Monopolies -- United States; Railroads and state -- United States
As our position on the "Legal Tender" decisions and their effect upon
the finances and commerce of the country have been controverted by some
of the _legal men_ to whom we have shown our manuscript, at the risk of
wearying the reader, we quote the dissenting opinions of the late Chief
Justice Chase, and his associates, on the points at issue in those
cases, feeling assured that these opinions fully sustain us. If our
views are correct as to the effect of these decisions upon the best
interests of the country, and their tendency to increase the power of
the combinations that now have such control over the different
departments of the government, as well as the financial and commercial
interests of the country, it follows that no real relief from the
oppressions under which the people are suffering can be obtained until
the legal tender statutes are repealed, and the latest decisions of the
supreme court as to their constitutionality and scope are reversed.
We have claimed that those decisions were in conflict with the
provisions of the constitution. Our position is supported by the
opinions quoted. We have said that the supreme court of the United
States was reorganized in the interests of railroad corporations and
other monopolies, before the legal tender questions were re-argued and
reversed. The opinions quoted sustain us in this particular. But we
desire the reader to examine these opinions and determine for himself.
CHAPTER II.
DISSENTING OPINION OF CHIEF JUSTICE CHASE.
We dissent from the argument and conclusion in the opinion just
announced.
The rule, by which the constitutionality of an act of congress passed in
the alleged exercise of an implied power is to be tried, is no longer,
in this court, open to question. It was laid down in the case of
_McCulloch_ v. _Maryland_, by Chief Justice Marshall, in these words:
"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 consistent with the
letter and spirit of the constitution, are constitutional."
And it is the plain duty of the court to pronounce acts of congress not
made in the exercise of an express power nor coming within the
reasonable scope of this rule, if made in virtue of an implied power,
unwarranted by the constitution. Acts of congress not made in pursuance
of the constitution are not laws.
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