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Contesting Commerce: Gibbons v. Ogden , Steam Power, and Social Change
Author(s) -
COX THOMAS H.
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
journal of supreme court history
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 1540-5818
pISSN - 1059-4329
DOI - 10.1111/j.1540-5818.2009.01198.x
Subject(s) - ogden , supreme court , law , state (computer science) , frontier , monopoly , power (physics) , jurisprudence , political science , governor , sociology , economics , engineering , physics , algorithm , quantum mechanics , computer science , market economy , thermodynamics , aerospace engineering
The U.S. Supreme Court case Gibbons v. Ogden (1824) 1 represents one of the most significant yet least understood cases in the history of American jurisprudence. Most accounts depict the case as a constitutional showdown between former New Jersey Governor Aaron Ogden and his estranged business partner, a Georgian businessman and planter named Thomas Gibbons. Ogden charged Gibbons with operating a steamboat on the Hudson River in violation of the Fulton–Livingston Steamboat monopoly that controlled steam travel in the state of New York. In March 1824, Chief Justice John Marshall ruled for the Supreme Court that Gibbons' federal coasting license trumped a state grant issued to Ogden by the Fulton–Livingston syndicate. 2