1819. Dartmouth V. Woodward: own fault." What rights which are secured by this alleged contract are invaded by the acts of the legislature? Is it the right of property, or of privileges? College It is not the former, because the corporate body is not deprived of the least portion of its property. If it be the personal privileges of the corporators that are attacked, these must be either a common and universal privilege, such as the right of suffrage, for interrupting the exercise of which an action would lie; or they must be monopolies and exclusive privileges, which are always subject to be regulated and modified by the supreme power of the State. Where a private proprietary interest is coupled with the exercise of political power or a public trust, the charters of corporations have frequently been amended by legislative authority." In charters creating artificial persons for purposes exclusively private, and not interfering with the common rights of the citizens, it may be admitted that the legislature cannot interfere to amend without the consent of the grantees. The grant of such a charter might perhaps be considered as analogous to a contract between the State and private individuals, affecting their private rights, and might thus be regarded as within the spirit of the constitutional prohibition. But this charter is merely a mode of exercising one of the great powers of civil government. Its amendment, or even repeal, can no more be considered as the breach of a contract, than the amendment or repeal of any other law. Such repeal or amendment is an ordinary act of public a Gray v. The Portland Bank, 3 Mass. R. 364. The Commonwealth v. Bird, 12 Mass. R. 443. 1819. legislation, and not an act impairing the obligation of a contract between the government and private Dartmouth College citizens, under which personal immunities or propriWoodward, etary interests are vested in them. The Attorney-General, on the same side, stated, that the only question properly before the Court was, whether the several acts of the legislature of NewHampshire, mentioned in the special verdict, are repugnant to that clause of the constitution of the United States, which provides, that no State shall pass any bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law impairing the obligation of contracts." Beside its intrinsic difficulty, the extreme delicacy of this question is evinced by the sentiments expressed by the Court, whenever it has been called to act on such a question." In the case of Fletcher v. Peck, the Court says, "The question whether a law be void for its repugnancy to the constitution, is, at all times, a question of much delicacy, which ought seldom, if ever, to be decided in the affirmative, in a doubtful The Court, when impelled by duty to render such a judgment, would be unworthy of its station could it be unmindful of the solemn obligation which that station imposes. But it is not on slight implication and vague conjecture that the legislature is to be pronounced to have transcended its powers, and its acts are to be considered as void. The opposition between the constitution and the law should be such case. a Calder et ux. v. Bull et ux. 3 Dall. 392, 394, 395. Fletcher v. Peck, 6 Cranch, 87. New-Jersey v. Wilson, 7 Croneh, 1819. Dartmouth V. that the judge feels a clear and strong conviction of their incompatibility with each other." In Calder et ux. v. Bull et ux. Mr. Justice Chace expressed himself with his usual emphatic energy, and said, Woodward. "I will not decide any law to be void, but in a very clear case." Is it, then, a very clear case that these acts of New-Hampshire are repugnant to the constitution of the United States? d 1. Are they bills of attainder? The elementary writers inform us, that an attainder is "the stain or corruption of the blood of a criminal capitally condemned." True it is, that the Chief Justice says, in Fletcher v. Peck, that a bill of attainder may affect the life of an individual, or may confiscate his estate, or both. But the cause did not turn upon this point, and the Chief Justice was not called upon to weigh with critical accuracy his expressions in this part of the case. In England, most certainly, the first idea presented is that of corruption of blood, and consequent forfeiture of the entire property of the criminal, as the regular and inevitable consequences of a capital conviction at common law. Statutes sometimes pardon the attainder, and merely forfeit the estate. But this forfeiture is always complete and entire. In the present case, however, it cannot be pretended that any part of the estate of the trustees is forfeited, and, if a part, certainly not the whole. 2. Are these acts "laws impairing the obligation a 6 Cranch, 128. c 4 Bl. Com. 380. b 3 Dall. 395. d 6 Cranch, 138. 1819. Dartmouth V. of contracts?" The mischiefs actually existing at the time the constitution was established, and which College were intended to be remedied by this prohibitory Woodward. clause, will show the nature of the contracts contemplated by its authors. It was the inviolability of private contracts, and private rights acquired under them, which was intended to be protected;" and not contracts which are in their nature matters of civil police, nor grants by a State of power, and even property, to individuals, in trust to be administered for purposes merely public. "The prohibitions not to make any thing but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts, and not to pass any law impairing the obligation of contracts," says Mr. Justice Chace, "were inserted to secure private rights." The cases determined in this Court, illustrate the same construction of this clause of the constitution. Fletcher v. Peck was a case where a State legislature attempted to revoke its grant, so as to devest a beneficial estate in lands; a vested estate ; an actual conveyance to individuals as their private property. In the case of New-Jersey v. Wilson, there was an express contract contained in a public treaty of cession with the Indians, by which the privilege of perpetual exemption from taxation was indelibly impressed upon the lands, and could not be taken away without a violation of the public faith a The Federalist, No. 44. 1 Tucker's Bl. Com. part 1. Ap pendix, 312. b Calder et ux. v. Bull et ux. 3 Dall. 390. c 6 Cranch, 87. b 1819. Dartmouth V. solemnly pledged." Terret v. Taylor was also a case of an attempt to devest an interest in lands actually vested under an act amounting to a contract. In all those instances, the property was held by the gran- Woodward. tees, and those to whom they had conveyed, beneficially, and under the sanction of contracts, in the ordinary and popular signification of that term. But this is an attempt to extend its obvious and natural meaning, and to apply it by a species of legal fiction to a class of cases which have always been supposed to be within the control of the sovereign power. Charters to public corporations for purposes of public policy are necessarily subject to the legislative discretion, which may revoke or modify them as the continually fluctuating exigencies of the society may require. Incorporations for the purposes of education and other literary objects, in one age, or under one form of government, may become unfit for their office in another age, or under another government. This charter is said to be a contract between Doctor Wheelock and the king; a contract founded on a donation of private property by Doctor Wheelock. It is hence inferred, that it is a private eleemosynary corporation; and the right of visitation is said to be in the founder and his heirs; and that the State can have no right to interfere, because it is neither the founder of this charity, nor contributor to it. But if the basis of this argument is removed, what becomes of the superstructure? The fact that Doctor Wheelock was a contributor, is not found by the a 7 Cranch, 164. b 9 Cranch, 43. VOL. IV. 77 |