Two dominant constitutional issues in the 1790s illustrate the fluid nature of constitutional meaning in the early republic. One issue was whether the Constitution permitted individuals to sue states in federal court. The Supreme Court’s decision in Chisholm v. Georgia (1793) generated widespread state interposition to resist the Court’s broad interpretation of a constitutional clause and resulted in the Eleventh Amendment. A second constitutional issue generating interposition in 1796 was whether President Washington had exceeded his authority in negotiating the Jay Treaty with Great Britain. Federalists argued that the Constitution’s text clearly provided presidential authority while Republicans wanted Congress to speak for the sovereign people and have a vital role in assessing a treaty’s constitutionality. Both sides considered it important to understand the intent of those who drafted and ratified the Constitution and to employ that history in interpreting the document. Yet, this process of constitutional interpretation allowed inferences fromthe Constitution’s text, reliance on memory, and even thoughts about the framers’ intentions.

Justiciability doctrine also dealt with the amenability of states to suit in the federal courts, an issue the Court addressed in Monaco v. Mississippi, which found a general principle of state sovereign immunity embedded in the Constitution. The Court also continued to limn the controus of the law authotizing suits under limited circumstances against state officers charged with enforcing allegedly unconstitutional state laws. And, in an important and confusing decision the Court invoked standing and political questions rules to avoid deciding whether the proposed Child Labor Amendment had expired because of the lapse of time or asserted procedural irregularities in state ratification processes.