Old sheep, y.e. Initialled by Jefferson at sig. I and T. With the Library of Congress 1815 bookplate. On the title-page the author’s autograph inscription: M ^r Cooper to M ^r Jefferson .

Presentation copy from the author. On July 25, 1812, Cooper wrote from Carlisle to Jefferson: “. . . When my edition of Justinian’s Institutes is out, which will be in about three months, I will beg your acceptance of a copy. I have already printed the text and translation amounting to 400 pages, and 150 pages of notes. Having had the misfortune of losing by fire great part of my collections for notes, I am obliged to use the intervals of my leisure here, to compose as fast as I can for the Printer, who keeps even daily pace with me. But hurried as I am (lecturing also thrice a week) I shall not scruple to risk the publication. I expect the additional notes, preface and index will occupy about 150 pages more, making a volume of 700 pages. I have preferred correcting the diffuse and awkward translation of Harris, to composing entirely a new one, and I have aimed at the difficult task of keeping the translation within bounds of space not much exceeding the original . . .”

Eighteen months later, on January 16, 1814, Jefferson wrote to Cooper: “ . . . your Justinian came safely also, and I have been constantly meaning to acknolege it, but I wished at the same time to say something more. I posessed Theophilus’s, Vinnius’s and Harris’s editions; but read over your notes, and the Addenda et Corrigenda, and especially the parallels with the English law, with great satisfaction and edification. your edition will be very useful to our lawyers, some of whom will need the translation as well as the Notes . . . ”

On May 20, 1817, Dr. John Manners of Flemington, New Jersey, wrote to Jefferson a long letter on legal matters, and made reference to this book: “. . . Judge Peters contends that the federal courts are invested with common law jurisdiction. Of the latter opinion is my father-in-law Judge Cooper, under whose direction my legal studies were conducted, & to whom I am indebted for whatever talents, as a lawyer, I may be thought to possess, as expressed in his edition of Justinian (p 415), altho he seems to have expressed a different opinion in Cooper’s Bankrupt Law (p 230 & 283) . . .”

Jefferson replied to this letter from Monticello on June 12 and, in reference to this part of Manners’ letter, wrote: “ . . . I have turned to the passage you refer to in Judge Cooper’s Justinian, and should suppose the general expressions there used would admit of modification conformable to this doctrine. it would alarm me indeed, in any case, to find myself entertaining an opinion different from that of a judgment so accurately organised as his. but I am quite persuaded that whenever Judge Cooper shall be led to consider that question simply and nakedly, it is so much within his course of thinking, as liberal as logical, that, rejecting all blind and undefined obligation, he will hold to the positive and explicit precepts of the law alone . . . ”