necessary and proper
Definitions from Case Law · United States Supreme Court
Definitions from Case Law
From 76 U.S. 579 - Thomson v. Pacific Railroad · 1869Most cited · 180 citing opinions
the words 'necessary and proper' as equivalent in meaning to the words 'appropriate, plainly adapted, not prohibited, but consistent with the letter and spirit of the Constitution
How often courts cite the case defining “necessary and proper”
Court decisions citing the opinion that defined “necessary and proper” — 179 in all, by decade. Counts are citations to the defining case as a whole, not verified uses of the term. The dip in the most recent years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the latest years.