Celebrating the American Experiment

Aristotle

1598 – 1st English Edition

In this work, originally written in 350 B.C., Aristotle explores the purpose of political community, the nature of citizenship, the best forms of government, and the relationship between virtue and political life.

Reference #0027

John Trenchard and Thomas Gordon

1724 – 1st Edition

These essays draw upon the English republican tradition arguing that liberty depends upon civic virtue, self-government, and resistance to arbitrary power. Cato’s Letters was especially influential during the American Revolutionary period; the Letters could be found in approximately half of the private libraries in the American colonies.

Reference #0052-0055

John Locke

1694 – 2nd Edition Corrected

The first treatise attacks Sir Robert Filmer’s defense of the divine right of kings. The second argues that all men are naturally equal and that legitimate government rests upon the consent of the governed rather than hereditary claims to political authority.

Reference #0205

Baron de Montesquieu (Charles-Louis de Secondat)

1752 – 2nd Edition

Montesquieu examines the principles that sustain different forms of government and argues that political liberty is best preserved through a constitutional system that separates political power. He also criticizes slavery and arbitrary rule.

Reference #0259-0260

Algernon Sidney

1698 – 1st Edition

Discourses was written in response to Robert Filmer’s Patriarcha. Sidney defends political equality and government by consent while rejecting the divine right of kings. He cites Cardinal Robert Bellarmine directly and favorably.

Reference #0315

Aristotle

1488 – Manuscript

Written around 335 B.C., Aristotle argues that human happiness is achieved through a life of virtue in accordance with reason. He examines justice, practical wisdom, friendship, and the moral formation necessary for human flourishing.

Reference #0672

Robert Bellarmine

1590-1593

Bellarmine’s Controversies addresses many of the central religious and political disputes of the Reformation era. In discussing political authority, he argues that while authority ultimately comes from God, God does not directly appoint particular rulers. Because no person possesses a natural right to rule all others, political communities possess a role in determining their form of government and selecting rulers who serve the common good.

Reference #0752-0754

Marcus Tullius Cicero

1680 – 1st Edition English

Cicero’s De Officiis, written in 44 B.C., examines virtue, justice, moral obligation, and the responsibilities of citizens and statesmen. Its teachings profoundly influenced later Christian thought and political philosophy.

Reference #0941

Great Britain

1766 – 1st Edition English

The Stamp Act of 1765 taxed most paper documents in the American colonies and was then repealed in 1766 due to protests in the colonies. This act on display cancelled any penalties incurred during the lifetime of the Stamp Act. It also validated the documents issued in violation of the Stamp Act.

Reference #0003

Great Britain

1774 – 1st Edition

This act revokes the 1691 charter of William and Mary. It reduced authority from the Massachusetts colonial assembly while it gave the Crown and Parliament control over the mode of appointment, makeup of the council, and the manner of selection of judges.

Reference #0004

United States

1777 – 3rd Edition

This is one of the first printings of the Declaration of Independence. It was printed by John Dunlap and is one of three known to exist in the world.

Reference #0100

Thomas Paine

1776 – 6th Edition

This 6th edition was printed in the same year as the 1st edition, which was anonymously published on January 10, 1776. Common Sense became the most widely circulated document at the time, going through twenty-five editions in its first year; one in six households owned a copy.

Reference #0270

Thomas Paine

1792 – 1st Edition Collected American

This work was written by Thomas Paine between December 23, 1776, and April 19, 1783. Paine proposes plans for the taxation and strengthening of the American Union.

Reference #0272

Pennsylvania Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery (Benjamin Franklin, President; Benjamin Rush, Secretary)

1787 – 1st Edition

Founded in Philadelphia in 1774, the Pennsylvania Abolition Society was the first of its kind in America and a model for anti-slavery groups nationwide. This charter marks the Society’s 1787 reorganization, which drew in Franklin and Rush to lend national stature. The Pennsylvania acts for the gradual abolition of slavery are included.

Reference #0453

Thomas Jefferson, ed. Thomas Jefferson Randolph

1829 – 1st Edition

The work was edited by Thomas Jefferson Randolph, Thomas Jefferson’s eldest grandson and the executor of his estate. It is a collection of Thomas Jefferson’s works and reflections throughout his life.

Reference #1183-1186

John Adams

1788 – 1st Edition Boston

Drawing upon examples from ancient and modern history, Adams examines the strengths and weaknesses of different forms of government. Rejecting both absolute monarchy and simple democracy, he argues that liberty is best preserved through a balanced constitution that combines and moderates the powers of the one, the few, and the many.

Reference #0020

Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay

1788 – 1st Edition

This collection of eighty-five essays was written under the pseudonym “Publius” to defend the proposed Constitution. The authors argue that Americans could establish good government through reflection and choice by creating a constitutional republic capable of governing effectively while securing the blessings of liberty. This edition was owned by a member of the Virginia House of Burgesses.

Reference #0121

United States

1789 – 1st Publication

The journal includes the seventeen amendments to the Constitution proposed by the House of Representatives that were rejected by the Senate, as well as the twelve amendments that were approved and sent to the states for ratification. This volume also contains President Washington’s first address to Congress, the first rules of the Senate, and debates about legislation. It is the first congressional record.

Reference #0546

William Clark and Meriwether Lewis

1814 – 1st Edition English

This is the official account of the Lewis and Clark expedition from their travels. They stopped in Atchison, Kansas, on July 4, 1804, and celebrated the first recorded Independence Day west of the Mississippi River.

Reference #0661

Thomas Jefferson

1804 – 1st Edition

The United States purchased the Louisiana territory from France and Napoleon Bonaparte in 1803. At a cost of $15 million, the acquisition added 828,000 square miles of territory, including lands that would later become part of fifteen U.S. states and two Canadian provinces.

Reference #0726

United States

1788 – 1st Edition Connecticut Printing

This 1st edition is one of five known copies. This is the first official printing of the Constitution of the United States between the Connecticut ratification and the Constitution becoming effective in the United States on March 4, 1789.

Reference #0728

Federal Farmer

1787-1788

These collected letters argue that the proposed Constitution would weaken the sovereign states in favor of a consolidated government which would destroy American liberties.

Reference #0821

Frederick Douglass

1846

This is considered one of the most influential works in literature and it helped fuel the abolitionist movement in the United States as it tells the life story of Frederick Douglass from slave to freeman. The volume sold 5,000 copies within four months of its publication and approximately 30,000 by 1860.

Reference #0109

Edward Everett and Abraham Lincoln

1863 – 1st Edition

This is the first printing of the Gettysburg Address in book form. It is only preceded by the very rare pamphlet printing called “The Gettysburg Solemnities.” The document contains the 272-word speech Lincoln delivered on November 19, 1863.

Reference #0197

U.S. Supreme Court

1857 – 1st Edition

In this decision, the Supreme Court ruled that persons of African descent could not be citizens of the United States and held that Congress lacked authority to restrict slavery in the territories. Through a controversial interpretation of the Fifth Amendment’s Due Process Clause, the Court declared the Missouri Compromise unconstitutional and intensified the sectional conflict over slavery.

Reference #0389

Alexis de Tocqueville

1836 – 2nd Edition of Part I

This is the second edition of Part I, in two volumes, with the original fold-out map. The first part of Tocqueville’s Democracy in America appeared in 1835 (the second part followed in 1840); this is its 1836 reprinting. The work grew out of the 1831–1832 American tour that Tocqueville undertook with Gustave de Beaumont. Part I examines the institutions and mores that sustain American self-government such as the New England township, religion, civic associations, and the habits of the citizenry. It also warns of a distinctive democratic danger, the tyranny of the majority.

Reference #0352-0353

Lysander Spooner

1856

In this work, Spooner argues that slavery violates natural law and lacks constitutional legitimacy. He contends that the Constitution’s text contains no legal recognition of property in persons.

Reference #0747

Kansas

Adopted by delegates in 1858 and printed in 1859

This proposed constitution for the state of Kansas prohibits slavery and grants civil and political rights to black men that were uncommon in the United States at the time. It was never adopted as the state’s constitution.

Reference #1460

St. Thomas Aquinas

1472-1475 – Incunable

This portion of Aquinas’s Summa Theologiae, originally written in the thirteenth century, examines the virtues and vices that shape human conduct. It is organized around the theological virtues (faith, hope, and charity) and the cardinal virtues (prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance). It is one of the most influential works of moral, political, and theological thought in the Western tradition.

Reference #0023

St. Augustine of Hippo; translated by John Healey

1610 – 1st Edition English

This is translated by John Healey from the original Latin and includes the commentary of Juan Luis Vives. Written in the early fifth century A.D., City of God contrasts the city of God and the earthly city, two communities formed by different loves and ultimate ends.

Reference #0029

Nicholas of Cusa

1650 – 1st Edition

Written in the fifteenth century, these four dialogues explore wisdom, human understanding, and the search for truth. The final dialogue considers how measurement and empirical observation can contribute to knowledge of the natural world.

Reference #0470

St. Isidore of Seville

1400

This volume contains Isidore’s Sentences and On the Contemplative Life, both originally written in the early seventh century. These works draw together the wisdom of Scripture and the Church Fathers while reflecting on moral formation, pastoral leadership, and the contemplative life.

Reference #0483

St. Augustine of Hippo

1620 – 1st Edition

Written between 397 and 400 A.D., Confessions recounts Augustine’s spiritual journey from youthful ambition and error to conversion and the Catholic faith. It remains one of the most influential works of Christian autobiography and reflection on truth, happiness, and the human soul.

Reference #0500

Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius

1400-1425 – Manuscript

Originally written in the sixth century, this dialogue between Boethius and Lady Philosophy explores fortune, happiness, virtue, justice, providence, and free will. Confronting the apparent prosperity of the wicked and suffering of the just, Boethius argues true happiness is found not in wealth, power, or fame, but in the pursuit of wisdom and virtue.

Reference #0681

Innocent III (Lotario dei Conti di Segni)

1250 – Manuscript

Written by Lotario dei Conti di Segni before his election as Pope Innocent III at the end of the twelfth century, this work reflects on the frailty and transience of human life. Its meditation on human weakness and mortality became one of the most widely read devotional works of the Middle Ages.

Reference #0896

Pseudo-Bonaventure (attrib.); Omer Talon.

First text dated 1518; Talon’s Rhetorica later

This is a composite volume of two printed texts bound together. The first, traditionally titled Biblia Pauperum and ascribed to St. Bonaventure, is not the illustrated Paupers’ Bible but a text-only collection of scriptural exempla for preachers. Bound with it is the Rhetorica of Omer Talon (Audomarus Talaeus), a standard text on style and delivery.

Reference #0933

Robert Barker

1611 – 1st Edition

There were two editions of the King James Bible printed in 1611, which are distinguished by a mistake printing of Ruth 3:15. The incorrect edition reads “he went into the city,” whereas the correct edition reads “she went into the city.” This edition includes the “he” version of the verse.

Reference #1063

St. Hildegard of Bingen; Hermas; Uguetin de Metz; Elizabeth of Schönau et al

1513 – 1st Edition

The volume contains a very rare first edition and first appearance in print of Hildegard of Bingen’s Scivias Libri Tres, published in 1513. Scivias was prepared from manuscripts of the French humanist Jacques Lefevre d’Etaple, only eight of which survive today.

Reference #1207

St. Bernard of Clairvaux

1667 – 1st Edition

This edition is a collection of the writings of Bernard of Clairvaux, one of the most influential spiritual and theological figures of the Middle Ages. Through sermons, letters, and theological treatises, Bernard shaped medieval monasticism and helped define the spiritual life of Western Christianity.

Reference #1348