Status of Judicial Decisions

Status of Judicial Decisions (Obligation of Contracts)

Although the highest state court usually has final authority in determining the construction as well as the validity of contracts entered into under the laws of the state, and federal courts will be bound by decisions of the highest state court on such matters, this rule does not hold when the contract is one whose obligation is alleged to have been impaired by state law.1 Otherwise, the challenged state authority could be vindicated through the simple device of a modification or outright nullification by the state court of the contract rights in issue. Similarly, the highest state court usually has final authority in construing state statutes and determining their validity in relation to the state constitution. But this rule too has had to bend to some extent to the Supreme Court's interpretation of the Contract Clause.2

More about Status of Judicial Decisions

Suppose the following situation: (1) a municipality, acting under authority conferred by a state statute, has issued bonds in aid of a railway company; (2) the validity of this statute has been sustained by the highest state court; (3) later the state legislature repeals certain taxes to be used to pay off the bonds when they become due; (4) the repeal is sustained by a decision of the highest state court holding that the statute authorizing the bonds was unconstitutional ab initio. In such a case the Supreme Court would take an appeal from the state court and would reverse the latter's decision of unconstitutionality because of its effect in rendering operative the repeal of the tax.3

Status of Judicial Decisions: Developments

Suppose, however, that the state court has held the statute authorizing the bonds unconstitutional ab initio in a suit by a creditor for payment without the state legislature's having repealed the taxes. In this situation, the Supreme Court would still afford relief if the case were one between citizens of different states, which reached it via a lower federal court.4 This is because in cases of this nature the Court formerly felt free to determine questions of fundamental justice for itself. Indeed, in such a case, the Court in the past has apparently regarded itself as free to pass upon the constitutionality of the state law authorizing the bonds even though there had been no prior decision by the highest state court sustaining them, the idea being that contracts entered into simply on the faith of the presumed constitutionality of a state statute are entitled to this protection.5

Other Aspects

In other words, in cases in which it has jurisdiction because of diversity of citizenship, the Court has held that the obligation of contracts is capable of impairment by subsequent judicial decisions no less than by subsequent statutes, and that it is able to prevent such impairment. In cases, on the other hand, of which it obtains jurisdiction only on the constitutional ground and by appeal from a state court, it has always adhered in terms to the doctrine that the word “laws” as used in Article I, § 10, does not include judicial decisions. Yet, even in these cases, it will intervene to protect contracts entered into on the faith of existing decisions from an impairment that is the direct result of a reversal of such decisions, but there must be in the offing, as it were, a statute of some kind&emdash;one possibly many years older than the contract rights involved&emdash;on which to pin its decision.6

Other Issues

In 1922, Congress, through an amendment to the Judicial Code, endeavored to extend the reviewing power of the Supreme Court to “any suit involving the validity of a contract wherein it is claimed that a change in the rule of law or construction of statutes by the highest court of a State applicable to such contract would be repugnant to the Constitution of the United States . . . .” 7 This appeared to be an invitation to the Court to say frankly that the obligation of a contract can be impaired by a subsequent court decision. The Court, however, declined the invitation in an opinion by Chief Justice Taft that reviewed many of the cases covered in the preceding paragraphs.

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Dealing with Gelpcke and subsequent decisions, Chief Justice Taft said: “These cases were not writs of error to the Supreme Court of a State. They were appeals or writs of error to federal courts where recovery was sought upon municipal or county bonds or some other form of contracts, the validity of which had been sustained by decisions of the Supreme Court of a State prior to their execution, and had been denied by the same court after their issue or making. In such cases the federal courts exercising jurisdiction between citizens of different States held themselves free to decide what the state law was, and to enforce it as laid down by the State Supreme Court before the contracts were made rather than in later decisions. They did not base this conclusion on Article I, § 10, of the Federal Constitution, but on the state law as they determined it, which, in diverse citizenship cases, under the third Article of the Federal Constitution they were empowered to do. Burgess v. Seligman, 107 U.S. 20 [1883].” 8 Although doubtless this was an available explanation in 1924, the decision in 1938, in Erie Railroad Co. v. Tompkins,9 so cut down the power of the federal courts to decide diversity of citizenship cases according to their own notions of “general principles of common law” as to raise the question whether the Court will not be required eventually to put Gelpcke and its companions and descendants squarely on the Contract Clause or else abandon them.

Resources

References

This text about Status of Judicial Decisions is based on “The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation”, published by the U.S. Government Printing Office.

[Footnote 1] Jefferson Branch Bank v. Skelly, 66 U.S. (1 Bl.) 436, 443 (1862); Bridge Proprietors v. Hoboken Co., 68 U.S. (1 Wall.) 116, 145 (1863); Wright v. Nagle, 101 U.S. 791, 793 (1880); McGahey v. Virginia, 135 U.S. 662, 667 (1890); Scott v. McNeal, 154 U.S. 34, 35 (1894); Stearns v. Minnesota, 179 U.S. 223, 232-33 (1900); Coombes v. Getz, 285 U.S. 434, 441 (1932); Atlantic Coast Line R.R. v. Phillips, 332 U.S. 168, 170 (1947).

[Footnote 2] McCullough v. Virginia, 172 U.S. 102 (1898); Houston & Texas Central Rd. Co. v. Texas, 177 U.S. 66, 76, 77 (1900); Hubert v. New Orleans, 215 U.S. 170, 175 (1909); Carondelet Canal Co. v. Louisiana, 233 U.S. 362, 376 (1914); Louisiana Ry. & Nav. Co. v. New Orleans, 235 U.S. 164, 171 (1914).

[Footnote 3] State Bank of Ohio v. Knoop, 57 U.S. (16 How.) 369 (1854) (discussed below), and Ohio Life Ins. and Trust Co. v. Debolt, 57 U.S. (16 How.) 416 (1854), are the leading cases. See also Jefferson Branch Bank v. Skelly, 66 U.S. (1 Bl.) 436 (1862); Louisiana v. Pilsbury, 105 U.S. 278 (1882); McGahey v. Virginia, 135 U.S. 662 (1890); Mobile & Ohio R.R. v. Tennessee, 153 U.S. 486 (1894); Bacon v. Texas, 163 U.S. 207 (1896); McCullough v. Virginia, 172 U.S. 102 (1898).

[Footnote 4] Gelpcke v. City of Debuque, 68 U.S. (1 Wall.) 175, 206 (1865); Havemayer v. Iowa County, 70 U.S. (3 Wall.) 294 (1866); Thomson v. Lee County, 70 U.S. (3 Wall.) 327 (1866); The City v. Lamson, 76 U.S. (9 Wall.) 477 (1870); Olcott v. The Supervisors, 83 U.S. (16 Wall.) 678 (1873); Taylor v. Ypsilanti, 105 U.S. 60 (1882); Anderson v. Santa Anna, 116 U.S. 356 (1886); Wilkes County v. Coler, 180 U.S. 506 (1901).

[Footnote 5] Great Southern Hotel Co. v. Jones, 193 U.S. 532, 548 (1904).

[Footnote 6] Sauer v. New York, 206 U.S. 536 (1907); Muhlker v. New York & Harlem R.R., 197 U.S. 544, 570 (1905).

[Footnote 7] 42 Stat. 366.

[Footnote 8] Tidal Oil Co. v. Flannagan, 263 U.S. 444, 452 (1924).

[Footnote 9] 304 U.S. 64 (1938).

Tables of Contents

• Status of Judicial Decisions and other Topics in the Contents – Article 1 of the U.S. Constitution
• U.S. Constitutional Law Category
• List of amendments to the U.S. Constitution
• Status of Judicial Decisions and other Topics in the Constitution Contents
• Interpretation of the U.S. Constitution (Table of Contents)
• Clauses of the Constitution (Table of Contents)