Lowery v. Minh-Vu Hoang

The United States Constitution provides that:

The Congress shall have [p]ower [t]o ... establish ... uniform [l]aws on the subject of [b]ankruptcies throughout the United States.

U.S. Const., art. I § 8, cl. 4. Despite this seemingly clear grant of power, it took Congress a long while to establish federal bankruptcy law, and longer still for it to establish a permanent bankruptcy law that preempted existing state insolvency laws. Thus, there were long stretches during the 19th century in which Maryland had its own insolvency law that operated alongside, or even instead of, federal bankruptcy…