Manuscript document signed, assigning Richard Cary and Cuthbert Bullitt as District Court Judges
Richmond: 24 June 1789
Bifolium (232 x 188 mm). Manuscript document in brown ink on fine laid paper watermarked with a horn topped by a crossed frond within a scalloped shield, suspending entwined cursive letters C S and surmounted by a coronet (similar to Heawood 2757, datable to an example of 1790), old folds into thirds over both height and width. Document on recto of first leaf signed by members of the General Court James Mercer, St. George Tucker, Richard Parker, Richard Cary, John Tyler and Cuthbert Bullitt, and affixed with individual paper seals; inscribed “Cary & Bullitt Allotment Sept 1789” in central panel on verso of second leaf. Light browning along folds of verso of second leaf, some negligible spotting, a few mostly indiscernible small breaks or tears along folds, otherwise fine.
The General Court was the supreme court of record in the Dominion of Virginia and was originally presided over by the royal governor and his council. After the Revolution the General Court, with Admiralty and Chancery, became one of three high courts of the Commonwealth, each contributing three judges to sit on the newly formed Court of Appeals. The judicial reorganization of 1788 created district courts for the eighteen districts of the State (including trans-Allegheny counties now in West Virginia) and the district of Kentucky and provided that the General Court, sitting in Richmond, would assign two of its number to ride circuit to each district court as presiding judges (Acts of 1788, c. 67, December 12, 1788). Immediately following the reorganization Richard Cary of Elizabeth City was elected judge of the General Court on December 24, 1788, and Cuthbert Bullitt of Prince William County, on December 27, 1788. This document “allots” (assigns) Cary and Bullitt to preside over the four named district courts for the autumn term in 1789.
The members of the General Court included some of the foremost Virginians of the day. Judge Cary was one of three judges of the Court of Admiralty before the reorganization of 1788 and hence ex-officio a judge of the first Court of Appeals. Judge Bullitt had served on the committee which drafted the Virginia Declaration of Rights in 1786. Both Cary and Bullitt were members of the Virginia Convention of 1788 to ratify the United States Constitution.
Of the other signers, the first, James Mercer served as a delegate for Virginia to the Continental Congress in 1779. He was appointed a judge of the General Court in 1780, thus becoming a judge on the first Court of Appeals, and in 1789 he was appointed to the reorganized Court of Appeals. The second signer, St. George Tucker, became a professor of law at the College of William and Mary and was appointed successively a member of the General Court, the reorganized Court of Appeals and the United States District Court. He published an edition of Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England, supplying valuable annotations on the United States Constitution and laws of Virginia, and wrote a notable 1796 Dissertation on Slavery, with a Proposal for its Gradual Abolition in Virginia. The third signer, Richard Parker, represented Westmoreland County in the House of Delegates in 1778. He was appointed a judge of the General Court in January 1788, in which capacity he also briefly served on the first Court of Appeals. John Tyler, the fifth signer, after Cary and before Bullitt, was vice president of the Virginia Ratifying Convention of 1788. He was appointed a judge in the Court of Admiralty in 1786, consequently becoming a judge on the first Court of Appeals. After serving as a judge of the General Court following the 1788 reorganization, Tyler was elected Governor of Virginia in 1808 and in 1811 was appointed to the United States District Court.
View more images of this item
Price: $500
Inquiries: mail@mobysnewt.com
