Page 251 - American Stories, A History of the United States

bank and whether a state had the power to tax or regulate an agency or institution
9.1 Congress created.
In response to the first question, Marshall set forth his doctrine of “implied pow-
ers.” Conceding that the Constitution contained no specific authorization to charter
9.2 a bank, the chief justice argued that such a right could be deduced from more general
powers and from an understanding of the “great objects” for which the federal gov-
ernment had been founded. Marshall thus struck a blow for a loose construction of

9.3 the Constitution and a broad grant of power to the federal government to encourage
economic growth and stability.
In answer to the second question—the right of a state to tax or regulate a federal
agency—Marshall held that the bank was indeed such an agency and that giving a
state the power to tax it would also give the state the power to destroy it. In an impor-
tant assertion of the supremacy of the national government, Marshall argued that the
American people “did not design to make their government dependent on the states.”
This opinion ran counter to the view of many Americans, particularly in the South,
that the Constitution did not take away sovereignty from the states. The debate over
federal–state relations was not resolved until the northern victory in the Civil War
decisively affirmed the dominance of federal authority. But Marshall’s decision gave
great new weight to a nationalist constitutional philosophy.

Read the Document The opinion of the Supreme Court for McCulloch v.
Maryland (1819)

John MaRShall chief Justice John Marshall affirmed the Supreme court’s authority to overrule state laws
and overrule congressional legislation that it held to be in conflict with the constitution. The portrait is by chester
Harding, c. 1829.
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