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A. S. BLAIR,
attorney-at-law of Manchester, Delaware
county, is a native of New
York, having been born in the village of Perry,
Genesee (now Wyoming) county,
August 24, 1831. He is the second child and eldest son of
David J. and Margaret (Rockfellow)
Blair, the former a native of Massachusetts and the latter
a native of New Jersey. His parents were married in New
York late in the "twenties" and resided there till 1835,
when, joining the great tide of immigration then streaming
through western New York and Pennsylvania towards the rich
forest lands and broad prairies of the trans Alleghany
country, they moved to Ohio, settling first in Loraine and
afterwards in Huron county, where they resided till 1855.
At that date they came to Iowa, locating in Manchester,
Delaware county. Here the
father died in 1861, aged fifty one, the mother still
surviving. These passed their mature
years in the peaceful pursuits of agriculture, leading the
industrious, useful lives common to their calling. They
were the parents of nine children, all of whom reached
maturity and all but two of whom are now living, the full
list now comprising seven boys and two girls, by name and
in the order of their ages as follows:
Jerusha B., Amos S. (our
subject), Abram V., Charles H., Ira,
Emoret E., John L, Carrie M. and Miles E. |
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The subject of
this notice was about four years old when his parents moved to
Ohio. He was therefore mainly reared in Loraine and Huron
counties, that state. He grew up on his father's farm and his
earlier years were spent amid the scenes and marked by the
activities characteristic of the average farm boy's life. He
went from the district schools of Huron
county to Oberlin college at Oberlin, Ohio, and
thence to Baldwin University at Berea, Ohio, where he finished a
more than ordinarily thorough literary education. Having
previously determined to devote himself to one of the
liberal professions he selected law as the one best suited to
his tastes, and began reading in 1852 with John E. Osborn of
Norwalk, Ohio, He read law for two years, continued his other
studies of a more general nature, taught school to pay his way
along and was admitted to the bar in the spring of 1854 at a
session of the supreme court of the State of Ohio, held at
Berrysburg, Wood county. He
continued teaching for a year after he was admitted, filling the
position of superintendent of the public schools at Lexington,
Ohio. In the spring of 1855 he started for the new Northwest
and located in Prairie Du
Chien, Wis., in July, that
year, where heat once began the practice of
his profession. He continued there successfully engaged in
the practice till 1858 when, having married in the meantime and
his father having moved to Manchester, Delaware county, Iowa, he
decided on a change to the latter place himself and made it in
October that year. He has since resided in Manchester, being
now one of the oldest members of the Manchester bar as he has
always been one of the most active and successful.
Mr. Blair is a lawyer by nature as
well as by adoption. He has devoted his whole life to his
profession and he still pursues its arduous duties with the
enthusiasm of youth. He has never held public office except a
few positions of a local nature such as every good citizen is
expected to fill, the onerous duties of which far exceed the
honors connected with them. But he has
been active in politics notwithstanding, and he has
generally succeeded in making his influence felt. He is an
ardent republican and has done his party good service
for many years both in council and on the public
platform. Up to a few years ago when he, in a measure,
retired from politics, he had not missed a party convention of
any consequence, whether county, district or state, for
twenty-five years and he had been the able champion of the
principles of his political faith
on the public platform in all the campaigns, local or state,
where those principles were involved. He is a ready
debater, strong, and forcible, and being well-grounded in the
political history of the country and a stanch believer in the
doctrines of his party he is a formidable antagonist in the
discussion of political issues before the people. He possesses
also the acumen of the politician, the ready
genius for combining dissimilar forces, reconciling
opposing ones and accomplishing through the cementing of these,
things apparently impossible of accomplishment. He has a
large circle of friends and political acquaintances made in this
way and it is probably from a love for the society of these and from a stronger love
for the keen, intellectual delights that flow from
association with them that he has taken the part he has in
politics. Certainly for one of his tastes and his ideas of
his professional obligations, he has been exceedingly fortunate
in the use he has been able to make of the political machinery
of his county and state, making it as he has the means of
furthering his political beliefs, and gathering from its
associations its friendly rivalries and its more serious
contests, some of its highest social and intellectual pleasures,
while at the same time he has escaped what has too frequently
proved to others its fatally fascinating power. But as
already stated it is as a lawyer that Mr. Blair has done his
best work. It is as a lawyer that he is best and most
favorably known. In his profession he has labored long and
earnestly and it is but simple truth and justice to say that his
labors have met with the success that they have well
deserved. He has always had a large practice, more extensive
possibly in early years when the custom was in vogue of
"traveling around the circuit" than now, but not so lucrative
nor were the cases of such magnitude. Being a country
practitioner he has had to deal with every conceivable form of
litigation, and whatever his tastes
at first may have been or his special aptitudes for particular
branches of the profession, he has of necessity and from long
practice developed into what is usually known as an" all-round
lawyer." The limits set to this article will not admit of even
the most general summary of his professional career, extending
now over more than a third of a century, and such a summary is
possibly not advisable at this time; yet mention may properly be
made of two cases in which he has been counsel in recent years
and which illustrate no less his methods than they show the
value his services have been to the public as well as to his
clients. These cases are Wood vs. The Chicago, Milwaukee & St.
Paul Railway Company, reported in the 59th and 68th Iowa supreme
court reports and the Washburn & Moen Manufacturing Company and
others vs. the Beat-'em-all Barbwire
Company and others, tried in the United States circuit court for
the northern district of Iowa and reported in volume 33, of the
Federal Reporter. The former of these attracted no little
attention at the time it was under trial and it established a
rule governing the liability of railroad companies as to
contracts made by their agents for transportation for shipping
purposes, which has since been followed, not only in this state,
but in other states as well. There were two trials in the lower
court and three in the supreme court, Mr. Blair and his
associate counsel winning the case for their client upon a
rehearing in the upper court, in which the court reversed its
opinion, rendered twice theretofore on the same state of facts,
establishing a doctrine at last precisely the opposite of the
one announced in the two previous decisions. The question in
controversy was as to the liability of a railroad company for
damages for injury to perishable personal property by reason of
the company's failure to furnish cars for the transportation of
the property at a stipulated future time, in accordance with the
company's agent's promise that they would be forthcoming at that
time. The supreme court held in its first two decisions that
whether or not an agent had authority to make such a contract
was a matter of fact to be determined in any given case by a
jury; but they finally overruled this decision and established
the doctrine, more in accordance with public policy and sound
judicial discretion, that a railway company by placing its agent
in charge of its business at a station and empowering him to
contract for the shipment of property holds him out as
possessing the authority to contract with reference to all the
necessary and ordinary details of the business, he being within
the range of that business a general agent, and that therefore
the company is liable for damages for injuries sustained by
shippers where transportation has not been furnished within the
time promised by the agent. Even the unprofessional reader can
see the importance of this ruling to the shipping public and the
possible saving it involves to all shippers of perishable
property. In the other case the issue was as to an alleged
infringement of patent by the "Beat-'em-all"
Barb Wire Company, then of Waterloo, Iowa, the Washburn & Moen
Manufacturing Company, of Worcester, Mass., claiming the
exclusive right to control the manufacture of barb wire fences
under the Glidden patent, and seeking by injunction to close up
the enterprising "infant industry" of Iowa, the latter being Mr.
Blair's client. The Washburn & Moen Company had, before the
trial of this case, controlled the manufacture of all the barb
wire fences in the United States. They had many lawsuits
throughout the country growing out of attempts of other
companies to enter the field as manufacturers of barb wire
fences, all of which suits they had won, thus forcing these
companies to pay them a royalty on every foot of fence
manufactured by them. But the fact was successfully established
in this case that the Glidden patent held by the Washburn & Moen
Company was void by reason of prior use; the claims of the
Washburn & Moen Company to protection by reason of their
patent were thoroughly elucidated and the way thus cleared
up for the entry of other manufacturers into the large
and lucrative field in which they had long held exclusive
privileges under their alleged patents. This case, although
still pending on appeal in the United States supreme court, has
already been the means of saving to manufactures of barb wire
fences and through them to the farmers of the country between
two and three millions of dollars by reducing the tribute which
these manufacturers were compelled to pay the Washburn & Moen
Company for the use of the supposed patent held by that
company. In these two cases Mr. Blair displayed to good
advantage two of his most marked characteristics as a lawyer;
his indefatigable industry and his unswerving tenacity of
purpose. Convinced that his clients had good cases, he brought
to bear every resource of the law as well as every fact within
his reach necessary to establish the legality of their
claims and his final success was
no less a tribute to his persistent labor than it was to the
knowledge that enabled him to perform that labor. In these
cases, as well as in many others of lesser note, he
achieved popularity before the courts, and won reputation as an
advocate and trial lawyer.
Speaking of
Mr. Blair, generally, it may be recorded that what success he
has attained has been reached by the manner in which he has
handled his cases throughout the entire course of their
litigation, and it would be hard to say at what stage in the
handling of a case he is most at home or has achieved the best
results. In accepting cases he is deliberate, exacting
sincerity from his clients; in the preparation and conduct of
causes on trial he is conscientious and diligent, courteous to
adverse counsel, circumspect to the court, logical, clear,
compact and convincing to the jury; and in the discussion and
analysis of questions of law to the court, he is sound, forcible
and cogent, possessing that skillful generalization which
readily seizes upon the strong points of a subject; that happy
condensation of thought which at once extracts the substance of
an opponent's argument, and that clear foresight and
comprehension which immediately grasps the angularities of
the most intricate legal problems. And in all things is he
plain and easy of understanding, making manner
subservient to
matter and subduing that manner to pleasant speech, whether upon
the public platform, before a meeting of political delegates, a
jury or in ordinary .
Mr. Blair has
a family consisting of a wife and three children. He married,
May 5, 1856, taking to share his life's fortunes a lady whom he
met while teaching in the public schools at Lexington, Ohio, and
one who was well qualified to bear him the companionship he
sought with her hand. His wife's maiden name was Laura Bloomer,
a daughter of Coles A. Bloomer, then of Huron
county, Ohio, she being a native of
that county. The children of this union are: a daughter,
Effee M. now wife of George W.
Dunham, attorney-at-law and postmaster, at Manchester; and two
sons, Charles L. and Frederick B. While Mr. Blair has
never courted popularity, being
content with the measure of public praise accorded him for the
faithful discharge of his professional obligations, he has
nevertheless not been unmindful of his duties as a citizen. He
has kept abreast of the general progress of affairs in his
community and has lent a helping hand to every worthy enterprise
that has sought favor there, and has given the weight of his
influence, and, when occasion has demanded, his own personal
exertions to the upbuilding of the
public schools, churches, and societies and other helpful
factors which have contributed to the healthful growth and
development of his adopted home. He is a member of a number of
the benevolent orders and his charitable impulses frequently
take the practical turn inculcated by these.
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