"What are you reading from?" demanded Judge Dowling, who had in his earlier life been a fireman and later a police officer. "From the statutes of 1876, your honour," was the reply. "Well, you needn't read any more," retorted the judge; "I'm judge in this Court, and my statutes are good enough law for anybody." A codified law and precedent cases were of no account to this "equity" judge.
But these are mild instances of the methods of early American judges compared with the summing up of Judge Rodgers—Old Kye, as he was called—in an action for wrongful dismissal brought before him by an overseer. "The jury," said his honour, "will take notice that this Court is well acquainted with the nature of the case. When this Court first started in the world it followed the business of overseering, and if there is a business which this Court understands, it's hosses, mules, and niggers; though this Court never overseed in its life for less than eight hundred dollars. And this Court in hoss-racing was always naterally gifted; and this Court in running a quarter race whar the hosses was turned could allers turn a hoss so as to gain fifteen feet in a race; and on a certain occasion it was one of the conditions of the race that Kye Rodgers shouldn't turn narry of the hosses." Surely it must have been Old Kye who, upon taking his official seat for the first time, said: "If this Court know her duty, and she thinks she do, justice will walk over this track with her head and tail up."
On a divorce case coming before a Western administrator of the law, Judge A. Smith, he thus addressed the plaintiff's counsel, who was awaiting the arrival of his opponent to open proceedings. "I don't think people ought to be compelled to live together when they don't want to do so. I will decree a divorce in this case." Thereupon they were declared to be no longer man and wife. At this juncture the defendant's counsel entered the Court and expressed surprise that the judge had not at least heard one side of the case, much less both sides, and protested against such over-hasty proceedings. But to all his protestations the judge turned a deaf ear; only informing him that no objections could now be raised after decree had been pronounced. "But," he added, "if you want to argue the case 'right bad,' the Court will marry the couple again, and you can then have your say out."
Breach of promise cases generally afford plenty of amusement to the public, both in the United States and Great Britain, but it is only in early American Courts that we hear of a judge adding to the hilarity by congratulating the successful party to the suit. A young American belle sued her faithless sweetheart, and claimed damages laid at one hundred dollars. The defendant pleaded that after an intimate acquaintance with the family, he found it was impossible to live comfortably with his intended mother-in-law, who was to take up residence with her daughter after the marriage, and he refused to fulfil his promise. "Would you rather live with your mother-in-law, or pay two hundred dollars?" inquired the judge. "Pay two hundred dollars," was the prompt reply. Said the judge: "Young man, let me shake hands with you. There was a time in my life when I was in the same situation as you are in now. Had I possessed your firmness, I should have been spared twenty-five years of trouble. I had the alternative of marrying or paying a hundred and twenty-five dollars. Being poor, I married; and for twenty-five years have I regretted it. I am happy to meet with a man of your stamp. The plaintiff must pay ten dollars and costs for having thought of putting a gentleman under the dominion of a mother-in-law."
The charms of the female sex were more susceptible to the Iowa judge than to his brother of the former story. This worthy refused to fine a man for kissing a young lady against her will, because the complainant was so pretty that "nothing but the Court's overwhelming sense of dignity prevented the Court from kissing her itself."
"A fellow-feeling makes one wondrous kind," wrote Garrick, and something of this nature must have actuated Judge Bela Brown in a case in a Circuit Court of Georgia. The judge was an able lawyer, and right good boon companion among his legal friends. The night before the Court opened he joined the Circuit barristers at a tavern kept by one Sterrit, where the company enjoyed themselves "not wisely, but too well." Next morning the judge was greatly perturbed to find a quantity of silver spoons in his pocket, which had been placed there by a wag of the company as the judge left the tavern the night before. "Was I tipsy when I came home last night?" timidly asked the judge of his wife. "Yes," said she; "you know your habits when you get among your lawyer friends."—"Well," responded the judge, "that fellow keeps the meanest liquor in the States; but I never thought it was so bad as to induce a man to steal."
Before the close of the Court a man was arraigned for larceny, who pleaded guilty, but put forward the extenuating circumstance that he was drunk and didn't know what he was doing. "What is the nature of the charge," asked Judge Brown. "Stealing money from Sterrit's till," replied the clerk. "Are you sure you were tipsy when you took this money?"—"Yes, your honour; when I went out of doors the ground kept coming up and hitting me on the head."—"That will do. Did you get all your liquor at Sterrit's?"—"Every drop, sir." Turning to the prosecuting attorney the judge said, "You will do me the favour of entering a nolle prosequi; that liquor of Sterrit's I have reason to know is enough to make a man do anything dirty. I got tipsy on it myself the other night and stole all his spoons. If Sterrit will sell such abominable stuff he ought not to have the protection of this Court—Mr. Sheriff, you may release the prisoner."
The judge of a Court in Nevada dealt differently with a man who, charged with intoxication, thought to gain acquittal by a whimsical treatment of his offence. On being asked whether he was rightly or wrongly charged he pleaded, "Not guilty, your honour. Sunstroke!"—"Sunstroke?" queried Judge Cox. "Yes, sir; the regular New York variety."—"You've had sunstroke a good deal in your time, I believe?"—"Yes, your honour; but this last attack was most severe."—"Does sunstroke make you rush through the streets offering to fight the town?"—"That's the effect precisely."—"And makes you throw brickbats at people?"—"That's it, judge. I see you understand the symptoms, and agree with the best recognised authorities, who hold it inflames the organs of combativeness and destructiveness. When a man of my temperament gets a good square sunstroke he's liable to do almost anything."—"Yes; you are quite right—liable to go to jail for fifteen days. You'll go down with the policeman at once." With that observation the conversation naturally closed, and the victim of so-called sunstroke "went down."