TROUBLED BRIDGE OVER WATER

CHARLES RIVER BRIDGE V. WARREN BRIDGE 36 US 420 (1837) THE WELFARE OF THE PUBLIC CAN TRUMP PRIVATE CONTRACTS.

the U.S. Supreme Court, voting 5-2, rejected a claim by owners of a toll bridge in Boston that the Massachusetts legislature had acted unconstitutionally in authorizing construction of a second, competing bridge. The ruling meant little to Bostonians. The second span, the Warren Bridge, connecting their city with the Charlestown neighborhood, then a separate village just across the Charles River, had long been completed. Warren Bridge tolls had so quickly paid off the initial investors that crossings had become free. But the high court’s ruling profoundly affected commercial life in the United States, marking a turning