The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• Foreword
• Note On the Text
• On the Study of Law
• On Sovereignty and Legislature
• Of the Several Forms of Government
• View of the Constitution of the United States
• Of the Unwritten, Or Common Law of England; and Its Introduction Into, and Authority Within the United American States
• Of the Right of Conscience; and of the Freedom of Speech and of the Press
• Of the Cognizance of Crimes and Misdemeanours
• On the State of Slavery In Virginia

Note on the Text

The texts for all the writings of St. George Tucker published herein are taken from essays he appended to his edition of Blackstone: 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, 5 vols. (Philadelphia: Published by William Young Birch and Abraham Small. Robert Carr, Printer, 1803). The texts here preserve the original eighteenth-century spelling and punctuation and the liberal use of italics and small capitals common at the time.

It has, however, been necessary to make considerable alteration in Tucker’s footnotes. These are voluminous. Many are references to obsolete compilations of laws or to now familiar specific clauses of the Constitution of the United States, which was then a new document. (Blackstone’s Commentaries was, after all, primarily a reference work for law students.) Tucker’s notes were marked by archaic printer’s symbols, used generalized rather than precisely specific titles of works, and often cited page references to eighteenth-century editions of classic works that are not likely to be available to readers today.

Many footnotes that seemed no longer useful have been eliminated. In those retained, Tucker’s style has been preserved as far as possible. At the end of most essays, a recapitulation of the major works referred to by Tucker has been added. In addition, some new footnotes have been placed in the present edition where it seemed useful for the contemporary reader. In every case, such new material is preceded by the tag “Editor’s note.” All footnotes, new and old, have been renumbered in one series for each essay.

Clyde N. Wilson

Note on Tucker’s Numbering of the Amendments

A word to the reader who otherwise is likely to be disconcerted by Tucker’s manner of labeling the first ten amendments to the Constitution. The First Congress proposed twelve amendments, designed to meet objections raised by Virginia and other states. Two of these amendments, though ratified by Virginia, were never ratified by a sufficient number of states, a fact of which Tucker apparently was not aware when he prepared his edition of Blackstone for the printer. So he refers often to “the twelve articles of the amendments.” Even more disconcertingly, he assigns the amendments numbers that do not correspond to later practice. For instance, when he writes “the twelfth article of the amendments,” he means the Tenth Amendment. When he writes “the third article of the amendments,” he means the First Amendment. Once this peculiarity is grasped the exposition becomes clear.