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Even the scanty supply of libraries which the Colonies possessed was depleted at the time of the Revolution by the flight of Tory lawyers, most of whom were wealthy and carried their books away with them. (1)

Some of these law libraries of refugees were confiscated however, or were purchased for the Judges and lawyers by legislative resolves. Thus a resolve of the Massachusetts Legislature, in 1779, authorized the sale to Hon. James Sullivan of the Modern Entries, Pleas of the Crown, Foster, and Hawkins and the Reports of Strange, Keyling and Burrow which had belonged to Benjamin Gridley who had become a royalist. (2)

The College Libraries of the time contained practically no law books. In the first catalogue of the Harvard College Library (1723) works of Lord Bacon, Seldon, Grotius and seven volumes of Common Law-Spelman's Glossary, Pulton's Statutes, Keble's Statutes, Coke's First and Second Institutes and two volumes of the Year Books were the only books on legal subjects. After the burning of the library in 1764, the following seven volumes, presented by Thomas Hollis constituted for many years the sole law library of the College:(3)

Bacon's Historical Discourse (1647). Burns' Ecclesiastical Law (1763). Carpenter D. P. Glossarium etc. (1766). Codex Theodosianus. Glanvill R. Tractatus de Legibus etc. (1604) Horne's Mirror (1642). Prynne's Sovereigne Power of Parliaments (1643)

There were no public libraries in which books of law could be found.

And as there were in the Colonies no collegiate law lectures before 1780, and no law schools before 1784, the young man who aspired to be a lawyer had two courses open to him.

The first was, to pick up such scraps of knowledge of practice,

(1) Peter S. Du Ponceau who studied in Philadelphia in 1784 under William Lewis writes in 1837 (Penn. Hist. Soc. Proc. Vol. IV).

"I had gone through Blackstone's Commentaries and Wood's Institutes and was advised to enter upon the study of Coke upon Littleton. I wanted to have a copy of the work all to myself to read it at my ease; but it was not easy to be procured. After many fruitless applications I bethought myself of putting an advertisement in the papers in which I offered to give a set of Valin's Commentary on the French Marine Ordinances in exchange. To my great astonishment and delight I received a note from Mr. Rawle then unknown to me, accepting the offer."

(2) See Life and Writings of James Sullivan, by T. G. Amory. (3) See Preface to the first official Catalogue of Library of the Harvard Law School, by Charles Sumner (1833); also edition of 1846.

as he could, by serving as a copyist or assistant in the clerk's office of some inferior or higher court, and by reading such books, Coke chiefly, as he could borrow.

This was the exiguous training which many eminent lawyers received who could not afford the time or the money to adopt the second course. They are well described by Hugh Blair Grigsby in his picture of the venerable James Nimmo of the Norfolk (Virginia) Bar in 1802: "He was of that substantial class of lawyers who, having received an elementary grounding in Latin and mathematics in the schools of the time, entered the clerk's office and served a term of duty within its precincts. He was thus well versed in the ordinary forms of the law and with the decision of the courts in leading cases. With such men as a class there was no great intimacy with the law as a science. As long as the case lay in the old routine, this class of lawyers would get along very well; but novelties were unpleasant to them; they hated the subleties of Special Pleading, and they turned pale at a demurrer." (1)

Some few young men of pre-eminent native ability achieved distinction without training even in a clerk's office. Thus Patrick Henry was admitted to the Bar in Sept. 1760 at the age of 24, after but six weeks' solitary study of Coke upon Littleton and the Virginia Statutes, although one of the three examiners, George Wythe, refused to sign his license, leaving it to Peyton and John Randolph to admit him. The latter said they "perceived him to be a young man of genius, very ignorant of law but did not doubt he would soon qualify himself." Wirt states, however, in his life of Henry, (2) that "in spite of his talents he never conquered his aversion to systematic study of the law and could rarely see the bearing of reported cases", this failing standing often in the way of success.

The second course open to a law student was the familiar one of entering the office of some leading member of the Bar, preferably one of the few who had good law libraries, and there absorbing, by study, observation, and occasionally by direct teaching from his senior, the principles of the law.

For the privilege of entering such an office a student was obliged to pay a sum of money, usually $100 to $200, sometimes

(1) Discourse on life and Character of Hon. Littleton Waller Tazewell, by Hugh Blair Grigsby (1860).

(2) Life of Patrick Henry, by William Wirt.

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as much as $500, if admission was desired to the office of some pre-eminent celebrity. An interesting illustration of the value set on these privileges is found in a promissory note (still extant) as follows:

Phila. March 22, 1782. I promise to pay James Wilson Esq. or order on demand one hundred guineas, his fee for receiving my nephew Bushrod Washington as a student of law in his office. G. Washington. (1)

In the office, the student had access to all his senior's law books for study. He pored over the MSS. volumes of forms, and the abstracts, commonplace books, and MSS. notes of cases, which each lawyer of those days made for himself. (2) He was expected to copy out pleadings and other documents for his senior, and to draft briefs. In return the lawyer gave to his student such advice, information, or instruction as his time or his whim permitted.

As a rule, the lawyer was too busy a man to pay much attention to his students; and the chief advantage gained by them was in personal association with the able lawyers against whom he tried his cases, and in the general influence which great characters have on younger men who come in contact with them.

Thus even so learned a lawyer as James Wilson was said to have been of slight advantage to his students, as an instructor:

Mr. Wilson devoted little of his time to his students in his office (among whom were Judge Washington and Samuel Sitgreaves) and rarely entered it except for the purpose of consulting books. Hence his intercourse with them was rare, distant, and reserved. As an instructor he was almost useless to those who were under his direction. He would never engage with them in professional discussions; to a direct question he gave the shortest possible answer and a general request for information was always evaded. (3)

An interesting sidelight on this lack of sympathy in the relations between lawyer and student is found in an essay written by William Livingston, (4) while a student, in 1745, in the office

(1) See Letters and Times of the Tylers, by Leon G. Tyler.

(2) For interesting description of a student's life, see Life of James Sullivan, by T. G. Amory.

(3) Sanderson's Lives of the Signers.

(4) Life of William Livingston, by Theodore Sedgwick Jr. (1833). This essay appeared in print in Parker's New York Weekly Post Boy for Aug. 19, 1745, signed Tyro Philolegis.

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