Skip to Main Content

Legislative Petitions

Virginia legislative petitions (1776–1865)

Search Legislative Petitions, 1776–1865

Overview

As the primary catalyst for legislation, petitions played a vital role in Virginia politics before 1865. Legislative petitions serve as a vibrant register of popular opinion on matters both public and private. Additionally, they are a useful tool in historical and genealogical research, often containing hundreds of signatures as well as supplementary documents such as maps, wills, naturalizations, deeds, resolutions, affidavits, judgments, and other items. 

One of the most basic civil rights that English settlers brought with them to Virginia was the right to petition the government. Legislative petitions became the only form in which private or specific local or provincial matters could be introduced for deliberation in the House of Burgesses. With the adoption of the U.S. Bill of Rights in 1791, the right "to assemble and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances" was guaranteed. 

Petitions enabled citizens to communicate with their state representatives, serving as an important indicator of public opinion. The right to petition was not restricted by class, race, or sex; as a result, women, free Black people, and enslaved people petitioned the General Assembly, although these groups were denied the right to vote. Petitions usually addressed local needs, including internal improvements (such as canals and roads), the troubles that sheriffs encountered in collecting taxes, and county divisions. Petitions often sought legislative action, financial aid, and divorce. Petitions also document requests for the emancipation of enslaved persons, campaigns for the abolition of slavery, and complaints about the activities of free Black people. Religious petitions ranged from philosophical calls for religious freedom to proposals for lotteries to fund new church buildings.

Over the years, many petitions were legally withdrawn from the clerk’s office, and others were lost. The present Legislative Petitions collection contains nearly 25,000 items dating from 1776 to 1865, as well as some petitions presented to the House of Burgesses and the Revolutionary Conventions. Surviving petitions dating prior to 1776 may be found in the Colonial Papers, a fragmentary collection that includes letters and petitions to the royal governors and House of Burgesses.

Search Tips

  • Entries are searchable by name, locality, and keyword(s). Petitions with names of many petitioners should be searched with the keyword "citizens" or "inhabitants," as not every name is indexed when there are multiple petitioners.
  • To narrow by date, use the Publication Dates filter or Advanced Search option on the search results page.
  • Using quotes around phrases may return fewer, more relevant results.
  • Boolean operators OR, NOT and AND written in ALL CAPS may be used. By default, all search terms will be combined with the AND operator. To exclude terms, use the NOT operator before a term.
  • Wildcards can be used to find variant spellings or words. The question mark (?) will match any one character. For instance, "Ols?n" will match "Olsen" or "Olson". The asterisk (*) will match any number of characters (including zero). "Ch*ter" will match "Charter", "Character", and "Chapter", and "Temp*" will match "Temptation", "Temple", and "Temporary".

To narrow searches by subject, use the subject headings below. You may also select a category from the Subjects filter on the search results page.

Note: subjects related to African Americans include "Enslaved persons," "Free Blacks," and "Slavery." However, names of African Americans may also be found in petitions without these subjects.

  • Agriculture/Livestock/Farming
  • Appropriations/Salary Increases
  • Bridges
  • Canals
  • Charters/Incorporations
  • Churches/Religious Issues
  • Citizenship/Naturalizations
  • Commerce
  • Constitutional Conventions
  • Courts/Judicial System
  • Division of County/New County
  • Divorce
  • Elections
  • Enslaved persons
  • Ferries/Packets
  • Fishing/Oyster Industry
  • Flour Inspection/Industry
  • Free Blacks
  • Indians
  • Land/Real Estate
  • Manufacturers/Manufacturing Companies
  • Militia/Public Guard
  • Mining/Mining Companies
  • Miscellaneous
  • Navigation/Navigation Companies
  • Organizations
  • Paper Money
  • Pardons/Release from Fines, Judgments, etc.
  • Private Relief/Compensation
  • Prohibition/Temperance
  • Revenue/Taxation
  • Roads/Turnpike Companies
  • Schools/Universities
  • Slavery
  • Tobacco Inspection/Industry
  • Towns
  • War Claims/Pensions
  • Wills and Administrations

Related Resources

Digital Collections

Finding Aids

Publications

  • Church, Randolph W. Virginia Legislative Petitions: Bibliography, Calendar, and Abstracts from Original Sources, 6 May, 1776–21 June, 1782. Richmond: Virginia State Library, 1984.

  • Eckenrode, H. J. A Calendar of Legislative Petitions, Arranged by Counties: Accomac–Bedford. Richmond: D. Bottom, Superintendent of Public Print., 1908.

  • Researchers have abstracted selected petitions from several localities, including Caroline, Charles City, Cumberland, Gloucester, Henry, Isle of Wight, James City, King William, Nansemond, New Kent, Northampton, Rockingham, Southampton, Surry, Westmoreland, and York counties. These abstracts are available in the Archives Research Room at the Library of Virginia.

Microfilm

  • Legislative petitions, 1776–1865, are available on microfilm in the Second Floor Reading Rooms.  The collection is organized into the following series: I. Counties (Reels 1–207), II. Cities (Reels 208–228), III. Kentucky Counties (Reels 229–230), IV. Miscellaneous – Chronological (Reels 231–239), and V. Miscellaneous – Alphabetical (Reel 240).

  • Religious petitions, 1776–1802, are part of the Legislative Petitions microfilm but are also available as a separate microfilm collection (Miscellaneous Reels 425a, 425b, 425c). The microfilm includes a typescript calendar of religious petitions and 423 original petitions.  

  • Colonial papers, 1630–1778, are available on Miscellaneous Reels 609–612.