Legal Tender Act of 1862 and Ensuing Litigation
The Legal Tender Cases primarily involved the constitutionality of the Legal Tender Act of 1862, 12 Stat. 345, enacted during the American Civil War. This act authorized issuance of paper money, United States Notes, to finance the war without raising taxes. The paper money depreciated in terms of gold and became the subject of controversy, particularly because debts contracted earlier could be paid in this cheaper currency.
In Hepburn, Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase held for a 4-3 majority of the Court that the Act was an unconstitutional violation of the Fifth Amendment. Ironically, Chief Justice Chase had played a role in formulating the Legal Tender Act of 1862, in his previous position as Secretary of the Treasury. On the same day that Hepburn was decided, President Ulysses Grant nominated two new justices to the Court, Joseph Bradley and William Strong, although Grant later denied that he had known about the decision in Hepburn when the nominations were made. Bradley and Strong subsequently voted to reverse the Hepburn decision, in Knox v. Lee and Parker v. Davis, by votes of 5-4. The constitutionality of the Act was more broadly upheld thirteen years later in Juilliard v. Greenman.
Read more about this topic: Legal Tender Cases
Famous quotes containing the words legal, tender, act and/or ensuing:
“It has come to this, that the friends of liberty, the friends of the slave, have shuddered when they have understood that his fate was left to the legal tribunals of the country to be decided. Free men have no faith that justice will be awarded in such a case.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“When the ground was partially bare of snow, and a few warm days had dried its surface somewhat, it was pleasant to compare the first tender signs of the infant year just peeping forth with the stately beauty of the withered vegetation which had withstood the winter ... decent weeds, at least, which widowed Nature wears.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Remember that you are an actor in a drama, of such a part as it may please the master to assign you, for a long time or for a little as he may choose. And if he will you to take the part of a poor man, or a cripple, or a ruler, or a private citizen, then may you act that part with grace! For to act well the part that is allotted to us, that indeed is ours to do, but to choose it is another’s.”
—Epictetus (c. 55–135 B.C.)
“In the declining day the thoughts make haste to rest in darkness, and hardly look forward to the ensuing morning. The thoughts of the old prepare for night and slumber. The same hopes and prospects are not for him who stands upon the rosy mountain-tops of life, and him who expects the setting of his earthly day.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)