The laws of Harvard College. Boston: Printed by Samuel Hall, at No. 53, Cornhill, 1790. First edition. 8vo, [A]⁴ B-H⁴ I² (final leaf blank) pp. [1-5] 6-66 [2]. Unwatermarked American paper. Lacking half title and final blank; hole near center of D1 with loss to about 6 words, some shallow loss to margins. Most corners rounded; three tissue repairs circa 1925. Bound in cloth and marbled boards, with the bookplate and ownership signature of George Cheever Shattuck (1879–1972). Evans 22561; Sabin 30749.

Extensively annotated by Charles Pinckney Sumner (1776–1839). Admittatur form completed and signed by Harvard President Joseph Willard (1738–1804) and dated 11 August 1792.

The first printing of the laws of Harvard College, with a wonderful provenance. 

The bastard son of a Harvard dropout, Charles Pinckney Sumner bucked family tradition by staying the course, graduating from Harvard in 1796 as the class valedictorian. Although he was named for one of slavery’s loudest apologists, at college Sumner came under the influence of his brilliant classmate, future Supreme Court justice Joseph Story, and of professor Eliphalet Pearson, an ardent abolitionist. After graduation he would visit Saint Dominque (Haiti) to toast the rebels and meet Toussaint L’Ouverture. Upon his return from Haiti, he read law in the office of Josiah Quincy and practiced law independently, struggling financially until 1819, when under the patronage of Governor Levi Lincoln he took a position as a Sheriff of Suffolk County, Massachusetts, serving ultimately as high Sheriff until 1839.

As a Supreme Court justice, Sumner’s friend and Harvard classmate Joseph Story (1779–1845), would write the majority opinion in the Amistad case.

As historian John Stauffer notes, middle-class respectability did nothing to temper Sumner’s radical temperament:

Over the coming years he voiced a range of forward-leaning views on race: he was in favor of legalizing interracial marriage, of integrating Boston's public schools, and he pronounced himself “entirely willing” to see a Negro judge sit on the bench. (Stauffer 2023, 331)

Anne Whitney, Charles Sumner (1900)

Through his friendship with his Black neighbors in Boston – including the Vassall family, Rev. Thomas Paul, and polemicist David Walker -- and his association with William Lloyd Garrison, whom he protected from angry mobs in 1835, Pinckney Sumner proved his dedication to the principles of racial equality. The convictions that he modeled would influence his eldest son Charles Sumner (1811–1874) profoundly. The younger Sumner would have a distinguished career as the most forceful voice in the United States Senate first for emancipation and then for equal rights. Abolitionism was so deeply embedded in Pinckney Sumner’s household that Charles would say the fundamental belief in equality was “autochthonous” in him (Stauffer 2023, 337).

The long march of the Sumner family along the path of justice began at Harvard with this volume. The final page bears the Latinized signature of the president (“Josephus Williard”) formalizing Pinckney’s admission to the college that would mold his legal career and that of his son. The printed text includes extensive details on the structure of the school, the degree requirements, and library regulations as well as over ten pages defining the penalties for “Misdemeanors and Criminal Offenses.” Sumner has annotated the text extensively – his underlining and marginalia appear on practically every page.

A superb relic of Harvard’s impact on the course of American law.

Selected References

Stauffer, John. Charles Sumner’s political culture and the foundation of civil rights; or, the education of Charles Sumner. The New England Quarterly 2023; 96 (4): 322–340. doi: https://doi.org/10.1162/tneq_a_01003

Sumner, Charles Pinckney. Valedictory poem delivered in the chapel of Harvard University on the 21 June 1796. Ms. Harvard University Archives. https://id.lib.harvard.edu/alma/990069952500203941/catalog

-----. Eulogy on the illustrious George Washington, pronounced at Milton, twenty-second February, 1800. Dedham: H. Mann, 1800. https://books.google.com/books?id=_bNcAAAAcAAJ

-----. A discourse on some points of difference between the sheriff's office in Massachusetts and in England. Freeman & Bolles, 81, Court Street, Boston, [1829]. https://books.google.com/books?id=NPrrxO3l7sQC