, and moved with the unfaltering courage of a Roman legion. Defeated, routed, and overwhelmed at the polls, each individual Democrat came to the next election just as surely as the polls were opened. The Whigs blundered, as the strong always will, and the Democrats meekly made all the profit possible out of the blunders. The long proscription of Democrats as to State offices at length worked like a leaven. In some communities the only eminently qualified persons for important offices were Democrats. But these were always passed by for incompetent Whigs.

Mr. Hardin, prophetically foreseeing the end, besought Governor Owsley to bestow offices only for meritorious qualifications. Hardin was the civil service reformer of his time, but his warnings were unheeded. All the while down to 1847, the Democratic party had held fast to its theory of constitutional reform-to the principle that all offices, legislative, executive, ministerial, and judicial, should be elective by the people-that power ought to rest in each local community to choose the rulers who managed its affairs, and that officers were the servants of the people and should be immediately responsible as such. In 1847, the constitution of 1799 was neither better nor