McCULLOCH V. MARYLAND

McCULLOCH V. MARYLAND, 4 Wheaton 316 (1819), was decided by the Supreme Court of the United States on 6 March 1819. Congress had incorporated the second Bank of the United States, a branch of which was established in Baltimore. The state of Maryland required all banks not chartered by the state to pay a tax on each issuance of bank notes. When James W. McCulloch, the cashier of the Baltimore branch of the bank, issued notes without paying the tax, Maryland brought suit. Two questions were at issue: first, whether Congress had power under the Constitution to establish a bank and, second, whether Maryland could impose a tax on this bank.

Chief Justice John Marshall wrote the opinion for a unanimous court upholding the power of Congress to charter a bank as a government agency and denying the power of a state to tax the agency. Marshall's discussion, broadly interpreting the powers of Congress, is still a classic statement of the implied powers of the federal government. Since the Constitution empowers the government to tax, borrow, and engage in war, Congress, by incorporating a bank, was creating the means to attain the goals of these powers. The chief justice phrased the basic point as follows: "Let the end be legitimate, let it be within the scope of the Constitution, and all means which are appropriate, which are plainly adapted to that end, which are not prohibited, but consist with the letter and spirit of the Constitution, are constitutional." Along with this principle, Marshall expounded the notion of federal supremacy, noting that the national government, "though limited in its powers, is supreme within its sphere of action."

Having reaffirmed the principle of federal supremacy, Marshall responded to the second question, which was whether the state of Maryland could legally tax a branch of the U.S. bank located in that state. The power of the federal government to incorporate a bank had been established; the supremacy of the federal government in legal conflicts with state authority had likewise been set forth; and there was agreement that "the power to tax involves the power to destroy." It followed from all of this that an admittedly legal function of the federal government could not be subjected to possible destruction by an inferior government through taxation. The state tax was void.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Gunther, Gerald, ed. John Marshall's Defense of McCulloch v. Maryland. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1969.

Kelly, Alfred H., Winfred A. Harbison, and Herman Belz. The American Constitution: Its Origins and Development. 7th ed. New York: Norton, 1991.

White, G. Edward. The Marshall Court and Cultural Change, 1815 –1835. New York, 1988.

Paul C. Bartholomew / a. r.

See also Banking ; Cohens v. Virginia ; Judiciary Act of 1789 ; Osborn v. Bank of the United States .