Thomas, Peter C. Bacon,--would have been great leaders
at any Bar in the United States, or on any circuit in England.
Study at a law school is invaluable to the youth if he is
to rise in his profession; but there is no law school like
a court-house when such men are conducting trials. The difficult
art of cross-examination, the more difficult art of refraining
from cross-examination, can only be learned by watching men
who are skilled in the active conduct of trials.
The Supreme Court of Massachusetts at that day with Chief
Justice Shaw at its head was without an equal in the country
and not surpassed by the Supreme Court of the United States
itself. I can conceive of no life more delightful than that
of a lawyer in good health, and with good capacity, and with
a sufficient clientage, spent in that manly emulation and
honorable companionship.
The habit of giving dissenting opinions which has become
so common both in the Supreme Court of the United States
and of late in the Massachusetts Supreme Court did not then
exist. If there were a division on an important question
of law the statement of the result was usually "a majority
of the Court is of opinion.
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