It\u2019s election day in Smithtown, which means a sunny day off for some, interrupted by last minute automated phone calls from Candidates and strangely Bill Clinton. While the Zeldin\/Bishop race has the media in a frenzy, we thought of a great excuse to introduce our new column and take you on an exciting voyage back in time, to another tight election. It is with great love for history and respect for the historian and author of this excerpt, that we introduce the work of Brad Harris, in a column we\u2019ve appropriately deemed Smithtown Yesterday.<\/p>\n
In 1850, John Lawrence Smith ran for the office of District Attorney of Suffolk County. \u00a0Again he ran on the Democratic ticket and again he was elected. \u00a0He served with such distinction in this office that the Democratic Party nominated him for Suffolk County Judge. \u00a0He won election in spite of the 600 vote margin that the Republicans enjoyed over Democrats in Suffolk County. \u201cSo fitted did he show himself to perform judicial duties that he was renominated as County Judge and Surrogate in 1862, and \u2026 he was again elected, by 1,100 vote majority, upon the Democratic ticket. (J. Lawrence Smith, The History of Smithtown, Smithtown Historical Society, 1961, p. 31.)<\/p>\n
Judge J. Lawrence Smith became such a respected jurist in Suffolk County that he won election again and again to the office of Suffolk County Judge and Surrogate. \u00a0He continued to serve as a Suffolk County Judge until his death in 1889. \u00a0The fact that such a prominent and respected jurist lived in the middle of the little community of Smithtown Branch, and had his office there, gave a measure of importance to the village. \u00a0This fact became even more significant when the Judge\u2019s Office later became the site of trials in Suffolk County. \u00a0According to his daughter Bessie, her father was \u201cJudge of Suffolk County and \u2018Judge Smith\u2019s Office\u2019 was the real judgement seat for the Townspeople, a place to be feared and revered! \u00a0All the disputes of the Town were brought to my father, and later, when he was too ill to go to hold Court at Riverhead, the Court was brought to the office in Smithtown.\u201d \u00a0Here in offices built off the west side of the Homestead, the Judge held court and dispensed justice to the people of Suffolk County. \u00a0The Judge\u2019s presence in the community put the little village of Smithtown Branch on the map.<\/p>\n
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It\u2019s election day in Smithtown, which means a sunny day off for some, interrupted by last minute automated phone calls from Candidates and strangely Bill Clinton. While the Zeldin\/Bishop race has the media in a frenzy, we thought of a great excuse to introduce our new column and take you on an exciting voyage back in time, to another tight election. It is with great love for history and respect for the historian and author of this excerpt, that we introduce the work of Brad Harris, in a column we\u2019ve appropriately deemed Smithtown Yesterday. Judge John Lawrence Smith, pillar of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1230,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[340,342],"tags":[385,386,384],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-1229","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-communityspotlight","category-town-hall","tag-historic-election","tag-smithtown-historical-society","tag-smithtown-history"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/Smithtownyesterday.jpg?fit=2100%2C1500&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6dZB9-jP","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1229","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1229"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1229\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1231,"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1229\/revisions\/1231"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1230"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1229"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1229"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1229"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/smithtowntodaynews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=1229"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}