Dartmouth College V. Woodward : Colleges, Corporations, and the Common Good.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Nelson, Adam R.

Series:

Landmark Law Cases and American Society Series

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Woodward, William Henry, 1774-1818--Trials, litigation, etc.

Woodward, William Henry.

Dartmouth College--Trials, litigation, etc.

Dartmouth College.

United States. Supreme Court.

United States.

New Hampshire. Superior Court of Judicature.

New Hampshire.

Contracts--United States--Cases.

Contracts.

Corporation law--United States--Cases.

Corporation law.

Constitutional law--United States--Cases.

Constitutional law.

Genre:

Electronic books.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (279 pages)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

La Vergne : University Press of Kansas, 2025.

Summary:

Dartmouth College v. Woodward examines the landmark case decided by the United States Supreme Court in 1819 after New Hampshire's state legislature attempted to amend Dartmouth's charter to place the college under greater public control. Adam R. Nelson interprets the case not only as one about higher-education governance or American corporate law in an emerging constitutional order, and not simply as a case about the Marshall Court's preference for "private" over "public" initiative as the primary driver of social and commercial development. More fundamentally, Nelson uses the case to illustrate a broad ideological shift from commonwealth republicanism to market liberalism in both education and jurisprudence during the early nineteenth century. The question at the heart of the case was: should Dartmouth College be subject to legislative authority? This book finds that when the state court said "yes" but the US Supreme Court said "no," the divergence between these decisions stemmed not only from different applications of the contracts clause but also from disagreements about the degree to which core institutions in a democracy--whether colleges or churches or companies--should be overseen or regulated by political majorities. Implicit in the Dartmouth case, though never clarified, was the question of whether higher education was a private or public good, and thus whether colleges are better off under private or public control. By choosing the private path, Dartmouth reinforced a gradual privatization of what might otherwise have been considered public goods. Americans today live with the consequences of this decision. A landmark in American corporate law, the Dartmouth College case has been cited in a wide variety of subsequent decisions, including Citizens United (2010) and Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores (2014). Adam Nelson's informative work provides an accessible introduction to this important piece of American legal history.

Contents:

Part I: The context

A quest for a charter

Incorporation ... and ill will

Public support and public supervision

Corporations, contracts, and the Constitution

Who controls the college? : who controls the church?

Part II: The case

Dartmouth College v. Dartmouth University

Trustees of Dartmouth College v. Woodward

Founders and first donors

Advice from a "high authority"

"It is, sir, a small college, and yet there are those who love it"

Part III: The consequences

How to win friends and influence justices

The Marshall Court decides

"New facts" ... and new foundations

"A university ... under the auspices and control of the legislature

Colleges, contracts, and the common good.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

ISBN:

9780700638697

0700638695

OCLC:

1517397758