The successful counsel in this case were Daniel Webster and William Pinkney, and in the course of his decision the Chief Justice complimented the counsel on both sides as maintaining the affirmative and negative with a splendor of eloquence and a strength of argument seldom, if ever, surpassed.
It may also be added that no decision of the United States Supreme Court, or of any other court in the United States, has since impugned the correctness of the principle upon which the case of McCulloch vs. Maryland was decided. A brief notice, however, of subsequent judicial proceedings is interesting and necessary to complete the history of this celebrated case.
Thus, the Legislature of Ohio having, as before stated, imposed an annual tax of $50,000 upon the branch of the Bank of the United States established in that State before the decision in the McCulloch case, the State officers, even after the decision, proceeded to levy and collect the tax. Thereupon the case was again brought before the United States Supreme Court on an application for injunction, and was reargued, with reliance upon the point that the bank was a mere private corporation, whose chief object was individual trade or profit. The court, however, at once reaffirmed its former judgment, and held that the bank was a public corporation, created for national purposes, and an instrument for carrying into effect the national powers. At the same time the opinion of the court in the McCulloch case, that its decision "did not deprive a State of any resources it originally possessed," remained unaffected.
Subsequently a case came before the United States Supreme Court (Weston vs. the City of Charleston, S. C.) in which the question involved was the right of a State to tax stock issued for loans made to the United States, whether on the stock, eo nomine or included in the aggregate of the tax-payers' property to be valued at what it was worth. The court, by Chief-Justice Mar-
parts, is to be considered; the conflicting powers of the Government of the Union and of its members are to be discussed; and an opinion given which may essentially influence the great operations of the Government. No tribunal can approach such a question without a deep sense of its importance and of the awful responsibility involved in its decision. But it must be decided peacefully, or remain a source of hostile legislation; perhaps of hostility of a still more serious nature; and if it is to be so decided, by this tribunal alone can the decision be made. On the Supreme Court of the United States has the Constitution of our country devolved this important duty. The sovereignty of a State extends to everything which exists by its own authority, or is introduced by its permission; but it does not extend to those means which are employed by Congress to carry into execution powers conferred on that body by the people of the United States. We think it demonstrable that it does not. These powers are not given by the people of a single State. They are given by the people of the United States to a Government whose laws, made in pursuance of the Constitution, are declared to be supreme. Consequently, the people of a single State can not confer a sovereignty which will extend over them."
