A Report of the Debates and Proceedings in the Secret Sessions of the Conference Convention / For Proposing Amendments to the Constitution of the United States, Held at Washington, D.C., in February, A.D. 1861

by L. E. Chittenden

His life hath flowed a sacred stream, in whose calm depths
The beautiful and pure alone are mirrored;
Which, though shapes of ill may hover o'er the surface,
Glides in light, and takes no shadows from them.

But, sir, the great crowning virtue and glory of his life was his acceptance of the mission which brought him here. Though whitened by the frosts of nearly eighty winters, neither lofty mountains nor intervening space could restrain his patriotic heart from a prompt response to the call of his country to mingle his influence in a sincere and sacred effort to save the Constitution and perpetuate the Union. He accepted the great trust; he mingled in our deliberations, and has fallen in the discharge of his duty. He has justly earned a title to the gratitude and respect of his country. May we not, sir, fondly hope that he, who was called from the discharge of such duties to the presence of his God, has passed from the sorrows of earth to the happiness of Heaven, and to the full fruition of joys pure, perfect, and eternal?

The Hon. THOMAS EWING, of Ohio, said:—I rise to bear my tribute of respect to the memory of the deceased. I have known him long. On my first entrance into active life, at the bar, I found him an able and distinguished member. Since that time down to the present day, he has been largely associated, in mind and person, with all the acts and progress, professional and political, of my life. I feel his loss intensely; and I feel it with more regret, because I know that on this occasion his voice would have been potential in our counsels, and would have been united with all of us who labor most earnestly for the preservation of the Union.

I tender my sympathies to the family of the deceased. I unite with them in their regrets and in their hopes of the happy future to which he may have attained.

The Hon. WILLIAM C. RIVES, of Virginia, said:—Though wholly unprepared to say any thing worthy of the solemnity of this occasion, I feel that I should be wanting, sir, in that sentiment of respect which is due to the character of a distinguished citizen, if I were not to add to what has been so eloquently spoken by others, a few words of personal recollection in regard to our deceased friend Judge Wright. It so happened that we entered the public councils of the country at the same moment, and continued in them for the same period of time. It is now just thirty-seven years since I had the pleasure of meeting Judge Wright, for the first time, in the House of Representatives of the United States. I may be permitted to say, that there were giants in those days. My honorable friend from Kentucky (Governor Wickliffe), who has already so feelingly addressed the Convention, will recollect that on the roll of the House of Representatives at that time stood the names of Webster and Everett, of Oakley and Storrs, of Sargeant and of Hemphill, of Lewis McLane, of the immortal Clay, and Barbour and Randall, and other gentlemen known to fame from the State which I have the honor to represent in this body, and Livingston of Louisiana, McDuffie and Hamilton of South Carolina, and other gentlemen who, on the spur of the occasion, I am not now able to recall, but whose names will forever shine upon the rolls of their country's glory. And yet in that body Judge Wright, then in the maturity of his powers, though not previously known to the nation, vindicated an equal rank in debate with those gentlemen whose names I have mentioned. Sir, I shall never forget with what earnestness, with what manliness, with what integrity, with what ability, he ever uttered his convictions of public duty, whatever they were, in that consecrated hall.

After remaining here, I think, for six years, he retired to his own State for the purpose of assuming the duties of a highly-important and dignified office, which was soon followed by his retirement into the bosom of private life, where he met a rich and ample solace for the storms of his public career. He was followed there by the respect of his fellow-citizens throughout the country, and the confidence of his own State, as we have recently seen, by his being called from that honorable retirement to take part in the grave and solemn duties of this assembly. Sir, he came among us in obedience to the solemn call of patriotic duty, at a most exigent and distressing period in our national annals. He came here on an errand of peace, in the spirit of peace and conciliation. Such was the feeling entertained toward him by the whole of this assembly, that without the slightest preconcert, so far as I know, he was invited by general consent to preside during the preliminary stages of the organization of this Convention. I had an opportunity, from time to time, of private conversation with the aged statesman. I found no member of the assembly I met here, and, indeed, I have found nowhere any citizen of this wide Republic of ours, whose heart was more deeply imbued with the spirit of conciliation and of peace—of that spirit which was so solemnly and impressively uttered in his last prayer, "May the Union be preserved." Sir, it is not given to mortal man to choose the manner of his death; but if such were the privilege accorded to any human being, what more glorious end could he, appreciating a true fame, covet, than that which has been the lot of our departed friend? Sir, I speak what I feel, and I dare say I express a sentiment which has impressed itself upon many other bosoms in this assembly, when I say that his sudden death in the midst of our deliberations, seems to me to exalt—in some degree to canonize—our labors. This manifestation of the visible hand of God among us, brings us in the immediate presence of those solemn responsibilities which attach themselves to the discharge of our duties here. I doubt not that every member of this assembly is already deeply impressed with the solemnity of those duties, and I feel convinced that there are few, if any, in this assembly, who would not lay down their fleeting and feverish existence, and follow our deceased brother to his final account, if by doing so they could restore peace and harmony to this glorious Republic of ours.

It does not become me to make any professions of devotion to my country—to my whole country—but this I will say, in the spirit of the last prayer of my friend, that I should regard my poor life, such as it is, a cheap purchase—the cheapest imaginable purchase—for that great boon to our country, the restoration of its peace, of its harmony, of its unity, of its ancient confederated strength and glory.

The question was taken, and the resolutions were unanimously adopted.

The body of Judge Wright was then brought into the hall, preceded by Rev. Dr. Hall, who read the impressive service of the Episcopal Church. A number of the members of the family, and of the friends of the deceased, were present during the services.

The funeral cortege proceeded from the hall to the depot of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad.