The attorneys of the College before the Superior Court were Jeremiah Mason, one of the best lawyers of the day, Jeremiah Smith, a former Chief Justice of New Hampshire, and Daniel Webster. These three able lawyers argued that the amending act exceeded "the rightful ends of legislative power," violated the principle of the separation of powers, and deprived the trustees of their "privileges and immunities" contrary to the "law of the land" clause of the State Constitution, and impaired the obligation of contracts. The last contention stirred Woodward's attorneys, Bartlett and Sullivan, to ridicule. "By the same reasoning," said the latter, "every law must be considered in the nature of a contract, until the Legislature would find themselves in such a labyrinth of contracts, with the United States Constitution over their heads, that not a subject would be left within their jurisdiction"; the argument was an expedient of desperation, he said, a "last straw." The principal contention advanced in behalf of the Act was that the College was "a public corporation," whose "various powers, capacities, and franchises all ... were to be exercised for the benefit of the public," and were therefore subject to public control. And the Court, in sustaining the Act, rested its decision on the same ground. Chief Justice Richardson conceded the doctrine of Fletcher vs. Peck, that the obligation of contracts clause "embraced all contracts relating to private property, whether executed or executory, and whether between individuals, between States, or between States and individuals," but, he urged, "a distinction is to be taken between particular grants by the Legislature of property or privileges to individuals for their own benefit, and grants of power and authority to be exercised for public purposes." Its public character, in short, left the College and its holdings at the disposal of the Legislature. Of the later proceedings, involving the appeal to Washington and the argument before Marshall, early in March, 1818, tradition has made Webster the central and compelling figure, and to the words which it assigns him in closing his address before the Court has largely been attributed the great legal triumph which presently followed. The story is, at least, so well found that the chronicler of Dartmouth College vs. Woodward who should venture to omit it must be a bold man indeed.