George Washington's Personal 'Acts of Congress'

Ten copies for a new government

In the fall of 1789 the First Federal Congress finished its first session, which ended on September 29. Before leaving New York on his tour of the northern states, President George Washington placed an order with Francis Childs and John Swaine, the official printers of the United States, who held the right to print the government's legislation and documents. He wanted ten leather-bound copies of the Constitution and everything the new Congress had passed.

The printed sheets went to a New York binder named Allen (Mount Vernon's account names him John Allen, a National Archives account Thomas Allen), who bound them in tree calf. Washington's copy got a plaque on the front reading 'President of the United States' and a spine label reading 'Acts of Congress.' Matching volumes went to his department secretaries, Chief Justice John Jay and the associate justices, each lettered with its owner's title. Of these, only three are known to survive: Washington's, Thomas Jefferson's and Jay's.

The 106-page volume holds the ratified Constitution, the 12 amendments Congress proposed to the states on September 25, 1789, of which 10 were ratified as the Bill of Rights in 1791, and the acts that set up the first executive departments. Washington signed the title page in his bold hand and pasted in his engraved armorial bookplate, with the family coat of arms and the motto 'exitus acta probat,' 'the result is the test of the actions.'

A president reading his job description

Washington hardly ever wrote in his books, unlike John Adams, whose books are crowded with opinions in the margins. That is what makes this volume extraordinary: every one of its notes sits beside the text of the Constitution, where Washington drew neat brackets around passages that mattered to him.

Next to Article II, Section 2, the clause letting the president ask department heads for written opinions and requiring the Senate's advice and consent on treaties, he wrote 'President' and 'Powers.' Beside Article II, Section 3, which says the president shall report to Congress on the state of the union, he wrote 'Required.' He also marked passages in Article I on the presidential veto.

He left no record of when he made the notes. Mount Vernon's historians think early 1790 is most likely, when he was preparing his first annual message to Congress, and almost certainly before fall 1790, when a newer volume would have replaced this one. The notes seem to separate what he must do, report to Congress, from what he may do, seek advice.

His first year shows why that line mattered. In August 1789 he went to the Senate in person to ask its advice on instructions for a peace commission to the Creek Nation. The senators declined to debate it on the spot and asked for more time; Washington lost his temper, came back a few days later, and concluded the Senate could not serve as a quick-acting council. He turned to his department secretaries instead, and on November 26, 1791, convened the first cabinet meeting, a body the Constitution never created.

From 75 cents to $9.8 million

Washington ordered an updated volume each fall, and when he retired in March 1797 he took all seven home to his study at Mount Vernon. After his death on December 14, 1799, he left his 'library of Books and Pamphlets of every kind' to his nephew Bushrod Washington, an associate justice of the Supreme Court. The estate inventory valued this annotated first volume at 75 cents.

The book stayed with the Washington family until 1876. On November 28 of that year it sold at auction in Philadelphia to C.H. Hart for $13. In April 1892 it sold again, for $1,150, to Phoebe Hearst, and it later belonged to her son, the newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst. After passing through a Massachusetts foundation, it was bought on November 17, 1964, at auction in New York by Pennsylvania businessman and colonial art collector H. Richard Dietrich Jr.; it stayed with him and then his estate until 2012. Sources also spell the name Dietrick and Deutrich, and one names the buyer as the Dietrich American Foundation.

Offered at auction in New York on June 22, 2012, it was expected to bring as much as $3 million. The Mount Vernon Ladies' Association and an unidentified bidder pushed it to $9,826,500, called a world auction record for an American book or historical document. The previous high for a Washington item was $3.2 million, paid in 2009 for his 1787 letter to Bushrod Washington about the Constitution. Mount Vernon's winning paddle was number 222, for Washington's birthday, February 22.

The purchase was funded by lead gifts from an anonymous benefactor, Mr. and Mrs. William H. Borthwick, the A. Alfred Taubman Fund, Terry J. Kohler and the association itself. 'Washington himself once wrote, the Constitution is our guide, which I will never abandon,' said regent Ann Bookout. 'By acquiring this book, his personal copy of the Constitution, we are taking him quite literally.' It came home almost 136 years after it left.

Back at Mount Vernon

Mount Vernon first showed the volume in its Donald W. Reynolds Museum from Constitution Day, September 17, 2012, into February 2013, together for the first time with Washington's annotated copy of a printed draft of the Constitution, lent by the National Archives.

It is now kept at the Fred W. Smith National Library for the Study of George Washington, which opened in the fall of 2013, as the centerpiece of a collection that in 2012 held 47 books and 450 documents that belonged to Washington.

There is no other copy of the Constitution that its first president marked up. In Washington's words to the Boston selectmen in 1795, quoted by Mount Vernon: 'the constitution is the guide, that I will never abandon.'

Timeline

1. Mar 4, 1789

   The First Congress meets at Federal Hall in New York and declares the Constitution in effect.

2. Apr 30, 1789

   Washington is inaugurated as the first president.

3. Sep 25, 1789

   Congress proposes 12 amendments to the states.

4. Sep 29, 1789

   The first session of Congress ends; Washington orders ten bound copies of its acts.

5. 1790

   Washington most likely annotates his copy while preparing his first annual message (late 1789 to fall 1790).

6. Dec 1791

   Ten of the proposed amendments are ratified as the Bill of Rights.

7. Mar 1797

   Washington retires and brings the volume to Mount Vernon.

8. Dec 14, 1799

   Washington dies; his library, including the Acts, goes to Bushrod Washington. The inventory values the volume at 75 cents.

9. Nov 28, 1876

   The volume leaves the Washington family, selling at auction in Philadelphia to C.H. Hart for $13.

10. Apr 1892

    It sells for $1,150 to Phoebe Hearst; it later belongs to William Randolph Hearst.

11. Nov 17, 1964

    It is bought at auction in New York by collector H. Richard Dietrich Jr.

12. Jun 22, 2012

    The Mount Vernon Ladies' Association buys it at auction in New York for $9,826,500.

13. Sep 17, 2012

    It goes on display at Mount Vernon beside Washington's annotated copy of a draft of the Constitution.

14. 2013

    The Washington Library at Mount Vernon opens and becomes its home.

The world in 1789

• Feb 4, 1789

  Washington is unanimously elected president by the Electoral College.

• Apr 28, 1789

  Fletcher Christian leads the mutiny on HMS Bounty.

• May 5, 1789

  The Estates-General convenes in France for the first time in 175 years, the start of the French Revolution.

• Jul 4, 1789

  Washington signs the Tariff of 1789, the first major law passed by the new Congress.

• Aug 26, 1789

  France proclaims the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen.

• Sep 11, 1789

  Alexander Hamilton is appointed the first secretary of the treasury.

• Sep 24, 1789

  The Judiciary Act establishes the federal courts.

• Nov 26, 1789

  The nation observes a Thanksgiving Day recommended by Washington.

Price record

A realized auction price is what a buyer actually paid on the date shown, including the buyer's premium where the sale reported it. It is the strongest kind of reference price, and it is a record of one sale of one object on one day, not a promise of what the next example will bring.

By reference price, George Washington's Personal 'Acts of Congress' is number 6 of 100 in the memorabilia entries of the FLOAT 100. 100 of those 100 rest on a realized sale; the rest carry an asking price or a guide value, and each page says which. Rank within the FLOAT 100 itself (4 here) is editorial: how much an object defines its field, not price alone.

Did you know

• When Washington died, his estate inventory valued this book at 75 cents.
• Mount Vernon's winning bid in 2012 was placed with paddle number 222, a nod to Washington's February 22 birthday.
• The 2012 price was roughly three times the previous record for any Washington item, $3.2 million for a 1787 letter.
• In 1876 it sold for $13.
• It once belonged to William Randolph Hearst.
• The cabinet appears nowhere in the Constitution; Washington invented it, holding the first meeting on November 26, 1791.
• The book contains 12 proposed amendments, not 10: two were not ratified with the Bill of Rights in 1791.