for assault and battery. About the same time a son of Governor Desha was charged with the murder of a man for his money in Harrison County — was three times tried and convicted of the murder and sentenced to be hung. The " New Court " party claimed that it was a persecution by the "Old Court" party and the latter taunted the sorrowing father with faithlessness to official duty because he yielded to parental impulses and sympathized with his son. Finally the parent, broken-hearted, unlike the first Brutus in Roman history, pardoned his son and soon after, his term of office having expired, retired forever from public life. The contest, which at first was conducted on a high plane and brought into play the powers and the classical attainments of Rowan, Barry, Kendall, Sharp, Bibb and Desha on the one side and Robertson, Mar shall, Crittenden, Wickliffe and Hardin on the other, had now progressed so far towards anarchy that the very safety of the State was threatened. The venerable Governor Shelby (first governor of Kentucky), in writing from his home on June 20, 1825, said : —
propitious. In these particulars they are emi nently blessed; yet these people, so much favored by a beneficent Heaven, so much signalized by their peculiar natural capacities are oppressed with debt; their currency depreciated; their Constitution disregarded; their laws powerless; their lives and their property insecure; them selves driven to the verge of civil war; industry deprived of its incentives and despoiled of its rewards; fraud sanctified by law; the improvi dent living on the provident; the idle fattening on the sweat of the laboring; dishonest bankruptcy considered honorable; solvency, criminal; refus ing to pay debts, a badge of patriotism; attempt ing to exact payment, called oppression; the punctual, laboring citizen denominated " aristo crat," " tory "; the lazy and dissolute, who live by fraud and stealth, lauded as patriots, whigs, republican; travellers murdered for their money and no punishment inflicted; citizens murdered weekly and no murderer hung; the fines inflicted on those who support " the powers that be," remitted; the honest alarmed; the upright miserable; the State degraded. This is a faith ful, but very imperfect picture of the condition of our country. Who so blind as not to see the causes of all these effects, in an unjust and un constitutional administration of the government? The best form of government corruptly or fool ishly administered will be oppressive."
"The interference of the legislature has par alyzed the exertions of the people and effected an entire destruction of all confidence between man and man. Although this system was sanc tioned by the will of the majority of the legisla ture, that does not justify it. The Constitution must be a shadow if it be made to yield to the will of each impassionate majority and those essential principles of a free government for which we have fought and bled must cease to be our pride and boast."
This may sound extravagant to people of this day, but it was written by an eye-wit ness — one of the most conservative men that ever lived — afterwards known to fame as Chief Justice Robertson, Kentucky's most eminent jurist. After the elections in 1825 the tide of popular favor began setting towards the "Old Court." At the spring term in 1826 it had on its docket 736 cases. Out of that number it was in possession of about 350 records. The others had been borne off by the " Desha Court." In the six months preceding that time 274 cases had been docketed, more than ever before in the same length of time. The " New Court " party had lost the House in the elections in 1825, but as only one-fourth of the senators were elected then,
A writer in the " Spirit of '76," who signs himself" Plebeian," in a card to Gov ernor Desha, gives the following description of the situation at this time : — "The condition of Kentucky is acknowledged to be a good one. It is inferior to that of no State in the Union. The people of Kentucky are intelligent. Their soil is prolific. Their climate
