23 quotes
Seldom has a battle, in which greater numbers were not engaged, been so important in its consequences as that of Cowpens..
A constitution is framed for ages to come, and is designed to approach immortality as nearly as human institutions can approach it.
The people made the Constitution, and the people can unmake it. It is the creature of their own will, and lives only by their will.
We must never forget that it is a constitution we are expounding.
McCulloch v. Maryland (1819)
The subject is the execution of those great powers on which the welfare of a Nation essentially depends.
McCulloch v. Maryland (1819)
It is emphatically the province and duty of the Judicial Department to say what the law is.
Marbury v. Madison (1803)
This is of the very essence of judicial duty.
Marbury v. Madison (1803)
An unlimited power to tax involves, necessarily, a power to destroy; because there is a limit beyond which no institution and no property can bear taxation.
McCulloch v. Maryland (1819)
The law does not expect a man to be prepared to defend every act of his life which may be suddenly and without notice alleged against him.
A dead soldier ties down no personnel behind the lines. A maimed soldier requires on average 40 personnel in the medevac chain.
We have no more right to decline the exercise of jurisdiction which is given, than to usurp that which is not given. The one or the other would be treason to the constitution.
T]he Government of the Union, though limited in its powers, is supreme within its sphere of action.
McCulloch v. Maryland (1819)
This provision is made in a constitution intended to endure for ages to come, and, consequently, to be adapted to the various crises of human affairs.
McCulloch v. Maryland (1819)
The acme of judicial distinction means the ability to look a lawyer straight in the eyes for two hours and not hear a damned word he says.
Let the end be legitimate, let it be within the scope of the constitution, and all means which are appropriate, which are plainly adapted to that end, which are not prohibited, but consist with the letter and spirit of the constitution, are constitutional.
McCulloch v. Maryland (1819)
No political dreamer was ever wild enough to think of breaking down the lines which separate the States, and of compounding the American people into one common mass.
The Government of the United States has been emphatically termed a government of laws, and not of men. It will certainly cease to deserve this high appellation if the laws furnish no remedy for the violation of a vested legal right.
Marbury v. Madison (1803)
In the Legislature of the Union alone are all represented. The Legislature of the Union alone, therefore, can be trusted by the people with the power of controlling measures which concern all, in the confidence that it will not be abused.
McCulloch v. Maryland (1819)
It is the peculiar province of the legislature to prescribe general rules for the government of society; the application of those rules to individuals in society would seem to be the duty of other departments.
The very essence of civil liberty certainly consists in the right of every individual to claim the protection of the laws whenever he receives an injury. One of the first duties of government is to afford that protection.
Marbury v. Madison (1803)