Note 508 — Chapter V
Reading edition
In Marshall's time the college laws provided that "No liquors shall be furnished or used at [the college students'] table except beer, cider, toddy or spirits and water." (History of William and Mary College (Baltimore, 1870), 44; and see Fithian, Feb. 12, 1774, 106-07.)
Twelve years after Marshall took his hasty law course at William and Mary College, a college law was published prohibiting "the drinking of spirituous liquors (except in that moderation which becomes the prudent and industrious student)." (History of William and Mary College, 44.)
In 1769 the Board of Visitors formally resolved that for professors to marry was "contrary to the principles on which the College was founded, and their duty as Professors"; and that if any professor took a wife "his Professorship be immediately vacated." (Resolution of Visitors, Sept. 1, 1769; ib., 45.) This law was disregarded; for, at the time when Marshall attended William and Mary, four out of the five professors were married men.
The college laws on drinking were merely a reflection of the customs of that period. (See chaps. VII and VIII.) This historic institution of learning turned out some of the ablest and best-educated men of the whole country. Wythe, Bland, Peyton and Edmund Randolph, Taylor of Caroline, Nicholas, Pendleton, Madison, and Jefferson are a few of the William and Mary's remarkable products. Every one of the most distinguished families of Virginia is found among her alumni. (See Catalogue of Alumni, History of William and Mary College, 73-147. An error in this list puts John Marshall in the class of 1775 instead of that of 1780; also, he did not graduate.)