Note 16 — Chapter I · HIS LIFE BEFORE BECOMING CHIEF JUSTICE; HIS PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS

In an amusing account of this election (Munford’s The Two Parsons), we are told that the sheriff presided, with the two candidates, Marshall and John Clopton, seated on the justice’s bench. The voter, being asked for whom he voted, gave the name of his candidate; and the latter thanked him; e.g., “Your vote is appreciated, sir,” said Marshall to his friend Parson Blair. For an account of the same method of conducting elections in Virginia at a later period, see John S. Wise’s The End of an Era.