to the convention, and while the convention was in session the country was plunged into civil war. Sumter had been fired on, and the reverberation of the explosion was heard around the world. President Lincoln called for three hundred thousand troops for the purpose of suppressing the resistance to the government and apportioned Virginia's quota for her to raise. For what! as they viewed it, to fight against Virginia and Virginians. Brave old Jubal Early had stood up for the Union in that convention; even went so far as to indorse General Anderson returning the fire from Fort Sumter; said he had done nothing but his duty. But when Virginia was required to raise troops to fight against Virginia his love for the Union was destroyed. Mr. Woods, regarding the Civil War as actually begun and the dire alternative presented to fight for Virginia or the Union, he cast his fortune with Virginia, and a few days after Fort Sumter fell, and the call for the troops was made; the ordinance of secession was passed by a large majority, although up to that time a large majority of the convention was opposed to secession. But they regarded the die as cast, and they had no alternative but to stand by their State. How fixed were they in their opinions, and in their allegiance to Virginia, let the terrible struggle, the most gigantic in either modern or ancient history, attest. Poor Virginia bared her sacred bosom to the storm of war, and her soil drank up more fraternal blood in the valley, at First and Second Bull Run, the Seven Days battles near Richmond, at Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, First and Second Cold Harbor, the Wilderness, Spottsylvania Courthouse, Petersburg, Appomatox, and other places from Washington to Richmond, than was spilled in all other places, in that terrible four years of war and carnage. Mr. Woods was now an exile from his Philippi home for four years. He was in the South fighting for what he believed to be right. He was attached to the celebrated" Stonewall Brigade.' When the war closed and the angel of peace spread his white wings in benediction over this stricken land, and the South lay prostrate beneath a mighty load, singing the sad strain: "Around me blight, where all before was bloom, And oh! 'Tis hard to say, but said 'tis sweet; "It is the prayer of prayers, and how it brings, Mr. Woods returned to his Philippi home. Not like a culprit, not like a traitor, but with head erect, realizing that God still reigned. "He was troubled on every side, yet not disturbed. He was perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed." Mr. Woods came home like a man and by his upright Christian conduct, won those who looked askance upon him when he returned. When he left he was the class leader in his little church in Philippi. He had not been long at home when he was invited by those who were "on the other side," to take his old place as class-leader. He took it, and at the altar of prayer he mingled his petitions with theirs, he visited their sick and dying, he spoke words of consolation to the bereaved ones, aye, he went with them to the holy communion and partook with them of the emblems of the broken body and shed blood of their common Savior. He was good enough to do all this, they had the greatest confidence in his Christian character, but they would not let him vote. He was not good enough for that. But he waited, and but a few years of political persecution could endure, and he saw his political shackles fall to the ground. In 1871 he was a candidate in the Sixth Senatorial District for a seat in the constitutional convention which was to meet in 1872. He was elected, and in that convention was Chairman of the Committee on Bill of Rights and Elections, and a member of the Revisory Committee, composed of the Chairmen of the several committees. He was a very able, influential member of that convention and had much to do in forming a constitution that not only made test. oaths odious and impossible, but a constitution that has stood the test of over a quarter of a century without very material change. He did much on the stump in his district to have the constitution ratified by the people. He was a fluent speaker and a clear logical reasoner, and his power with the people was great. He could say with truth, what but few justices ever could say, that he never was defeated for a public office by the people. At the election in August, 1872, under the new constitution, all the officers of the State were elected. The candidates for circuit judge in the Parkersburg Circuit, Geo. Loomis, the Republican candidate, and James M. Jackson, the Democratic, both claimed to be elected. Judge Jackson obtained the certificate, and Judge Loomis contested. In the special tribunal for the trial of the case, Mr. Woods was selected as one of the judges. He wrote the opinion in the case; a clear, concise and able opinion, deciding the contest in favor of Judge Jackson. For this opinion, see Loomis v. Jackson, 6 W. Va. Judge Haymond resigned his seat on the Supreme Bench of the State the last of December, 1882. Gov. J. B. Jackson, on the first of January, 1883, appointed Judge Woods to fill the vacancy until the next general election in November, 1884. He was a candidate for election to fill the unexpired term of Judge Haymond. He was elected by a good majority, after nearly a year's service on the bench. Of his qualifications for that high position, serving with him for the six years he was on the bench, I believe I am qualified to speak. He brought with him to the bench fine native talents, his classical education, wide range of reading, his legal education, which was very much widened and deepened by his long and successful practice at the bar; these, with sound and 1 mature judgment, practical good sense, great industry, with a profound sense and love of justice, and the obligation on him to find the justice and right of the case, fitted him in a high degree to discharge the duties of that most responsible position. He was a cautious, conscientious judge. He also studied and worked to keep himself in the line of the decisions. He did not believe he had any right, and he did not dare, to depart from the rule of settled law. For the strongest proof of this let me refer to his very able and exhaustive opinion in the case of Wilson v. Perry, 30 W. Va., where he was compelled to decide that a testator's bequests, some of them were void because the settled law in this State and in Virginia said they were, because indefinite charities. A good and pious old man had left money in trust for churches and Sunday-schools, and Judge Woods would have been glad to have sustained the bequests if he could have done so. Authorities from many of the States would have upheld such bequests, but the decisions in Virginia and this State had pronounced such bequests void, and he did not dare to depart from those decisions. The Legislature had not overruled them, and he did not dare to usurp the law-making power. His duty was to decide what the law was, and not what he might think it ought to be. He and his associates would not, because they felt that they did not dare to do so, indulge at all in "judgemade law." Another one of Judge Woods' decisions which I will cite dislayed great ability of analysis, and all the other qualities of an able jurist. That is Flanagan's case in 26 W. Va. Flanagan had been indicted for the murder of a woman, who, with her child, had been burned to death in a log cabin in Randolph County. Flanagan was tried, convicted of the murder and sentenced to die on the gallows. His counsel brought the case up on writ of In the opinion Judge Woods displayed great ability. He came to the conclusion, in which all the judges concurred, that there was absolutely no proof in the record, (and all the evidence was certified), that the house was error. burned by an incendiary; that it did not take fire accidentally, that there was no proof of the corpus delicti and the court reversed the judgment, set aside the verdict, and remanded the case for a new trial. In that case the rules governing circumstantial evidence are well and forcibly laid down. Judge Woods wrote many strong opinions, covering a great number of subjects. His opinions will be found in eleven volumes of our Supreme Court reports from the twenty-first to the thirty-first, inclusive. If our courts of last resort could have such judges as Samuel Woods there would be no room for complaint. Judge Woods was a deeply religious man and for his religion he never apologized, and was careful not to put any stain upon it. He was ever ready to testify to the truth of religion. A scene occurred once at a skating rink in Wheeling that illustrates the faithfulness of Judge Woods to his religious principles. Miss Jennie Smith, the evangelist, was holding a series of meetings in the rink. One night a poor man in deep mental distress came to the anxious seat, to find comfort, that he sadly needed. Judge Woods and the president of the court were there, and Miss Smith called on both to pray for the poor penitent, which they did, and there on their knees wrestling with God for mercy for that poor distressed soul, was half the Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia. Did they lower their dignity? If there is anything in our holy religion, they did not. They were but doing their duty. Judge Woods was never ashamed of the profession he had made. For many long years he had been a consistent member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. That religion that he had experienced in his youth was his solace through life and in death. Judge of the Supreme Court of Appeals of the State as he was, he felt he was but a poor mortal, and in daily need of forgiveness. He believed in prayer, as "The simplest form of speech That infant lips can try; Prayer, the sublimest strains that reach |