1800-1860: Law and Justice: Publications

Joseph Angell, A Treatise on the Common Law in Relation to Water-courses Intended More Particularly as an Illustration of the Rights and Duties of the Owners and Occupants of Water Privileges: To Which is Added an Appendix, Containing the Principal Adjudged Cases (Boston: Wells & Lilly, 1824)—an effort to assert the common law on riparian development, but the argument had little power in industrializing America;

Thomas Hart Benton, Historical and Legal Examination of That Part of the Decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in the Dred Scott Case: Which Declares the Unconstitutionality of the Missouri Compromise Act, and the Self-extension of the Constitution to Territories, Carrying Slavery Along with It (New York: D. Appleton, 1857)—a view of the Dred Scott case by one of the most prominent politicians of the antebellum period;

Montgomery Blair, Dred Scott (a Colored Man) vs. John F. A. Sandford. Argument of Montgomery Blair, of Counsel for the Plaintiff in Error (Washington, D.C.: Gideon, 1857)—the views of one of the principal players in the Dred Scott decision;

George Caines, An Enquiry Into the Law Merchant of the United States, or, Lex mercatoria americana: On Several Heads of Commercial Importance: Dedicated by Permission to Thomas Jefferson, President of the United States, 2 volumes (New York: Isaac Collins & Son, 1802)—the first book published in the United States dealing with commercial law;

The Case of Dred Scott in the United States Supreme Court. The Full Opinions of Chief Justice Taney and Justice Curtis, and Abstracts of the Opinions of the Other Judges; With an Analysis of the Points Ruled, and Some Concluding Observations (New York: H. Greeley, 1860);

Daniel Chipman, An Essay on the Law of Contracts for the Payment of Specific Articles; With a Supplement by D. B. Eaton (Burlington, Vt.: C. Goodrich, 1852)—the author argued for the importance of the market in determining the value of goods in a contract: “Let money be the sole standard in making all contracts.”;

Thomas Cooper, An Introductory Lecture to a Course of Law (Columbia, S.C.: Telescope Office, 1834)—a pamphlet by a prominent political theorist;

Nathan Dane, A General Abridgement and Digest of American Law, 9 volumes (Boston: Cummings & Hilliard, 1823-1829);

Stephen A. Douglas, Kansas—Utah —Dred Scott Decision: A Speech of the Hon. S. A. Douglas Delivered at Springfield, Illinois, June 12, 1857 (Springfield, 111.: Lanphier & Walker, 1857)—an excellent example of a political speech delivered by a leading politician that dealt with the West and was published and distributed in that region;

E. N. Elliott, Cotton Is King, and Pro-slavery Arguments: Comprising the Writings of Hammond, Harper, Christy, Stringfellow, Hodge, Bledsoe, and Cartwright, on This Important Subject (Augusta, Ga.: Pritchard, Abbott & Loomis, 1860)—one of several political pamphlets issued by Southerners in the late antebellum period dealing with issues fundamental to the economy of the South and the Southwest. Sen. James Henry Hammond, one of the authors, was among the most famous Southern politicians of the age and in a speech to the Senate on 4 March 1858, issued the famous declaration: “You dare not make war on cotton—no power on earth dares make war upon it. Cotton is king.”;

David Hoffman, A Course of Legal Study, 2 volumes (Baltimore: J. Neal, 1836);

Benjamin C. Howard, Report of the Decision of the Supreme Court of the United States, and the Opinions of the Judges Thereof, in the Case of Dred Scott versus John F. A. Sandford, December Term, 1856 (Washington, D.C.: C. Wendell, 1857)—a version of the original opinions in one of the most famous cases ever handed down by the U.S. Supreme Court;

James Kent, Commentaries on American Law, 4 volumes (New York: O. Halsted, 1826-1830)—a summary of the principles of a former chief judge of the New York Supreme Court, with much attention to commercial law;

Laws of the Cherokee Nation Adopted by the Council at Various Periods: Printed for the Benefit of the Nation (Talequah, Cherokee Nation: Cherokee Advocate Office, 1852);

Laws of the Cherokee Nation, Passed during the Years 1838-1867 (St. Louis: Democrat Print, 1868)—the Indian nation’s laws enacted in the period of removal and in Oklahoma;

Theophilus Parsons, The Law of Contracts, 2 volumes (Boston: Little, Brown, 1853-1855)—one of the central texts from the mid nineteenth century dealing with the importance of contracts in American society, by the younger Parsons (his father, with the same name, had been chief justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Court), who also wrote Maritime Law (1859) and Outlines of the Religion and Philosophy of Swedenborg (1875);

Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States, 2 volumes (Boston: Little, Brown, 1858)—the views of one of the preeminent American jurists of his age who served as associate justice on the U.S. Supreme Court from 1811 to 1845, during which time he was also teaching a generation of lawyers at Harvard Law School;

Story, Commentaries on Equity Jurisprudence as Administered in England and America (Boston: Hilliard, Gray, 1836)—a central text in the evolving law of contracts in the United States;

Story, Life and Letters of Joseph Story, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, and Dane Professor of Law at Harvard University, Edited by His Son William W. Story, 2 volumes (Boston: Little, Brown, 1851);

William Wetmore Story, A Treatise on the Law of Contracts, 2 volumes (Boston: Little, Brown, 1856)—the repeated publication of this book by the son of Joseph Story (the first edition had appeared in 1844) signaled the wide acceptance within the United States of the modern form of contract law; the younger Story, for his part, eventually settled in Rome, where he studied sculpture and became a close friend of many nineteenth-century luminaries including Nathaniel Hawthorne and Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning;

Zephaniah Swift, A Digest of the Law of Evidence in Civil and Criminal Cases. And a Treatise on Bills of Exchange and Promissory Notes (Hartford: Oliver D. Cooke, 1810)—a tract by the former chief justice of Connecticut that argued that business was “governed by the customs and usages of nations, and not by municipal law”;

Roger Brooke Taney, Opinions of the Judges of the Supreme Court of the United States in the Case of the Proprietors of Charles River Bridge vs. the Proprietors of Bridge and Others, at the January Term of the Court, 1837 (Boston, 1837)—opinions in a case that had farreaching implications for the economic development of much of the United States, including the West;

St. George Tucker, Blackstone’s Commentaries: With Notes of Reference to the Constitution and Laws of the Federal Government of the United States and of the Commonwealth of Virginia: In Five Volumes: With an Appendix to Each Volume Containing Short Tracts Upon Such Subjects as Appeared Necessary to Form a Connected View of the Laws of Virginia, 5 volumes (Philadelphia: W. Y. Birch & A. Small, 1803)—an American version of the famous English jurist’s views on the law;

Gulian C. Verplanck, An Essay on the Doctrine of Contracts (New York: G. & C. Carvill, 1825)—one of the most original and significant new interpretations of the law of contracts in antebellum America.