From: johnl@iecc.com

>I can't recall having seen any citations of English cases after 1776,
>and I'm pretty sure I'd remember that because I'd recall questioning the
>legal authority of such a precedent.

In the 1800s the Court cited English law all the time.  See, for
example, the patent case Pennock & Sellers v. Dialogue - 27 U.S. 1
(1829), where Justice Story discussed the Statute of Monopolies as the
legislative antecedent of US patent law, and cites Wood v. Zimmer, 1
Holt's N.P. 58.

You can find a copy of the case here:

http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/27/1/case.html

I see from googling around that Jefferson hated the idea of using
English law as US precedent, but as so often happened, the country
went in a different direction.

R's,
John
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