Mr. Phillips was a native of Maryland, and came to St. Paul in 1848. He was the first district attorney of the county of Ramsey. He became quite prominent as a lawyer and politician, and tradition has handed down many interesting anecdotes concerning him. The indictment charged him with assault with intent to maim. In an altercation with a man, he had drawn a pistol on him, and his defense was that the pistol was not loaded. The witness for the prosecution swore that it was, and added that he could see the load. The prisoner, as the law then was, was not allowed to testify in his own behalf. He was convicted and fined $25. He was very indignant at the result, and explained the assertion of the witness, that he could see the load, in this way. He said he had been electioneering for Mr. Henry M. Rice, and from the uncertainty of getting his meals in such an unsettled country, he carried crackers and cheese in the same pocket with his pistol, a crumb of which had gotten into the pistol, and the fellow was so scared when he looked at it, that he thought it was loaded to the muzzle. Another anecdote which is related of him shows that he fully understood the fundamental principle which underlies success in the practice of law--that of always charging for services performed. Mr. Henry M. Rice had presented him with a lot in St. Paul, upon which to build an office, and when he presented his next bill to Mr. Rice there was in it a charge of four dollars for drawing the deed. The territorial courts as originally constituted, being composed of only three judges, the trial terms were held by single judges, and the supreme court by all three sitting in bank, where they would review each others decisions on appeal. When the state was admitted into the Union the judiciary was made to consist of a chief justice and two associate justices, who constituted the supreme court, with a jurisdiction exclusively appellate, and a district judge for each district. As the state has grown in population and business, the supreme court judges have been increased to five and the judicial districts to eighteen in number, two of which, the second and the fourth, have six judges each, the eleventh three, the first and seventh two each, and the remainder one each. The practice adopted by the territorial legislature was generally similar to that of the New York code, with such differences as were necessary to conform it to a very new country. From a residence in the territory and state of forty-seven years, nearly all of which has been spent either in practice at the bar or as a judge on the bench, I take pride in saying that the judiciary of Minnesota, in all its branches, both territorial and state, has, during its fifty years of existence, equalled in ability, learning and integrity that of any state in the West, which is well attested by the seventy-seven well filled volumes of its reported decisions.