ABSTRACT
During the long tenure of Chief Justice John Marshall, the Supreme Court continued to enhance the power of the national government. The early nineteenth century has been labeled the "Golden Age" of American law - an age of "instrumentalism" when law was used creatively to accommodate to social conditions. Creativity flourished not only in the constitutional decisions of the Marshall Court, but perhaps even more in the case-by-case adjustment of the common law in the decisions of state courts. One area where concern for property continued to appear was in the criminal law. Indeed, concern for the protection of private property began to dominate the criminal law after the Revolution, and, as it did, it superseded the ethical concerns that had underlaid that body of law during the colonial period. Courts also continued to protect existing patterns of resource use in water rights and flooding cases.
