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The Marshall Court
Introduction: The Supreme Court under John Marshall worked to expand the power of the federal government.
Establishing its place as the interpreter of law and the Constitution, the Court heard many important cases in the first
decades of the nineteenth century. In this exercise, you will examine and learn about four of these cases. As you read
the descriptions of each case and answer the questions, ask how these cases expanded federal power, and at whose
expense. Try to imagine how things might be different had they been decided differently.
Fletcher v. Peck (1810)
In 1795, nearly every member of the Georgia state legislature was bribed to permit the sale of 30 million acres of land at
less than two cents per acre for a total of $500,000. Only one member of the legislature voted against the legislation. The
land was known as the Yazoo lands and eventually became the states of Alabama and Mississippi.
As a result of public outrage, most of the legislators lost the following election and the new legislature passed a statute in
1796 essentially nullifying the transactions. Those who had purchased the land refused to accept the return of their
purchase price and much of the land was resold to bona fide purchasers at great profit.
Robert Fletcher, plaintiff, purchased 15,000 acres from John Peck, defendant, in 1803 for $3,000. Peck, in spite of the
1796 statute, had placed a covenant in the deed that stated that the title to the land had not been constitutionally impaired
by any subsequent act of the state of Georgia. Fletcher sued Peck to establish the constitutionality of the 1796 act; either
the act was constitutional and the contract was void, or the act was unconstitutional and Fletcher had clear title to the
land.
The question the court was asked was whether a law that negates all property rights established under an earlier law
unconstitutional? The court held that a law that negates all property rights established under an earlier law is
unconstitutional for violating the Contract Clause (Article I, Section 10) of the United States Constitution.
The court, while disapproving of the extensive corruption in the earlier state legislature, held that contracts signed under
the original law must be accepted as valid. The motives of the legislators could not be considered by the Court and were
not the responsibility of bona fide purchasers who were following the law. The court acknowledged that a legislature can
repeal any act of a former legislature, but that this principle did not apply where the legislature sought to undo actions
taken under the previous act while it was still valid.
The court held that the land grant was a type of contract, and therefore the Contract Clause (Art. I, sec. 10 of the U.S.
Constitution) applied. The Contract Clause states: “No State shall … pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law
impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.”
The court held that the 1796 law was an unconstitutional ex post facto law that sought to penalize bona fide purchasers
for wrongs committed by those from whom they were purchasing.
Adapted from http://www.lawnix.com/cases/fletcher-peck.html
The Marshall Court
Introduction: The Supreme Court under John Marshall worked to expand the power of the federal government.
Establishing its place as the interpreter of law and the Constitution, the Court heard many important cases in the first
decades of the nineteenth century. In this exercise, you will examine and learn about four of these cases. As you read
the descriptions of each case and answer the questions, ask how these cases expanded federal power, and at whose
expense. Try to imagine how things might be different had they been decided differently.
McCullough v. Maryland (1819)
It was 1819 and the United States had been a nation under the Constitution for barely a generation when an
important case about federal power reached the Court. After a first attempt in 1791, Congress established the
second National Bank of the United States in 1816. Many states opposed branches of the National Bank within
their borders. They did not want the National Bank competing with their own banks, and objected to the
establishment of a National Bank as an unconstitutional exercise of Congress’s power.
The state of Maryland imposed a tax on the bank of $15,000/year, which cashier James McCulloch of the
Baltimore branch refused to pay. The case went to the Supreme Court. Maryland argued that as a sovereign
state, it had the power to tax any business within its borders. McCulloch’s attorneys argued that a national
bank was “necessary and proper” for Congress to establish in order to carry out its enumerated powers.
Chief Justice John Marshall wrote, “Although, among the enumerated powers of government, we do not find
the word ‘bank,’…we find the great powers to lay and collect taxes; to borrow money; to regulate
commerce…Let the end be legitimate, let it be within the scope of the constitution, and all means which are
appropriate, which are plainly adapted to that end, which are not prohibited, but consist with the letter and spirit
of the constitution, are constitutional.”
Further, the Court ruled that Maryland could not tax the national bank: “That the power to tax involves the
power to destroy. . . . If the states may tax one instrument, employed by the [federal] government in the
execution of its powers, they may tax any and every other instrument….This was not intended by the American
people. They did not design to make their government dependent on the states.”
Marshall also noted an important difference between the Constitution and the Articles of Confederation (the
United States’ first governing document that had been replaced by the Constitution). The Articles said that the
states retained all powers not “expressly” given to the federal government. The Tenth Amendment, Marshall
noted, did not include the word “expressly.” This was further evidence, he argued, that the Constitution did not
limit Congress to doing only those things specifically listed in Article I.
Adapted from http://www.billofrightsinstitute.org/educate/educator-resources/lessons-plans/landmark-supremecourt-cases-elessons/mcculloch-v-maryland-1819/
The Marshall Court
Introduction: The Supreme Court under John Marshall worked to expand the power of the federal government.
Establishing its place as the interpreter of law and the Constitution, the Court heard many important cases in the first
decades of the nineteenth century. In this exercise, you will examine and learn about four of these cases. As you read
the descriptions of each case and answer the questions, ask how these cases expanded federal power, and at whose
expense. Try to imagine how things might be different had they been decided differently.
Dartmouth College v. Woodward (1819)
In 1769 the British Crown granted a charter to Dartmouth College, which set forth the purpose of the school,
established a governance structure, and transferred land to the college. In 1816 the State Legislature of New
Hampshire sought to alter the charter without the consent of the college’s board of trustees, with the ultimate
goal of converting the private college into a public university. The legislative changes increased the number of
trustees, authorized the state governor to appoint trustees, created a new state board with the power to veto
trustee decisions, and seized the college’s book of records, corporate seal, and other corporate property. The
trustees of the College filed suit, alleging that the actions of the New Hampshire legislature were
unconstitutional.
When they ratified the Constitution, the states surrendered a portion of their sovereignty in favor of the federal
government. Pursuant to Article I, Section 10:
No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin
Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any
Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility…
Of the many limitations placed on the states, the “Contracts Clause” has received the most attention. In basic
terms, it prohibits states from making laws that interfere with contracts that have already been created.
By a vote of 6-1, the Supreme Court sided with Dartmouth College. Chief Justice John Marshall wrote on
behalf of the majority, holding:
The charter granted by the British Crown to the trustees of Dartmouth College, in New Hampshire, in the year
1769, is a contract within the meaning of that clause of the Constitution of the United States, art. 1, s. 10, which
declares that no state shall make any law impairing the obligation of contracts.
In reaching its decision, the majority clarified that the Contracts Clause applied to individual property rights and
not to “the political relations between the government and its citizens”.
“The provision of the Constitution never has been understood to embrace other contracts than those which
respect property, or some object of value, and confer rights which may be asserted in a court of justice,” Chief
Justice Marshall further explained.
Applying this reasoning, the Court further held that the state could not interfere with the college’s corporate
charter because it constituted a contract between private parties. “That a corporation is established for
purposes of general charity, or for education generally does not, per se, make it a public corporation, liable to
the control of the legislature,” the majority concluded. Accordingly, it struck down the New Hampshire law as
unconstitutional.
Adapted from http://scarinciattorney.com/historicaldartmouth-college-v-woodward-the-contracts-clause/
The Marshall Court
Introduction: The Supreme Court under John Marshall worked to expand the power of the federal government.
Establishing its place as the interpreter of law and the Constitution, the Court heard many important cases in the first
decades of the nineteenth century. In this exercise, you will examine and learn about four of these cases. As you read
the descriptions of each case and answer the questions, ask how these cases expanded federal power, and at whose
expense. Try to imagine how things might be different had they been decided differently.
Gibbons v. Ogden (1824)
On one side of the river was New York: on the other, New Jersey. Aaron Ogden stood on the New York side
and smiled. Ogden had a license from New York to operate on the state’s waterways. Since New York required
all out-of-state operators to get expensive permits (protecting Ogden from competition), Ogden figured he
would be doing good business. But Gibbons, Ogden’s former business partner, was also a steamboat
operator. And Gibbons had a license from the federal government to operate a steamboat through interstate
waterways. Ogden and Gibbons each thought his own license should outweigh the other man’s. The case went
to the Supreme Court.
The Court had to decide—who had the power to regulate navigation on interstate waterways: Congress, or the
individual states? The Court ruled in Gibbons’s favor, holding that the Constitution gave this power to
Congress. The opinion, written by Chief Justice John Marshall, focused on the meaning of the Commerce
Clause in Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution, which states that Congress has the power “[t]o regulate
Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States…” The word “among,” the Court ruled, “may
very properly be restricted to that commerce which concerns more States than one.”
The Court acknowledged that the Constitution did not expressly grant Congress the power to regulate
navigation on interstate waterways. But Marshall pointed out that all the states were connected by waterways
and commerce would be impossible without navigating them. Therefore, the power to regulate transporting
goods on waterways was “necessary and proper” for Congress to carry out its enumerated power to “regulate
commerce…among the several states.”
If individual states had their own rules about commerce with other states, trade would be next to impossible. In
fact, one important purpose of replacing the Articles of Confederation had been to “rescue [the United States]
from the embarrassing and destructive consequences, resulting from the legislation of so many different
States, and to place it under the protection of a uniform law.” States could not set their own rules for commerce
in ways would interfere with the national government’s ability to carry out its power to establish uniform rules.
Finally, the decision affirmed that state laws that contradict constitutional acts of Congress “must yield” to the
supremacy of the Constitution, as stated in Article VI: “This Constitution and the laws of the United States
which shall be made in pursuance thereof … shall be the supreme law of the land.”
Adapted from https://billofrightsinstitute.org/educate/educator-resources/lessons-plans/landmark-supremecourt-cases-elessons/gibbons-v-ogden-1824/