Born on November 12, 1770, in Philadelphia, Province of Pennsylvania, British America,[1] Hopkinson received an Artium Baccalaureus degree in 1786 from the University of Pennsylvania, an Artium Magister degree in 1789 from the same institution and read law in 1791,[1] with William Rawle and James Wilson.

[1] In 1819, Hopkinson argued several landmark constitutional cases before the United States Supreme Court, including Dartmouth College v. Woodward, Sturges v. Crowninshield and McCulloch v.

[3] Hopkinson's 1833 opinion in Wheaton v. Peters established the foundations of modern American copyright law.

[3] His civic and cultural activities included service as President of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and as Vice-President of the American Philosophical Society (elected in 1815).

[6] Hopkinson also penned the edition's preface and "The Life of the Author,"[7] marking the first instance of published American literary criticism of Shakespeare.

The public quarrels between British editors regarding their analyses, Hopkinson believed, stemmed from a desire for self-aggrandizement that detracted from Shakespeare's work itself.