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Frederick and Samuel Green- Printers at Annapolis
ment and it doubtless had considerable influence in Maryland. He was
a member of the ratifying convention which met at Annapolis in 1788.
On October 30, 1789, he was appointed Chancellor of Maryland and
served in that capacity until his death on January 16, 1806. As one of
Maryland's leading lawyers, he was fully capable of the task of editing
the laws.
He interpreted the act authorizing the publication of the Laws to
include:
"... all subsisting public acts of assembly, the operation of which was not already past; the pro-
ceedings of the last convention, so far as in any manner they respect the declaration of rights, and
the constitution and form of government; the subsisting resolves of convention, and the articles of
confederation."6
All laws which were made for only a limited period of time and whose
term had expired by 1785 were given only by title unless they contained
some unusual or important clause. Also all acts respecting individuals,
small groups of men, schools or parishes were given only by title unless
they were notable for some legal precedent. The resulting volume was
considerably smaller in number of pages than Bacon's Laws and does
not have that same typographical beauty which distinguished the former
as one of the finest products of the printing press in Colonial America.7
A LAST WORD ON THE GREEN FAMILY
Frederick Green was Postmaster at Annapolis for several years in the
decade after the Revolution. The records of the Post Office under the
Continental Congress are not complete enough to show the date of his
appointment and the length of his service but his name is found in sev-
eral of the undated lists of postmasters of the states during that period.8
Samuel Green succeeded him as postmaster and held that position until
his death on January 6, 1811, although he was a staunch Federalist in
the service of a Republican government.
Both brothers were highly esteemed at the time of their deaths; both
retained their positions though opposed to the political party in power.
6 Preface to Laws of Maryland, made since M ,DCC ,LXIII
7 Difficult as it is to point out the features of a printed page which make it inferior to another page printed in the
same type, yet certain imperfect features of Hanson's Laws can be detected when compared with the earlier volume. The
printer crowded too much material into the title page, thus preventing that sufficient contrast which gives the simple
and dignified appearance to the first page of Bacon's Laws. He decreased the number of pages of text by lengthening the
type page. As is so often the case when economy is preferred to good typography, this had an unfortunate effect on the
proportions of the page. The paper, which was probably made in America, is much poorer than that used by Jonas Green
on Bacon's Laws.
8 Papers of the Continental Congress, Vol. 61. Manuscript division, Library of Congress.569I
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