Marshall died two years after his Barron mistake. He may have been senile by that point... It's the only thing the makes sense of his drastic turn on the BoR and the complete ignorance of the legislation used to pass the BoR.
“It’s the only thing the makes sense of his drastic turn on the BoR and the complete ignorance of the legislation used to pass the BoR.”
I’m interested in your support for this argument, as it is pretty well accepted that the bill of rights was intended to apply only to the general government, and that is echoed in the debates surrounding the adoption of the amendments. Madison pointed out during the debate, quite correctly, as it turns out, that Art. 1, s. 8 gave Congress significantly broad powers that needed to be checked. Madison stated “[i]f there is any reason for restraining the state governments from this power [through state constitutions], there is like reason for restraining the federal government.”
I just don’t think the debates back up the contention that the bill of rights was intended to apply to the states. The history just doesn’t bear it out.