The Court had to decide-who had the power to regulate navigation on interstate waterways: Congress, or the individual states? The Court ruled in Gibbons’s favor, holding that the Constitution gave this power to Congress. Ogden and Gibbons each thought his own license should outweigh the other man’s. And Gibbons had a license from the federal government to operate a steamboat through interstate waterways. But Gibbons, Ogden’s former business partner, was also a steamboat operator. Since New York required all out-of-state operators to get expensive permits (protecting Ogden from competition), Ogden figured he would be doing good business. Ogden had a license from New York to operate on the state’s waterways. Aaron Ogden stood on the New York side and smiled. On one side of the river was New York: on the other, New Jersey. In this Commerce Clause case, the Supreme Court affirmed Congress’s power to regulate interstate commerce, and held that by virtue of the Supremacy Clause, state laws “must yield” to constitutional acts of Congress. This month we spotlight one of the earliest cases exploring the division between state and federal power: Gibbons v.
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