For nearly nine decades after the United States Constitution was ratified, those needing to research federal law had no official codification upon which to authoritatively rely.
It was not until 1866 and the administration of President Andrew Johnson that the Congress finally approved Sumner's An Act to provide for the Revision and Consolidation of the Statute Laws of the United States.
President Ulysses S. Grant renewed the appointment of Charles Pinckney James but called on Benjamin Vaughan Abbott and Victor C. Barringer to replace Cushing and Johnston.
Congress then authorized a joint committee to appoint someone to finish the project, and Washington D.C. lawyer Thomas Jefferson Durant then finalized a revision that undid the substantive changes made by the commission.
[6] Thus, over time, researchers once again had to delve through many volumes of the United States Statutes at Large or use unofficial, privately published supplements.
[6] According to the preface to the United States Code, "From 1897 to 1907 a commission was engaged in an effort to codify the great mass of accumulating legislation.