McCulloch v. Maryland

McCulloch v. Maryland
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued February 21 – March 3, 1819 Decided March 6, 1819
Full case name	James McCulloch v. The State of Maryland, John James[a]
Citations	17 U.S. 316 (more) 4 Wheat. 316; 4 L. Ed. 579; 1819 U.S. LEXIS 320; 4 A.F.T.R. (P-H) 4491; 42 Cont. Cas. Fed. (CCH) ¶ 77,296
Case history
Prior	Judgment for John James, Baltimore County Court; affirmed, Maryland Court of Appeals
Subsequent	None
Holding
Although the Constitution does not specifically give Congress the power to establish a bank, it delegates the ability to tax and spend. Because a bank is a proper and suitable instrument to assist the operations of the government in the collection and disbursement of the revenue, and because federal laws are supreme over state laws, Maryland had no power to interfere with the bank's operation by taxing it. Maryland Court of Appeals reversed.
Court membership
Chief Justice John Marshall Associate Justices Bushrod Washington · William Johnson H. Brockholst Livingston · Thomas Todd Gabriel Duvall · Joseph Story
Case opinion
Majority	Marshall, joined by unanimous
Laws applied
U.S. Const. art. I, § 8, cl. 1, 18

McCulloch v. Maryland,^[a] 17 U.S. (4 Wheat.) 316 (1819), was a landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision that defined the scope of the U.S. Congress's legislative power and how it relates to the powers of American state legislatures. The dispute in McCulloch involved the legality of the national bank and a tax that the state of Maryland imposed on it. In its ruling, the Supreme Court established firstly that the "Necessary and Proper" Clause of the U.S. Constitution gives the U.S. federal government certain implied powers necessary and proper for the exercise of the powers enumerated explicitly in the Constitution, and secondly that the American federal government is supreme over the states, and so states' ability to interfere with the federal government is restricted.^[3][4] Since the legislature has the authority to tax and spend, the court held that it therefore has authority to establish a national bank, as being "necessary and proper" to that end.

The state of Maryland had attempted to impede an operation by the Second Bank of the United States through a tax on all notes of banks not chartered in Maryland. Though the law, by its language, was generally applicable to all banks not chartered in Maryland, the Second Bank of the United States was the only out-of-state bank then existing in Maryland, and the law was thus recognized in the court's opinion as having specifically targeted the Bank of the United States. The Court invoked the Necessary and Proper Clause of the Constitution, which allows the federal government to pass laws not expressly provided for in the Constitution's list of enumerated powers of Congress if such laws are necessary and proper to further the powers expressly authorized.

McCulloch has been described as "the most important Supreme Court decision in American history defining the scope of Congress's powers and delineating the relationship between the federal government and the states."^[5] The case established two important principles in constitutional law. First, the Constitution grants to Congress implied powers to implement the Constitution's express powers to create a functional national government. Prior to the Supreme Court's decision in McCulloch, the scope of the U.S. government's authority was unclear.^[3] Second, state action may not impede valid constitutional exercises of power by the federal government.

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