It would be too long and too tedious a story to enter into particulars in regard to these suits, and the questions of fact and law involved in them. The unusual and unwarranted conduct of the attorneys for the Northwestern road in getting these cases before Justice Brewer for his decision and determination was by no means a compliment to the judge for whom they manifested such a strong partiality. Neither would I indulge in any surmise as to the grounds for their partiality. It is sufficient to say they were not disappointed in the result and that Judge Brewer reversed both of these judgments.
I afterward determined if possible to obtain the opinion of the supreme court of the United States upon the questions of law involved in these cases. I accordingly brought another suit for another client; to-wit, one E. M. Parsons, in a case involving an amount sufficient to entitle me to an appeal directly to the supreme court of the United States, having previously attempted to get the supreme court of the United States to review the decision of Justice Brewer in the former cases upon writs of certiorari, the same being denied by the supreme court. Judge Shiras, presiding in the circuit court at Des Moines, in view of the action of the circuit court of appeals in the other cases, sustained a demurrer pro forma to my amended petition filed in the Parsons case, and it was upon demurrer admitting the averments and allegations in this petition that the case was heard before the supreme court of the United States. Justice Brewer delivered the opinion in the Parsons case in which he held that the statements of the petition did not entitle the plaintiff to recovery. The opinion discloses the fact that Judge Brewer was somewhat offended at my attempt to have the supreme court pass upon the questions of law involved in the cases that he had disposed of as the presiding judge in the court or appeals. I had supposed that a judge of the supreme court of the United States would regard it rather as a compliment than otherwise to his sense of fairness to believe that he was capable of impartially and without prejudice, sitting with his brother judges, to review one of his own decisions, but the opinion shows plainly that I overestimated that distinguished jurist, and that he thought more of his infallibility than I did of his impartiality. This opinion of the court will be found in the case of Parsons vs. The Chicago & Northwestern Railroad Company in volume 167, _United States Reports_, 324. The court in this opinion asserts the very extraordinary position that the Interstate Commerce Law in providing a remedy whereby a shipper of grain might recover his actual damages for a refusal of the railroad company to comply with the law which was enacted for his protection, was in the nature of a penal statute, and that the petition of the plaintiff in such a case must expressly aver and negative the existence of any possible excuse for the wrong committed by the railroad company.