Dooly was less facile: his convictions were honest and strong, and he
clung to them. He won the confidence not only of his party, but of the
people, for high integrity; but this was all. Out of his county he was
intrusted with no political position, and those who most prized his
talents and integrity could never be persuaded to aid in giving these
to the country. He was more than once beaten for the Senate of the
United States; and once by Forsyth, who was not announced as a
candidate, and who was at the time minister plenipotentiary of the
nation at the Spanish Court. His great legal abilities were, however,
complimented by the Republican Legislature, by placing him upon the
bench of the highest judicial tribunal of the State, where his
usefulness was transcendent, and where most of his life was spent.
As a wit, Dooly never had an equal in the State, and there might now be
written a volume of his social and judicial wit. Its compass was
illimitable--from the most refined and delicately pungent to the
coarsest and most vulgarly broad; but always pointed and telling.
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