''Hepburn v. Griswold'', 75 U.S. (8 Wall.) 603 (1870), was a

United States Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that turn on question ...

case in which the

Chief Justice of the United States The chief justice of the United States is the chief judge of the Supreme Court of the United States and is the highest-ranking officer of the U.S. federal judiciary. Appointments Clause, Article II, Section 2, Clause 2 of the U.S. Constitution g ...

, Salmon P. Chase, speaking for the Court, declared certain parts of the Legal Tender Acts to be unconstitutional. Specifically, making

United States Notes A United States Note, also known as a Legal Tender Note, is a type of Banknote, paper money that was issued from 1862 to 1971 in the United States. Having been current for 109 years, they were issued for longer than any other form of U.S. paper ...

legal tender was unconstitutional. The

lawsuit A lawsuit is a proceeding by one or more parties (the plaintiff or claimant) against one or more parties (the defendant) in a civil court of law. The archaic term "suit in law" is found in only a small number of laws still in effect today ...

originated when one Mrs. Hepburn attempted to pay a debt to Henry Griswold on a

promissory note A promissory note, sometimes referred to as a note payable, is a legal instrument (more particularly, a financing instrument and a debt instrument), in which one party (the ''maker'' or ''issuer'') promises in writing to pay a determinate sum of ...

, which was made five days prior to the issuance of United States Notes that the case questioned. Griswold sued Hepburn in the

Louisville Louisville is the most populous city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky, sixth-most populous city in the Southeast, and the 27th-most-populous city in the United States. By land area, it is the country's 24th-largest city; however, by populatio ...

Chancery Court The Court of Chancery was a court of equity in England and Wales that followed a set of loose rules to avoid a slow pace of change and possible harshness (or "inequity") of the common law. The Chancery had jurisdiction over all matters of eq ...

on the note and refused Hepburn's tender of United States Notes to satisfy his claim. She then tendered the notes into the Chancery Court, which declared her debt satisfied. The Court of Errors of Kentucky reversed the chancery court's judgment, and Hepburn appealed to the Supreme Court, which affirmed the judgment of the Court of Errors. The Supreme Court found that the

US federal government The Federal Government of the United States of America (U.S. federal government or U.S. government) is the national government of the United States. The U.S. federal government is composed of three distinct branches: legislative, execut ...

was authorized to coin money, but that power was distinct from the power to make paper

legal tender Legal tender is a form of money that Standard of deferred payment, courts of law are required to recognize as satisfactory payment in court for any monetary debt. Each jurisdiction determines what is legal tender, but essentially it is anything ...

, which was not authorized under the

US Constitution The Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the United States of America. It superseded the Articles of Confederation, the nation's first constitution, on March 4, 1789. Originally including seven articles, the Constitut ...

. It also found that the treatment of notes as legal tender represented an impairment to enforcing the obligations of contracts. The Constitution prohibits the several states from impairing the obligations of contracts. The Court found no similar constraint upon the federal government, but it held that such an impairment would violate the spirit of the Constitution. The dissenting opinion argued that the government was threatened by the war and that making the notes legal tender provided the government with the necessary supplies to continue to fight the war. The majority opinion affirmed that the government holds the power to wage war but that making notes legal tender was not a necessary consequence of that power. It continued that making United States Notes legal tender was unnecessary to fighting a war. All that the federal government needed to do was to make them "receivable for government dues". That argument is similar to the theory of

chartalism In macroeconomics, chartalism is the theory of money that money originated historically with states' attempts to direct economic activity rather than as a spontaneous solution to the problems with barter or as a means with which to tokenize debt ...

. The majority opinion was explicitly overruled by '' Knox v. Lee'' and other Legal Tender Cases, , in which Chase dissented.

External links

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Summary of ''Hepburn v. Griswold'' at Teogatha Law
{{Money and central banking within the contemporary United States (pre–1913) United States Constitution Article One case law United States Supreme Court cases United States Supreme Court cases of the Chase Court Overruled United States Supreme Court decisions 1870 in United States case law Banknotes of the United States History of Louisville, Kentucky

See also

Further reading

External links