Collections

The Rawle Reading Room At Temple University Law Library

The Rawle Reading Room houses a law library created by William Rawle and his descendants from 1783 through 1860, representing the collections of four generations of outstanding Philadelphia lawyers. This library was created at a time when there were no institutional law libraries in this country.

This unique collection provides a view of the working tools and methods used by lawyers in the early years of our democracy and valuable insights into the origins of the Constitution and the common law system.

Dedicated on March 30, 1992, the Rawle Room is a replica of the mid-19th century library of a prominent Philadelphia lawyer. It was provided by the Rawle Endowment and by a gift from the law firm of Rawle and Henderson.

The Rawle Collection

The Rawle Collection includes more than 4,000 books from the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. Several hundred volumes of particular historical and scholarly interest are displayed in the Rawle Reading Room, with the remainder housed nearby.

The collection includes books printed in the colonies and on English law, books by William Rawle, the elder, by other members of the renowned Rawle family and a "Miscellany of the Law."

Handwritten comments by William Rawle, set down in a precise script, still readable, in faded brown ink, add to the value and historical interest of a number of the books.

One such book is A View of the Constitution of the United States of America, authored by William Rawle, an early work in the field of American constitutional law which was adopted as a textbook at West Point and other institutions. The author's copy of the second edition contains his marginal notes towards a never-completed third edition.

The manuscript, in Rawle's hand, of A Legal Common Place Book is one of the jewels of the collection, described as an "invaluable and a priceless historical document," by former Temple Professor and Law Librarian Erwin C. Surrency, who was instrumental in bringing the collection to the Law School. Within its pages, Rawle collected "commonplaces" or passages important for reference, as a means of legal study.

Also of historical interest are English liberties, printed in Boston in 1721 by James Franklin, the elder brother of Benjamin Franklin, and The Charters of The Province of Pennsylvania and The City of Philadelphia, printed and sold in 1742 by Benjamin Franklin.

Among the other colonial imprints, compiled by Lawrence J. Reilly, reference law librarian, are The Laws of the Province of Pennsylvania, printed and sold by Andrew Bradford, 1728; The Charters and Acts of the Assembly of The Province of Pennsylvania, printed by Peter Miller in 1762 and The Acts of Assembly of the Province of Pennsylvania, printed by Hall and Sellers in 1775.

These books and many other historically interesting books in the Rawle Collection were the working tools of members of the Rawle family and firm and of their peers and colleagues. Still intact after two centuries, this collection is a significant addition to the Law Library and a remarkable resource for students, scholars and legal historians.

William Rawle

William Rawle was the founder of Rawle and Henderson, the law office with the longest continuous practice in the United States.

Rawle was born in Philadelphia in 1759. His father died in a hunting accident in 1761 and his mother remarried Samuel Shoemaker, a Tory who served as mayor of Philadelphia during the British occupation.

When the British troops withdrew, Shoemaker and his family left with them for New York and eventually London. During those years, young Rawle began his study of law, becoming a member of the Middle Temple Inn of Court in England.

In 1782, thanks to a handwritten passport from Benjamin Franklin, then in France, Rawle returned to Philadelphia. In 1783 he passed the bar and opened a law office in his home on Spruce Street in Philadelphia.

In 1789 he was elected to the state legislative assembly, and two years later was appointed as a United States Attorney for Pennsylvania by President George Washington, a post he held for more than eight years. p>Prominent in legal, civic and intellectual affairs, William Rawle wrote, annotated, collected and used many of the legal books now on display in the Rawle Reading Room at Temple Law School.