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| Book Reviews | Lincoln the Lawyer Lincoln was at root a collection law- Lincoln’s experience as an attorney By Brian Dirck yer. The West in the 19th century was served him well in his later political University of Illinois Press, Urbana, IL, 2007. the scene of both easy lending and fre- career, in that he made political con- 228 pages, $29.95. quent defaults, and Lincoln was in the nections on the circuit and, more im- center of this process. As Dirck states, portant, he learned the values of settle- “Lincoln practiced law in a veritable ment and reconciliation. The Papers of Abraham Lincoln: shower of [promissory notes]. They The four-volume selection of legal Legal Documents and Cases rained down on him, year in and year cases edited by Daniel Stowell was out, for his entire 25-year practice. ... meticulously prepared. There is a bio- Edited by Daniel W. Stowell Insofar as Lincoln specialized in any graphical note for every person men- University of Virginia Press, Charlottesville, VA, area of the law, he was a debt-collec- tioned in the records, including parties, 2007. 4 volumes, $300.00. tion attorney.” Most of these cases were judges, sheriffs, and jurors. There are straightforward—just a matter of turn- maps of the southern Illinois counties ing to the appropriate page in Chitty’s and photographs of litigants and court- REVIEWED BY HEN R Y S. CO H N Pleading. houses. Stowell weaves the documents Lincoln’s law practice also included in each case together and explains their In 2000, the University of Illinois probating estates and handling family importance. published a DVD containing nearly matters such as dower and child sup- Documents in the first volume show 96,000 documents gathered from the port, and he took on a few contro- Lincoln’s efforts to train interns and stu- surviving record of Abraham Lincoln’s versial criminal cases as well. He also dents who sought membership in the 25 years as a practicing attorney. Now, represented the Illinois Central Railroad Illinois bar. Among these documents two excellent works have drawn on the on various matters, including collecting is his famous letter to a farmer, listing DVD to capture the essence of Lincoln’s from investors who failed to pay their the law books that he considers essen- legal career. First, in Lincoln the Law- pledges on subscriptions and represent- tial for the beginning student (“Begin yer, Brian Dirck of Anderson University ing the railroad when persons claimed with Blackstone’s Commentaries, and in Indiana shows that Lincoln did not property damages resulting from rail- after reading it carefully through, say meet the Hollywood image of a law- road construction. twice ...”), and then concluding, “Work, yer as portrayed by Henry Fonda in the Dirck declares more than once that work, work, is the main thing.” The 1939 movie, “Young Mr. Lincoln,” or by Lincoln was a “pretty ordinary attor- second volume includes letters that re- Gregory Peck, who played Atticus Finch ney,” although he acknowledges that cord Lincoln’s trip through the Eighth in the 1962 movie, “To Kill a Mocking- Lincoln was adroit in his presentations Circuit in spring 1852, describing the bird.” The second work to draw on the in court. As an example of the latter, cases handled at the 14 courthouses in DVD is a four-volume selection of legal Dirck describes Lincoln’s representa- the circuit and the conditions (mostly cases and other documents edited by tion of a defendant who, upset by a rain and mud) at each location. Daniel Stowell (as well as several prede- news story, had attacked an editor with The more than 50 cases included in cessors) and published by the University his cane and was now being sued for the four volumes are remarkable in the of Virginia Press in association with the $10,000. Lincoln couldn’t deny the facts, way they present a cultural picture of Illinois Historic Preservation Agency. so, when the time came for him to ad- pre-Civil War America. The cases show In Lincoln the Lawyer, Brian Dirck dress the jury, “Lincoln slowly stood, the nation encouraging inventions, ex- portrays Lincoln in a more mundane picked up a copy of [the plaintiff’s] mo- panding capital markets, and making light than Hollywood generally portrays tion, and then suddenly burst out into internal improvements. One invention lawyers. Lincoln, after all, chose the law a ‘long loud laugh accompanied by that brought clients to Lincoln was the as a profession because he needed a se- his most wonderfully grotesque facial “atmospheric churn”—supposedly a cure job, after not having done well as expression.’” This sight caused several great improvement—that made butter a grocer, postman, and surveyor in New members of the jury to snicker, and in 15 minutes. Lincoln defended the Salem, Ill. Dirck shows that as an attor- Lincoln apologized. He explained that patent holder against salesmen who ney Lincoln was regarded as “peculiar” the plaintiff had written a demand for sought commissions on their sales of but was nevertheless popular. His office $1,000 but had crossed out the figure the device. Lincoln’s clients also includ- was filthy, he was careless in his dress, and replaced it with $10,000. Lincoln ed several railroad entrepreneurs who and—unlike his fellow lawyers—he en- joked that the plaintiff must have had needed his assistance to lobby the Illi- joyed traveling the often muddy open second thoughts and “concluded that nois legislature for additional routes, to road on the circuit. He was a “man’s the wounds to his honor were worth collect on subscriptions for stock, and man,” surviving on the poor food of tav- an additional nine thousand dollars.” to perform other legal tasks. erns, sharing his straw bed with other Dirck writes that Lincoln robbed the Lincoln also represented a poor soul attorneys, and making his reputation as case and the plaintiff of dignity, and the a storyteller. jury returned a verdict of only $300. REVIEWS continued on page 54 November/December 2008 | The Federal Lawyer | 53 FedLawyer_thirdpage_10-08 9/30/08 4:22 PM NEW BOOK FROM REVIEWS continued from page 53 THE CATO INSTITUTE who tried to venture to California for the for his oral argument, including case gold rush, only to quit before he reached summaries and points to emphasize. the West Coast. Lincoln had to work out The notes show how he prepared for a The Cato a settlement with the failed prospec- difficult assignment and reveal that he “ tor’s backers, who demanded that the had the intellect to understand a com- Supreme would-be prospector repay the seed plex matter. money they had given him. Lincoln also In 1852, in Grubb v. John Frink & Court Review handled bankruptcy cases, taking ad- Co., Lincoln filed suit in an Illinois trial vantage of an 1841 federal bankruptcy court on behalf of a plaintiff who had is essential act, repealed by Congress in 1843, to file been injured when his hired coach several petitions in bankruptcy for his overturned. Lincoln gathered evidence reading. clients. The inventory listed in a bank- of the coach driver’s negligence, and ruptcy case included in the first volume the record includes notes of Lincoln’s – NAT HENTOFF describes home furnishings that would depositions of the plaintiff’s physician Syndicated Columnist, Village ”Voice interest historians of that era. and of a friend of the plaintiff’s who The documents in these volumes, cared for him after he was injured. The which are reproduced with few dele- case was settled just as the trial com- tions, allow details of Lincoln’s life to menced, based on Lincoln’s pre-trial emerge. In one letter related to a pend- preparation. ing case, Lincoln comments to the ad- In 1853, in People v. Loe, Lincoln dressee, a fellow attorney, on the status represented a young man charged with of a current Whig political campaign. murder for allegedly knifing another In another letter, he apologizes to co- youngster to death during a brawl. Lin- counsel for failing to reply sooner on a coln’s friend, David Davis, was the trial matter, because he had just gotten mar- judge, and he wrote to his father-in-law ried. Indeed, the state of marriage is that the case looked hopeless for Lin- one of “profound wonder” to Lincoln. coln, but Lincoln was able to convince In a chapter involving a claim that a the jury to convict Loe only of man- testator had been unduly influenced, slaughter. Loe was sentenced to eight the editor notes that Lincoln, like many years but was released after four years, people at the time, never wrote a will; when Lincoln and people in Loe’s town this caused Mary Lincoln much grief in asked the governor to reduce his sen- settling Lincoln’s affairs after his assas- tence. (Pardons were routinely given so sination. One case shows the economic that the town would not have to sup- side of Lincoln’s legal practice: he sued port the inmate or the inmate’s family.) the Illinois Central Railroad for services Loe returned to his community, mar- rendered and received his largest fee ried a woman who was 16 years old, Published every September, the Cato —$5,000. The fee became a matter of and fathered two children. He died in Supreme Court Review brings together lead- contention in Lincoln’s 1858 debate 1864 from wounds that he received on ing legal scholars to analyze key cases from with Stephen Douglas when Lincoln the battlefield as a Union soldier.