Tapping Reeve House and Law School | |
![]() East elevation and north profile of Tapping Reeve House, 2010 | |
Location | Litchfield, CT |
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Coordinates | 41°44′38″N73°11′19″W / 41.74395°N 73.18851°W |
Built | 1784 |
NRHP reference No. | 66000879 |
Significant dates | |
Added to NRHP | October 15, 1966 [1] |
Designated NHL | December 21, 1965 [2] |
The Litchfield Law School was a law school in Litchfield, Connecticut, that operated from 1774 to 1833. Litchfield was the first independent law school established in America for reading law. Founded and led by lawyer Tapping Reeve, the proprietary school was unaffiliated with any college or university. [3] While Litchfield was independent, a long-term debate resulted in the 1966 recognition of William & Mary Law School as the first law school to have been affiliated with a university. [4]
Reeve began teaching his first student in 1774 and was teaching by lecture by 1784. Reeve later became the Chief Justice of the Connecticut Supreme Court. The school closed in 1833, having educated over 1,100 students, including Aaron Burr and John C. Calhoun. The law school, including Reeve's house, was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1965 as the Tapping Reeve House and Law School, [2] [5] which is owned and operated by the Litchfield Historical Society as a museum displaying life in a 19th-century period school. [6] The Society also operates the Litchfield History Museum.
Reeve was born on Long Island, New York, in 1744. He graduated from the College of New Jersey (now Princeton University) in 1763, serving for seven years as a tutor at the Grammar School that was connected with the college. There he met the children of Aaron Burr Sr.—Aaron Burr (later Vice President of the United States) and Sally Burr, who were both his students.
Tapping Reeve moved to Connecticut and studied law under Judge Jesse Root of Hartford, and was admitted to the bar in 1772. In the same year, he married Sally Burr. They then moved to Litchfield and Reeve started his own law practice. Tapping Reeve built his six-room Litchfield house in 1773 and settled in with his wife. In 1780 he added a downstairs wing for Sally, who found it difficult to climb stairs.
In addition to practicing law, Reeve trained many prospective attorneys, including Aaron Burr, his brother in law. Students lived in the homes of town residents and traveled to Reeve's house on South Street to receive their morning lectures on the common law in Reeve's downstairs parlor. In 1784, in response to increasing demand, Reeve had a one-room school built adjacent to his house. [7] James Gould became Reeve's associate when Reeve was elected to the Connecticut Supreme Court in 1798. Reeve withdrew in 1820 and Gould continued until 1833. The school's lectures covered the entire body of the law including real estate, rights of persons, rights of things, contracts, torts, evidence, pleading, crimes, and equity.[ citation needed ]
The list of students who attended Tapping Reeve's law school includes two Vice Presidents of the United States (Aaron Burr and John C. Calhoun), 101 members of the United States House of Representatives, 28 United States senators, six United States cabinet secretaries, three justices of the United States Supreme Court, 14 state governors and 13 state supreme court chief justices. Litchfield Law School students also held state and local political office and became business leaders. Students went on to found university law schools and become university presidents. [8] Framed pictures of students are still hung in the school, including George Catlin, Horace Mann (the educator), Aaron Burr, Oliver Wolcott Jr., and Roger Sherman Baldwin. Each name is followed by the year that the student finished, when known. [9]
Nathaniel Smith was a nineteenth-century lawyer, cattle dealer, judge and politician. He served as a U.S. Representative from Connecticut and as a judge of the Supreme Court of Connecticut.
Roger Sherman Baldwin was an American politician who served as the 32nd Governor of Connecticut from 1844 to 1846 and a United States senator from 1847 to 1851. As a lawyer, his career was most notable for his participation in the 1841 Amistad case.
Henry Waggaman Edwards was an American lawyer, a Democrat, and the 27th and 29th governor of the U.S. state of Connecticut. He previously served in both the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives.
Aaron Burr Sr. was a notable Presbyterian minister and college educator in colonial America. He was a founder of the College of New Jersey and the father of Aaron Burr (1756–1836), the third vice president of the United States.
Litchfield is a town in and former county seat of Litchfield County, Connecticut, United States. The population was 8,192 at the 2020 census. The town is part of the Northwest Hills Planning Region. The boroughs of Bantam and Litchfield are located within the town. There are also three unincorporated villages: East Litchfield, Milton, and Northfield. Northfield, located in the southeastern corner of Litchfield, is home to a high percentage of the Litchfield population.
William Wolcott Ellsworth was a Yale-educated attorney who served as the 30th governor of Connecticut, a three-term United States Congressman, a justice of the State Supreme Court.
Rebecca Minot Prescott (1742–1813) was the second wife of United States Founding Father Roger Sherman.
Tapping Reeve was an American lawyer, judge, and law educator. In 1784 he opened the Litchfield Law School, the first law school in the United States, in Litchfield, Connecticut.
Roger Minott Sherman was a lawyer and politician from Fairfield County, Connecticut.
Richard Skinner was an American politician, attorney, and jurist who served as the ninth governor of Vermont.
Zephaniah Swift was an eighteenth-century American author, judge, lawyer, chief justice, congressman, law professor, diplomat and politician from Windham, Connecticut. He served as a U.S. Representative from Connecticut and State Supreme Court Judge. He wrote the first legal treatise published in America.
Jabez Williams Huntington was a United States representative and Senator from Connecticut.
Samuel Augustus Foot was the 28th Governor of Connecticut as well as a United States representative and Senator.
Samuel Shethar Phelps was an American lawyer and politician. He was a United States senator from Vermont, and a member of the Whig Party.
The Litchfield Female Academy in Litchfield, Connecticut, founded in 1792 by Sarah Pierce, was one of the most important institutions of female education in the United States. During the 30 years after its opening the school enrolled more than 2,000 students from 17 states and territories of the new republic, as well as Canada and the West Indies. Some 1,848 students known to have attended the school have been identified through school lists, diaries and journals, correspondence, as well as art and needlework done at the school. Many more, unidentified to date, attended, especially before 1814, when formal attendance lists were first kept. The longevity of the school, the size of the enrollments, the wide geographic distribution of the student body, the development of the curriculum and the training of teachers, all distinguish it from the numerous other female academies of the Early Republic. The young women were exposed to ideas and customs from all the relatively isolated parts of the new nation, developing a more national perspective than most Americans of the period.
Thomas Tucker Whittlesey was an American lawyer and politician who served as a U.S. Representative from Connecticut from 1836 to 1839.
Litchfield Historic District, in Litchfield, Connecticut, is a National Historic Landmark District designated in 1968 as a notable and well-preserved example of a typical late 18th century New England village. As a National Historic Landmark, it is listed on the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP). It is the core area of a larger NRHP-listed historic district that includes the entire borough of Litchfield and was designated a state historic district in 1959.
James Gould was a jurist and an early professor at the Litchfield Law School.
Anson Dickinson was an American painter of miniature portraits who achieved fame during his lifetime, producing a very large number of works, but who is now largely forgotten.
Milo Lyman Bennett was an American jurist who served as an associate justice of the Vermont Supreme Court.
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(help) and Accompanying 5 photos, exterior, from 1965 and 1974.