Beschreibung:

AMERICAN REVOLUTION AND CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION]. AN EXTRAORDINARY VOLUME OF NINE REVOLUTIONARY AND EARLY FEDERAL PAMPHLETS, INCLUDING THE EARLIEST AVAILABLE EDITION OF "COMMON SENSE" AND THE FIRST REPORT OF THE SECRET SESSIONS OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION. 8 o (202 x 122 mm). (A few occasional marginal tears, some pale browning, overall in very good condition.) Contemporary sheep, black morocco spine label (some wear to extremities, rubbed); red quarter morocco slipcase. Provenance : James P. Chichester (signature dated 1 September 1819 at head of introduction to the Paine). COMPRISING: PAINE, Thomas (1737-1809). Common Sense; Addressed to the Inhabitants of America...Second Edition . Philadelphia: Printed, and Sold, by R. Bell, 1776. 80 pages. American Independence 222b; Gimbel CS-3; Evans 14964. INGLIS, Charles (1734-1816). True Interest of America Impartially Stated, In Certain Strictures on a Pamphlet Intitled Common Sense . Philadelphia: James Humphreys 1776. 70 pages. (Small hole in title-page with loss of two letters.) Evans 14809. DALRYMPLE, John (1726-1810). Address of the People of Great-Britain to the Inhabitants of America . London: T. Cadell, 1775. 60 pages. (Lacks half title.) American Controversy 75-39a. LEE, Richard Henry (1733-1794). Observations Leading to a Fair Examination of the System of Government, Proposed by the Late Convention . [New York: Thomas Greenleaf], 1787. 40 pages. Evans 20454; Wellsprings of a Nation 198. WARREN, Mercy (1728-1814). Observations on the New Constitution, and on the Federal and State Conventions . Boston, printed, New York, reprinted: [Thomas Greenleaf], 1787. 22 pages. Bernstein, Are We To Be A Nation? p. 225; Evans 21112. MARTIN, Luther (1748-1826). The Genuine Information, Delivered to the Legislature of the State of Maryland, Relative to the Proceedings of the General Convention, Lately Held at Philadelphia . Philadelphia: Eleazar Oswald, 1788. 93 pages. Evans 21220; Howes M-343; Sabin 44897. WOOD, Silas (1769-1847). Letters Addressed to the Electors of Representatives to Congress for the First Election District in the State Of New-York . New York: T. & J. Swords, 1800. 22 pages. Evans 39135. SHEFFIELD, John Holroyd, Earl of (1735-1821). Observations on the Manufactures, Trade, and Present State of Ireland . Dublin: J. Exshaw, 1785. 56 pages. KENT, James (1763-1847). Introductory Lecture to a Course of Law Lectures . New York: Francis Childs, 1794. 23 pages. Evans 27183. This exceptional volume of pamphlets, evidently bound together about 1800, contains two of the rarest and most important works from the foundation of the nation: Thomas Paine's Common Sense , in its earliest obtainable edition, and the only contemporary work to describe the secret sessions of the Federal Constitutional Convention, Luther Martin's The Genuine Information . Common Sense ranks as the most famous political utterance of the American Revolution. This is the earliest reasonably obtainable edition, the second, issued eleven days after the first by the same publisher Robert Bell. The only copy of the first edition to appear on the market in recent decade was the Engelhard copy, which realized $123,500 in January 1996. Even rarer and of equal importance is the sixth pamphlet in the volume, Luther Martin's The Genuine Information , the only contemporary source to describe the debates in the Federal Constitutional Convention. These debates have now become an integral part of the founding documents of the United States, and a basic resource for Constitutional scholars interpreting the meaning of the Constitution. At the time, however, virtually nothing was known of its proceedings because of the surprisingly effective veil of silence drawn by the secrecy oath its members had taken. It was not until 1819-1821, a third of a century later, that the debates of the Convention became generally known. The exception to this was The Genuine Information . Martin, a delegate from Maryland