the general Government, notwithstanding the tenth amendment and the nature of the Constitution. The doctrine, that a power not expressly forbidden may be exercised, would, as I have observed, change the character of our Government. If I have read the Constitution aright, if there is any weight to be given to the uniform teachings of our great jurists and of commentators previous to the late civil war, the true doctrine is the very opposite of this. If the power is not in terms granted, and is not necessary and proper for the exercise of a power which is thus granted, it does not exist. And in determining what measures may be adopted in executing the powers granted, Chief-Justice Marshall declares that they must be appropriate, plainly adapted to the end, not prohibited, and consistent with the letter and spirit of the Constitution. Now, all through that instrument we find limitations upon the power, both of the general Government and the State Governments, so as to prevent oppression and injustice. No legislation, therefore, tending to promote either can consist with the letter and spirit of the Constitution. A law which interferes with the contracts of others and compels one of the parties to receive in satisfaction something different from that stipulated, without reference to its actual value in the market, necessarily works such injustice and wrong. There is, it is true, no provision in the Constitution of the United States forbidding in direct terms the passing of laws by Congress impairing the obligation of contracts, and there are many express powers conferred, such as the power to declare war, levy duties, and regulate commerce, the exercise of which affects more or less the value of contracts. Thus war necessarily suspends intercourse between citizens or subjects of belligerent nations, and the performance during its continuance of previous contracts. The imposition of duties upon goods may affect the prices of articles imported or manufactured, so as to materially alter the value of previous contracts respecting them. But these incidental consequences arising from the exercise of such powers were contemplated in the grant of them. As there can be no solid objection to legislation under them, no just complaint can be made of such con

sequences. But far different is the case when the impairment of the contract does not follow incidentally, but is directly and in terms allowed and enacted. Legislation operating directly upon private contracts, changing their conditions, is forbidden to the States; and no power to alter the stipulations of such contracts by direct legislation is conferred upon Congress. There are also many considerations, outside of the fact that there is no grant of the power, which show that the framers of the Constitution never intended that such power should be exercised. One of the great objects of the Constitution, as already observed, was to establish justice, and what was meant by that in its relations to contracts, as said by the late Chief Justice in his opinion in Hepburn vs. Griswold, was not left to inference or conjecture. And in support of this statement he refers to the fact that when the Constitution was undergoing discussion in the convention, the Congress of the Confederation was engaged in framing the ordinance for the government of the Northwest Territory, in which certain articles of compact were established between the people of the original States and the people of the Territory for the purpose, as expressed in the instrument, "of extending the fundamental principles of civil and religious liberty, whereon these republics [tho States united under the confederation], their laws and constitutions are erected." That Congress was also alive to the evils which the loose legislation of the States had created by interfering with the obligation of private contracts and making notes a legal tender for debts; and the ordinance declared that in the just preservation of rights and property no law "ought ever to be made, or have force in the said Territory, that shall in any manner whatever interfere with or affect private contracts, or engagements, bona fide and without fraud, previously formed." This principle, said the Chief Justice, found more condensed expression in the prohibition upon the States against impairing the obligation of contracts, which has always been recognized as an efficient safeguard against injustice;" and the court was then of opinion that "it is clear that those who framed and those who adopted the Constitution intended that

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the spirit of this prohibition should pervade the entire body of legislation, and that the justice which the Constitution was ordained to establish was not thought by them to be compatible with legislation of an opposite tendency." Soon after the Constitution was adopted the case of Calder vs. Bull came before this court, and it was there said that there were acts which the Federal and State legislatures could not do without exceeding their authority; and among them was mentioned a law which punished a citizen for an innocent act, and a law which destroyed or impaired the lawful private contracts of citizens. "It is against all reason and justice," it was added, "for a people to entrust a legislature with such powers, and, therefore, it cannot be presumed that they have done it" (3 Dallas, 388). And Mr. Madison, in one of the articles in the Federalist, declared that laws impairing the obligation of contracts were contrary to the first principles of the social compact, and to every principle of sound legislation. Yet this court holds that a measure directly operating upon and necessarily impairing private contracts, may be adopted in the execution of powers specifically granted for other purposes, because it is not in terms prohibited, and that it is consistent with the letter and spirit of the Constitution.

From the decision of the court I see only evil likely to follow. There have been times within the memory of all of us when the legal-tender notes of the United States were not exchangeable for more than one-half of their nominal value. The possibility of such depreciation will always attend paper money. This inborn infirmity no mere legislative declaration can cure. If Congress has the power to make the notes a legal tender and to pass as money or its equivalent, why should not a sufficient amount be issued to pay the bonds of the United States as they mature? Why pay interest on the millions of dollars of bonds now due, when Congress can in one day make the money to pay the principal? And why should there be any restraint upon unlimited appropriations by the Government for all imaginary schemes of public improvement, if the printing-press can furnish the money that is needed for them?

INDEX.