Sturges v. Crowninshield
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| Sturges v. Crowninshield | ||||||||
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 Supreme Court of the United States |
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Sturges v. Crowninshield 4 Wheat 122 (1819) dealt with the constitutionality of New York creating bankruptcy laws and retroactively applying those laws.
[edit] First issue
This case decided whether state bankruptcy laws violated the provision in Article II, Section 8 of the Constitution giving Congess the power "to establish...uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies through-out the United states". This was a power which Congress had never excercised. Were the states restricted from passing bankruptcy laws of their own?[1]
Justice Marshall stated in the opinion:
| The first [issue] is...since the adoption of the constitution of the United States, any state has authority to pass a bankrupt law, or whether the power is exclusively vested in the congress of the United States? |
Justice Marshalls answer to this question was not very clear.
In Ogden v. Saunders, eight years later, Justice Johnson explained why the ruling was so vague:
| The report of the case of Sturges v. Crowninshield needs also some explanation. The Court was, in that case, greatly divided in their views of the doctrine, and the judgment partakes as much of a compromise, as of a legal adjudication. The minority thought it better to yield something than risk the whole. |
In otherwords, the Republican judges wanted to retain all state bankruptcy laws and the Fedralists wanted to abolish them all. Minority Republicans agreed on the best bargain they could by agreeing to sacrifive the New York law if the rest were not deemed unconstitutional. [2]
[edit] Second issue
In addition, the Supreme Court addressed the issue of ex post facto law or retroactive law in the particular New York bankruptcy law in question. This law covered debts contracted before the law was passed. The retroactive portion of the law was ruled to be unconstitutional by a unanimous court, because it impaired the debtors obligation to a contract.[1]
[edit] Notes
- ^ a b Bates, Ernest Sutherland (1982). Story of the Supreme Court. Wm. S. Hein Publishing. ISBN 0837703220.p. 118
- ^ Bates, p. 119
