Tomorrow marks the 155th anniversary of the ruling of Texas v. White, a case argued before the United States Supreme Court in 1869. The case involved a claim by the Reconstruction government of Texas that United States bonds owned by Texas since 1850 had been illegally sold by the Confederate state legislature during the American Civil War.
BACKGROUND
On February 1, 1861, Texas drafted and approved an Ordinance of Secession. Texas had received $10 million in United States bonds in settlement of border claims. Needing money to support the confederate war effort, the legislature authorized the sale of the remaining bonds. 136 bonds were purchased by a brokerage owned by George White and were resold to several individuals.
With the end of the war the state realized that it was no longer in possession of the bonds, it determined that the bonds had been sold illicitly to finance the rebellion against the United States and filed a lawsuit against George White and others.
RULING
The court ruled that Texas was, and remained, a state of the United States ever since it first joined the Union in 1845, despite it later purporting to join the Confederate States of America. The court further held that the Constitution did not permit states to unilaterally secede from the United States, and that the ordinances of secession, and all the acts of the legislatures within seceding states intended to give effect to such ordinances, were "absolutely null”. The purported bond sale during the civil war was thus void and the reconstructed Texas remained the legal owner.
The Union of the States … began among the Colonies, and grew out of common origin, mutual sympathies, kindred principles, similar interests, and geographical relations. It was confirmed and strengthened by the necessities of war, and received definite form and character and sanction from the Articles of Confederation. By these, the Union was solemnly declared to "be perpetual". And when these Articles were found to be inadequate to the exigencies of the country, the Constitution was ordained "to form a more perfect Union". It is difficult to convey the idea of indissoluble unity more clearly than by these words. What can be indissoluble if a perpetual Union, made more perfect, is not? - Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase