The Contracts Clause
The Taney Court through the New Deal
Proprietors of Charles River Bridge v. Proprietors of Warren Bridge (1837)
36 U.S. 420 (1837)
Decision: 5-2
Vote: Affirmed
Opinion: Taney, joined by McLean, Baldwin, Wayne, and Barbour
Concur: McLean, joined by Barbour, Baldwin and Wayne
Dissent: Story, joined by Thompson
Proprietors of Charles River Bridge v. Proprietors of Warren Bridge (1837)
TANEY, Ch. J., delivered the opinion of the court.
The questions involved in this case are of the gravest character, and the court have given to them the most anxious and deliberate consideration. The value of the right claimed by the plaintiffs is large in amount; and many persons may, no doubt, be seriously affected in their pecuniary interests, by any decision which the court may pronounce; and the questions which have been raised as to the power of the several states, in relation to the corporations they have chartered, are pregnant with important consequences; not only to the individuals who are concerned in the corporate franchises, but to the communities in which they exist. The court are fully sensible, that it is their duty, in exercising the high powers conferred on them by the constitution of the United States, to deal with these great and extensive interests, with the utmost caution; guarding, so far as they have the power to do so, the rights of property, and at the same time, carefully abstaining from any encroachment on the rights reserved to the states …
In the last-mentioned year, a petition was presented to the legislature, by Thomas Russell and others, stating the inconvenience of the transportation by ferries, over Charles river, and the public advantages that would result from a bridge; and praying to be incorporated, for the purpose of erecting a bridge in the place where the ferry between Boston and Charlestown was then kept. Pursuant to this petition, the legislature, on the 9th of March 1785, passed an act incorporating a company, by the name of ‘The Proprietors of the Charles River Bridge,’ for the purposes mentioned in the petition …
The bridge was accordingly built, and was opened for passengers on the 17th of June 1786. In 1792, the charter was extended to seventy years from the opening of the bridge; and at the expiration of that time, it was to belong to the commonwealth. The corporation have regularly paid to the college the annual sum of two hundred pounds and have performed all of the duties imposed on them by the terms of their charter.
In 1828, the legislature of Massachusetts incorporated a company by the name of ‘The Proprietors of the Warren Bridge,’ for the purpose of erecting another bridge over Charles river …
The Warren bridge, by the terms of its charter, was to be surrendered to the state, as soon as the expenses of the proprietors in building and supporting it should be reimbursed; but this period was not, in any event, to exceed six years from the time the company commenced receiving toll.
When the ori