case; in unravelling the confusion of names, dates, and in winnowing out the real issue; that having been done, he eliminated the irrelevant and he then discussed the single issue that had been left.

His method was rarely disclosed, but he does give us an insight as to how this was done in a sentence in the Ellison case, where he said: "Having freed the Court from its own misconstruction of the Code, we are now ready for a new and true construction. And to find it, is one of those difficult easy things which so frequently present themselves in the law. When the right point of view is discovered, the problem is more than half solved." (87 Georgia, 706). But whatever the method, the result is that most of his decisions appear to be so simple and the results so self-evident that one almost instinctively inquires as to how there ever could have been any question over so plain a matter, forgetting that the real work behind the scenes was in reducing the question to that obvious issue. In respect of his opinions, he cannot be better characterized than by language which he used of another (83 Ga., 825): "His mind was a crystal; it was as clear as a sunbeam. What he saw, he saw with a distinct vision, and what he said, was said in clear, concise and elegant language." While he was essentially modern in his spirit, yet he uniformly sought the fountains and ancient ways of the law. There is, however, a noticeable lack of anything like pedantry in his opinions. There is no smell of the lamp. His constant effort was to seek what he somewhere calls the "justice of the justice" of the case; but never to the sacrifice of legal principles or of legal rights, and, for that reason, it was his habit always to trace back to one of the tried and received maxims of the law, even though he did not quote it.

The solidity of Lord Coke's learning and reasoning give value and permanence to his work, but his quaintness has attracted many a reader who would otherwise have passed by the dry volumes, and so with Judge Bleckley's decisions. The pithy remark, the flash of humor, the quaint turn of a phrase, have added an attractiveness to their otherwise solid strength,

and made his opinions known and read far and wide. But his reputation does not rest upon his brilliant sentences; they are but the flashes of his genius. His national reputation as a great judge rests upon the solidity of his learning, his profound knowledge of the law, and the value of his opinions contained in the Georgia Reports. Most of them are brief; all of them, he made to appear easy. Occasionally he did have before him. a case which taxed even his own power of analysis and simplification, and then he girded up his loins for an elaborate and conspicuously great opinion. He himself regarded the opinion in the Ellison case as his best work, and, next to that, he put Ewing vs. Shropshire, 80 Georgia, in which he uttered the last words over the remains of the Rule in Shelley's case. Kinnebrew vs. State, 80 Georgia, 241, is a model of severe logic. Alabama Railroad vs. Fulghum, 87 Ga., 263, is a conspicuous illustration of his power of condensation.

Judge Bleckley verified the French maxim that the style is the man. His clearness is only equaled by the openness of his nature. He had the simplicity and frankness of a child, -a frankness that prompted him to admit a fault as soon as it was committed and ever afterwards. He loved the friends of his youth, was full of sentiment, and cherished the very certificate that admitted him to the bar, and the two volumes he read as a youthful student. And yet, deep as was the hold of sentiment on his nature, he knew that courts are not the proper place for feeling and emotion. In asserting this important truth, he prepared his paper on "Emotional Justice." (9 Ga. Bar Rep., 54)— one of the saddest, profoundest and wisest things ever written on a subject which naturally developed into a discussion of mob law and its striking concomitant, appeals to the emotion of juries. In this paper, Judge Bleckley gave a wonderful instance of his marvelous power of analysis. Nothing can be more difficult than to prove an axiom, discuss a truism, or to lay bare the foundations of the bed-rock. This he did with sustained power, and both proved and enforced that which seemed beyond proof. He says: "The influence of the mob waxes, while that of the jury wanes. The body which decides be

tween guilt and innocence ought to be the most influential, the most feared and respected of any in society. No organization in or out of the court house should be so terrible to evil-doers as a jury of twelve men. No mob, even if composed of firstclass citizens, ought to compete with the jury for repute in inflicting punishment on offenders. The jury alone should be conspicuous in the exercise of this high function in behalf of the public. I exhort and abjure all good citizens to cooperate with the executive and the judiciary in staying quickly that violent justice which is rife in our unhappy country. Children already born may live to see mobs mobbed; large mobs. may execute smaller ones; mobs of one race may rise up against mobs of another race; mobs of bad men may become more numerous and more terrible than mobs of good men."

No sketch of Judge Bleckley's life would be even passably correct which failed to call attention to his relations to the bar by whom he was loved and venerated. He was ever the honored guest of the Bar Association, and no meeting was complete without his presence. In response to urgent invitations, he prepared for it many papers of permanent interest and value. These, with his stenographically reported oral addresses, and the "Letter to Posterity" published in the "Greenbag," not only afford interesting biographical material, but will be of value to the future student of Georgia jurisprudence. That same student may find on the walls of the Supreme Court room in the State Capitol an excellent portrait of the Chief Justice, though he will not be able therefrom fully to appreciate the towering form, the powerful body, the immense brow, nor the deepsunken eyes, indicative of the spirit of the poet, the mathematician and the jurist all struggling for preeminence. In personal appearance, he was like a prophet of old, but his nature was too kind and his heart too gentle to rebuke, with any bitterness, the sins and frailties of his generation. From eleven years of age to eighty, he devoted himself to the study of the law the youngest student in the State, attorney, reporter, justice, chief justice, he lived the Nestor of Georgia's bench and bar. He

died March 6, 1907, and on his tomb might truthfully be inscribed the epitaph over Macaulay, "His body lies buried here, but his name will live forever."

JNO. L. HOPKINS,

Chairman.

J. R. LAMAR,

JOEL BRANHAM,
H. H. PERRY.

[The substance of the foregoing sketch was prepared for "Men of Mark in Georgia" by a member of the Committee. With the consent of the publisher, and at the request of the other members of the Committee, that sketch revised and somewhat amplified was made the basis of the foregoing report.]

APPENDIX D.

HOW FAR SHOULD PUBLIC UTILITY CORPORATIONS BE CONTROLLED, AND BY

WHAT MEANS ?

ADDRESS BY

ANDREW J. COBB

OF ATHENS.

(Stenographically Reported.)

Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Georgia Bar Association: When I accepted the invitation to discuss this question, it was my purpose to submit in writing whatever I should say, but those things, that will happen sometimes, happened in this case, and, when the time arrived, which I had set apart for the purpose of reducing to writing what I intended to say, other engagements prevented me from doing it. I would have much preferred to have addressed you in writing for two reasons: First: It would have shown the respect for this body which it always merits at the hands of anyone who is invited to come before it, and second, whatever I might say would have been in more succinct form, and consumed less time.

But now to the subject. "How Far Should Public Utility Corporations Be Controlled, and by What Means?" I am not unaware of the largeness of the question. Neither am I unaware of the fact that I am, in the time limited, unable to discuss it in all its various phases. What may be said will be largely suggestive.

In 1876 the Supreme Court of the United States, in the case of Munn vs. Illinois (94 U. S. 113) announced the rule