is well known to all lawyers and judges; and it is no compliment to a court for counsel to rely upon a case of which in oral argument he merely reads a part of the syllabus or a few lines of the head notes. ... If a case is worth citing in an oral argument to the court, and especially to a court of final resort, it is worth while to put that court in possession of so much of the elements of it as is necessary to under stand what was decided in it. The counsel whom I have known who used the authority of adjudged cases with most skill and effect, will, with the book from which they intend to read lying before them, make, in their own language and not in that of the reporter, a condensed statement of the issues in the case, and how they arose, so far as they are appli cable to the point in hand. Having done this and given the court whom he is addressing to understand, if necessary, the character of the court which decided the case he is about to cite, counsel then reads from the report of the opinion the most condensed state ment he can find of the decision of the court and of the reasons on which it was based. This can be done within a very short time if counsel will prepare themselves in advance for the presentation of the case, and it is vastly more effectual in its influence on the mind of the listening court than reading page after page from a voluminous decision which the court cannot remember, much of which is useless so far as the case in hand is concerned, and the relation of that part which may be pertinent obscured by the reading of a long and uninteresting opinion. By the former method the court is at once put in possession of the point actually decided in the case cited, and is enabled to discern how far it is applicable to the case before it, and to gain some idea of the reasoning on which that principle was made to rest in the former case. If it becomes necessary in the further consid eration of the matter by the court to refer to this de cision, the care and skill of counsel has pointed out where all that is valuable may be found without the labor of reading through a hundred pages of useless matter to find it."
decent EDeatf)$i. Guv Ashton Brown, of Omaha, Neb., died in that city, October 27. He was State Libra rian, Clerk of the Supreme Court, and Official Reporter. He was born at Batavia, N. Y., in De cember, 1846. His father was Joshua Lawrence Brown, Judge of Genesee County. The son re ceived his education at a village school and neigh boring academy, finishing at a New England military academy. In 1862, when a lad of sixteen, 72
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he joined the Twenty-second Battery of New York. This company being consolidated with the One Hundred and Thirty-eighth New York Volunteers, became Battery M of the Ninth New York Artil lery, and Guy Brown was made sergeant-major of the largest regiment in the army of the Potomac. In this capacity he performed, in a great degree, the duties of the office of adjutant, while on duty building and guarding the defence to Washington. When the regiment was ordered to the front, the young sergeant-major was promoted to the office of adjutant over forty-eight ranking subaltern offi cers. Soon he was offered a position on the staff of his commanding general, but declined, prefer ring to fight in the line with his comrades. Upon re-enlistment he was commissioned captain for mer itorious services, and assigned to Company M of the Second New York Artillery. He served in the campaigns from the Wilderness to the close of the war, participating in the battles of Cold Harbor, the attack of Ream's Station, the disaster at Monocacy, which made possible the preservation of the nation's capital; the victories in the Shen andoah valley, and numerous other engagements. He was never absent a day from his command until he fell, severely wounded, at the beginning of one of the last battles of the war. Captain Brown was brevetted major for gallant services in the field, and returning home at the close of the conflict, engaged in the crockery business at his 'native place. In 1867 he removed his estab lishment to Nebraska City, and after a short mer cantile career was appointed clerk of the District Court for Otoe County. Upon that position be coming an elective office, he entered the office of James M. Woolworth, in Omaha, studied law, and was admitted to the bar. In 1868 he was appointed Clerk to the Supreme Court, removed to Lincoln, and performed the labor of editing one of the early volumes of the Supreme Court Reports. He was also librarian of the then law division of the State Library; was made executive clerk of the House of Representatives at its ses sion of 1873, — an office created by the exigen cies of the time, never existing before or since. The same year he prepared the General Statutes of Nebraska. In 1875 he was chosen secretary of the Constitutional Convention, and under the new regime, became the first reporter, Clerk of the Supreme Court, and State Librarian, which triune office he held until his decease.
