CHARLES RIVER BRIDGE V. WARREN BRIDGE
The 1837 landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision Charles River Bridge v. Warren Bridge, 36 U.S. (11 Pet.) 420, 9 L. Ed. 773, illustrated the
shift in politics brought about by the presidency
of ANDREW JACKSON. Nineteenth-century FEDERALISM, a dominant political doctrine from the time of the drafting of the U.S. Constitution,
favored the protection of private investments.
The Charles River Bridge decision espoused
newly popular Jacksonian political beliefs,
which favored free enterprise. Arguably, the case
altered the course of economic JURISPRUDENCE
in the United States.
The facts of Charles River Bridge began in
1650 when the state of Massachusetts granted a
charter to Harvard College (now Harvard Uni-
versity) to operate for profit a ferry over the
Charles River between Boston and Charlestown.
Later, in 1785, the Massachusetts Legislature
granted a charter to a group of Charlestown
businessmen to build the Charles River Bridge.
These entrepreneurs were to fund the bridge’s
construction and in return the state would allow
them to collect revenue from a specified toll for
the next forty years. As part of the agreement,
the entrepreneurs were to pay an ANNUITY to
Harvard College to replace ferry profits lost by
the building of the new bridge.
The bridge was immediately successful and
immensely profitable. Prompted by its popular-
ity, the Massachusetts Legislature in 1792 char-
tered the building of a second bridge, known as
the West Boston Bridge. To appease the propri-
etors of the Charles River Bridge, who faced
competition from the West Boston Bridge, the
state of Massachusetts extended the Charles
River Bridge charter from forty to seventy
years.
In 1828 Massachusetts chartered a third
bridge, the Warren Bridge, which was to be con-
structed within a few rods of the Charles River
Bridge. The Charles River Bridge proprietors
strongly objected to this third bridge because the
competition would diminish their profits. But
Massachusetts citizens viewed the Charles River
Bridge as monopolistic and welcomed competi-
tion and reduced tolls. The Warren Bridge was
completed as planned.
Within a year the Charles River Bridge suf-
fered a 40 percent drop in revenues. The bridge’s
proprietors, represented by DANIEL WEBSTER
and LEMUEL SHAW, went to court, seeking an
INJUNCTION against the Warren Bridge.Webster
and Shaw argued that the Warren Bridge’s char-
ter with the state violated the Contracts Clause
of the U.S. Constitution by interfering with the
state’s separate obligations under its charter with
the Charles River Bridge proprietors. They
maintained that as successors to the original
ferry service charter held by Harvard College,
the Charles River Bridge proprietors had an
implied exclusive right to tolls charged for cross-
ing the Charles River. Moreover, they said that
judicial policy should protect investments; with-
out security in investments, entrepreneurs
would not be willing to take risks in technologi-
cal developments such as bridges and railroads.
And this reluctance to take risks would only
prove detrimental to the public.
Lawyers for the Warren Bridge proprietors
countered that no exclusive rights existed for
transportation over the Charles River and that
judicial policy should favor technological
progress and free enterprise over the rights of
those investing in private property.After hearing
oral arguments in October 1829, the Supreme
Judicial Court of Massachusetts ruled in favor of
the Warren Bridge proprietors. The Charles
River Bridge group appealed the case to the U.S.
Supreme Court.
In March 1831, the Supreme Court first
heard arguments in the case. At that time JOHN
MARSHALL was chief justice and the Court was
dominated by Federalists. But several justices
were absent during that argument, so the Court
scheduled a second argument. This action had
a significant consequence: several justices
resigned or died prior to the second argument,
and, taking advantage of his privilege of
appointing new justices, President Jackson
changed the membership of the Court to prima-
rily Democratic.
Following a second argument in 1837 the
Court held that the Warren Bridge charter did
not violate the Contracts Clause of the Consti-
tution. Chief Justice ROGER B. TANEY,who
authored the opinion, held that any state legisla-
tion that chartered a private entity to provide a
public service, such as a bridge, turnpike, or
ferry, was to be strictly construed (interpreted)
in favor of the state and against the private
entity. The Court found that no implied rights
had passed from the Harvard College ferry char-
ter to the Charles River Bridge charter.
Chief Justice Taney further observed the
harm in ruling for the Charles River Bridge pro-
prietors simply because they faced competition
and reduced profits owing to the Warren Bridge.
He suggested that such a holding would encour-
age turnpike proprietors to sue the railroads for
destroying turnpike profits. In Taney’s view,
economic development was better served by
public improvements than by protections for
monopolies.
The Charles River Bridge decision received
widespread attention. Hard-line Federalists dis-
puted the Court’s rationale, insisting that only
by protecting vested property rights would
future financing for transportation technology
be ensured. And although railroads were not at
issue in Charles River Bridge, many historians
believe that the Taney Court placed great faith in
the future of railroads in the United States, and
in rendering its opinion was attempting to facil-
itate their growth. There is little doubt among
legal scholars that Charles River Bridge signified
the introduction of Jacksonian politics into U.S. jurisprudence.
FURTHER READINGS
Mensel. 1994. “Privilege against Public Right: A Reappraisal
of the Charles River Bridge Case.” Duquesne Law Review
33.
