GOVERNOR, 1904
York, himself an expert, says was the ablest politician the country has ever produced. A review of these events shows with entire plainness the following facts:
A vacancy in the Supreme Court in which, professionally and otherwise, I took a great interest was filled, while I was governor, for twenty-one years by the selection of a man whom I had declined to appoint. The committee of the bar were so wearied with the chase after an ignis fatuus, and their feet were so clogged with the mire of the swamps, that they accepted without a murmur the selection of a man whom most of those they represented had denounced as a ring politician of such type that he was unfit even for executive office. The press, which would have opposed anybody, good or bad, favored by Quay, had been kept for four months upon a trail that led nowhere. My efforts to be decent, the pathos of the committee of lawyers, and the malice of the newspapers, had each contributed its part toward the completion of the plans of this master in the manipulation of men. If this be not genius, where will we find it? It ought to be added that Elkin was elected by a large majority, as I would have been, and has made an upright and unusually capable judge, who has won the approval of the entire profession. The lawyers over the state who signed a protest numbered one hundred and six, a small percentage of the whole bar. The newspapers, after the close of this episode, were, I think, rather more cautious about telling their readers what I intended to do. In a vein of playfulness Quay sent me from Florida these excerpts:
Et interrogatum est ab omnibus “ubi est ille J. Hay Brown?” Et respondum est ab omnibus “non est inventus.”
Et interrogatum est ab omnibus “ubi est ille high and reputable writer?” et respondum est ab omnibus “non est inventus.”
Et interrogatum est ab omnibus “ubi est ille high and responsible writer?” Et respondum est cum cachino “non est inventus.”
Deinde iteratum est ab omnibus cum cachinatione undulante et trepidante “non sunt inventi.” Murder as a Fine Art.
