Читать книгу The Handy Supreme Court Answer Book - David L Hudson - Страница 214

Chief Justice Marshall actually was one of the primary sponsors of the bankruptcy law when he was a U.S. representative from Virginia. The other coincidence was that one of the other chief sponsors of the legislation, U.S. congressman Robert Goodloe Harper of South Carolina, represented Fisher, the person challenging the constitutionality of the law.

CourtSpeak: United States v. Fisher Bankruptcy Case (1805)

Chief Justice John Marshall (unanimous ruling): “The government is to pay the debt of the union, and must be authorized to use the means which appear to itself most eligible to effect that object. It has consequently a right to make remittances by bills or otherwise, and to take those precautions which will render the transaction safe. This claim of priority on the part of the United States will, it has been said, interfere with the right of the state sovereignties respecting the dignity of debts, and will defeat the measures they have a right to adopt to secure themselves against delinquencies on the part of their own revenue officers.

“But this is an objection to the constitution itself. The mischief suggested, so far as it can really happen, is the necessary consequence of the supremacy of the laws of the United States on all subjects to which the legislative power of congress extends.”