Stephen A. Douglas | Page 8

little by-play. Excitement ran high, for the opposition within the party was vehement in its protest to cut-and-dried resolutions commending Jackson. An older man with more discretion and modesty, would have hesitated to face the audience; but Douglass possessed neither retiring modesty nor the sobriety which comes with years. He not only read the resolutions, but he defended them with such vigorous logic and with such caustic criticism of Whigs and half-hearted Democrats, that he carried the meeting with him in tumultuous approval of the course of Andrew Jackson, past and present.[39]
The next issue of the Patriot, the local Whig paper, devoted two columns to the speech of this young Democratic upstart; and for weeks thereafter the editor flayed him on all possible occasions. The result was such an enviable notoriety for the young attorney among Whigs and such fame among Democrats, that he received collection demands to the amount of thousands of dollars from persons whom he had never seen or known. In after years, looking back on these beginnings, he used to wonder whether he ought not to have paid the editor of the Patriot for his abuse, according to the usual advertising rates.[40] The political outcome was not in every respect so gratifying. The Democratic county ticket was elected and a Democratic congressman from the district; but the Whigs elected their candidate for governor.
A factional quarrel among members of his own party gave Douglass his reward for services to the cause of Democracy, and his first political office. Captain John Wyatt nursed a grudge against John J. Hardin, Esq., who had been elected State's attorney for the district through his influence, but who had subsequently proved ungrateful. Wyatt had been re-elected member of the legislature, however, in spite of Hardin's opposition, and now wished to revenge himself, by ousting Hardin from his office. With this end in view, Wyatt had Douglass draft a bill making the State's attorneys elective by the legislature, instead of subject to the governor's appointment. Since the new governor was a Whig, he could not be used by the Democrats. The bill met with bitter opposition, for it was alleged that it had no other purpose than to vacate Hardin's office for the benefit of Douglass. This was solemnly denied;[41] but when the bill had been declared unconstitutional by the Council of Revision, Douglass' friends made desperate exertions to pass the bill over the veto, with the now openly avowed purpose to elect him to the office. The bill passed, and on the 10th of February, 1835, the legislature in joint session elected the boyish lawyer State's attorney for the first judicial district, by a majority of four votes over an attorney of experience and recognized merit. It is possible, as Douglass afterward averred, that he neither coveted the office nor believed himself fitted for it; and that his judgment was overruled by his friends. But he accepted the office, nevertheless.
When Douglas,--for he had now begun to drop the superfluous s in the family name, for simplicity's sake,[42]--set out on his judicial circuit, he was not an imposing figure. There was little in his boyish face to command attention, except his dark-blue, lustrous eyes. His big head seemed out of proportion to his stunted figure. He measured scarcely over five feet and weighed less than a hundred and ten pounds. Astride his horse, he looked still more diminutive. His mount was a young horse which he had borrowed. He carried under his arm a single book, also loaned, a copy of the criminal law.[43] His chief asset was a large fund of Yankee shrewdness and good nature.
An amusing incident occurred in McLean County at the first court which Douglas attended. There were many indictments to be drawn, and the new prosecuting attorney, in his haste, misspelled the name of the county--M Clean instead of M'Lean. His professional brethren were greatly amused at this evidence of inexperience; and made merry over the blunder. Finally, John T. Stuart, subsequently Douglas's political rival, moved that all the indictments be quashed. Judge Logan asked the discomfited youth what he had to say to support the indictments. Smarting under the gibes of Stuart, Douglas replied obstinately that he had nothing to say, as he supposed the Court would not quash the indictments until the point had been proven. This answer aroused more merriment; but the Judge decided that the Court could not rule upon the matter, until the precise spelling in the statute creating the county had been ascertained. No one doubted what the result would be; but at least Douglas had the satisfaction of causing his critics some annoyance and two days' delay, for the statutes had to be procured from an adjoining county. To the astonishment of Court and Bar, and of Douglas himself, it appeared