Editing Dartmouth College v. Woodward (section)

==Judgment==
The decision, handed down on February 2, 1819, ruled in favor of the college and invalidated the act of the New Hampshire Legislature, which in turn allowed Dartmouth to continue as a private institution and take back its buildings, seal, and charter. The majority opinion of the court was written by Marshall. The opinion reaffirmed Marshall's belief in the sanctity of a contract (also seen in ''[[Fletcher v. Peck]]''<ref name=Fletcher/>) as necessary to the functioning of a republic (in the absence of royal rule, contracts rule).{{according to whom|date=January 2017}}

The Court ruled that the college's corporate charter qualified as a contract between private parties, the King and the trustees, with which the legislature could not interfere. Even though the United States were no longer [[Crown colony|royal colonies]], the contract was still valid because the Constitution said that a state could not pass laws to impair a contract. The fact that the government had commissioned the charter did not transform the school into a civil institution. Marshall's opinion emphasized that the term "contract" referred to transactions involving individual property rights, not to "the political relations between the government and its citizens."<ref>The Oyez Project, [https://www.oyez.org/cases/1789-1850/17us518/ "Dartmouth College v. Woodward"], 17 U.S. 518 (1819)]</ref>