The Supreme Court of New Jersey. in 1848 a member of the Assembly from Morris County. He served twice in this responsible position; during his second term being elected Speaker. He never again be came a candidate for political honors, but applied himself diligently and resolutely to his profession, in which he became eminent and very successful. In 1858 Martin Ryerson resigned his office of Associate Justice, and the Governor se lected Mr. Whelpley to fill the vacancy. This selection was acknowledged by all to be exceedingly proper, and one of the best that could have been made. He held the position until 1861, when Henry W. Green, then Chief-Justice, "was made Chancellor, and Judge Whelpley was selected as the head of the Court to succeed Chancellor Green. Very soon after he was raised to this responsible post he sickened with that terrible malady, Bright's disease, from which he never recovered. He, however, continued to discharge the duties of the high office to which he was so recently elected, until about two months before his death. In the month of February, 1864, in the prime of his man hood, in his forty-sixth year, he died, after the intensest suffering, calmly and bravely meeting his end, which for months he knew was approaching. After this brief and imperfect sketch of this illustrious man, it is well to pause a moment and think of his shining virtues, his great intellect, his many-sided character, and his noble nature. View him from any standpoint, as a man, as a citizen, as a jurist, as a lawyer, and he was great. But in these sketches he is to be spoken of as a lawyer and as a judge. He was in every respect a great lawyer, and possessed nearly, if not quite, all of the characteristics of a consummate jurist. He was a clear thinker, of a cool dispas sionate judgment, with a power of analysis which enabled him to grasp all the points in any case submitted and give them their due proportions and their appropriate relations. He had an acute and intuitive perception of 61
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the principles of legal science which never failed him, and a perfect control of himself which kept him entirely free from any pre judice, and forced every faculty of his nature to submit to intellectual leadership. His habits of close thought and logical reason ing gave him a great mental grasp, which en abled him to gather up all the legal principles involved in cases before him and use those principles with unerring effect. His argu ments were compact, lucid, and convincing. He had strengthened all these mental gifts by severe study and intellectual training, and had not disdained the lighter studies found outside of his chosen pursuit. In addressing juries he seized every salient fact in the evidence, marshalled all the testi mony, so that it was presented, connected in all its parts, to the mental vision of jurors with such irresistible vigor that they were forced to admit its power. He was not a great orator, with grace of delivery, with voice and gesture; but his diction was admirable, his words were well chosen, al ways appropriate, his style always forcible; he was never redundant, rarely impassioned, but able, if he chose, to rise to great heights of eloquence. He met the requirements of the intellect and of the judgment, and never stormed the heart with appeals for sympathy. He was always listened to by jurors; they could not help listening, — he commanded their attention, even of the dullest of them. But it was before the bench that he shone the brightest, and it was in that arena that he won his highest renown. The judges ever heard him with the profoundest respect, and they never failed to award him their ad miration, even if they did not agree with him. In two cases before the Court of Errors, the highest appellate court in the State, he accomplished what no other lawyer, be fore his time or since, has ever been able to do. In both cases he carried his appeals by inducing the lay members to vote with him and overrule the law judges. One of these cases was so interesting and peculiar
