Excerpt from Leading Cases on American Constitutional Law The intended scope of this book would have been indicated more accurately if the title were "Some Leading Cases on Some Leading Topics in American Constitutional Law." Accuracy of description however had to be sacrificed to brevity, which indeed is the dominant note of every part of the book. This makes it necessary to explain that the present collection is an attempt to bring together within the compass of about four hundred pages as many as possible of the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States interpreting the Federal Constitution. Because of limitations of space no attempt has been made to cover the whole subject. Important topics, such as eminent domain, ex post facto legislation, bankruptcy, and the war power, have been omitted altogether in the belief that the fuller treatment of other topics which such omissions made possible would give the collection added value. Sixty-four cases are here included. The basic decisions in which the important doctrines of constitutional law are first elaborated, such as McCulloch v. Maryland, Gibbons v. Ogden, and Cooley v. The Wardens of the Port, are reprinted with considerable fullness, while the later decisions of a less fundamental character are much abbreviated. In every instance however the facts out of which the controversy arose are given, as well as a sufficient portion of the opinion to show why the court decided as it did. The texts of all the decisions made since the beginning of the December Term, 1855 (18 Howard), are taken from the official reports. The texts of decisions made prior to that time are taken from Curtis' Decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States. Except for omissions or paraphrases which are indicated in the usual way, the texts followed have been reproduced verbatim et literatim. I have tried to meet the needs of two classes of students. First, I have had in mind students in law schools where the amount of time given to the subject does not warrant the use of the larger casebooks. It is for them especially that the numerous references to other cases have been included in the notes. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.