Report of the Committee of Revisors Appointed by the General Assembly of Virginia in MDCCLXXVI

This is the title page of the published version of the 1784 Report of the Committee of Revisors appointed by the General Assembly of Virginia in MDCCLXXVI. In the autumn of 1776 Thomas Jefferson and other Virginia leaders began the process of revising Virginia’s monarchical laws to make them reflect republican principles. The process resulted in a report, first submitted in 1779, which was never passed in full but instead transformed into various bills and enacted piecemeal over the course of nearly a decade. By the time the House of Delegates began to debate this 1784 version of the report, Jefferson had accepted the position of minister plenipotentiary to France. James Madison took the lead in advocating for the revisions. Jefferson wrote in his autobiography, “I considered 4 of these bills, passed or reported, as forming a system by which every fibre would be eradicated of antient or future aristocracy; and a foundation laid for a government truly republican.”