Quotes From Supreme Court Justices

2000 Election (Selection)
It is confidence in the men and women who administer the judicial system 
that is the true backbone of the rule of law. Time will one day heal the 
wound to the confidence that will be inflicted by today's decision.  One 
thing, however, is certain. Although we may never know with complete 
certainty the identity of the winner of this year's Presidential 
election, the identity of the loser is perfectly clear.  It is the 
Nation's confidence in the judge as an impartial guardian of the rule of 
law.  I respectfully dissent.
Justice John Paul Stevens 12-12-2000

1st Amendment
"It was not by accident or coincidence that the rights to freedom in 
speech and press were coupled in a single guaranty with the rights of 
the people peaceably to assemble and to petition for redress of 
grievances. All these, though not identical, are inseparable.
They are cognate rights, and therefore
are united in the first Article’s assurance."
Judge Wiley B. Rutledge
[Wiley Blount Rutledge] U.S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: Thomas v. Collins, 1944

4th Amendment
The 4th Amendment and the personal rights it secures have a long history. 
At the very core stands the right of a man to retreat into his own home 
and there be free from unreasonable governmental intrusion.
Potter Stewart 
Source:Bartkus v. Illinois, 5 March 1961

"This provision (the 4th Amendment) speaks for itself.
Its plain object is to secure the perfect enjoyment of that
great right of the common law, that a man's house
shall be his own castle, privileged against
all civil and military intrusion."
Justice Joseph Story
(1779-1845) US Supreme Court Justice
1833
http://liberty-tree.ca/qb/Joseph.Story.Quote.8610

"It is better, so the Fourth Amendment teaches us,
that the guilty sometimes go free than
the citizens be subject to easy arrest."
Justice William O. Douglas
Source: Henry v. United States, 1959

5th Amendment
The critical point is that the Constitution places the right of silence 
beyond the reach of government. 
William O. Douglas 
Source:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_o_douglas.html

Advice to the Young
The advice of elders to young men is very apt to be as unreal as  
a list of the hundred best books.
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Source:The Path Of Law

Affirmative Action
I yield to no one in my earnest hope that the time will come when 
an 'affirmative action' program is unnecessary and is ...only a 
relic of the past....Then persons will be regarded as persons, 
and discrimination of the type we address today will be an ugly 
feature of history that is instructive but is behind us....In 
order to get beyond racism, we must first take account of race....
And in order to treat some persons equally, we must treat 
them differently.
Harry A. Blackmun
Source:Univ of Cal v. Bakke

Anonymous
"Anonymous pamphlets, leaflets, brochures and even books 
have played an important role in the progress of mankind. 
Persecuted groups and sects from time to time throughout 
history have been able to criticize the oppressive practices 
and laws either anonymously or not at all... It is plain 
that anonymity has sometimes been assumed for the most 
constructive purposes."
Justice Hugo L. Black
Source: Tally v. California, 1960

Authority
Since when have we Americans been expected to bow submissively to authority 
and speak with awe and reverence to those who represent us? 
William O. Douglas 
Source:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_o_douglas.html

In view of the Constitution, in the eye of the law, there
is in this country no superior, dominant, ruling class of citizens.
There is no caste here. Our Constitution is colorblind,
and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens."
John Marshall Harlan
Source: Plessy v. Ferguson, 1896

Bad Law
Great cases like hard cases make bad law.
Oliver Windell Holmes
Source:Northern Securities Co v. US 1904

Betrayal
"Republics are created by the virtue, public spirit, and
intelligence of the citizens. They fall, when the wise are banished
from the public councils, because they dare to be honest, and
the profligate are rewarded, because they flatter the people,
in order to betray them."
Justice Joseph Story
(1779-1845) US Supreme Court Justice
1833

Big Brother
"Big Brother in the form of an increasingly powerful government and
in an increasingly powerful private sector will pile the records high
with reasons why privacy should give way to national security, to law
and order, to efficiency of operation, to scientific advancement and
the like."
Justice William O. Douglas
Source: Points of Rebellion, 1969

Bigot
The mind of a bigot is like the pupil of the eye. The more light you shine 
on it, the more it will contract.
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Source:http://www.quotationspage.com/quotes/Oliver_Wendell_Holmes_Jr./

Bill of Rights
"The very purpose of a Bill of Rights was to withdraw certain subjects
from the vicissitudes of political controversy, to place them beyond the
reach of majorities and officials and to establish them as legal
principles to be applied by the courts. One's right to life, liberty,
and property, to free speech, a free press, freedom of worship and
assembly, and other fundamental rights may not be submitted to vote;
they depend on the outcome of no elections."
Justice Robert H. Jackson
(1892-1954), U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: West Virginia Board of Education vs. Barnette, 1943

"It is my belief that there are 'absolutes' in our Bill of Rights,
and that they were put there on purpose by men who knew what the 
words meant and meant their prohibitions to be 'absolutes.' "
Justice Hugo L. Black
Source: 1962
http://liberty-tree.ca/qb/Hugo.Black.Quote.8F10

Brown V. Board Of Education
In approaching this problem, we cannot turn the clock back...
Earl Warren, 1954
Source:The Supreme Court in American History, 1965

Can't Do It
Deep-seated preferences can not be argued about.
Oliver Wendell Holmes
Source:Natural Law

Capital Punishment
Capital punishment...treats members of the human race...as objects to 
be toyed with and discarded. 
William J. Brennan
Source:http://www.memorablequotations.com/brennan.htm

Censorship
"The First and Fourteenth Amendments say that Congress and the States
shall make "no law" which abridges freedom of speech or of the press.
In order to sanction a system of censorship I would have to say that
"no law" does not mean what it says, that "no law" is qualified to mean
"some" laws. I cannot take this step."
William O. Douglas (1898-1980), U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: Superior Films v. Department of Education of the State of Ohio,1954

"Regardless of the strength of the government's interest 
[in protecting children,] the level of discourse reaching a mailbox simply 
cannot be limited to that which would be suitable for a sandbox." 
Thurgood Marshall,1983
Source:http://www.zaadz.com/quotes/authors/us_supreme_court/

Censorship reflects a society's lack of confidence in itself.
It is the landmark of an authoritarian regime..." 
Potter Stewart 
Source:Ginsberg v. United States, 1966

Certainty and Repose
Certainty generally is illusion, and repose is not the destiny of man.
Oliver Wendell Holmes
Source:The Path Of Law

Change
"A nation's success or failure in achieving democracy is judged in 
part by how well it responds to those at the bottom and the margins 
of the social order... The very problems that democratic change 
brings -- social tension, heightened expectations, political unrest 
-- are also strengths. Discord is a sign of progress afoot; unease 
is an indication that a society has let go of what it knows and 
is working out something better and new." 
Sandra Day O'Connor
Source:The Nation

Character of Every Act
The character of every act depends upon the circumstances in 
which it is done.
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Source:http://www.quotationspage.com/quotes/Oliver_Wendell_Holmes_Jr./

Checks and Restraints
"Those in power need checks and restraints lest they come to identify 
the common good for their own tastes and desires, and their continuation 
in office as essential to the preservation of the nation."
William O. Douglas
(1898-1980), U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: We, The Judges, 1956

Church and State
"The First Amendment has erected a wall between Church and State.  
That wall must be kept high and impregnable.
We could not approve the slightest breach."
Hugo L. Black
Everson V Board of Education 1947

This freedom was first in the Bill of Rights. It was set forth in 
absolute terms, and its strenght is its rigidity. The First 
Amendment's purpose was to create a complete and permanent 
separation of the spheres of religious activity and civil 
authority by comprehensively forbidding every form of public 
aid or support for religion.
Tom Clark
Source:Everson v. Board of Education

"From the standpoint of freedom of speech and the press,
it is enough to point out that the state has no legitimate interest
in protecting any or all religions from views distasteful to them...
It is not the business of government to suppress
real or imagined attacks upon a particular religious doctrine."
Justice Tom C. Clark
(1899-1977) U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: Burstyn v. Wilson, 1952

"The door of the Free Exercise Clause stands tightly closed against any 
government regulation of religious beliefs as such. Government may neither 
compel affirmation of a repugnant belief, nor penalize or discriminate 
against individuals or groups because they hold views abhorrent to the 
authorities."
Justice William J. Brennan, (1906-1997) U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: Sherbert v. Verner, 1963

Civil Liberties
"At the foundation of our civil liberties lies
the principle that denies to government officials
an exceptional position before the law and which
subjects them to the same rules of conduct
that are commands to the citizen."
Justice Louis D. Brandeis
Source: Burdeau v. McDowell, 1921

"Civil government cannot let any group ride roughshod over others
simply because their consciences tell them to do so."
-- Justice Robert H. Jackson
(1892-1954), U. S. Supreme Court Justice
http://quotes.liberty-tree.ca/quote_blog/Robert.Jackson.Quote.21A5

"Those who won our independence by revolution were not cowards. 
They did not fear political change. They did not exalt order at 
the cost of liberty."
Justice Louis Brandeis

Clear and Present Danger
"What finally emerges from the 'clear and present danger' cases
is a working principle that the substantive evil must be extremely
serious and the degree of imminence extremely high before utterances
can be punished... It must be taken as a command of the broadest scope
that explicit language, read in the context of a liberty-loving society,
will allow."
Justice Hugo L. Black
(1886-1971) US Supreme Court Justice
Source: Bridges v. California

Competition
Undoubtedly competition involves waste. What human activity does 
not?... There are wastes of competion which do not develop but kill. 
These the law can and should eliminate, by regulating competion.
Louis D. Brandeis
Source:The Curse of Bigness

No system of regulation can safely be substituted for the operation of 
indivdual liberty as expressed in competion.
Louis D. Brandeis
Source:Brandeis: A Free Man's Life

Compromise
To obtain a just compromise, concession must not only be mutual--it must be 
equal also....There can be no hope that either will yield more than it gets 
in return.
John Marshall
Source:The Life Of John Marshall

Congressional Powers
"It is fundamental that the great powers of Congress to conduct 
war and to regulate the Nation's foreign relations are subject 
to the constitutional requirements of due process. The 
imperative necessity for safeguarding these rights to 
procedural due process under the gravest of emergencies has 
existed throughout our constitutional history, for it is then, 
under the pressing exigencies of crisis, that there is the 
greatest temptation to dispense with fundamental constitutional 
guarantees which, it is feared, will inhibit governmental action."
Justice Arthur Goldberg
US Supreme Court Justice
Source: Kennedy v. Mendoza-Martinez, 1963

Constitution
Our Constitution is color blind, and neither knows or tolerates 
classes among citizens.
John Marshall Harlan
Plessy V Ferguson 1896

If the provisions of the Constitution be not upheld when they 
pinch as well as when they comfort, they may as well be abandoned.
Charles Evan Hughes
Home Building & Loan Ass'n V Blaisdel 1934

The contention that...the Constitution is to be disregarded if it stands 
in the way of that which is deemed of the public advantage...is 
distructive of the whole theory upon which our American Commonwealths 
have been founded.
Horace H. Lurton
Source:North American Review, 1911

The Constitution is not neutral. It was designed to take the government 
off the backs of people. 
William O. Douglas 
Source:
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_o_douglas.html

At the constitutional level where we work, 90 percent of any decision 
is emotional. The rational part of us supplies the reasons for 
supporting our predilections. 
William O. Douglas
Source:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_o_douglas.html

"The makers of our constitution undertook to secure conditions favorable 
to the pursuit of happiness... They sought to protect Americans in their 
beliefs, their thoughts, their emotions and their sensations. They 
conferred, as against the government, the right to be let alone, the most 
comprehensive of the rights and the right most valued by civilized men."
Justice Louis D. Brandeis
(1856-1941) US Supreme Court Justice
Source: Olmstead v. United States, 1928

"Here I close my opinion.
I could not say less in view of questions of such gravity
that go down to the very foundations of the government.
If the provisions of the Constitution can be set aside
by an Act of Congress, where is the course of usurpation to end?
The present assault upon capital is but the beginning.
It will be but the stepping-stone to others, larger and more sweeping,
till our political contests will become a war of the poor
against the rich; a war growing in intensity and bitterness."
Justice Stephen J. Field,(1816-1899) US Supreme Court Justice
Source: United States Supreme Court opinion, 
Pollock v. Farmers Loan & Trust Co. (1898)

"The layman's constitutional view is
that what he likes is constitutional and
that which he doesn't like is unconstitutional."
Justice Hugo L. Black
Source: New York Times, 26 February 1971
http://liberty-tree.ca/qb/Hugo.Black.Quote.8F12

"The public welfare demands that constitutional cases
must be decided according to the terms of the Constitution itself, and
not according to judges’ views of fairness, reasonableness, or justice."
Justice Hugo L. Black
(1886-1971) US Supreme Court Justice
Source: Lecture, Columbia University, 1968

Constructionist
"I belive the Court has no power to add to or subtract from the 
procedures set forth by the founders...I shall not at any time 
surrender my belief that the document itself should be our guide, not 
our own concept of what is fair, decent, and right."
Hugo L. Black
1969 Interview
Source:The Supreme Court and Its Great Justices by Sidney H. Asch

Contract
The old idea of a good bargain was a transaction in which one man got 
the better of another. The new idea of a good contract is a transaction 
which is good for both parties to it.
Louis D. Brandeis
Source:Business--A Profession

Contradictory
To do the contradictory is a tough problem....You build a fireproof
house and nevertheless take out fire insurance.
Filex Frankfurter
Source:Letters 

Court
When the [Supreme] Court moved to Washington in 1800, it was provided with 
no books, which probably accounts for the high quality of early opinions.
Robert H. Jackson
Source:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/r/roberthja124920.html

We do not sit as a superlegislature to weigh the wisdom of legislation. 
William O. Douglas 
Source:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_o_douglas.html

We who have the final word can speak softly or angrily. 
We can seek to challenge and annoy, as we need not stay 
docile and quiet. 
William O. Douglas 
Source:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_o_douglas.html

Court's Job
We must distinguish between the sound certainty and the sham, 
between what is gold and what is tinsel; and then, when 
certainty is attained, we must remember that it is not the 
only good, that we can buy it at too high a price.
Benjamin Nathan Cardozo
Source:The Grouth of the Law

Crime & Government
"Crime is contagious. If the government becomes a law breaker,
it breeds contempt for the law."
Justice Louis D. Brandeis
Source: Olmstead v. United States, 1928

Critics
It seemed to me that I had barely reached the Court when people were 
trying to get me off. 
William O. Douglas 
Source:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_o_douglas.html

Danger
"Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect 
liberty when the Government's purposes are beneficent. Men born 
to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty 
by evil-minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in 
insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without 
understanding."
Justice Louis D. Brandeis
US Supreme Court Justice 1928
Source:dissenting, Olmstead v. United States, 277 US 479 (1928)

Democracy
Democracy substitutes self-restraint for external restraint. It is more 
difficult to maintain than to achieve. 
Louis D. Brandeis
Source:http://www.memorablequotations.com/brandeis.htm

Dictatorship
"A people who extend civil liberties only to preferred groups
start down the path either to dictatorship of the right or the left."
Justice William O. Douglas, U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source:http://quotes.liberty-tree.ca/quote_blog/William.O..Douglas.Quote.C5AF

Discrimination
Discrimination is the act of treating differently two persons...
under like circumstances.
Louis Dembitz Brandeis
Source:National Life Ins Co v. US

A state government may adopt race-conscious programs if the purpose 
of such programs is to remove the disparate racial impact it actions 
might otherwise have and if there is reason to believe that the 
disparate impact is itself the product of past discrimination, 
whether its own or that of society at large.
William Joseph Brennan
Source:Univ of Cal v. Bakke

Doubts
To have doubted one's own first principles is the mark of a 
civilized man.
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Source:http://www.quotationspage.com/quotes/Oliver_Wendell_Holmes_Jr./

Drugs
"While the collateral consequences of drugs such as cocaine
are indisputably severe, they are not unlike those
which flow from the misuse of other, legal, substances."
Justice Byron R. White
source:http://quotes.liberty-tree.ca/quote_blog/Byron.White.Quote.B29B

Due Process (5th Amendment)
The 5th Amendment is an old friend and a good friend. One of the great
landmarks in men's struggle to be free of tyranny, to be decent 
and civilized. 
William O. Douglas 
Source:
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_o_douglas.html

Economic System
The legislature must be free to choose unless government is to be 
rendered impotent.  The Fourteenth amendment has no more imbedded 
in the Constitution our preference for some particular set of economic 
beliefs, than it has adopted, in the name of liberty, the system of 
theology, which we happen to approve.
Halen Fiske Stone
Morehead V New York 1936

Emergency Power
"The Constitution of the United States is a law
for rulers and people, equally in war and in peace,
and covers with the shield of its protection
all classes of men, at all times, and under all circumstances.
No doctrine, involving more pernicious consequences,
was ever invented by the wit of man than
that any of its provisions can be suspended
during any of the great exigencies of government.
Such a doctrine leads directly to anarchy or despotism,
but the theory of necessity on which it is based is false;
for the government, within the Constitution,
has all the powers granted to it,
which are necessary to preserve its existence;
as has been happily proved by the result
of the great effort to throw off its just authority."
Justice David Davis
(1815-1886) U.S. Supreme Court Justice 1862-1877
Source: Ex parte Milligan 71 U.S. 2 (1866) DAVIS, J., Opinion of the Court
http://liberty-tree.ca/qb/David.Davis.Quote.5879

"Emergency does not create power.
Emergency does not increase granted power or remove or diminish
the restrictions imposed upon power granted or reserved.
The Constitution was adopted in a period of grave emergency.
Its grants of power to the federal government and
its limitations of the power of the States
were determined in the light of emergency,
and they are not altered by emergency."
Justice Charles Evans Hughes
(1862-1948) Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court
Source: Home Building & Loan Assn v. Blairsdell, 1934

Equal Protection
The guarantee of equal protection cannot mean one thing when
applied to one individual and something else when applied to 
a person of another color. If both are not accorded the same 
protection, then it is not equal.
Lewis F. Powell, Jr
Source:Univ Of Calif. v. Bakke (1978)

Equality
Equality is equity.
Noah Hayes Swayne
Source:Pacific Insance Co. v. Soule

Error
"It is not the function of our Government to keep the citizen from falling 
into error; it is the function of the citizen to keep the Government from 
falling into error."
Robert H. Jackson, 1950
Source:American Communications Association v. Douds,339 U.S. 382,442

If err we must, let us err on the side of tolerance.
Filex Frankfurter
Source:New York Times, Nov 23, 1952

Executive Power
Men have discovered no technique for long preserving free government 
except that the executive be under the law. 
Justice Robert H. Jackson 
Source:Sam Ervin, The Whole Truth 

Experience
Often a liberal antidote of experience supplies a sovereign cure for 
a paralyzing abstraction built apon a theory.
Benjamin Nathan Cardozo
Source:Paradoxes Of Legal

Experiments
It is one of the happy incidents of the federal system, that a single 
courageous State may if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory,
and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the 
rest of the country.
Louis Brandeis 1932 
Source:Serria Club

Facts and the Law
If facts are changing, law cannot be static.
Felix Frankfuter
Source:Law and Politics

Final End
"Those who won our independence believed that the final end 
of the State was to make men free to develop their faculties...
They valued liberty both as an end and as a means.
They believed liberty to be the secret of happiness
and courage to be the secret of liberty."
Justice Louis D. Brandeis
(1856-1941) US Supreme Court Justice
Source: Whitney v. California, 1927

Formulas
To rest upon a formula is a slumber that prolonged, means death.
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr
Source:Ideals and Doubts

Freedom Of Association
"Privacy in one’s associations… may in many circumstances be 
indispensable to freedom of association, particularly where a 
group espouses dissident beliefs."
John Marshall Harlan, (1899-1971) U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: NAACP v. Alabama

Freedom Of Religion
"The government must pursue a course
of complete neutrality toward religion."
Justice John Paul Stevens
(1920- )American jurist, senior Associate Justice of the 
U.S. Supreme Court Source: 1985

"Just as the right to speak and the right to refrain from speaking
are complementary components of a broader concept of individual freedom,
so also the individual’s freedom to choose his own creed is the
counterpart of his right to refrain from accepting the creed established
by the majority."
Justice John Paul Stevens
U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: Wallace v. Jaffree, 1985

Free Society
To rely on a tidy formula for the easy determination of what is a 
fundamental right for purpose of legal inforcement may satisfy a 
longing for certainty but ignores the movements of a free socity.
Felix Frankfurter
Source:Wolf v. Colorado

Free Thought
If there is any principle of the Constitution that more 
imperatively calls for attachment than any other it is 
the principle of free thought--not free thought for those 
who agree with us but freedom for the thought we hate.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, 1929
Source:The Supreme Court in American History, 1965

"Our forefathers found the evils of free thinking
more to be endured than the evils of inquest or suppression.
This is because thoughtful, bold and independent minds
are essential to the wise and considered self-government."
Justice Robert H. Jackson
(1892-1954), U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: Atlantic Monthly, January 1955
http://quotes.liberty-tree.ca/quote_blog/Robert.Jackson.Quote.A09D

"Those who begin coercive elimination of dissent soon find themselves 
exterminating dissenters. Compulsory unification of opinion achieves 
only a unanimity at the graveyard."
Justice Robert H. Jackson, U. S. Supreme Court Justice
http://quotes.liberty-tree.ca/quote_blog/Robert.Jackson.Quote.A09F

Freedom
The right to be let alone is indeed the beginning of all freedoms. 
William O. Douglas 
Source:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_o_douglas.html

"Freedom to differ is not limited to things that do not matter much.
That would be a mere shadow of freedom.
The test of its substance is the right to differ
as to things that touch the heart of the existing order." 
Justice Robert H. Jackson, (1892-1954), U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, 1943

"The price of freedom of religion, or of speech, or of the press,
is that we must put up with, and even pay for, a good deal of rubbish."
Justice Robert H. Jackson
(1892-1954) U. S. Supreme Court Justice
http://quotes.liberty-tree.ca/quote_blog/Robert.Jackson.Quote.A0A1

Freedom Of Speech
 Persecution for the expression of opinions...seems to me to be 
perfectly logical. If you have no doubt of your premises of your 
power and want a certain result with all your heart, you naturally 
express your wishes in law and keep away opposition...
 But when men have realized that time has upset many fighting faults, 
they may come to beieve even more that the ultimate good desired is 
better reached by free trade in ideas--That the best test of truth 
is the power of thought to get itself accepted in the competition of 
the market, and that truth is the only ground upon which their wishes 
safely can be carried out. That at any rate is the theory of our 
Constitution. It is an experiment, as all life is an experiment....
 I think that we should be eternally vigilant against attemps to 
check the expression of opinions that we loathe and believe to be 
fraught with death.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
Abrams V US 1919

Free speech is not to be regulated like diseased cattle and impure 
butter. The audience that hissed yesterday may applaud today, 
even for the same performance. 
William O. Douglas 
Source:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_o_douglas.html

The very reason for the First Amendment is to make the people of
this country free to think, speak, write and worship as they
wish, not as the Government commands.
Hugo L. Black
IAM v. Street, 367 US 1961

"An unconditional right to say what one pleases about public affairs
is what I consider to be the minimum guarantee of the First Amendment."
Justice Hugo L. Black
Source: New York Times Company vs. Sullivan, 1964

If there is a bedrock principle of the First Amendment,
it is that the government may not prohibit the expression of an idea
simply because society finds the idea itself offensive or disagreeable."
Justice William J. Brennan
Source: Texas vs. Johnson, 1989
http://quotes.liberty-tree.ca/quote_blog/William.Brennan.Quote.8F32

One who comes to the Court must come to adore, not to protest. 
That's the new gloss on the 1st Amendment. 
William O. Douglas 
Source:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_o_douglas.html

Fear of serious injury cannot alone justify suppression of free speech and 
assembly. Men feared witches and burned women. It is the function of speech 
to free men from the bondage of irrational fear.
Louis D. Brandeis
Source:http://www.memorablequotations.com/brandeis.htm

If the First Amendment means anything, it means that a state has no business 
telling a man, sitting in his own house, what books he may read or what films 
he may watch. Our whole constitutional heritage rebels at the thought of 
giving government the power to control men's minds. 
Thurgood Marshall
Source:http://www.memorablequotations.com/marshall.htm

"Freedom of expression is the well-spring of our civilization...
The history of civilization is in considerable measure
the displacement of error which once held sway as official truth
by beliefs which in turn have yielded to other truths.
Therefore the liberty of man to search for truth ought not
to be fettered, no matter what orthodoxies he may challenge."
Felix Frankfurter, (1882-1965) U.S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: Concurring Opinion, Dennis et al. v. U.S. (1951)
http://liberty-tree.ca/qb/Felix.Frankfurter.Quote.3FFC

"[A] function of free speech under our system of government is to invite 
dispute. It may indeed best serve it's high purpose when it indices a 
condition of unrest, creates dissatisfaction with things as they are, 
or even stirs people to anger. Speech is often provocative and challenging. 
It may strike at prejudices and preconceptions and have profound unsettling 
effects as it presses for understanding." 
Potter Stewart 
Source:Free Speech and Political Protest [Marvin Summers], 1967

"The censor’s sword pierces deeply into the heart of free expression."
Earl Warren
(1891-1974) Chief Justice, U. S. Supreme Court
Source: Times Film Corps. vs. City of Chicago, 23 January 1961

"The struggle is always between the individual
and his sacred right to express himself
and... the power structure that seeks
conformity, suppression and obedience."
Justice William O. Douglas
http://quotes.liberty-tree.ca/quote_blog/William.O..Douglas.Quote.390A

"The constitutional right of free speech has been declared to be the 
same in peace and war. In peace, too, men may differ widely as to 
what loyalty to our country demands, and an intolerant majority, 
swayed by passion or by fear, may be prone in the future, as it has 
been in the past, to stamp as disloyal opinions with which it disagrees."
Justice Louis D. Brandeis
Source: Schaefer v. U. S., 1920

"The greater the importance to safeguarding the community from incitements 
to the overthrow of our institutions by force and violence, the more 
imperative is the need to preserve the constitutional rights of free speech, 
free press and free assembly in order to maintain the opportunity for free 
political discussion."
Justice Charles Evans Hughes
Source: DeJonge v. Oregon, 1937

Generalization
No generalization is wholly true, not even this one.
Oliver Wendell Holmes

Government
Government is not an exact science.
Louis Dembitz Brandeis
Source:Truax v. Corrigan

Government of Laws
It is not enough to know that the men applying the standard are 
honorable and devoted men. This is a government of laws, not of 
men....It is not without signnificance that most of the provisions 
of the Bill of Rights are procedural. It is procedure that spells 
much of the diffenence between rule by law and rule by 
whim or caprice.
William O. Douglas
Source:Anti-Fascist Refugee Comm v. McGrath

Habit
Most of the things we do, we do for no better reason than that our 
fathers have done them or our neighbors do them, and the same is 
true of a larger part than what we suspect of what we think. 
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. 
Source:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/o/
oliver_wendell_holmes_jr.html

Health
The best of wages will not compensate for excessively long working 
hours which undermine heath.
Louis Dembitz Brandeis
Source:Brandeis:The Personal History of an American Ideal

History
History, in illuminating the past, illuminates the present, 
and in illuminating the present, illuminates the future. 
Benjamin Cardozo
Source:http://www.memorablequotations.com/cardozo.htm

Ideas
"Ideas are indeed the most dangerous weapons in the world.
Our ideas of freedom are the most powerful
political weapons man has ever forged."
William O. Douglas
(1898-1980), U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: An Almanac of Liberty, 1954

"Every idea is an incitement. It offers itself for belief, and if 
believed it is acted on unless some other belief outweighs it or 
some failure of energy stifles the movement at its birth. The only 
difference between the expression of an opinion and an incitement 
is the speaker’s enthusiasm for the result."
Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., also known as "The Great Dissenter"
Source: Gitlow v United States, 1922

Initiative and Judgment
Organization can never be a substitute for initiative and for judgment.
Louis Dembitz Brandeis
Source:Business--A Profession

Insight
"A moment's insight is sometimes worth a life's experience."
Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
"The Great Dissenter"
http://quotes.liberty-tree.ca/quote_blog/Oliver.Holmes,.Quote.2B13

Inspiration
Method is much, technique is much, but inspiration is even more.
Benjamin N. Cardozo
Source:Law and Literature

Jury Duty
Jury service is a duty as well as a privelege of citizenship; 
it is a duty that cannot be skirked on a plea of inconvenience 
or decreased earning power.
Frank Murphy
Source:Thiel v. Southern Pacific Co, 1945

Knowledge
Knowledge and timber shouldn't be much used till they are seasoned.
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Source:The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table

Labor Unions
In present conditions a workman may not unnaturally believe that 
only by belonging to a union can he secure a contract that shall 
be fair to him....If that belief, whether right or wrong, may be 
held by a reasonable man, it seems to me that it may be enforced 
by law in order to establish the equality of position...in which 
liberty of contract begins.  Whether in the long run it is wise 
for the working men to enact legislation of this sort is not my 
concern, but I am strongly of the opinion that there is nothing 
in the Constitution of the United States to prevent it...
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
Coppage V State of Kansas 1915

Long ago we stated the reason for labor organizations. We said that 
union was essential to give laborers opportunity to deal on an 
equality with their employer.
US Supream Court
Source:Jones & Laughlin Steel Co. 1937

Law
A law embodies beliefs that have triumphed in the battle of ideas.
Oliver Wendell Holmes
Source:The Supreme Court in American History pp109

Law and Justice
"This is a court of law, young man, not a court of justice."
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
Source:http://en.thinkexist.com/quotation/
This_is_a_court_of_law-young_man-not_a_court_of/148879.html

Common sense often makes good law. 
William O. Douglas 
Source:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_o_douglas.html

Law and the Court
It is emphatically the province and duty of the judicial department 
to say what the law is.
John Marshall 1803
Source:The Supreme Court in American History, 1965

Leadership
The reward of the general is not a bigger tent, but command.
Oliver Wendell Holmes
Sourec:Letter to Charles Bunn, 1917

Liberty
Liberty implies the absence of arbitary restraint, not 
immunity from reasonable regulations...
Charles Evans Hughes, 1937
Source:The Supreme Court in American History, 1965

"The great ideals of liberty and equality are preserved
against the assaults of opportunism, the expediency of the passing hour,
the erosion of small encroachments, the scorn and derision of those
who have no patience with general principles."
-- Justice Benjamin Cardozo
(1870-1938) U.S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: Nature of Judicial Process, 1921
http://quotes.liberty-tree.ca/quote_blog/Benjamin.Cardozo.Quote.9E1D

Life Of The Law
The life of the law has not been logic; it has been experience.
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Source:The Common Law

Litigation
Litigation is the pursuit of practical ends, not a game of chess.
Felix Frankfurter
Source:Indianapolis v. Chase Nation Bank

Majority
"There can be no assumption that today’s majority is “right”
and the Amish or others like them are “wrong.”
A way of life that is odd or even erratic
but interferes with no right or interests of others
is not to be condemned because it is different."
-- Justice Warren E. Burger
Chief Justice, U. S. Supreme Court
Source: Wisconsin v. Yoder, 15 May 1972
http://quotes.liberty-tree.ca/quote_blog/Warren.Burger.Quote.8F45

Marriage
Marriage is a coming together for better or for worse, hopefully 
enduring, and intimate to the degree of being sacred. 
William O. Douglas 
Source:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_o_douglas.html

McCarthyism
"Ultimately all the questions boil down to one -
Whether we as a people will try fearfully and futilely to preserve 
democracy by adopting totalitarian methods, or whether in accordance 
with out traditions, and our constitution we will have the 
confidence and courage to be free."
Hugo L. Black
Barenblatt V US 1959

"The mere summoning of a witness and compelling him to testify 
against his will, about his beliefs, expressions or associations, 
is a measure of governmental interference. And when those forced 
revelations concern maters that are unorthodox, unpopular, or 
even hateful to the general public, the reactions in the life of 
the witness may be disastrous."
Earl Warren, Chief Justice
Source: U. S. Supreme Court

Mind
"The mark of a truly civilized man is confidence
in the strength and security derived from the inquiring mind."
Felix Frankfurter, (1882-1965) U.S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: Dennis v. United States, 1950

Morality
Morality is not merely different in different communities. Its
level is not the same for all the component groups within the
same community.
Benjamin Nathan Cordozo
Source:Paradoxes of Legal Science

News
Fresh news is got only by enterprise and expense.
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
INS v. AP (1918) 

Opinion
"Our institutions were not devised to bring about uniformity of opinion; 
if they had we might well abandon hope. It is important to remember, as 
has well been said, 'the essential characteristic of true liberty is 
that under its shelter many different types of life and character and 
opinion and belief can develop unmolested and unobstructed.'"
Justice Charles Evans Hughes
(1862-1948) Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court
Source: U. S. Supreme Court, Forbes Magazine, 1 November 1957

Oppression
As nightfall does not come at once, neither does oppression. In both 
instances, there's a twilight where everything remains seemingly 
unchanged, and it is in such twilight that we must be aware of change 
in the air, however slight, lest we become unwitting 
victims of the darkness. 
William O. Douglas 
Source:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_o_douglas.html

Patriot Act
The Constitution of the United States is a law for rulers and the people, 
equally in war and in peace.
Justice David Davis 1866
Source:The Supreme Court in American History, 1965

Powers
This government. . . can exercise only the powers granted to it.
John Marshall 1819
Source:The Supreme Court in American History, 1965

Preferences
Deep-seated preferences can not be argued about.
Oliver Windell Holmes
Source:Natural Law 

Press
The Press was protected so that it could bare the secrets of the
government and inform the people.  Only a free and unrestrained
press can effectively expose deception in government. And 
paramount amoung the responsibilities of a free press is the
duty to prevent any part of the government from deceiving
the people.
Hugo L. Black
New York Times V US (Pentagon Paper)

Privacy
We deal with a right of privacy older than the Bill of Rights-older 
than our political parties, older than our school system. 
William O. Douglas 
Source:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_o_douglas.html

Prodedures
The history of American freedomis , in no small measure, the history 
of procedure.
Felix Frankfurter
Source:Malinski v. New York

Progress
Progress flows only from struggle.
Louis D. Brandeis
Source:Business--A Profession

Public Opinion
"Judges ... rule on the basis of law,
not public opinion,
and they should be totally
indifferent to pressures
of the times."
Justice Warren E. Burger
Chief Justice, U. S. Supreme Court
Source: Christian Science Monitor, 11 February 1987

Putting Minds Together
The output of a multitude of minds must be expected to contain its 
proportion of vagaries.
Benjamin N. Cardozo
Source:The Grouth of the Law

Race
If discrimination based on race is constitutionally permissible when 
those who hold the reins can come up with "compelling" reasons to 
justify it, then constitutional guarantees acquire an 
accordionlike quality. 
William O. Douglas 
Source:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_o_douglas.html

Real Rulers In Washington
"The real rulers in Washington are invisible
and exercise power from behind the scenes."
Justice Felix Frankfurter
(1882-1965) U.S. Supreme Court Justice
http://quotes.liberty-tree.ca/quote_blog/Felix.Frankfurter.Quote.7DF7

Required Flag Saluting
"Compulsory unification of opinion achieves only the unanimity 
of the graveyard. It seems trite but necessary to say that the 
First Amendment to the Constitution was designed to avoid these 
ends by avoiding these beginnings.  If there is any fixed star 
in our constitutional constellation, it is that no offical, 
high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, 
nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force 
citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein."
Robert H. Jackson
Supreme Court Justice 1942
West Vir. Board of Education V Barnette

Revolt
"The right to revolt has sources deep in our history."
William O. Douglas, Supreme Court Justice
Source: An Almanac of Liberty, 1954

Right Stuff
Efficiency and economy imply employment of the right instrument 
and material as well as their right use in the right manner.
Louis Dembitz Brandeis
Source:St. Louis & Ohio Rail v. US

Right to Defy
"The right to defy an unconstitutional statute is basic in our scheme.
Even when an ordinance requires a permit to make a speech,
to deliver a sermon, to picket, to parade, or to assemble,
it need not be honored when it's invalid on its face."
Justice Potter Stewart
(1915-1985), U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: Walker v. Birmingham, 1967

Scholars
The world's great men have not commonly been great scholars, nor its 
great scholars great men.
Oliver Wendell Holms
Source:The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table

Secret Police
"I cannot say that our country could have no 
secret police without becoming totalitarian,
but I can say with great conviction that it 
cannot become totalitarian without a 
centralized national police."
Justice Robert H. Jackson
(1892-1954), U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: The Supreme Court in the American System of Government, 1955

Settled
Nothing is settled until it is settled right.
Louis D. Brandeis
Source:Brandeis: A Free Man's Life

Tact, Respect, and Generosity
Tact, respect, and generosity toward variant views will always 
commend themselfs to those charged with the duties of legislation 
so as to achieve a maximum of good will and to require a minimun 
of unwilling submission to a general law.
Felix Frankfurter
Source:W. Vir. State Board Of Ed. v. Barnette (1942)

Tax
"The power to tax involves the power to destroy."
Justice John Marshall
Source:http://quotes.liberty-tree.ca/quote_blog/John.Marshall.Quote.B6C6

Temptation
Temptation is not always invitation.
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Source:Erie Railroad v. Hilt

Test Oath
"[We] cannot say that a failure, because of religious scruples to 
assume a particular physical position and to repeat the words of 
a patriotic formula creates a grave danger to the nation.  Such a 
statutory exaction is a form of a test oath, and a test oath has
always been abhorent in the United States."
Hugo L. Black
Barenblatt V US 1959

The Decision
General propositions do not decide concrete cases. The decision will depend on a 
judgment or intuition more subtle than any articulate major premise.
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Source:Lochner v. New York

Thought Control
"The priceless heritage of our society is the
unrestricted constitutional right of each member to think
as he will. Thought control is a copyright of totalitarianism,
and we have no claim to it."
Justice Robert H. Jackson
Source: US Supreme Court, American Communications Association 
v. Douds, 339 U.S. 382, 442 (1950)

Trusts
Put not your trust in money, but put your money in trust.
Oliver Wendell Holmes
Source:The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table

Unconstitutional Law
[Justices do not have the right to declare] "a law unconstitutional 
simply becasue they considered a law unwise." [The court] "is not 
to decide whether the view taken by the legislature is a wise view, 
but whether a body of men could reasonable hold such a view."
Lousis D. Brandeis
Source:The Supreme Court and It's great Justicies

When a legislature undertakes to proscribe the exercise of a citizen's
constitutional rights it acts lawlessly and the citizen can take matters
into his own hands and proceed on the basis that such a law is
no law at all. 
William O. Douglas 
Source:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_o_douglas.html

Unorthodox
"The great and invigorating influences in American life 
have been the unorthodox: the people who challenge an 
existing institution or way of life, or say and do 
things that make people think."
William O. Douglas
(1898-1980), U. S. Supreme Court Justice
Source: Interview, 1958

Value
Value has been defined as the ability to command the price.
Louis Dembitz Brandeis
Source:St. Louis & Ohio RR v. US

Well Written Law
A body of law is more rational and more civilized when every rule it 
contains is referred arrticulately and definitely to an end which it 
subserves and the grounds for desiring that end are stated, or are 
ready to be stated in words.
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Source:Wigmore in Evidence

Wiretap
It is desirable that criminals should be detected, and to that end all
available evidence should be used....We have to choose, and for my part,
I think it less evil that some criminals should escape than that the 
goverment should play an ignoble part.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
Olmstead V U.S. 1928

Words
A word is not a crystal, transparent and unchanging, it is the skin of 
a living thought and may vary greatly in colour and content according 
to the circumstances and time in which it is used.
Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Source:http://www.quotationspage.com/quotes/Oliver_Wendell_Holmes_Jr./

The logic of words should yield to the logic of realities.
Louis Dembitz Brandeis
Sourec:DeSanto v. Pennsylvania

It is the part of wisdom, particulary for judges, not to be victimized 
by words.
Felix Frankfuter
Source:Shapiro v. US (1948) 



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