Existing comment:
The Chase Court:
After receiving the presidential commission naming him Chief Justice, Salmon P. Chase took his seat on December 15, 1864. Within the first months of his tenure, he gathered the Justices for the first known photograph of the full Court. Under Chase, the Justices decided many cases during the Reconstruction era (1865-1877) that arose from Civil War legal issues. Among them was Hepburn v. Griswold (1870), a 4-3 decision ruling that the Union's use of paper currency, or "greenbacks," during the war had been illegal. Surprisingly, Chase wrote the majority opinion which declared the use of such currency unconstitutional even though he had authorized it earlier as Secretary of the Treasury. Subsequently, the Court reversed itself with Chase in dissent, in the Legal Tenders Cases (1871). |