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Warren M. Billings
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Statute Law in Colonial Virginia: Governors, Assemblymen, and the Revisals That Forged the Old Dominion (Early American Histories) Kindle Edition

by Warren M. Billings (Author) Format: Kindle Edition
4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 7 ratings
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Between 1632 and 1748, Virginia’s General Assembly revised the colony’s statutes seven times. These revisals provide an invaluable opportunity to gauge how governors, councilors, and burgesses created a hybrid body of colonial statute law that would become the longest strand in the American legal fabric. In Statute Law in Colonial Virginia, Warren Billings presents a series of snapshots that depict the seven revisions of the corpus juris the General Assembly undertook. In so doing, he highlights the good, the corrupt, and the loathsome applications of broad legislative authority throughout the colonial era. Each revision was built on prior written law and embodies the members’ legal knowledge and statutory craftsmanship, revealing their use of an unbridled discretion to further the interests they represented. Statutes undergirded Virginia’s evolving legal culture, and by examining these revisals and their links, Billings casts light on the hybrid nature of Virginia statute law and its relation to English laws.

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  1. Part of series
    Early American Histories
  2. Print length
    191 pages
  3. Language
    English
  4. Sticky notes
    On Kindle Scribe
  5. Publisher
    University of Virginia Press
  6. Publication date
    February 22, 2021
  7. File size
    675 KB
  8. Page Flip
    Enabled
  9. Word Wise
    Enabled
  10. Enhanced typesetting
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  11. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

Review

The preeminent historian of early Virginia, Warren Billings trains his penetrating lens on America’s oldest legislature and the statutory overhauls it accomplished during two eventful centuries. His fast-paced, highly readable account sheds new light on the pulls and tugs on both sides of the Atlantic that shaped this pivotal first experiment in American democracy and that influence law-making even today.

-- Frank B. Atkinson, former Chairman, federal Jamestown 400th Commemoration Commission, author of The Lion’s Den: A Story of American Renewal

This book represents an important contribution on the substance of the Virginia revisals, a topic that no one has addressed in book-length form. The scholarship is completely sound, and Billings is the most important colonial Virginia legal historian and the only person who can make all the necessary connections.

-- Mary Sarah Bilder, Boston College Law School

This thoroughly researched account, written by a master historian, casts new light on the hybrid nature of Virginia statute law and its connection with English law. It will interest advanced students and historians of US legal development.

― CHOICE

Billings’s careful unfolding of this story not only adds to our understanding of earlyAmerican legal and political history, but it also provides a scholarly entry point toHening’s compilation of early Virginia statutes that researchers ignore at their ownperil.

― Virginia Magazine of History and Biography

Review

This thoroughly researched account, written by a master historian, casts new light on the hybrid nature of Virginia statute law and its connection with English law. It will interest advanced students and historians of US legal development.



Billings’s careful unfolding of this story not only adds to our understanding of early American legal and political history, but it also provides a scholarly entry point to Hening’s compilation of early Virginia statutes that researchers ignore at their own peril.

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B08KTSM12L
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ University of Virginia Press (February 22, 2021)
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ February 22, 2021
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 675 KB
  • Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 191 pages
  • Page numbers source ISBN ‏ : ‎ 081394564X
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 7 ratings

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Warren M. Billings

Warren M. Billings

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Customer reviews

4.5 out of 5 stars
4.5 out of 5
7 global ratings

Top review from the United States

David A. Vazquez
5.0 out of 5 stars A well-written and researched mini tome, as well as entertaining.
Reviewed in the United States on August 10, 2023
Verified Purchase
This work is an excellent brief overview of the development of Virginia statute law from the early 1600s through the mid 1700s, through the lens of the various revisals of the laws during that period. It also brings to life many of the personalities involved in these revisals, including governors, assemblymen, councilors, clerks, and even printers, and the interplay and friction between them. The beginnings and foreshadowing of later much more acute frictions between the General Assembly and the Crown is well addressed in this book. If you're an amateur local Virginia historian and genealogist like myself, this small tome will prove useful to you because it will go a long way toward illuminating and explaining why the General court as well as county courts did what they did and how these changed over time-- such as the deciding of suits; the choosing and function of local judges, attorneys and sheriffs; the distribution of lands and slaves to inheritors; etc. And, you might even find the names of ancestors or associates of your ancestors named in these pages as well! Or at the very least, further ideas about where to search for more clues in the many documents the book mentions and explains, such as in the detailed footnotes and bibliographical essay.
This book is very close to what I've been seeking-- a legal history of the colony from its earliest years, though this particular work concentrates on the revisals almost entirely. Highly recommended.
-- David Vazquez
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