The Law of Baron and Femme; of Parent and Child; of Guardian and Ward; of Master and Servant; and the Powers of Courts of Chancery. With an Essay on the Terms, Heir, Heirs, and Heirs of the Body
New Haven: Printed by Oliver Steele, 1816. [4],494,[9]pp. Contemporary calf; rebacked to style, gilt leather label. Corners lightly worn. Contemporary ownership inscription on front pastedown. Text moderately tanned, some occasional soiling or foxing. Contemporary annotations to text. Good. Item #6552
First edition of the first American treatise dedicated exclusively to domestic relations and family law. Reeve's landmark text functions as a progressive restatement of Blackstone's Commentaries, famously challenging entrenched English common law doctrines. Most notably, Reeve rejects the traditional parameters of coverture, the Blackstonian doctrine that a woman's legal existence is entirely suspended or subsumed by her husband upon marriage. Operating as a prescriptive, reform-minded text, Baron and Femme explicitly argued for the liberalization of domestic law, asserting that married women should possess the legal right to execute wills and control property -- positions that directly contradicted contemporary statutory law and jurisprudence in Connecticut and numerous other states.
This copy was owned by Thomas Smith Grimke, a prominent Charleston attorney, South Carolina politician, and visionary social activist. He was the son of jurist John Faucheraud Grimke and the brother of the foundational abolitionists and feminists Sarah and Angelina Grimke. Admitted to the South Carolina Bar in 1809, Grimke built a formidable legal practice. His ownership inscription, with date of purchase, are on the front pastedown, and his extensive annotations throughout the text bear witness to his meticulous study of Reeve's text. Indeed, Grimke's notes capture an elite Southern legal mind grappling with New England's emerging legal liberalism, highlighting the friction between traditional property structures and early human rights reform. A wonderful association copy.
Price: $3,000.00