The Confederate Note Case was a case heard by the United States Supreme Court in 1873. The case involved the Atlantic, Tennessee and Ohio Railroad Company, the Charlotte and South Carolina Railroad Company, Joseph Wilson and Anderson Mitchell, who were suing the Carolina National Bank of Columbia, South Carolina, and L. D. Childs. The plaintiffs were seeking to recover the value of Confederate notes that had been issued by the Confederate government during the Civil War. The plaintiffs argued that the Confederate notes were legal tender and that the defendants had wrongfully refused to accept them as payment for the railroad companies’ debts. The defendants argued that the Confederate notes were not legal tender and that they were not obligated to accept them as payment. The Supreme Court ultimately ruled in favor of the defendants, holding that the Confederate notes were not legal tender and that the defendants were not obligated to accept them as payment. The Court also held that the Confederate notes were not a valid form of payment for the railroad companies’ debts.

In The Confederate Note Case, the dissenting opinion argued that the majority's decision was wrong and should be reversed. The case involved a dispute between two railroad companies and their shareholders on one side, and a bank on the other. At issue were certain notes issued by the railroads during the Civil War to pay for supplies in lieu of money; these notes had been discounted at less than face value by banks before being presented to Carolina National Bank of Columbia (CNB) for payment. CNB refused payment because it believed they were not valid legal tender under South Carolina law. The dissenters argued that since there was no evidence that either party knew or had reason to know about any invalidity when entering into this transaction, then both parties must have intended them as binding obligations with full faith and credit given to each note as if it were legal tender currency. Therefore, CNB should have accepted them as such without discounting their value due to lack of knowledge regarding validity under state law.