AND THE SENTIMENT OF UNION 375 



went over to the Republicans, who thus succeeded in 

 electing their candidate for governor, with a majority 

 of the legislature. In June, 1816, the new legislature 

 passed an act reorganizing the college, and a new 

 board of trustees was at once appointed by the gov- 

 ernor. Judge Woodward, secretary of the old board, 

 went over to the new board and became its secretary, 

 taking with him the college seal. The new board pro- 

 ceeded to expel the old board, which forthwith brought 

 suit against Judge Woodward in an action of trover 

 for the college seal. The case was tried in May, 1817, 

 with those two great lawyers, Jeremiah Mason and 

 Jeremiah Smith, as counsel for the plaintiffs. It was 

 then postponed till September, when Mr. Webster was 

 secured by the plaintiffs as an additional counsel. The 

 plaintiffs contended that in the case of a corporation 

 chartered for private uses, any alleged misconduct of 

 the trustees was properly a question for the courts, 

 and not for the legislature, which in meddling with 

 such a question plainly transcended its powers. Their 

 chief reliance was upon this point, but they contended 

 that the act of legislature reorganizing the college was 

 an act impairing the obligation of a contract, and 

 therefore violated the Constitution of the United 

 States. Nothing is more interesting or more signifi- 

 cant in the history of the case than the fact that 

 neither of the three great lawyers who represented the 

 plaintiffs at first attached much importance to this 

 second point, which to-day seems so obvious that we 

 only wonder how any one could ever for a moment 

 have hesitated about urging it. One could hardly 

 find anywhere a more forcible illustration of the 

 change which seventy years have wrought in our 



