Top 45 John Marshall Quotes
#1. 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.
John Marshall
#2. When a law is in its nature a contract, when absolute rights have vested under that contract, a repeal of the law cannot divest those rights. The people can act only by their agents and, within the powers conferred upon them, their acts must be considered as the acts of the people.
John Marshall
#3. The peculiar circumstances of the moment may render a measure more or less wise, but cannot render it more or less constitutional.
John Marshall
#4. No political dreamer was ever wild enough to think of breaking down the lines which separate the States and compounding the American people into one common mass.
John Marshall
#5. If the agency of the mother in forming the character of her children is, in truth, so considerable, as I think it - if she does so much toward making her son what she would wish him to be - how essential is it that she should be fitted for the beneficial performance of these important duties.
John Marshall
#6. The events of my life are too unimportant, and have too little interest for any person not of my immediate family, to render them worth communicating or preserving.
John Marshall
#7. 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.
John Marshall
#8. To obtain a just compromise, concession must not only mutual-it must be equal also ... There can be no hope that either will yield more than it gets in return.
John Marshall
#9. The people made the Constitution, and the people can unmake it. It is the creature of their will, and lives only by their will.
John Marshall
#10. A constitution is framed for ages to come, and is designed to approach immortality as nearly as human institutions can approach it.
John Marshall
#11. A constitution, intended to
endure for ages to come, and
consequently, to be adapted to the
various crises of human affairs.
John Marshall
#12. To listen well is as powerful a means of communication and influence as to talk well.
John Marshall
#13. My gift of John Marshall to the people of the United States was the proudest act of my life. There is no act of my life on which I reflect with more pleasure. I have given to my country a judge equal to a Hole, Holt, or a Mansfield.
John Marshall
#14. It is emphatically the province and duty of the Judicial Department to say what the law is.
John Marshall
#15. 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.
John Marshall
#16. A corporation is an artificial being, invisible, intangible, and existing only in contemplation of law.
John Marshall
#17. I suspect that 280 figure is a bit low. The reality is it's probably closer to 700 to 1,000 (students) out of the 911 units. But if they get a lot of empty nesters and up-and-coming professionals to buy there, that number could be a lot lower.
John Marshall
#19. No one imagines that a law professing to tax will be permitted to destroy.
John Marshall
#20. The institution of Masonry ought to be abandoned as one capable of much evil, and incapable of producing any good which might not be affected by safe and open means.
John Marshall
#21. The most lively fancy aided by the strongest description cannot equal the reality of the opera.
John Marshall
#22. I have always believed that national character ... depends more on the female part of society than is generally imagined. Precepts from the lips of a beloved mother ... sink deep in the heart, and make an impression which is seldom entirely effaced.
John Marshall
#23. The French Revolution will be found to have had great influence on the strength of parties, and on the subsequent political transactions of the United States.
John Marshall
#24. Seldom has a battle, in which greater numbers were
not engaged, been so important in its consequences as that of Cowpens.
John Marshall
#25. A legislative act contrary to the Constitution is not law.
John Marshall
#26. The particular phraseology of the Constitution of the United States confirms and strengthens the principle, supposed to be essential to all written constitutions, that a law repugnant to the Constitution is void; and that courts, as well as other departments, are bound by that instrument.
John Marshall
#27. In a free government almost all other rights would become worthless if the government possessed power over the private fortune of every citizen.
John Marshall
#28. 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.
John Marshall
#29. The Constitution is colorblind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens.
John Marshall
#30. Between a balanced republic and a democracy, the difference is like that between order and chaos.
John Marshall
#31. The government of the Union, then, ... is, emphatically, and truly, a government of the people. In form and in substance it emanates from them. Its powers are granted by them, and are to be exercised directly on them, and for their benefit.
John Marshall
#32. Have no power, by taxation or otherwise, to retard, impede, burden or in any manner control the operations of the constitutional laws enacted by Congress.
John Marshall
#33. Certainly all those who have framed written constitutions contemplate them as forming the fundamental and paramount law of the nation, and consequently the theory of every such government must be, that an act of the legislature, repugnant to the constitution, is void.
John Marshall
#34. The constitution controls any legislative act repugnant to it.
John Marshall
#35. What are the maxims of Democracy? A strict observance of justice and public faith, and a steady adherence to virtue.
John Marshall
#36. The federal government is acknowledged by all to be one of enumerated powers. The principle, that it can exercise only the powers granted to it ... is now universally admitted.
John Marshall
#37. The power to tax involves the power to destroy.
John Marshall
#38. I was born on the 24th of September 1755 in the county of Fauquier, at that time one of the frontier counties of Virginia. My father possessed scarcely any fortune and had received a very limited education - but was a man to whom nature had been bountiful, and who had assiduously improved her gifts.
John Marshall
#39. The government of the Union, though limited in its powers, is supreme within its sphere of action, and its laws, when made in pursuance of the constitution, form the supreme law of the land.
John Marshall
#40. What is it that makes us trust our judges? Their independence in office and manner of appointment.
John Marshall
#41. This government is acknowledged by all, to be one of enumerated powers.
John Marshall
#43. My father superintended the English part of my education, and to his care I am indebted for anything valuable which I may have acquired in my youth. He was my only intelligent companion, and was both a watchful parent and an affectionate friend.
John Marshall
#44. 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.
John Marshall
#45. 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.
John Marshall
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