August 3 Tuesday – In Philadelphia, Sam attended a hearing before Judge Butler in U.S. Circuit court. Sam’s New York attorneys, Alexander & Green, argued that a preliminary injunction should be issued to restrain John Wanamaker & Co. of Philadelphia from selling Grant’s Memoirs, on the ground that it was a subscription book and not sold in the book trade [NY Times, Jul 22, 1886 p.3 “Gen. Grant’s Book in Court.”]. Wanamaker’s attorneys argued that Webster & Co.’s contracts with general agents made them purchases, so that buying from such agents was defensible. This was a loophole that might be closed on the next subscription book [Aug. 6 to Webster]. Note: the judge ruled on Aug. 9.

The Philadelphia Daily News, p.3, ran Sam’s comments after the court session, which shed some light on the legal strategy [Scharnhorst, Interviews 90-1].

Twain in Court

…While talking to a Daily News reporter afterward Mr. Clemens, with his white high hat on the back of his head and his hands in the pockets of his light sack coat, twisted himself into all manner of shapes and in his familiar drawl and twang gave his opinion of the case.

“It has been settled,” he said, “that publishers have a right to sell books as they please, and in this case it is not a question only of whether Mr. Wanamaker shall be allowed to sell a few dozen books or not. We want to know just how binding the contracts with our agents are. If the present contract is not strong enough we’ll have one casted, don’t you see? It will be worth the powder to us, and other publishers will know just where they stand after we get through with it.”

Mr. Clemens took his hands from his pockets long enough to light a cigar and run his fingers through his bushy mixed gray hair and said: “Philadelphia is a nice, quiet city, but I must get out of it. I’ll go back to Gowen and ask him to tell me how I can get a through train to Elmira.” [Note: Franklin B. Gowen (1836-1889, former president of the Phila.& Reading R.R.