Marshall's decisions. An injunction had been granted by Chancellor Kent
and unanimously sustained by the Court of Errors of New York,
restraining Gibbons from navigating the Hudson River by steamboats
licensed by Congress for the coasting trade on the ground that he was
thereby infringing the exclusive right, granted by the legislature of
New York, to Robert R. Livingston and Robert Fulton to navigate the
waters of the state with vessels moved by steam. The Supreme Court
reversed the state courts and held the New York legislation void as an
interference with the right of Congress, under the Constitution, to
regulate interstate commerce.

[Footnote 1: 9 Wheat., 1 (1824).]

These were only a few of that series of great decisions which stand out
like mountain peaks on the horizon of our national life. Marshall's
judgments transformed a governmental experiment into something assured
and permanent. They confirmed the national supremacy and made the
Constitution workable.

Marshall is known to history for his work in vindicating the national
power under the Constitution. That was the need in his day and he met it
with superlative wisdom and skill. It would be a mistake, however, to
suppose that he favored federal encroachment upon the powers reserved to
the states. On the contrary, he rendered decisions in favor of state
rights which would be notable were they not overshadowed by the greater
fame of the decisions which went to the building of the nation.

With the passing of Marshall and the accession of Taney as Chief Justice
a new chapter opened in the history of the Court. The Federalists had
become extinct. Andrew Jackson had come into power and it had fallen to
his lot to fill a majority of the seats upon the bench by appointments
to vacancies. The result was at once apparent. Two cases[1] involving
important constitutional questions, which had been argued during
Marshall's lifetime but assigned for reargument on account of a division
in the Court, were now decided contrary to Marshall's known views and in
favor of a strict construction of national powers. Justice Story,
Marshall's longtime associate on the bench, dissented strongly in both
cases, lamenting the loss of Marshall's leadership and the change in the
viewpoint of the Court.

[Footnote 1: _Mayor of New York v. Miln_, 11 Peters, 102; _Briscoe v.
Bank of Kentucky_, 11 Peters, 257, decided in 1837.]

It would serve no useful purpose to enter upon a detailed