the young lawyer was occupied more with potatoes than pleading. He used to walk to Court at Hartford and back. His industry at last won him a practice. He was capable of dogged application. Wanting in imagi nation he was not led astray to lighter pur suits. In 1775 he removed to Hartford, and the next year was appointed State's attorney, which at that time was a lucrative office. His legal business soon became larger than any other lawyers at the Connecticut bar. It is said that his docket often contained fifteen hundred cases. It is well to remember that the inhabitants of Connecticut have always enjoyed a singularly grand reputation for litigiousness. It is not claimed for Ells worth that he was a learned lawyer or an elo quent advocate. His success seems to have depended upon his integrity and the medi ocrity of his talent. He concentrated his at tention solely on the main points of his cases and let the minor issues go. He had no play of fancy, but he was always in earnest and could state his points with lucidity and con viction. Thus passed his life until 1778, little dis turbed by the Revolution, the principles of which he had early espoused. In 1775 he was elected to represent Windsor in the Gen eral Assembly of Connecticut, and was ap pointed one of the committee called the "Pay Table," which seems to have been a sort of treasury board. In the summer of 1776 he went to Albany on business con nected with that committee. In October, 1777, he was elected by the Assembly a dele gate to the Continental Congress; but he did not take his seat there until October 8, 1778. Connecticut had seven delegates to the Congress, one or more of whom could represent the State. They therefore accom modated one another's convenience and each attended alternately. The prestige of Con gress had then departed. The enthusiasm had vanished. Jay has said that its members were "a set of damned rascals." Public credit was exhausted. Political cabals in trigued and misgoverned. At this juncture
of public affairs Ellsworth came to the coun cil of the nation unknown. He had no ac quaintance with politics, no knowledge oí political science. He was not adaptable. His only qualifications for the place were his talent for business, his zeal for the public cause, his power of steady application. The day after he took his seat he was appointed upon the committee of Marine Affairs, which had general control over naval matters. Soon also he was put upon the committee of Appeals, the functions of which were judi cial. This was the lineal ancestor of the Su preme Court of the United States. It was vested by Congress with power to determine appeals brought from the admiralty courts of the States in cases of prize and capture. One interesting case decided by this committee was afterwards affirmed by the Supreme Court in United States ÏT. Peters, 5 Cranch, 115, wherein all the facts are set forth and Mr. Chief Justice Marshall delivered the opinion. In February, 1779, Ellsworth 'went home, but returned to Philadelphia in De cember, where his chief service was his sup port of Robert Morris's scheme for a bank. From August, 1780, to June 4, 1781, he was in Connecticut. On the latter date he returned to Congress, but in August left it again. During those three months, how ever, he manifested his narrow views of the dignity of the States as against the central authority of the nation. At that time of ruined credit, total lack of resources and no power by which to enforce the collection of a revenue, the only hope of salvation was in strengthening the National ' Government. Not to have seen that a strong Federal policy was necessary bespeaks a myopy, indeed a blindness, that almost amounted to stupidity. He resumed his seat on December 20. 1782, and retained it until after the flight of Congress to Princeton on June № 1783. This period was of immense impor tance. The war had ended. Constructive statesmanship was demanded. Hamilto" and Madison had made their appearance m the national Legislature. Order was to be
