It was soon after this that he announced in a letter to Morrow that he had bought “the Stewart house” on Main street for something over $1,600, his father going security, and with some show of pride described it as “one of the prettiest pieces of property in town.” “This,” he adds, “may look to you like business. Well, it does.” And in a letter to Morrow October 18, 1870, he concludes: “Give my regards to Swartz and Stringer. Tell them that on the 10th of November all that is mortal of J. W. K. is to pass away, as that is the day the event takes place which tears him from the realms of single blessedness.”
The Kokomo Tribune, in announcing the marriage, which took place at the bride’s home, said:
“Notwithstanding the ultra Democracy of John, there is a whole-souled manner, a generous style and an earnestness about him that has compelled admiration. Besides, Mr. Kern has more than average ability. If he shall continue to be a student, as we know he has been for several years, he will gain eminence.
“What everybody says must be true. We have never heard a single person speak of the bride except in the highest terms of praise. She is intelligent, domestic in her habits and preferences and very good.
“Why should not the life of such a couple be blessed and blest? They have the very best wishes of every acquaintance.”
A rather unusual announcement, but very gracious considering that for three months before the same paper had covered its editorial page with vicious attacks on young Kern the politician.
III
After the election of 1870 and his marriage the young lawyer went forward by leaps and bounds in his profession. In the fall of 1870, before he had reached his majority, he was employed as special prosecutor in a sensational murder case involving a prominent family of Kokomo. Before this Kokomo had suspected that he was a brilliant criminal lawyer. Afterward it knew it. For in this case the youth of less than twenty-one found himself pitted against two of the giants of the Indiana bar, Thomas A. Hendricks, his political idol, and Major Jonathan W. Gordon, considered by many the greatest criminal lawyer and advocate who ever practiced in the courts of the commonwealth. It is related that during the trial, which was held in an adjoining county, Kern became careless in his attendance in court, and there was a disposition to consider him out of the case. In indignant mood he sauntered into the court room just as an argument as to the admissibility of evidence was being made by both Hendricks and Gordon. Much was involved in the point and the two legal giants had carefully prepared for the battle. At the conclusion of their arguments Kern arose, without having looked into a single book, or left his seat after hearing the issue, and delivered what was considered one of the most convincing arguments heard in the case, and the court sustained him. After that he took part in all the arguments that arose, and always with brilliant success. At that time he made of the two great lawyers pitted against him life-long friends and admirers. Hendricks took him aside and with a great show of interest advised him as to his course, and it was on this occasion that the great politician made the prediction that “the time will come when that young man will be the leader of the Democratic party in Indiana.”
From that time on he was engaged on one side or the other of every murder case and of most of the important criminal cases tried in Howard or the adjoining counties. He developed with remarkable rapidity into a great trial lawyer. His eloquence, his knowledge of fundamental principles, his quick grasp of the situation, made him a dangerous opponent for the most experienced. In those days he was careless in the preparation of his cases. It was said of him that he could go into a case with one day’s notice and apparently be as well prepared as though he had given six months to preparation. Judge Harness, his last partner in Kokomo, found him “a master in marshaling his facts and in getting everything out of a case there was in it—and frequently much more.” He was an expert in handling witnesses, especially in cross-examination. He was dramatic, resourceful, a master of strategy. In one case where his client was accused of having stolen a pocketbook, he secured a wallet as nearly like the one in question as possible, and presenting this to the prosecuting witness pressed him for a positive identification. The witness walked into the trap and identified the substitute pocketbook positively as his own, on which Kern presented the pocketbook in question, thereby putting the prosecution to rout. In another case he was positive that the prosecuting witness was lying and he carried through a fine bit of dramatic acting with the desired result. Without a particle of previous evidence of the witness to rely upon, he theatrically opened the drawer of the desk before him and pulled out a roll of blank paper. Holding this in his hand and looking the witness in the eye he demanded fiercely—“Did you not on a certain occasion testify so and so in this matter?” The witness, frightened at the manner of the lawyer and suspecting that he had been trapped completely, wilted and confessed that he had testified differently before.
While capable of tricks of this nature he was not known as a “tricky lawyer” in the usual acceptance of the term. He was scrupulously ethical from the day he received his first case. This knowledge of human nature which made him a power in cross-examination made him almost irresistible before the jury in argument. Here he was the master. He ran the gamut of the emotions, passing from wit and humor to pathos, and then to satire, and then denunciation, keeping the jury in laughter or tears. Often he was able to literally ridicule a case out of court.