List of Useful Court References

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Researching Court Records
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This article is part of a series.
Overview of Court Records
Court Procedures
Equity Cases
Probate
Divorce Actions
Types of Court Records
List of Court Record Types
Researching Court Records
Selected Proceedings and Courts
Justice of the Peace Courts
List of Useful Court References
Topics

This article originally appeared in "Court Records" by Sandra Hargreaves Luebking, FUGA, Loretto Dennis Szucs, FUGA, and Arlene H. Eakle, Ph.D. in The Source: A Guidebook to American Genealogy

This reference section begins with guides, bibliographies, and sources of general interest on law in the colonies and early states, then continues with specific subject titles. Some attempt has been made to avoid duplicating sources unless they apply to more than one subject area.

General Guides, References, and Inventories

Bentley, Elizabeth P. County Courthouse Book. 2nd ed. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1995.

Callender, Clarence N. American Courts: Their Organization and Procedures. New York: McGraw Hill, 1927.

Eakle, Arlene. Family History for Fun and Profit: 30th Anniversary Edition. Provo, Utah: Genealogical Institute, 2002.

Eichholz, Alice, ed. Red Book: American State, County, and Town Sources. 3rd ed. Provo, Utah: Ancestry, 2004.

Flaherty, David H. "A Select Guide to Manuscript Court Records of Colonial New England." American Journal of Legal History 9 (1967): 107-26.

Friedman, Lawrence M. A History of American Law. 3rd ed. New York: Touchstone, 2005.

Gersack, Dorothy Hill. "Colonial, State, and Federal Court Records: A Survey." American Archivist 36 (1973): 33-42.

Greenwood, Val D. The Researcher's Guide to American Genealogy. 3rd ed. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 2000.

Haskins, George L. "Court Records and History." William and Mary Quarterly 3rd ser., 5 (1948): 547-52.

Hasse, Adelaide R. Materials for a Bibliography of the Public Archives of the Thirteen Original States Covering Colonial Period and State Period to 1789. 1908; reprint, New York: Argonaut Press, 1966.

Hoffer, Peter Charles. Law and People in Colonial America. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998.

Jeffrey, William, Jr. "Early New England Court Records: A Bibliography of Published Material." Boston Public Library Quarterly (1954). As reprinted in American Journal of Legal History 1 (1957): 119-47.

Kammen, Michael G. "Colonial Court Records and the Study of Early American History: A Bibliographical Review." American Historical Review 70 (1965): 732-39.

Low, Erick Baker. A Bibliography on the History of the Organization and Jurisdiction of State Courts. Williamsburg: National Center for State Courts, 1980.

Maduell, Charles R. "Genealogy From Law Books." New Orleans Genesis 9 (1972): 42-43. Includes specific examples from state court reports.

Matchette, Robert D. Guide to Federal Records in the National Archives. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1995. Online version at <www.archives.gov>.

Neagles, James C. Military Records: A Guide to Genealogical and Historical Research. Salt Lake City: Ancestry, 1990.

New York State Archives. List of Pre-1874 Court Records in the State Archives. Albany: Office of Cultural Education, New York State Education Department, 1984.

Nunis, Doyce B., Jr. "Historical Studies in United States Legal History, 1950-59: A Bibliography of Articles Published in Scholarly Non-Law Journals." American Journal of Legal History 7 (1963): 1-27.

Prager, Herta, and William W. Price. "A Bibliography on the History of the Courts of the Thirteen Original States, Maine, Ohio, and Vermont." American Journal of Legal History 1 (1957): 336-62; 2 (1958): 35- 52, 148-54.

Pound, Roscoe. Organization of Courts. Boston: Little, Brown, 1940; reprint, Westport Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1979.

Rose, Christine. Courthouse Research for Family Historians. San Jose, Calif.: CR Publications, 2004.

Rust, Barbara. "The Right to Vote: The Enforcement Acts and Southern Courts." Prologue 21, no. 3 (Fall 1989): 231-38.

Ryskamp, George R. "Fundamental Common-Law Concepts for the Genealogist: Marriage, Divorce, and Coverture." National Genealogical Society Quarterly 23 (September 1995): 165-79.

Salmon, Marylynn. Women and the Law of Property in Early America. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1986.

Schwartz, Bernard, Barbara Wilcie Kern, and R. B. Bernstein, eds. Thomas Jefferson and Bolling v. Bolling: Law and the Legal Profession in Prerevolutionary America. San Marino, Calif.: Huntington Library Press, 1997.

Sell, Gary L. Legal Materials on Microform: A Bibliography. 3rd ed. Provo, Utah: Brigham Young University, 1976.

Spratling, Benjamin Barnett, III. "Court and Legal Records." In Printed Sources: A Guide to Published Genealogical Records, edited by Kory L. Meyerink. Salt Lake City: Ancestry, 1998.

---. "Court Records: Far Beyond Probate." Ancestry Magazine 14, no. 4 (July-August 1996): 5-8.

Taylor, D. Joshua. "Trial by Community." Utah Genealogical Society Quarterly 1, no. 1 (December 2005): 2-8.

Tompkins, Dorothy Campbell. Court Organization and Administration: A Bibliography. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973.

Weinberg, Allen. "Court Records: Orphans Among Archives." American Archivist 23 (1960): 167-74.

Admiralty Court Records

Andrews, Charles M. The Colonial Period of American History: England's Commercial and Colonial Policy. Vol. 4. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1938. An excellent historical treatment of the courts of admiralty in the colonies.

Dickerson, O. M. The Navigation Acts and the American Revolution. Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1951.

Hough, Charles M. Reports of the Cases in the Vice-Admiralty of the Province of New York. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1925.

Morris, Robert C. "From Piracy to Censorship: The Admiralty Experience." Prologue 21, no. 3 (Fall 1989): 186-95.

Owen, David R., and Michael C. Tolley. Courts of Admiralty in Colonial America: The Maryland Experience 1634-1776. Durham, N.C.: Carolina Academic Press, 1995.

Plowman, Robert J. "An Untapped Source: Civil War Prize Case Files 1861-65." Prologue 21, no. 3 (Fall 1989).

Towle, Dorothy S. Records of the Vice-Admiralty Court of Rhode Island: 1716-1752. Washington, D.C.: American Historical Association Committee on Legal History, 1939. Contains incomplete extracts of cases and a history of admiralty jurisdiction in Rhode Island.

Ubbelohde, Carl. The Vice-Admiralty Courts and the American Revolution. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1960. A good description of the courts before 1763 and their influence on the American Revolution.

Adoption Records

Current law on post-1930 adoption has made access to early records more difficult. See chapter 1, "The Foundations of Family History Research," for a discussion of freedom of information laws that may be used to get access.

Carp, E. Wayne. Adoption in America: Historical Perspectives. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2002.

Leary, Morton L. The Law of Adoption Simplified. New York: Oceana Publications, 1948.

Zainaldin, Jamil. "The Emergence of a Modern American Family Law, Child Custody, Adoption and the Courts, 1796-1851." Northwestern University Law Review 73 (1979).

Whitmore, William. H. The Law of Adoption in the United States, and Especially in Massachusetts. Albany: Joe Munsell, 1876; reprint, Clark, N.J.: Lawbook Exchange, 2003.

Bankruptcy and Debt

Mann, Bruce H. Republic of Debtors: Bankruptcy in the Age of American Independence. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2003.

Skeel, David. Debtor's Dominion: A History of Bankruptcy Law in America. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2001.

Owens, James K. "Documenting Regional Business History: The Bankruptcy Acts of 1800 and 1841." Prologue 21, no. 3 (Fall 1989): 178-85.

Szucs, Loretto Dennis. "To Whom I Am Indebted: Bankruptcy Records." Ancestry Magazine 12, no. 5 (September-October 1994): 26-27.

Thompson, Elizabeth Lee. The Reconstruction of Southern Debtors: Bankruptcy after the Civil War. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2004.

Watkins, Beverly. "To Surrender All His Estate: The 1867 Bankruptcy Act." Prologue 21, no. 3 (Fall 1989): 207-14.

Case Studies and Record Use

Ball, Walter V. "Family Records from County Court Order Books." National Genealogical Society Quarterly 58 (1970): 3.

Brayton, John Anderson. "Hardy of South Carolina-A Discreet Omission." Part I of "Check the Original! Two Lessons Learned the Hard Way." National Genealogical Society Quarterly 90, no. 1 (March 2002): 69-73.

Farnham, Charles W. "Lower Court Cases: A Genealogist's Tool." National Genealogical Society Quarterly 49 (1961): 200.

Fernandez, Angela. "Record-Keeping and Other Troublemaking: Thomas Lechford and Law Reform in Colonial Massachusetts." Law and History Review 23, no. 2 (Summer 2005): 235-78.

Hendrix, GeLee Corley. "Backtracking Through Burned Counties: Bonds of Louisiana, Mississippi, Georgia, and the Carolinas." National Genealogical Society Quarterly 78, no. 2 (June 1990): 98-114.

King, George H. S. "Maiden Names Used After Marriage." American Genealogist 47 (1971): 44.

Klein, Fannie J. Federal and State Court Systems: A Guide. Cambridge, Mass.: Ballinger Publishers, 1977.

Proffitt, Shana Elizabeth. "Mallory-Blunt of Virginia-A Miscopied Name." Part II of "Check the Original! Two Lessons Learned the Hard Way." National Genealogical Society Quarterly 90, no. 1 (March 2002): 69-73.

Randall, Ruth. "An Interracial Suit for Inheritance: Clues to Probable Paternity for a Georgia Freedman, Henry Clay Heard Sherman." National Genealogical Society Quarterly 89, no. 2 (June 2001): 85-97.

Rutman, Darrett B., and Anita H. Rutman. "Now-Wives and Sons-in-Law: Parental Death in a Seventeenth Century Virginia County." In Chesapeake in the Seventeenth Century. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1979.

Semonche, John E. "Common-Law Marriage in North Carolina: A Study in Legal History." American Journal of Legal History 9 (1965): 320-49.

Stevenson, Noel. "Genealogical Research in the Law Library." American Genealogist 18 (1941): 100-103. Genealogical applications of printed court reports.

Claims: Courts and Private (see also, Federal)

Eales, Anne Bruner, and Robert M. Kvasnicka. Guide to Genealogical Research in the National Archives. Washington, D.C.: General Services Administration, 2000. See chapter 16, "Claims Records."

Luebking, Sandra H. "Southern Claims Commission-Disallowed Claims." FORUM 17, no. 2 (Summer 2005): 13-15.

Mills, Gary B. Southern Loyalists in the Civil War: A Composite Directory of Case Files Created by the U.S. Commissioners of Claims, 1871-1880, Including Those Appealed to the War Claims Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Court of Claims. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 2004.

Naylor, Chris. "Those Elusive Early Americans: Public Lands and Claims in the American State Papers, 1789-1837." Prologue 37, no. 2 (Summer 2005). Online at http://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/2005/summer. Accessed 5 February 2006).

Schamel, Charles E. "Untapped Resources: Private Claims and Private Legislation in the Records of the U.S. Congress." Prologue 27, no. 1 (Spring 1995). Online at http://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/1995/spring/private-claims-2.html. Accessed 22 March 2006.

Colonial Courts

Billings, Warren M. A Little Parliament: The Virginia General Assembly in the Seventeenth Century. Richmond: Library of Virginia, 2004.

Chiroazzi, Michael, and Marguerite Most, eds. Prestatehood Legal Materials: A Fifty-State Research Guide, Including New York City and the District of Columbia. Vols. 1 and 2. Binghamton, N.Y.: Haworth Press, 2006.

Chitwood, Oliver Perry. Justice in Colonial Virginia. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1905; reprint, Clark, N.J.: Law Book Exchange, 2001.

Daniels, Bruce C. Town and County: Essays on the Structure of Local Government in the American Colonies. Middletown, Conn.: Wesleyan University Press, 1978.

Fernandez, Angela. "Record-Keeping and Other Troublemaking: Thomas Lechford and Law Reform in Colonial Massachusetts." Law & History Review 23, no. 2 (Summer 2005): 235-78.

Greene, Jack P. "The Publication of the Official Records of the Southern Colonies." William and Mary Quarterly 3rd ser., 14 (1957): 268-80.

Mirow, M. C. Latin American Law: A History of Private Law and Institutions in Spanish America. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2004.

Reinsch, Paul Samuel. English Common Law in the American Colonies. Madison: University of Wisconsin, 1899; reprint, Clark, N.J.: Lawbook Exchange, 2005. Online at http://www.lawbookexchange.com.

Surrency, Edwin C. "The Courts in the American Colonies." American Journal of Legal History 11 (1969): 253-76, 347-76.

Whitney, Edson L. Government of the Colony of South Carolina. Baltimore, 1895; reprint, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1973. Chapter 2 describes South Carolina's pre-Revolutionary admiralty courts.

Criminal Courts

Brown, Richard Maxwell. "The Archives of Violence." American Archivist 41, no. 4 (1978): 431-44.

Chapin, Bradley. Criminal Justice in Colonial America, 1606-1660 Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1983. See pages 99-142.

Friedman, Lawrence M. Crime and Punishment in American History. New York: BasicBooks, 1993.

Klein, Philip. Prison Methods in New York State. New York: Columbia University Press, 1920.

Pound, Roscoe. Criminal Justice in America. New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction Publishers, 1998.

Scott, William B. Criminal Proceedings in Colonial Virginia: (Records of) fines, examination of criminals, trials of slaves, etc., from March 1710 (1711) to (1754). (Richmond County, Virginia). Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1984.

Divorce

Bamman, Gale W., and Debbie W. Spero. Tennessee Divorces, 1797-1858: Taken from 750 Legislative Petitions and Acts. Thorndike, Mass.: Van Volumes Unlimited, 1990.

Basch, Norma. Framing American Divorce: From the Revolutionary Generation to the Victorians. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001.

Bell, Carol W. Ohio Divorces: The Early Years, 1794-1947. Youngstown, Ohio: the author, 1994.

Blattner, Theresa. Divorces, Separations, and Annulments in Missouri, 1769 to 1850. Bowie, Md.: Heritage Books, 1992.

Buckley, Thomas E. The Great Catastrophe of My Life: Divorce in the Old Dominion. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2002. An examination of the 471 surviving divorce petitions to the Virginia legislature for the years 1786 to 1851.

Cohen, Sheldon S. "The Broken Bond: Divorce in Providence County, 1749-1809." Rhode Island History 44 (1985): 67-79.

Cohn, Henry S. "Connecticut's Divorce Mechanism, 1636-1969." American Journal of Legal History 14 (1970): 35-54.

Cott, Nancy F. Public Vows: A History of Marriage and the Nation. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2002.

Hartog, Hendrik. Man and Wife in America: A History. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2000.

Index to Divorce Cases of the Thirteenth Judicial Circuit Court of Alabama, 1816-1918. Mobile: University of South Alabama Archives, 1994.

Kitchin, S. B. A History of Divorce. London: Chapman and Hall, 1912; reprint, Clark, N.J.: Lawbook Exchange, 2002. Online at http://www.lawbookexchange.com.

Phillips, Roderick. Untying the Knot: A Short History of Divorce [Abridged]. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1991.

Riley, Glenda. Divorce: An American Tradition. Lawrence: University of Nebraska Press, 1997.

Salmon, Marylynn. "Divorce and Separation." In Women and the Law of Property in Early America. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1989.

Spratling, Benjamin B. "Court and Legal Records." Chapter 12 in Printed Sources: A Guide to Published Genealogical Records, edited by Kory L. Meyerink, 438-466. Salt Lake City: Ancestry, 1998.

Stone, Lawrence. Road to Divorce: England, 1530-1987; Uncertain Unions: Marriage in England, 1660-1753; and Broken Lives: Separation and Divorce in England, 1660-1857. 3 vols. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 1990-93.

Van Ness, James S. "On Untieing the Knot: The Maryland Legislature and Divorce Petitions." Maryland Historical Magazine 67 (1972): 171-75.

Winslow, Raymond A., Jr. Part II: "County Records." In North Carolina Research: Genealogy & Local History, edited by Helen F. M. Leary. Rev. Ed. Raleigh: North Carolina Genealogical Society, 1996.

Woolsey, Theodore D. Divorce and Divorce Legislation, Especially in the United States. 2nd ed. rev. New York: Chas Scribner's Sons, 1882; reprint, Clark, N.J.: Lawbook Exchange, 2001.

Federal, Confederate, and Territorial Courts

Beers, Henry Putsey. Guide to the Archives of the Government of the Confederate States of America. 1968.

Blume, William, and Elizabeth Gaspar Brown. Digests and Lists Pertaining to the Development of Law and Legal Institutions in the Territories of the United States: 1787-1954. 6 vols. Ann Arbor, Mich.: University Microfilm, 1965-79.

Chiroazzi, Michael, and Marguerite Most, eds. Prestatehood Legal Materials: A Fifty-State Research Guide, Including New York City and the District of Columbia. Vols. 1 and 2. Binghamton, N.Y.: Haworth Press, 2006.

Corriston, Mark A. "Discovering Frontier History Through Territorial Court Records." Prologue 21, no. 3 (Fall 1989): 222-29.

Klein, Fannie J. Federal and State Court Systems: A Guide. Cambridge, Mass.: Ballinger Publishers, 1977.

McReynolds, Michael, comp. List of Pre-1840 Federal District and Circuit Court Records Located in Federal Record Centers. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1972. Special List, 31.

Szucs, Loretto Dennis, and Sandra Hargreaves Luebking. The Archives: A Guide to the National Archives Field Branches. Salt Lake City: Ancestry, 1988.

Ulasek, Henry T., and Marion Johnson. Records of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. Preliminary Inventory 116. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Service, 1959.

Younger, Richard D. "The Grand Jury on the Frontier." Wisconsin Magazine of History (Autumn 1956): 3-8 ff. Not consecutive.

Wilson, Don W. "Federal Court Records in the Regional Archives System." Prologue 21, no. 3 (Fall 1989): 176-77.

Indian Court Records

Barr, Charles Butler. Records of the Choctaw-Chickasaw Citizenship Court Relative to Records of Enrollment of the Five Civilized Tribes, 1898-1907. Independence, Mo.: C. B. Barr, 1990.

Brown, Loren N. "The Choctaw-Chickasaw Court Citizens." Chronicles of Oklahoma 16-4 (1938): 425. Online at http://digital.library.okstate.edu/chronicles. Accessed 05 February 2006.

Compiled Laws of the Cherokee Nation. Tahlequah, Ind. Terr.: National Advocate Press, 1881; reprint, Clark, N.J.: Lawbook Exchange, 1998.

Ford, Jeanette W. "Federal Law Comes to Indian Territory." Chronicles of Oklahoma 58, no. 4 (1980-81): 432-39. Online at http://digital.library.okstate.edu/chronicles. Accessed 05 February 2006.

Harring, Sidney L., Frederick Hoxie (series editor), Neal Salisbury (series editor). Crow Dog's Case: American Indian Sovereignty, Trial Law, and United States Law in the Nineteenth Century (Studies in North American Indian History). Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1994. Addresses American Indian Law, the Creek Nation, Alaska, and more.

Hill, Edward E. Guide to Records in the National Archives of the United States Relating to American Indians. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Service, 1984. This guide is well-indexed and gives specifics on the courts maintained by Indian agencies. The records themselves are not described in detail.

Indian Claims Commission. Vols. 30-43. Online at http://digital.library.okstate.edu. Accessed 05 February 2006.

Knight, Oliver. "Fifty Years of Choctaw Law, 1834-1884." Chronicles of Oklahoma 31, no. 1 (1953): 76. Online at http://digital.library.okstate.edu/chronicles. Accessed 05 February 2006.

Reid, John. A Law of Blood: The Primitive Law of the Cherokee Nation. New York: New York University Press, 1970.

Thompson, William P. "Courts of the Cherokee Nation." Chronicles of Oklahoma 2, no. 1 (1924): 63. Online at http://digital.library.okstate.edu/chronicles. Accessed 05 February 2006.

Laws, Statutes, Legal Terms

Abrams, Kerry. "Polygamy, Prostitution, and the Federalization of Immigration Law." Columbia Law Review 105, no. 3 (April 2005): 642-716. Online at http://www.columbialawreview.org.

Babbitt, Charles J. Hand-List of Legislative Sessions and Session Laws Statutory Revisions, Compilations, Codes, Etc., and Constitutional Conventions of the United States and its Possessions and of the Several States to May, 1912. Boston: Trustees of the State Library of Massachusetts, 1912; reprint, Clark, N.J., Lawbook Exchange, 2003.

Black, Henry Campbell. Black's Law Dictionary: Definitions of Terms and Phrases of American and English Jurisprudence, Ancient and Modern. 4th ed. St. Paul, Minn.: West Publishing, 1951. Newer editions of Black's are published regularly but genealogists seem to prefer the Fourth Edition.

Bouvier, John. A Law Dictionary: Adapted to the Constitution and Laws of the United States of America and of the Several States of the American Union. Rev. 6th ed. Online at http://www.constitution.org. Gives laws of states as of 1856. There were 18 editions to Bouvier, the last was published in 1914.

Bramwell, B. S. "Frequency of Cousin Marriages." Genealogists' Magazine 8 (1939): 305-16.

Burton, William C. Burton's Legal Thesaurus. New York: Macmillan Library Reference, 1998.

Chroust, Anton H. The Rise of the Legal Profession in America. 2 vols. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1965.

Duhaime's Law Dictionary. Online at http://www.duhaime.org/Dictionary.. Current and common legal terms only.

Evans, Barbara Jean. The New A To Zax: A Comprehensive Genealogical Dictionary for Genealogists and Historians. 2nd ed. N.p., 1990.

Georgetown Law Library. The Historic State Codes Preserva tion Project. http://www.ll.georgetown.edu/states/historic_codes. Scanning early state codes printed 1840-1930. See website for a full list by state.

Hein, William S., and Co. Colonial Session Laws. Microfiche. Buffalo, N.Y.: William S. Hein, 2003.

Hein, William S., and Co. Session Laws of American States and Territories: A Compilation of All States and Territories, 1775-2003. Update 4: A Complete Checklist. Microfiche. Buffalo, N.Y.: William S. Hein, 2005.

Myrick, Shelby, Jr. "Legal Terminology in Genealogical Research in the U.S.A." Salt Lake City: World Conference on Records, 1969. Area 1-10. Includes a useful glossary with terms often omitted from modern dictionaries.

RIRC. Session Laws of the American States and Territories Prior to 1900. Westport, Conn.: Redgrave Information Resources, 1988.

Weiner, Carol Z. "Is a Spinster an Unmarried Woman?" American Journal of Legal History 21 (1977): 27-31.

Mining District Records

Greever, William S. The Bonanza West: The Story of the Western Rushes, 1848-1900. Moscow: University of Idaho Press, 1990.

Marshal, Thomas Maitland. "Miners Laws of Colorado." American Historical Review 25 (1919-20): 426.

Mucibabich, Darlene. Life in Western Mining Camps: Social and Legal Aspects, 1848-1872. Hicksville, N.Y.: Exposition Press, 1977.

Mumrey, Nolee. Early Mining Laws of Buckskin Joe. Boulder, Colo.: the author, 1961.

---. History and Proceedings of Buckskin Joe. Boulder, Colo.: the author, 1961.

Paul, Rodman W. Mining Frontiers of the Far West. An expanded edition by Elliott West. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2001.

Shinn, Charles H. Institutional Beginnings of a Western State. Johns Hopkins University Studies in History and Political Science, 2nd ser. Vol. 7. Baltimore, 1880. Discusses the lead mines of Iowa.

---. Mining Camps: A Study in American Frontier Government. 1884; reprint, Gloucester, Mass.: Peter Smith, 1970. Includes an excellent description of the Spanish/Mexican legal system.

---. Land Laws of Mining Districts. Johns Hopkins University Studies in History and Political Science, 2nd ser. Vol. 12. Baltimore, 1884; reprint, Brooklyn, N.Y.: AMS Press, 1989.

Smith, Duane A. Rocky Mountain Mining Camps: The Urban Frontier. Niwot: University of Colorado Press, 1992.

Probate and Dower

Albright, Lee, and Helen F. M. Leary. "Designing Research Strategies." Chapter 2 in North Carolina Research: Genealogy and Local History, edited by Helen F. M. Leary. 2nd ed. Raleigh: North Carolina Genealogical Society, 1996.

Bernstein, Charles B. "Will and Probate Records in the United States." In Avotaynu Guide to Jewish Genealogy, edited by Sallyann Amdur Sack and Gary Mokotoff, 168-74. Bergenfield, N.J.: Avotaynu, 2004.

Devine, Donn. "The Widow's Dower Interest." Ancestry Magazine 12, no. 5 (September-October 1994): 20-22.

---. "Probate Records: An Underutilized Source." Ancestry Magazine 12, no. 3 (May-June 1994): 14-15.

Dorman, John Frederick. "Colonial Laws of Primogeniture." World Conference on Records, 1969 (Salt Lake City: Genealogical Society of Utah, 1969).

Greenwood, Val D. "Understanding Probate Records and Basic Legal Terminology," "What About Wills?" and "The Intestate." In The Researcher's Guide to American Genealogy. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 2000.

Haskins, George L. "Curtesy in the United States." University of Pennsylvania Law Review 100 (1951): 196-223.

Hill, Ronald A. "Using Records to Understand Ancestral Motives: The Thwarted Will of Christopher Lean of Cornwall." National Genealogical Society Quarterly 92, no. 4 (December 2004): 269-84.

Jacobus, Donald Lines. "Probate Law and Custom." American Genealogist 9 (1932): 4-9.

Keim, Clarence Ray. "Primogeniture and the Law of Entail in Colonial Virginia." William and Mary Quarterly Series 3, 25 (October 1968): 546-86.

Morris, Richard B. Primogeniture and Entailed Estates in America. New York: Columbia University, 1927.

Remington, Gordon L. New York State Probate Records: A Genealogist's Guide to Testate and Intestate Records. Boston: New England Historic Genealogical Society, 2002.

Shammas, Carole, Marylynn Salmon, and Michael Dahlin. Inheritance in America from Colonial Times to the Present. Galveston, Tex.: Frontier Press, 1997.

Southwick, Neal S. "The Coordinate Use of Wills and Deeds." Journal of Genealogy 2 (1973): 154-56.

Toms, Gary R., and William R. Gann. Widow's Dowers of Washington County, Tennessee 1803-1899. Milford, Ohio: Little Miami Publishing, 2004.

Regional and State Guides

Aiken, John. "New Netherlands Arbitration in the 17th Century." Arbitration Journal 29 (1974): 145.

Alaska State Archives. Record Group Inventory: District and Territorial Court System. Juneau: Alaska State Archives, Department of Administration, 1987.

Ames, Susie M., ed. County Court Records of Accomack-North-ampton, Virginia 1640-1645. University Press of Virginia, 1973.

Bailey, Robert E., et al., eds. A Summary Guide to Local Government Records in the Illinois Regional Archives. Springfield: Illinois State Archives, Office of the Secretary of State, 1992.

Bakken, Gordon Morris. "The Courts, the Legal Profession, and the Development of Law in Early California." [HTML] California History 2003. California Historical Society, San Francisco. Available from at Amazon.com, 1 January 2003, as an e-doc.

Barker, Bette Marie, et al., eds. Guide to Family History Sources in the New Jersey State Archives. Rev. ed. Trenton, N.J.: Division of Archives and Records Management, New Jersey Department of State, 1992.

Beckstead, Douglas S. The Judicial System in Utah: Organic Act to the Twentieth Century. Salt Lake City: Utah State Archives, 1988.

Bell, Carol Willsey. Ohio Guide to Genealogical Sources. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1988.

Brown, Richard Maxwell. The South Carolina Regulators. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1963.

Carroll, Mark M. Homesteads Ungovernable: Families, Sex, Race, and the Law in Frontier Texas, 1823-1860. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2001.

Chaulkey, Lyman. Chronicles of the Scotch-Irish Settlement in Virginia, Extracted From the Original Court Records of Augusta County, 1745. 3 vols. 1912; reprint, Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1999.

Dolan, John P., and Lisa Lacher. Guide to Public Records of Iowa Counties. Des Moines, Iowa: Connie Wimer, 1986.

Edgerton, Keith. Montana Justice: Power, Punishment, & the Penitentiary. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2004.

Fielder, George. The Illinois Law Courts in Three Centuries 1673-1973: A Documentary History. Chicago: Physician's Record Co., 1973.

Ford, Jeanette W. "Federal Law Comes to Indian Territory." Chronicles of Oklahoma 58 (1980-81): 432-39.

Gagle, Diane VanSkiver. "Ohio Court Records." Ohio Geneal-ogical Society News 36, no. 6 (November/December 2005): 197-98.

Grivas, Theodore. Military Government in California, 1846-1850, With a Chapter on Their Prior Use in Louisiana, Florida and New Mexico. Glendale, Calif.: Arthur H. Clarke, 1963.

Guzik, Estelle M., ed. Genealogical Resources in the New York Metropolitan Area. New York: Jewish Genealogical Society, 1989.

---. Genealogical Resources in New York. New York: Jewish Genealogical Society, 2003.

Hogan, Roseann Reinemuth. Kentucky Ancestry: A Guide to Genealogical and Historical Research. Salt Lake City: Ancestry, 1992.

Holcomb, Brent. Abstracts of South Carolina Wills. Easly, S.C.: Southern Historical Press, 1977.

Lang, Margaret. Early Justice in Sonora. N.p.: Mother Lode Press, 1963.

Leary, Helen F. M., ed. North Carolina Research: Genealogy and Local History. 2nd ed. Raleigh: North Carolina Genealogical Society, 1996.

Minnesota Historical Society Library and Archives Division. Genealogical Resources of the Minnesota Historical Society. St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1989.

Mitchell, Thornton W. North Carolina Wills: A Testator Index, 1665-1900. Corrected and Revised Edition in One Volume. 4th ed. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 2001.

Morris, Richard B., ed. Select Cases of the Mayor's Court of New York City, 1674-1784. Washington, D.C.: American Historical Association, 1935; reprint, Millwood, N.Y.: Kraus Reprint Co., 1975.

McKnight. "The Spanish Legacy to Texas Law." American Journal of Legal History 3 (1959): 222, 229.

Padgett, Patricia Ann. "Legal Status of Women in Colonial Virginia, 1700-1785." MA thesis, College of William and Mary, 1967.

Peters, Joan W. Military Records, Patriotic Service, and Public Service Claims from the Fauquier County, Virginia, Court Minutes Books, 1759-1784. Westminster, Md.: Heritage Books, 2004.

Rapaport, Diane. New England Court Records: A Research Guide for Genealogists and Historians. Lexington, Mass.: Quill Pen Press, 2006.

Ray, Susanne Smith, et al., comps. A Preliminary Guide to the Pre-1904 County Records in the Archives Branch. Richmond: Virginia State Library and Archives, 1987.

Ride, Millard Millburn, ed. This Was the Life: Excerpts from the Judgment Records of Frederick County, Maryland 1748-1765. 1979; reprint, Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1984.

Robinson, William M., Jr. Justice in Grey: A History of the Judicial System of the Confederate States of America. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1941.

Russell, George Ely. "Court Depositions and Affidavits as Evidence of Age in Maryland, 1637-1657." Maryland Magazine of Genealogy 2 (1979): 68-75.

Sanborn, Melinde Lutz. Ages from Court Records, 1636-1770: Essex, Middlesex, and Suffolk Counties, Massachusetts. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 2003.

Scott, Kenneth, ed. New York Historical Manuscripts: Minutes of the Mayor's Court of New York, 1674-1675. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1983.

Snyder, Terri L. Brabbling Women: Disorderly Speech and the Law in Early Virginia. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2003.

Utley, Robert M. Lone Star Justice: The First Century of the Texas Rangers. New York: Berkeley Books, 2003.

Wiener, Frederick B. Civilians Under Military Justice: British Practice Since 1689, Especially in North America. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1967.

Wolfe, William A., and Janet B. Wolfe. Names and Abstracts from the Acts of the Legislative Council of the Territory of Florida, 1822-1845. Tallahassee: Florida State Genealogical Society, 1991.

Wyatt-Brown, Bertram. Southern Honor: Ethics and Behavior in the Old South. New York: Oxford University Press, 1982.

Slave Law and Court

Crawford, Paul. "A Footnote on Courts for Trial for Negroes in Pennsylvania." Journal of Black Studies 5 (December 1974): 167-74.

Hoffer, Peter Charles. The Great New York Conspiracy of 1741: Slavery, Crime, and Colonial Law. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2003.

Klebaner, Benjamin J. "American Manumission Laws and the Responsibility for Supporting Slaves." Virginia Magazine of History and Biography 63 (1955): 443-53.

McPherson, Robert G. "Geor.gia Slave Trials, 1837-1849." American Journal of Legal History 4 (1960): 257-84; 364-77. Includes cases.

Missouri's Early Slave Laws: A History in Documents. Laws Concerning Slavery in Missouri, Territorial to 1850s. Online at http://www.sos.mo.gov/archives/education/aahi/earlyslavelaws/slavelaws.asp. Description of the Code Noirin Colonial Louisiana and the Black Code in the Missouri Territory.

Schafer, Judith Kelleher. Becoming Free, Remaining Free: Manumission and Enslavement in New Orleans, 1846-1862. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2003.

Senesé, Donald J. "The Free Negro and the South Carolina Courts, 1790-1860." South Carolina Historical Magazine 68 (1967): 140-53, 265.

Steel, Edward M., Jr. "Black Monongalians: A Judicial View of Slavery and the Negro in Monongalia County, 1776-1865." West Virginia 34 (1972-73): 331-59.

Tushnet, Mark V. Slave Law in the American South: State v Mann in History and Literature. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2003.

Special Topics

Bramwell, B. S. "Frequency of Cousin Marriages." Genealogists' Magazine 8 (1939): 305-16.

Gordon, Sarah Barringer. The Mormon Question: Polygamy and Constitutional Conflict in Nineteenth Century America. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 2002.

Miller, Alan N. Middle Tennessee's Forgotten Children. Apprentices from 1784 to 1902. Baltimore: Clearfield, 2004.

---. East Tennessee's Forgotten Children: Apprentices from 1778 to 1911. 2000; reprint, Baltimore: Clearfield, 2003.

Naanes, Ted, and Loretto D. Szucs. "Dead Men Do Tell Tales: Coroner's Records." Ancestry Magazine 12, no. 2 (March-April 1994): 6-11.

Naylor, Chris. "You have the body" Habeas Corpus Case Records of the U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Columbia, 1820-1863." Prologue 37, no. 3 (Fall 2005). Online at http://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/2005/fall/habeas-corpus.html.

Phillimore, W. P. W., and Edward A. Fry, comps. An Index to Changes of Name Under Authority of Act of Parliament...1760-1901. Phillimore, 1905; reprint, Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1968.

---. "Terms of Relationship in Colonial Times." American Genealogist 55 (1979): 52-54.

Porter, Roy, and David Wright, eds. The Confinement of the Insane: International Perspectives, 1800-1965. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 2003.

Provine, Dorothy. District of Columbia Indentures of Apprenticeship, 1801-1893. Lovettsville, Va.: Willow Bend Books, 1998.

Sanborn, Melinde Lutz. Ages from Court Records, 1636-1700, Essex, Middlesex, and Suffolk Counties, Massachusetts. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 2003.

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