I was placed, as I said, on the Committee on the Revision of the Laws.

My law practice had been in the interior of the Commonwealth.

So I had little knowledge of United States jurisprudence.

I determined in order to fit myself for my new duties to make a careful study of the statutes and law administered in the United States Courts.
I took with me to Washington a complete set of the Reports of the Supreme Court of the United States and purchased Abbott's Digest of those decisions, then just published.

The first evening after I got settled I spent in reading the opinions of the Supreme Court.