The Journal of the Joint Committee of Fifteen on Reconstruction: 39th Congress, 1865-1867 (Studies in History, Economics, and Public Law)

President Johnson's failure to pursue an aggressive Reconstruction policy incited Congress to supplant his authority by establishing the Joint Committee of Fifteen on Reconstruction, which drafted the Civil Rights Act (1866), the Reconstruction Act (1867) and the Fourteenth Amendment (1868), which contains the important and oft-debated "due process" clause. Due to a series of mishaps the committee's journal was never printed by the government. Brought home by Senator William Pitt Fessenden, one of the committee's members, it remained in his family until it was sold at auction. It was finally acquired by Columbia University, where it remains today. Kendrick offers the complete text of the journal (166 pages) and an extensive history of the committee's work. Published originally in the Columbia University series Studies in History, Economics and Public Law, this work is cited frequently in the literature on Reconstruction. It is a primary reference, for example, in Raould Berger's landmark study Government by Judiciary: The Transformation of the Fourteenth Amendment (1977). Originally published: New York: Columbia University Press, 1914.