Search Results: Early Republic & Revolution from Respublica Books LLC

London: Printed for R. and J. Dodsley in Pall-Mall, 1758. Second edition. Two volumes. Octavo. Contemporary full leather, spine labels. Scuffing to boards; offsetting to endpapers from leather tips; spotting and toning to certain leaves with occasional foxing; starting to front joints; wear to leather and boards, particularly at corners. Two in-tact folding maps. A bright and well-preserved second edition of this classic survey of European settlements in the Americas, in two volumes, with originally issued folding maps. From the personal library of Dr. Thomas E. Lovejoy, famed American ecologist, biologist, and conservationist. Very good.. Second edition of An Account of the European Settlements in America, attributed to Edmund Burke (1729-1797), who is believed to have revised the initial account authored (or co-authored) by purported kinsman William Burke (1729-1798). Edmund Burke is today best remembered for his Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790), which offered an enduring polemic… Read More

London: Printed for Timothy Goodwin, at the Queen's Head against St. Dunstan's Church in Fleet Street, 1694. Third edition corrected. Octavo. Three works bound together in attractive contemporary paneled calf, re-backed. Minor scuffing and wear to boards, including one-inch surface chip to front panel; owner notations to front pastedown and titles of the first two books; occasional marginalia and spotting and toning to leaves; faint staining affecting upper-right corner of certain leaves of third book; offsetting to certain leaves; else a bright and impressive assembly of these influential works, custom bound into one volume together with accompanying advertisements.. An Account of Denmark: London: Printed for Timothy Goodwin, at the Queen's Head against St. Dunstan's Church in Fleet Street, 1694. Third edition corrected. An Account of Sueden: London: Printed for Tim. Goodwin at the Queen's Head, against St. Dunstan's Church in Fleet Street, 1694. First edition. Franco-Gallia: London: Printed for… Read More

American Colonies, 1775. Original engraved boxwood block, 3 x 4 inches, three-quarters-inch deep, together with a uniformly framed modern impression. A few hair-line surface clefts and two larger clefts, one along the flag's edge and the other at flag center. Exceptionally rare and well-preserved Revolutionary War artifact depicting one of the most famous and enduring symbols and mottos of the colonial fight for independence.. Remarkable eighteenth-century engraved woodblock depicting an uncoiled rattlesnake against the thirteen-stripe flag emblazoned with the motto "Don't Tread on Me" set diagonally below. This original woodblock would have been used during the Revolutionary War to reproduce this defiant cartoon in colonial pamphlets, newspapers, and broadsides during the fight for independence. The cartoon's thirteen stripes represented the thirteen colonies, and the threatening serpent posed a striking warning to those who would dare tread upon their freedom. The rattlesnake was a well-known… Read More

London: Printed, and are to be sold by the Booksellers of London and Westminster, 1698. First edition. Folio (310 x 200 mm). Modern brown quarter calf, red morocco spine label and raised bands, with marbled boards, edges sprinkled red. Comes in a blue, flat-back cloth box. Ownership signature of "Adam Brown, 1797," and shelf mark to title page, several annotations and ink marks to contents, including sig. 302 verso. Contents occasionally spotted with small nick to top edge of S4 and short closed tear to lower edge of 2V2, else a very bright and clean copy housed in a nice custom box.. First edition of this major work of republican theory by English politician and republican theorist Algernon Sidney (1623-1683). Sidney wrote his Discourses Concerning Government between 1681 and 1683, and it originally circulated in manuscript form as a polemical refutation of Sir Robert Filmer's Patriarcha (1680), which defended the divine right of kings under absolute monarchy. Sidney opposed absolute monarchy as a… Read More

Richmond, Virginia: Appeals Press, Inc, 1922. Limited edition reprinting (No. 24 of 190). Quarto. Brown linen boards with paper label to front cover. Printed on laid paper with fore-edge untrimmed; uncut. Minor scuffing to front board, else fine.. Richard Bland (1710-1776) was an American planter and statesman from the State of Virginia who played a prominent role in the American debates that led to the Revolutionary War. He was an outspoken advocate for colonial self-determination and was opposed to British taxation and governance policies. He was active in state and colonial government, serving as a representative in the Virginia House of Burgesses, a member of the Virginia Committees of Correspondence and Safety, a delegate to five Virginia conventions, and an elected representative in the First and Second Continental Congresses. Bland studied law and history at the College of William and Mary before serving as a justice of the peace in Prince George County and as a militia officer in 1739. Bland… Read More

London: Printed for Henry Sampson Woodfall in Pater Noster Row, 1773. Small octavo. Two volumes. Leather bound in full period calf unlettered with gilt fillets. Rubbing to corners and minor spotting and toning throughout, else near-fine.. A superb copy of the collected edition of the Junius Letters. Originally published in the London Public Advertiser from January 21, 1769 to January 21, 1772 under the pseudonym "Junius," the so-called "Junius Letters" were polemical letters directed to, and highly critical of, the government of King George III. In the letters, Junius poured brilliant and slanderous invective upon Tory-minded English ministers on account of various public policies that allegedly ruined England and drove the American colonies toward rebellion. The letters were widely regarded as polemical masterpieces by English and American observers, and they were widely reprinted in English and colonial newspapers, lending moral support to the early revolutionary cause in America. Among other… Read More

London: Printed for A. Millar, opposite to Catherine-Street, in the Strand, 1749. First authorized edition. Octavo. Two works bound together in contemporary quarter calf, marbled boards with vellum corners, black morocco spine label letters in gilt. Some scuffing to boards, contemporary ink signature to front fly-leaf: "P Griffin St. Edmund Hall, Oxon, July 1764." Bright and well-preserved. Very good-plus.. Letters, on the Spirit of Patriotism: London: Printed for A. Millar, opposite to Catherine-Street, in the Strand, 1749. First authorized edition. Letters of the Honourable Algernon Sydney: London: Printed for R. Dodsley, at Tully's Head in Pall-Mall, 1742. First edition. First authorized edition of Henry St. John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke's (1678-1751) most influential political tracts, bound together with the first edition of the letters of Algernon Sidney (1623-1683) to Henry Savile. Assembling Bolingbroke's three famous Letters written in the 1730s following his exile from England upon the… Read More

Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1965. First edition. Octavo. Original green cloth, with gold titling to spine, and dust jacket (not price-clipped). Minor edgewear with spotting and dusting to page block; prior owner name and date to front free endpaper; faint toning and spotting to dust jacket with minor edgewear, particularly at lower hinges.. A collection of fourteen influential pamphlets of the American Revolution assembled and edited by Bernard Bailyn (1905-1987). Originally conceived as the first volume in a four-volume series (assembling seventy-two pamphlets in all) to be published by the Belknap Press of Harvard University as part of the John Harvard Library Series, this would be the only volume of the series ever published. The pamphlets included in this first and only volume include Richard Bland's The Colonel Dismounted (1764), James Otis's The Rights of the British Colonies (1764), and Daniel Dulany's Considerations on the Propriety of Imposing… Read More

London: Printed for J. Dodsley, in Pall-Mall, 1790. First edition. Octavo. Period-style half calf and marbled boards, red morocco spine label. Offsetting to endpapers from leather tips, title page browned and spotting to certain leaves. Todd identifies three editions with a 1790 title page, comprising ten impressions. Todd's setting a of [A]2 with the ornamental flower on p. [iv] pointing to the right and the "M" in the imprint immediately below the first "D" of "Dodsley" and setting x of 2A2 with no press figure on p. 354. SC/2/6.. First edition of Edmund Burke's (1729-1797) enduring polemic against the French Revolution and defense of conservative principles. The publication of Burke's pamphlet in 1790 would prove a watershed moment in the birth and development of modern conservatism, as Reflections has been credited as among the first-and finest-transformative statements of traditionalism into a fully conceived political philosophy. Burke was an Irish statesman who served in the House of Commons… Read More

London: Printed for J. Debrett, opposite Burlington-House, Piccadilly, 1784. First English edition. Octavo. Three-quarter leather and marbled boards with gold tooling and gilt title to spine; cover beautifully refurbished by master bookbinder Scott K. Kellar, with new black endpapers; small bookseller notations in pencil to front flyleaf and minor spotting to front and rear leaves, else pages exceptionally bright. Near-fine in a handsomely restored binding.. First English edition of Abbé de Mably's (1709-1785) letters to John Adams on the American approach to government as found in the laws of the thirteen colonies. Mably, a popular French writer, historian, and philosopher, met Adams in Paris while Adams was visiting in late 1782 as chief of the American delegation to negotiate a peace treaty with England. Adams recorded that he and Mably discussed Mably's interest in composing a work on the constitutions found within America, and Mably would later maintain that he wrote his Remarks at Adams's… Read More

Boston: Printed at the Repertory Office, 1804. Pamphlet. Wraps, 9 x 6 inches, 15 pp. Contemporary, likely original, plain blue wrappers, sewn, untrimmed; text slightly browned with foxing throughout and some contemporary marginalia. Short inscription on head of front wrapper.. An uncommon first edition of A Sketch of the Character of Alexander Hamilton, attributed to the influential Massachusetts Federalist and famed orator Fisher Ames, in contemporary (and likely the original) plain blue wrappers, untrimmed and bound with original thread binding. Ames was widely recognized for his oratorical skills and fervent opposition to Jeffersonian democracy. Prior to the election of 1800, Ames urged Hamilton to align with the Federalists and nominate Aaron Burr for President over Thomas Jefferson. Despite Ames's pleas, Hamilton broke with the Federalists and supported Jefferson, which ultimately resulted in Jefferson's victory amidst the contentious Electoral College tie. After Hamilton's death in 1804… Read More

Worcester: Printed by Isaiah Thomas, Jun. sold by him and by Mathew Carey, Philadelphia; also by the various Booksellers throughout the United States, 1802. First US edition. Two volumes bound as one. Contemporary calf. Re-backed, new endpapers, hole in upper margin of title and adjacent leaves, tear on final leaf affecting a few letters, browning and offsetting to pages. Enclosed in an open-end case of brown cloth with leather tips.. The first American edition of Montesquieu's (1689-1755) classic work of political theory that helped form the American Constitution. Montesquieu first published The Spirit of Laws in 1748 in his native France (as De l'esprit des loix) anonymously, in part because his works were subject to censorship. The book became recognized for its pioneering work on political theory and comparative law, and was rapidly translated into other languages and published throughout Europe. Thomas Nugent, the influential Irish historian and travel writer, published the first English… Read More

Worcester: Printed by Isaiah Thomas, Jun. sold by him and by Mathew Carey, Philadelphia; also by the various Booksellers throughout the United States, 1802. First US edition. Two volumes. Modern calf-backed marbled boards. Some browning of text, generally light. Contemporary signature of "Jos. Allen" on titles. Enclosed in an open-end cloth case.. The first American edition of Montesquieu's (1689-1755) classic work of political theory that helped form the American Constitution. Montesquieu first published The Spirit of Laws in 1748 in his native France (as De l'esprit des loix) anonymously, in part because his works were subject to censorship. The book became recognized for its pioneering work on political theory and comparative law, and was rapidly translated into other languages and published throughout Europe. Thomas Nugent, the influential Irish historian and travel writer, published the first English translation in 1750, but in 1751 the Roman Catholic Church placed the work on its Index… Read More

Philadelphia: Sold by H. and P. Rice, No. 50 Market-Street, 1793. Duodecimo. Contemporary blue paper wrappers with early manuscript title on front wrapper. Wrappers are worn with neat repair along spine; rear wrapper discolored. Shorthand annotation on front free endpaper and second plate. Small tear to outer margin of initial leaves not affecting text. Minor soiling to folding plate with tear to inner margin just touching text of leaves B1-B2, else very good. Includes the subscriber list as well as two engraved plates.. An exceptional copy of one of the earliest shorthand manuals printed in America-and this copy is rarer still because it contains the oft-missing subscriber list, which includes Thomas Jefferson (then Secretary of State), James Madison (then a Virginia representative), and members of Congress, among others. This short manual describes the shorthand system of Thomas Lloyd (1756-1827), who was known as the "Father of American Shorthand" on account of his stenographic skill and method… Read More