74 



BETTS, SAMUEL E. 



expressive, his gestures animated, his diction 

 was noble, and his voice incomparably sweet 

 and sonorous. Then his intellect was of grand 

 proportions, and his speech bore reading -as 

 well as hearing. 



BETTS, SAMUEL R., LL. D., one of the ablest 

 of American jurists, born in Richmond, Berk- 

 shire County, Mass., in 1787; died at New 

 Haven, Conn., November 3, 1868. He was 

 the son of a respectable farmer ; and, after a 

 thorough early training in his native town, en- 

 tered Williams College, where ho graduated 

 with honor in 1806. After a diligent study of 

 the law in Hudson, N. Y., he was admitted to 

 the bar, and commenced practice in Sullivan 

 County, N. Y., where he was winning a fair 

 reputation, at the outbreak of the War of 1812, 

 when ho entered the army, and soon after was 

 appointed Judge- Advocate by Governor D. D. 

 Torapkins. In 1815 he was elected to Congress 

 for the district comprising Orange and Sullivan 

 Counties. At the close of the term, he declined 

 a reelection, and devoted himself with great 

 assiduity to the study and practice of his pro- 

 fession. He was for some years District- Attor- 

 ney of Orange County. At that time, the bar 

 of the State of New York was remarkable for 

 the numerous eminent legal minds who were 

 engaged in the practice of the profession in the 

 courts of the eastern counties. Martin Yan 

 Buren, Elisha Williams, Thomas J. Oakley, 

 George Griffin, Ogden Hoffman, Prescott Hall, 

 and Thomas Addis Emmet, were the great 

 lights of the bar, and with all of them Mr. 

 Betts was brought in almost constant contact, 

 and, though younger than most of them, was 

 soon recognized as their peer in legal attain- 

 ments and intellectual acumen. After about 

 eight years of this practice, Mr. Betts was 

 appointed by President Monroe, in 1823, Judge 

 of the United States District Court. This po- 

 sition he held for the long period of forty-four 

 years, and throughout the whole term presided 

 over it with a dignity, a courtesy, a profundity 

 of legal knowledge, a carefulness of research, 

 and a patience of investigation which made him 

 a model jurist in all the great questions brought 

 before him. To him belongs the high honor 

 of having shaped and settled in a great degree 

 the maritime laws of the United States. The 

 whole subjects of salvage, general average, 

 wages of seamen, freighting, contracts, charters, 

 insurance, and prizes, owe the greater portion 

 of their present condition to the honored Judge, 

 who has made the law so perfect and complete 

 on these points, that the best lawyers in New 

 York regard it as a finished code. For the 

 first twenty years of his connection with the 

 District Court, there was never an appeal from 

 his decisions, and his opinions in his own 

 court on maritime questions, and in the Circuit 

 Court on patents, have been uniformly upheld. 

 Every kind of question arising out of the crim- 

 inal law of the United States has been before 

 him ; he has tried cases of piracy and murder 

 on the high-seas, and discharged the whole 



BOLIVIA. 



criminal business of a large district. The war 

 brought before him an entirely new class of 

 questions, affecting national and international 

 rights; but although beyond the age of three- 

 score-years-and-ten, the Judge bent himself to 

 the new tasks imposed, and, with a vigor, a 

 perseverance, and an ability rarely equalled, 

 met the great demand of the most trying period 

 of our history, in a manner which was credit- 

 able to himself, and reflected honor upon the 

 country he so patriotically and faithfully 

 served. His decisions upon the neutrality 

 laws, and his judgments on the slave-trade, 

 are fine specimens of constitutional reasoning 

 and argument. As a judge, the lawyers who 

 have had the best opportunities of forming an 

 opinion say that Judge Betts never had a supe- 

 rior, and doubt if he had an equal. His bear- 

 ing toward members of the bar was always 

 gentlemanly and courteous. His judgments 

 were regarded as the best considered on record. 

 He conducted a case with coolness, clearness, 

 and deliberation, allowing counsel every lati- 

 tude that might tend to throw light on the 

 matter at issue. And it may be well doubted 

 whether any man on the bench in this country 

 ever possessed the same amount of judicial 

 ability. He held the place he vacated and 

 honored for the lengthened period of forty-four 

 years, and up to the day of his death he was 

 still the revered and upright judge of that im- 

 portant court, where he pronounced numerous 

 decisions, which are regarded as text-books of 

 federal .jurisprudence, and in after-years will 

 be looked upon as the highest and soundest 

 efforts of legal skill and research. In social 

 and domestic life he was always highly es- 

 teemed and beloved; his conversational powers 

 were unusually fine, his acquaintance with 

 literature and men extensive, his manners 

 courteous, and his treatment of all, especially 

 of the young, such as to endear him to those 

 with whom he came in contact. He did not 

 outlive his interest in passing events, but his 

 mind was bright and vigorous, even after the 

 bodily frame showed signs of weakness and 

 decay. In May, 1867, having entered upon his 

 eighty-first year, and feeling the infirmities of 

 age, Judge Betts retired from the bench he had 

 so long honored, and passed the brief remain- 

 der of his life in the comforts and privacies of 

 his home at New Haven. 



BOLIVIA, a republic in South America. 

 Provisional President since the revolution of 

 December, 1864, General Mariano Melgarejo. 

 The limits of the republic have not yet been 

 fixed, and the statements of the area.therefore 

 widely differ. A treaty concluded between 

 Bolivia and Chili, on August 10, 1866, fixed 

 the 24th degree S. latitude as the dividing 

 line between these two republics. Another 

 treaty for regulating the frontier between Bo- 

 livia and Brazil was concluded on March 27, 

 1867. By this compact Bolivia resigns her 

 claims to the western bank of the river Para- 

 guay, a territory of about 18,000 square leagues. 



