Gold Clause Cases

1935 United States Supreme Court case

Gold Clause Cases

Supreme Court of the United States

Argued January 8–10, 1935
Decided February 18, 1935
Full case name| Norman v. Baltimore & Ohio R. Co;
United States v. Bankers Trust Co.;
Nortz v. United States;
Perry v. United States
Citations| 294 U.S. 240 (more)

55 S. Ct. 407; 79 L. Ed. 885; 1935 U.S. LEXIS 257; 95 A.L.R. 1352

Holding
Congress has power expressly to prohibit and invalidate contracts, although previously made and valid when made, when they interfere with carrying out any monetary policy Congress is free to adopt.
Court membership

Chief Justice
Charles E. Hughes
Associate Justices
Willis Van Devanter · James C. McReynolds
Louis Brandeis · George Sutherland
Pierce Butler · Harlan F. Stone
Owen Roberts · Benjamin N. Cardozo
Case opinions
Majority| Hughes, joined by Brandeis, Stone, Roberts, Cardozo
Concurrence| Stone
Dissent| McReynolds, joined by Van Devanter, Sutherland, Butler
Laws applied
U.S. Const. art. I, § 8, cl. 3.;
U.S. Const. art. I, § 8, cl. 5.;
U.S. Const. art. I, § 8, cl. 18.
U.S. Const. amend. XIV
Bond coupons payable in gold

The Gold Clause Cases were a series of actions brought before the Supreme Court of the United States, in which the court narrowly upheld the Roosevelt administration's adjustment of the gold standard in response to the Great Depression.

## Background

[edit]

Until the 1930s, business contracts in the United States regularly included gold clauses that allowed creditors to demand payment in gold or gold equivalents. The tightening of Federal Reserve policy from 1928 onward prompted a global unwinding of credit later dubbed the Great Contraction. Waves of bank failures occurred, aggravated by reliance on single-location banks (unit banks) that could not survive a run. A final bank panic in February 1933 saw widespread hoarding of gold and currency as well as international drains on gold reserves. Roosevelt started his term with banking suspended in most states and domestic gold reserves seriously depleted.[1]

With support from Congress, Roosevelt enacted a series of banking and currency reforms that effectively nationalized monetary gold. These included the Emergency Banking Act which authorized the President to prohibit international gold payments, Executive Order 6102 which required the surrender of all privately held monetary gold in exchange for currency, and the Gold Clause Resolution (Pub. Res. 73–10) which voided all gold clauses within the United States. The following year, under the Gold Reserve Act, the government took ownership of the Federal Reserve's gold stocks and devalued the dollar. Multiple cases were filed in response and made their way to the Supreme Court.

## Cases

[edit]

Norman v. Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Co. with United States v. Bankers Trust Co. 294 U.S. 240 (1935): The bearer of a $22.50 bond coupon of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad demanded payment of $38.10, the value of the coupon's gold obligation based on the statutory price of gold. Separately, the federal government and the Reconstruction Finance Corporation, as creditors of the Iron Mountain Railway, intervened in a case brought by the Missouri Pacific Railroad for additional payment on Iron Mountain bonds.

Nortz v. United States 294 U.S. 317 (1935): The owner of $106,300 in federal gold certificates surrendered them as required by Executive Order 6102, receiving only their face value in currency. He sued in the United States Court of Claims for an additional $64,000 representing the loss of the dollar against gold. That court submitted three certified questions to the Supreme Court, the first of which asked whether the plaintiff could demand the value of gold given that he had no right to possess the gold itself.

Perry v. United States 294 U.S. 330 (1935): The owner of a $10,000 Liberty Bond sued in the Court of Claims for an additional $7,000 representing the dollar's devaluation. Again, the Court of Claims submitted a question of whether it could consider a claim beyond the face value of the bond.

## Ruling

[edit]

While the Roosevelt administration waited for the Court to return its judgment, contingency plans were made for an unfavorable ruling.[2] Roosevelt drew up executive orders to close all stock exchanges and prepared a radio address to the public.[2] "If the policy of the government ... is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court", he wrote, then "the people would have ceased to be their own rulers". Weighing the possibility of a constitutional crisis against the prospect of economic and political instability, he wrote that "legislative and executive officers of the Government must look beyond the narrow letter" of the matter.[3]

Ideas floated about the White House to withdraw the right to sue the government to enforce gold clauses.[2] Attorney General Homer Cummings opined the court should be immediately packed to ensure a favorable ruling.[2] Roosevelt directed Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau to step back from regulating exchange and interest rates to provoke a public outcry for federal action, but Morgenthau refused.[2]

All three cases were announced on February 18, 1935, each in favor of the government's position by a 5–4 majority.[2] Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes wrote the opinion for each case, finding the government's power to regulate money a plenary power. Only in the Perry case the Court reached the question of the Gold Clause Resolution's constitutionality. It concluded that Congress acted unconstitutionally in voiding the government's prior obligations but not in restricting transactions in gold. As a result, it held that the bond holder had no cause of action because, in receiving currency that he could lawfully possess rather than gold coin which he could not, he had suffered no monetary loss.

Justice James Clark McReynolds wrote the dissenting opinion. He protested that gold clauses were binding contracts, and that allowing the administration's policies to stand would permanently damage faith in the government to uphold its own contracts and those of private parties. McReynolds distinguished the cases at hand from the Legal Tender Cases, arguing that in the earlier cases the government sought to continue operating until it could meet its obligations, while the Roosevelt administration apparently sought to nullify them.

## Subsequent events

[edit]

Congress responded to the ambiguous Perry ruling with an additional resolution (Pub. Res. 74–63) that provided sovereign immunity of the federal government against claims for damage resulting from the devaluation of currency or other federal obligations.[4] The future of gold as a basis for money remained unsettled for nearly the entire Roosevelt presidency. In 1944, the Allies of World War II developed the Bretton Woods system that pegged the dollar to gold and other currencies to the dollar. This system continued until 1971 when President Richard Nixon, in what came to be known as the "Nixon Shock", announced that the United States would no longer convert dollars to gold at a fixed value even for foreign exchange purposes, thus abandoning the gold standard. As part of the subsequent reforms to Bretton Woods institutions, President Gerald Ford signed an act that terminated legal prohibitions on private gold transactions as of December 31, 1974.[5]

The Gold Clause Resolution was amended in 1977 to again permit enforcement of gold clauses in private obligations issued after the date of the amendment.[6] This amendment has been held to apply even to lease contracts that originated earlier and were transferred;[7] however, in cases involving railroad bonds that spanned the entire gold ownership ban, courts have rejected the argument that the amendment reactivated the obligation to pay in gold, on the grounds that bonds are "issued" only to their original holders.[8][9] In 1986, the federal government introduced the American Gold Eagle coin series, the first gold money produced by the United States since the Great Depression. These coins are legal tender at their face value, but the Mint offers them only as collectibles at their much higher bullion value—not as a form of payment by the government.

## References

[edit]

1. ^ Kennedy, Susan Estabrook (1973). The Banking Crisis of 1933.
2. ^ a b c d e f McKenna, at 56–66.
3. ^ Daunton, Martin (2023). The Economic Government of the World, 1933-2023. p. 54–55.
4. ^ 31 U.S.C. § 5118: Gold clauses and consent to sue
5. ^ Pub. L. 93–373
6. ^ Pub. L. 95–147
7. ^ 216 Jamaica Avenue, LLC v. S & R Playhouse Realty Co., 540 F.3d, 433 (6th Cir. 2008).
8. ^ Gold Bondholders, Etc. v. ATSF Ry. Co., 658 P.2d, 776 (Alaska 1983).
9. ^ Adams v. Burlington Northern Railroad Company, 80 F.3d, 1377 (9th Cir. 1995).

## Further reading

[edit]

* Urofsky, Melvin I.; Finkelman, Paul (2002). A March of Liberty: A Constitutional History of the United States. Vol. 2 (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-512637-2.
* McKenna, Marian C. (2002). Franklin Roosevelt and the Great Constitutional War: The Court-packing Crisis of 1937. New York, NY: Fordham University Press. ISBN 978-0-8232-2154-7.

## External links

[edit]

* Text of Norman v. Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Co., 294 U.S. 240 (1935) is available from: Cornell Google Scholar Justia Library of Congress
* Text of Nortz v. United States, 294 U.S. 317 (1935) is available from: Cornell Google Scholar Justia Library of Congress
* Text of Perry v. United States, 294 U.S. 330 (1935) is available from: Cornell Google Scholar Justia Library of Congress

* v
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* e

U.S. Supreme Court Article I case law

Enumeration Clause of Section II

* Utah v. Evans (2002)
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Qualifications Clauses of Sections II and III

* Powell v. McCormack (1969)
* U.S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton (1995)
* Cook v. Gralike (2001)

Elections Clause of Section IV

* Ex parte Siebold (1879)
* Smiley v. Holm (1932)
* U.S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton (1995)
* Arizona State Legislature v. Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission (2015)
* Moore v. Harper (2023)

Speech or Debate Clause of Section VI

* Kilbourn v. Thompson (1881)
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Origination Clause of Section VII

* Flint v. Stone Tracy Co. (1911)
* United States v. Munoz-Flores (1990)

Presentment Clause of Section VII

* Pocket Veto Case (1929)
* Immigration and Naturalization Service v. Chadha (1983)
* Clinton v. City of New York (1998)

Taxing and Spending Clause of Section VIII

* Hylton v. United States (1796)
* Collector v. Day (1871)
* Springer v. United States (1881)
* Pollock v. Farmers' Loan & Trust Co. (1895)
* Brushaber v. Union Pacific Railroad Co. (1916)
* Bailey v. Drexel Furniture Co. (1922)
* United States v. Butler (1936)
* Helvering v. Davis (1937)
* South Dakota v. Dole (1987)
* Sabri v. United States (2004)
* National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius (2012)

Commerce Clause of Section VIII

| Dormant Commerce Clause|

* Brown v. Maryland (1827)
* Willson v. Black-Bird Creek Marsh Co. (1829)
* Cooley v. Board of Wardens (1852)
* Wabash, St. Louis & Pacific Railway Co. v. Illinois (1886)
* Swift & Co. v. United States (1905)
* George W. Bush & Sons Co. v. Malloy (1925)
* Baldwin v. G.A.F. Seelig, Inc. (1935)
* Edwards v. California (1941)
* Southern Pacific Co. v. Arizona (1945)
* Dean Milk Co. v. City of Madison (1951)
* Miller Bros. Co. v. Maryland (1954)
* Bibb v. Navajo Freight Lines, Inc. (1959)
* National Bellas Hess v. Illinois (1967)
* Pike v. Bruce Church, Inc. (1970)
* Hughes v. Alexandria Scrap Corp. (1976)
* Complete Auto Transit, Inc. v. Brady (1977)
* Hunt v. Washington State Apple Advertising Commission (1977)
* City of Philadelphia v. New Jersey (1978)
* Exxon Corp. v. Governor of Maryland (1978)
* Reeves, Inc. v. Stake (1980)
* Kassel v. Consolidated Freightways Corp. (1981)
* Sporhase v. Nebraska ex rel. Douglas (1982)
* White v. Mass. Council of Construction Employers (1983)
* South-Central Timber Development, Inc. v. Wunnicke (1984)
* Maine v. Taylor (1986)
* Healy v. Beer Institute, Inc. (1989)
* Quill Corp. v. North Dakota (1992)
* Chemical Waste Management, Inc. v. Hunt (1992)
* Oregon Waste Systems, Inc. v. Department of Environmental Quality of Oregon (1994)
* C&A Carbone, Inc. v. Town of Clarkstown (1994)
* West Lynn Creamery, Inc. v. Healy (1994)
* Granholm v. Heald (2005)
* United Haulers Ass'n v. Oneida-Herkimer Solid Waste Management Authority (2007)
* Department of Revenue of Kentucky v. Davis (2008)
* Comptroller of the Treasury of Maryland v. Wynne (2015)
* South Dakota v. Wayfair, Inc. (2018)
* Tennessee Wine and Spirits Retailers Assn. v. Thomas (2019)
* National Pork Producers Council v. Ross (2023)

|

Others|

* Gibbons v. Ogden (1824)
* Passenger Cases (1849)
* Paul v. Virginia (1869)
* Cooper Manufacturing Co. v. Ferguson (1885)
* Kidd v. Pearson (1888)
* In re Debs (1895)
* United States v. E. C. Knight Co. (1895)
* Champion v. Ames (1903)
* Southern Railway Co. v. United States (1911)
* Hoke v. United States (1913)
* Houston East & West Texas Railway Co. v. United States (1914)
* Hammer v. Dagenhart (1918)
* Board of Trade of City of Chicago v. Olsen (1923)
* A.L.A. Schechter Poultry Corp. v. United States (1935)
* Gold Clause Cases (1935)
* Panama Refining Co. v. Ryan (1935)
* Carter v. Carter Coal Co. (1936)
* NLRB v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corp. (1937)
* United States v. Carolene Products Co. (1938)
* McGoldrick v. Berwind-White Coal Mining Co. (1940)
* United States v. Darby Lumber Co. (1941)
* United States v. Wrightwood Dairy Co. (1942)
* Wickard v. Filburn (1942)
* United States v. South-Eastern Underwriters Ass'n (1944)
* North American Co. v. SEC (1946)
* H.P. Hood & Sons v. Du Mond (1949)
* Henderson v. United States (1950)
* Canton Railroad Co. v. Rogan (1951)
* Boynton v. Virginia (1960)
* Heart of Atlanta Motel, Inc. v. United States (1964)
* Katzenbach v. McClung (1964)
* Maryland v. Wirtz (1968)
* National League of Cities v. Usery (1976)
* Hodel v. Virginia Surface Mining & Reclamation Association, Inc. (1981)
* Commonwealth Edison Co. v. Montana (1981)
* EEOC v. Wyoming (1983)
* Garcia v. San Antonio Metropolitan Transit Authority (1985)
* New York v. United States (1992)
* United States v. Lopez (1995)
* Seminole Tribe of Florida v. Florida (1996)
* Reno v. Condon (2000)
* United States v. Locke (2000)
* Jones v. United States (2000)
* United States v. Morrison (2000)
* Gonzales v. Raich (2005)
* National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius (2012)
* Taylor v. United States (2016)

Coinage Clause of Section VIII

| Legal Tender Cases|

* Knox v. Lee (1871)
* Juilliard v. Greenman (1884)

|

Copyright Clause of Section VIII

| Copyright Act of 1790|

* Wheaton v. Peters (1834)
* Paige v. Banks (1872)
* Globe Newspaper Co. v. Walker (1908)

|

Patent Act of 1793|

* Tyler v. Tuel (1810)
* Evans v. Eaton (1818)
* Evans v. Eaton (1822)
* Evans v. Hettich (1822)

Patent infringement case law|

* Evans v. Jordan (1815)
* Hollister v. Benedict & Burnham Manufacturing Co. (1885)
* Rowell v. Lindsay (1885)
* Schillinger v. United States (1894)
* Bauer & Cie. v. O'Donnell (1913)
* General Talking Pictures Corp. v. Western Electric Co. (1938)

Patentability case law|

* Pennock v. Dialogue (1829)
* Hotchkiss v. Greenwood (1851)
* O'Reilly v. Morse (1853)
* Cochrane v. Deener (1876)
* City of Elizabeth v. American Nicholson Pavement Co. (1878)
* Egbert v. Lippmann (1881)
* Consolidated Safety-Valve Co. v. Crosby Steam Gauge & Valve Co. (1885)
* Voss v. Fisher (1885)

Copyright Act of 1831|

* Wheaton v. Peters (1834)
* Backus v. Gould (1849)
* Stephens v. Cady (1853)
* Stevens v. Gladding (1854)
* Little v. Hall (1856)
* Paige v. Banks (1872)
* Baker v. Selden (1879)
* Callaghan v. Myers (1888)
* Higgins v. Keuffel (1891)
* Holmes v. Hurst (1899)
* Brady v. Daly (1899)
* Bolles v. Outing Co. (1899)
* Mifflin v. R. H. White Company (1903)
* Mifflin v. Dutton (1903)

Copyright Act of 1870|

* Perris v. Hexamer (1879)
* Trade-Mark Cases (1879)
* Merrell v. Tice (1881)
* Schreiber v. Sharpless (1884)
* Burrow-Giles Lithographic Co. v. Sarony (1884)
* Thornton v. Schreiber (1888)
* Banks v. Manchester (1888)
* Callaghan v. Myers (1888)
* Thompson v. Hubbard (1889)
* Higgins v. Keuffel (1891)
* Belford v. Scribner (1892)
* Brady v. Daly (1899)
* Bolles v. Outing Co. (1899)
* Bleistein v. Donaldson Lithographing Co. (1903)
* McLoughlin v. Raphael Tuck & Sons Co. (1903)
* American Tobacco Co. v. Werckmeister (1907)
* Werckmeister v. American Tobacco Co. (1907)
* United Dictionary Co. v. G. & C. Merriam Co. (1907)
* White-Smith Music Publishing Co. v. Apollo Co. (1908)
* Dun v. Lumbermen's Credit Ass'n (1908)
* Bobbs-Merrill Co. v. Straus (1908)
* Scribner v. Straus (1908)
* Bong v. Campbell Art Co. (1909)
* Henry v. A.B. Dick Co. (1912)

Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890|

* Straus v. American Publishers Association (1913)
* Interstate Circuit, Inc. v. United States (1939)
* Fashion Originators' Guild of America v. FTC (1941)
* United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc. (1948)
* Broadcast Music, Inc. v. CBS Inc. (1979)

International Copyright Act of 1891|

* Press Pub. Co. v. Monroe (1896)
* McLoughlin v. Raphael Tuck & Sons Co. (1903)
* American Tobacco Co. v. Werckmeister (1907)
* White-Smith Music Publishing Co. v. Apollo Co. (1908)
* Globe Newspaper Co. v. Walker (1908)
* Bong v. Campbell Art Co. (1909)
* Caliga v. Inter Ocean Newspaper Co. (1909)
* Hills and Co. v. Hoover (1911)
* Kalem Co. v. Harper Bros. (1911)

Copyright Act of 1909|

* Hills and Co. v. Hoover (1911)
* DeJonge and Co. v. Breuker & Kessler Co. (1914)
* Herbert v. Shanley Co. (1917)
* Manners v. Morosco (1920)
* Fox Film Corp. v. Knowles (1923)
* Buck v. Jewell-LaSalle Realty Co. (1931)
* Douglas v. Cunningham (1935)
* Washingtonian Pub. Co. v. Pearson (1939)
* Sheldon v. Metro-Goldwyn Pictures Corp. (1940)
* Fred Fisher Music Co. v. M. Witmark & Sons (1943)
* F. W. Woolworth Co. v. Contemporary Arts, Inc. (1952)
* Mazer v. Stein (1954)
* De Sylva v. Ballentine (1956)
* Sears, Roebuck & Co. v. Stiffel Co. (1964)
* Williams & Wilkins Co. v. United States (1973)

Patent misuse case law|

* Motion Picture Patents Co. v. Universal Film Manufacturing Co. (1917)
* Morton Salt Co. v. G.S. Suppiger Co. (1942)

Clayton Antitrust Act of 1914|

* Fashion Originators' Guild of America v. FTC (1941)
* Dowling v. United States (1985)

Lanham Act|

* Inwood Laboratories, Inc. v. Ives Laboratories, Inc. (1982)
* San Francisco Arts & Athletics, Inc. v. United States Olympic Committee (1987)
* Two Pesos, Inc. v. Taco Cabana, Inc. (1992)
* Qualitex Co. v. Jacobson Products Co. (1995)
* College Savings Bank v. Florida Prepaid Postsecondary Education Expense Board (1999)
* Cooper Industries, Inc. v. Leatherman Tool Group, Inc. (2001)
* TrafFix Devices, Inc. v. Marketing Displays, Inc. (2001)
* Dastar Corp. v. Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp. (2003)
* Moseley v. V Secret Catalogue, Inc. (2003)
* Lexmark International, Inc. v. Static Control Components, Inc. (2014)
* POM Wonderful LLC v. Coca-Cola Co. (2014)
* Matal v. Tam (2017)
* Iancu v. Brunetti (2019)
* Romag Fasteners, Inc. v. Fossil, Inc. (2020)

Copyright Act of 1976|

* Zacchini v. Scripps-Howard Broadcasting Co. (1977)
* Sony Corp. of America v. Universal City Studios, Inc. (1984)
* Mills Music, Inc. v. Snyder (1985)
* Harper & Row v. Nation Enterprises (1985)
* Community for Creative Non-Violence v. Reid (1989)
* Stewart v. Abend (1990)
* Feist Publications, Inc., v. Rural Telephone Service Co. (1991)
* Fogerty v. Fantasy, Inc. (1994)
* Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc. (1994)
* Lotus Dev. Corp. v. Borland Int'l, Inc. (1996)
* Quality King Distributors Inc., v. L'anza Research International Inc. (1998)
* Feltner v. Columbia Pictures Television, Inc. (1998)
* New York Times Co. v. Tasini (2001)
* Eldred v. Ashcroft (2003)
* MGM Studios, Inc. v. Grokster, Ltd. (2005)
* Reed Elsevier, Inc. v. Muchnick (2010)
* Golan v. Holder (2012)
* Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (2013)
* Petrella v. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Inc. (2014)
* American Broadcasting Cos., Inc. v. Aereo, Inc. (2014)
* Star Athletica, LLC v. Varsity Brands, Inc. (2017)
* Fourth Estate Public Benefit Corp. v. Wall-Street.com (2019)
* Rimini Street Inc. v. Oracle USA Inc. (2019)
* Allen v. Cooper (2020)
* Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org, Inc. (2020)

Other copyright cases|

* American Lithographic Co. v. Werkmeister (1911)
* Ferris v. Frohman (1912)
* Order of St. Benedict of New Jersey v. Steinhauser (1914)
* International News Service v. Associated Press (1918)
* L. A. Westermann Co. v. Dispatch Printing Co. (1919)
* Lumiere v. Mae Edna Wilder, Inc. (1923)
* Educational Films Corp. v. Ward (1931)
* Fox Film Corp. v. Doyal (1932)
* George v. Victor Talking Machine Co. (1934)
* KVOS v. Associated Press (1936)
* Gibbs v. Buck (1939)
* Buck v. Gallagher (1939)
* Commissioner v. Wodehouse (1949)
* Miller Music Corp. v. Charles N. Daniels, Inc. (1960)
* Pub. Affairs Associates, Inc. v. Rickover (1962)
* Fortnightly Corp. v. United Artists Television, Inc. (1968)
* Goldstein v. California (1973)
* Teleprompter Corp. v. Columbia Broadcasting (1974)
* Twentieth Century Music Corp. v. Aiken (1975)

Other patent cases|

* Continental Paper Bag Co. v. Eastern Paper Bag Co. (1908)
* Minerals Separation, Ltd. v. Hyde (1916)
* United States v. General Electric Co. (1926)
* United States v. Univis Lens Co. (1942)
* Altvater v. Freeman (1943)
* Sinclair & Carroll Co. v. Interchemical Corp. (1945)
* Funk Bros. Seed Co. v. Kalo Inoculant Co. (1948)
* Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Co. v. Supermarket Equipment Corp. (1950)
* Graver Tank & Manufacturing Co. v. Linde Air Products Co. (1950)
* Aro Manufacturing Co. v. Convertible Top Replacement Co. (1961)
* Compco Corp. v. Day-Brite Lighting, Inc. (1964)
* Wilbur-Ellis Co. v. Kuther (1964)
* Brulotte v. Thys Co. (1964)
* Walker Process Equipment, Inc. v. Food Machinery & Chemical Corp. (1965)
* Graham v. John Deere Co. (1966)
* United States v. Adams (1966)
* Brenner v. Manson (1966)
* Lear, Inc. v. Adkins (1969)
* Anderson's-Black Rock, Inc. v. Pavement Salvage Co. (1969)
* Zenith Radio Corp. v. Hazeltine Research, Inc. (1971)
* Gottschalk v. Benson (1972)
* United States v. Glaxo Group Ltd. (1973)
* Dann v. Johnston (1976)
* Sakraida v. Ag Pro Inc. (1976)
* Parker v. Flook (1978)
* Diamond v. Chakrabarty (1980)
* Diamond v. Diehr (1981)
* Bonito Boats, Inc. v. Thunder Craft Boats, Inc. (1989)
* Eli Lilly & Co. v. Medtronic, Inc. (1990)
* Markman v. Westview Instruments, Inc. (1996)
* Warner-Jenkinson Co. v. Hilton Davis Chemical Co. (1997)
* Pfaff v. Wells Electronics, Inc. (1998)
* Dickinson v. Zurko (1999)
* Florida Prepaid Postsecondary Education Expense Board v. College Savings Bank (1999)
* J. E. M. Ag Supply, Inc. v. Pioneer Hi-Bred International, Inc. (2001)
* Festo Corp. v. Shoketsu Kinzoku Kogyo Kabushiki Co. (2002)
* Merck KGaA v. Integra Lifesciences I, Ltd. (2005)
* eBay Inc. v. MercExchange, L.L.C. (2006)
* Illinois Tool Works Inc. v. Independent Ink, Inc. (2006)
* LabCorp v. Metabolite, Inc. (2006)
* MedImmune, Inc. v. Genentech, Inc. (2007)
* KSR International Co. v. Teleflex Inc. (2007)
* Microsoft Corp. v. AT&T Corp. (2007)
* Quanta Computer, Inc. v. LG Electronics, Inc. (2008)
* Bilski v. Kappos (2010)
* Global-Tech Appliances, Inc. v. SEB S.A. (2011)
* Stanford University v. Roche Molecular Systems, Inc. (2011)
* Microsoft Corp. v. i4i Ltd. Partnership (2011)
* Mayo Collaborative Services v. Prometheus Laboratories, Inc. (2012)
* Kappos v. Hyatt (2012)
* Bowman v. Monsanto Co. (2013)
* Gunn v. Minton (2013)
* Association for Molecular Pathology v. Myriad Genetics, Inc. (2013)
* FTC v. Actavis, Inc. (2013)
* Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank International (2014)
* Akamai Techs., Inc. v. Limelight Networks, Inc. (2014)
* Teva Pharmaceuticals USA, Inc. v. Sandoz, Inc. (2015)
* Kimble v. Marvel Entertainment, LLC (2015)
* Apple Inc. v. Samsung Electronics Co. (2016)
* TC Heartland LLC v. Kraft Foods Group Brands LLC (2017)
* Peter v. NantKwest, Inc. (2019)

Other trademark cases|

* G. & C. Merriam Co. v. Syndicate Pub. Co. (1915)
* Kellogg Co. v. National Biscuit Co. (1938)
* Patent and Trademark Office v. Booking.com B. V. (2020)

Necessary and Proper Clause of Section VIII

* McCulloch v. Maryland (1819)
* Lambert v. Yellowley (1926)
* Sabri v. United States (2004)
* Gonzales v. Raich (2005)
* United States v. Comstock (2010)
* United States v. Kebodeaux (2013)

Habeas corpus Suspension Clause of Section IX

* Ex parte Bollman (1807)
* Ex parte Merryman (1861)
* Ex parte Endo (1944)
* Immigration and Naturalization Service v. St. Cyr (2001)
* Boumediene v. Bush (2008)
* Department of Homeland Security v. Thuraissigiam (2020)

No Bills of Attainder or Ex post facto Laws Clause of Section IX

* Calder v. Bull (1798)
* Sturges v. Crowninshield (1819)
* Ex parte Garland (1866)
* Hawker v. New York (1898)
* Samuels v. McCurdy (1925)
* Garner v. Board of Public Works (1951)
* De Veau v. Braisted (1960)
* Barr v. City of Columbia (1964)
* Teague v. Lane (1989)
* Kansas v. Hendricks (1997)
* Smith v. Doe (2003)

Contract Clause of Section X

| Legal Tender Cases|

* Hepburn v. Griswold (1870)

|

Others|

* Fletcher v. Peck (1810)
* Dartmouth College v. Woodward (1819)
* Sturges v. Crowninshield (1819)
* Ogden v. Saunders (1827)
* Charles River Bridge v. Warren Bridge (1837)
* Bronson v. Kinzie (1843)
* Stone v. Mississippi (1880)
* Smyth v. Ames (1898)
* Block v. Hirsh (1921)
* Home Building & Loan Ass'n v. Blaisdell (1934)
* W.B. Worthen Co. v. Kavanaugh (1935)
* City of El Paso v. Simmons (1965)
* U.S. Trust Co. of N.Y. v. New Jersey (1977)
* Allied Structural Steel Co. v. Spannaus (1978)
* Energy Reserves Group v. Kansas P. & L. Co. (1983)
* Exxon Corp. v. Eagerton (1983)
* Keystone Bituminous Coal Ass'n v. DeBenedictis (1987)
* Sveen v. Melin (2018)

Import-Export Clause of Section X

* Brown v. Maryland (1827)
* Canton Railroad Co. v. Rogan (1951)

Compact Clause of Section X

* Florida v. Georgia (1855)
* Virginia v. West Virginia (1871)
* Virginia v. Tennessee (1893)
* Wharton v. Wise (1894)
* Northeast Bancorp v. Federal Reserve Board of Governors (1985)
* New Jersey v. New York (1998)
* Virginia v. Maryland (2003)
* Polar Tankers, Inc. v. City of Valdez (2009)
* Texas v. New Mexico and Colorado (2018)

*[Pub. L.]: Public Law
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