– Photo by Jo Mathis
By Jo Mathis
Legal News
Every February, Wayne County 35th District Court Judge Ron Lowe of Plymouth dons a stovepipe hat and black suit and becomes a storytelling Abraham Lincoln.
And last month, he enjoyed it all the more as he spoke for the first time to law school students at a “Dinner with Lincoln” presentation.
“It’s a joy to be able to talk to people who are thinking of becoming lawyers,” he told the small group gathered in the library at Cooley Law School’s Ann Arbor campus, where Lowe teaches District Court Practice.
Lincoln’s method for giving a speech was consistent throughout his career, Lowe said.
“I’m going to tell you what I’m going to tell you about, then I’m going to tell you about it, and then I’m going to tell you what I told you about,” he said, speaking as Lincoln. “That’s a good formula for making speeches if you ever get to the point where you need to make speeches. And I would encourage you if you’re going to be lawyers that you need to make speeches.”
“During the period of time when I practiced law, if you were incapable of making speeches, you didn’t generate a lot of business. People expected you to be dynamic in the courtroom.”
During the hour-long presentation, which was followed by questions from the audience, Lowe distinguished between legendary Lincoln and the “blood and guts factual” Lincoln.
Speaking as if he were Lincoln during the 25 years he spent as a lawyer, Lowe explained that it was true that he was born in a one-room cabin. But so, too, were 80 percent of the white people born in 1809.
Lowe said that the Lincolns moved to another home when Abraham was eight years old, and were able to load everything they owned on the backs of two horses.
Still, that wasn’t unusual at the time, Lowe said.
He said the Lincoln family loved to attend “court day” at the three county courthouses, which provided real-life drama and entertainment for area residents.
Lincoln was an avid reader with a mind like steel, said Lowe, noting that once the knowledge made an impression, it stuck.
He became an honest lawyer who would refuse to represent someone if it would require him to tell a lie.
Most of his cases were debt collections, for which he received a fee of between $5 and $50 per case.
Though he was opposed to slavery, Lincoln fought for his client, no matter which side of the issue that client represented.
Lincoln kept papers in his top hat, a practice that he began when he was an Illinois postmaster at a salary of $50 a year, Lowe said.
Lowe, who is 6-2, lamented that he is 65 pounds heavier than the 160-pound Lincoln, and recalled the day he was fitted for his black 100 percent wool “Lincoln suit.”
The tailor said: “You’re going to be a fat Lincoln!”
“It was very unusual back then to be 6-foot-4, and then to top it off with a hat like this,” said Lowe. “That’s one of the reasons during the Civil War the security detail would just cringe. He’d go up on the front line and stand there with his top hat and suit and and this was one of the most easily recognizable people in the world.”
Lowe strongly suggested that the students see the movie, “Lincoln,” insisting that Daniel Day Lewis’s performance is as good as it gets.
He said he and fellow members of the Association of Lincoln Presenters were in awe as they watched the award-winning actor transform himself into the 16th president.
“That scene where he does nothing but walk down the hallway — and you watch him walk out of the White House — and you’re going, ‘That’s Lincoln!’” said Lowe. “He’s got the walk you’ve always read about. And you say, ‘That’s him!’”
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