[Rarebooks] fa: 1787 Gentleman's Magazine: EARLY PRINTING OF THE UNITED STATES CONSTITUTION

[ArCh]

Auction ending Sunday, October 23. Images and more details can be found at the URL below or by searching for the seller name arch_in_la. 

https://tinyurl.com/mr33vxca

Many thanks,
Ardwight Chamberlain
Ann Arbor, MI, USA

The Gentleman's Magazine, and Historical Chronicle. Volume LVII [57]. For the Year MDCCLXXXVII [1787]. Part the First [and] Part the Second. London: Printed by John Nichols, for D. Henry, 1787. Twelve monthly issues (Jan.-Dec.), plus the supplement, volume titles, indices and prefaces. Two volumes, 8vo, in early/period calf-backed marbled boards, gilt-lettered morocco spine labels; iv, 552, [14] pp.; [2], [553]-1200, [16] pp., with 27 copper-engraved plates, ten of which are folding (complete).

Contains an early printing, possibly the first outside of America, of the complete CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES, printed in its entirety over two monthly issues (Nov.-Dec.), along with the introductory letter from George Washington, as President of the Federal Convention, to the President of Congress. It was while posted in London that John Adams first read the complete text of the Constitution, possibly in the pages of this very magazine, and subsequently communicated his concerns to Thomas Jefferson in Paris over the document's lack of a bill of rights ("What think you of a Declaration of Rights? Should not a Thing have preceded the Model?").

With numerous other articles related to AMERICA, including:
	- An Act for establishing Religious Freedom in Virginia (the complete text of THOMAS JEFFERSON'S revolutionary statute, which he considered one of his two greatest accomplishments, the other being the Declaration of Independence).
	- An extract from, and a review of, "The Morals of Chess," by Dr. [BENJAMIN] FRANKLIN, of Philadelphia.
	- An account of the establishment of the PENNSYLVANIA SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING THE ABOLITION OF SLAVERY, "the President of which is Dr. Franklin," which includes "the introduction to what is called 'their Constitution'" and the text of a "memorial lately presented to the convention of the United States" by the Society's vice president, Jonathan Penrose.
	- The speech of General Washington, when the President of the American Congress informed him of being unanimously continued in the Chief Command of the American Army. (Washington was himself a subscriber to the Gentleman's Magazine.)
	- Judge Pendleton's animated Charge to the Grand Juries of South Carolina
	- Proceedings on the Capture of St. Eustatius (1781).
	- An Engagement in America misrepresented by M. de Chastellux, corrected by Col. Simcoe (re. the Battle of Spencer's Ordinary, near Williamsburg, in 1781: "Sir, I have read your Travels in North-America, and I find an attack which M. de la Fayette's troops made upon a corps under my command to be misrepresented in them…"). Elsewhere in this volume there is a lengthy (4 pp.) review of de Chastellux's book.
	- "American News," a semi-monthly collection of reports, letters and dispatches ("The present state of America is rather to be deplored than envied…"; "The Indian war, which threatened the province of Georgia, is happily blown over…"; "A serious disturbance is broken out in the Province of Massachusetts, where one part of the province has separated from the other, and affects to act independently…"; "The Congress have it in contemplation to send some vessels of force into the European seas, particularly into the Mediterranean, to protect the trade of the United States…"; "Sconetoyak, a celebrated War Captain, and son to one of the principal Chiefs… will leave this place [Philadelphia] in a few days for New York, to represent to Congress some grievances, and to demand an observance of the treaty of Hopewell, on the Keowu, which… has been violated and infringed by the lawless and unruly Whites on the frontiers…" etc., etc.).

Bindings a bit rubbed, with wear to the edges and extremities, cracking to the joints but all the boards are secure; generally light age-toning to the contents with occasional browning, a few small scattered spots and touches of soiling, else clean and sound. Front paste-down with the handsome bookplate of Marius Nielsen (engraved by Johannes Britze).