John K. Porter.

sequences of their possible verdict. But he said that he knew them for soldiers, who had fought four years against General Grant, and that he was convinced that in no tribunal could the reputation of that great soldier and honest man be more safe than in the case of a jury composed of his late oppo nents in war. He told me that after the verdict, which was an acquittal, five of the jury came to him and said, " We thank you for understanding us right. We fought against that man and fought hard, but nobody need take the trouble to persuade us that he is a perfectly honest man and a good patriot. We know it." The elevated railways which at present distinguish the city of New York have their foundation built, as I might say, in the sweat and blood of John K. Porter. Our firm were attorneys for the Gilbert Elevated, afterwards the Metropolitan, and afterwards the Man hattan Railway Company. The proceedings which surrounded the beginning of these enterprises were carried on under great diffi culties, and at times these difficulties seemed too great to be overcome. It was not only by triumph in the courts, but by advice given in his office and by labors far sur passing the ordinary labors of counsel, that a clean, substantial, unimpeachable legal basis was laid, on which the structures and franchises which they embody and represent can be forever made useful to this com munity. A volume might with profit and instruction be made upon the inside and outside history of the elevated railroads liti gations, and much of it would tend to encour age professional men to persist, even in the face of apparent disaster, where the object is a good and useful one. Judge Porter was employed in many im portant will cases, that being a branch of the law in which he had special facility. He was also engaged with me in a number of cases of importance for the Western Union Telegraph Company, for which dur ing fifteen years we were the general coun sel. These litigations often had to do with 56

441

the building up of the colossal success which that company has attained. The last case in which he appeared was the prosecution of Charles J. Guiteau, in dicted in the District of Columbia for the assassination of President Garfield. When he closed his address to the jury in that strange and unprecedented case, he pro nounced the last word which he was ever to speak in a court of justice. It was against the wishes of his partners that he engaged in that service. In fact, in the autumn of 1 88 1, we were together in Paris, where I had a very grave conversation with him on the subject of his health, which had shown signs of breaking. I knew that when he should reach home there would immedi ately follow the customary applications by attorneys to accept briefs; and representing the wishes of his family and his partners, I urged him to decline all professional em ployment for a year, to take rest, and, if possible, recreation; and this he seemed to promise. He returned first; and when I arrived I found that President Arthur had sent for him, and had made to him a per sonal appeal, based upon the peculiar circum stances of the case, to assume the responsible direction of the prosecution of the murderer of the late President. While this paper was being written, I learned from Mr. William Allen Butler a fact which I believe was not known to Judge Porter, and which would in part account for the urgency which was used to induce him to take part in the case. Mr. Butler tells me that he was on a visit to the White House during the trial, when President Arthur told him of his first knowl edge of Judge Porter. It seems that young Arthur, while still a student, chanced to be at Ballston Spa while the Circuit Court was in session, and a trial in progress in which Porter was of counsel. He did not know Porter, and, so far as I am aware, was never acquainted with him until they met in respect to the Guiteau case. The result of that Saratoga County trial, however, was