As long as judges tinker with the Constitution to 'do what the people want,' instead of what the document actually commands, politicians who pick and confirm new federal judges will naturally want only those who agree with them politically.
— Antonin Scalia
Pioneering Constituted quotations
We the people are the rightful masters of both Congress and the courts, not to overthrow the Constitution but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution.
Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people.
It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
Day by day, case by case, the Supreme Court is busy designing a Constitution for a country I do not recognize.
Whenever you can, act as a liberator.
Freedom, dignity, wealth - these three together constitute the greatest happiness of humanity. If you bequeath all three to your people, their love for you will never die.
Certainly the Constitution does not require discrimination on the basis of sex.
The only issue is whether it prohibits it. It doesn't.
There is nothing I dread so much as the division of the republic into two great parties, each arranged under its leader, and concerting measures in opposition to each other. This, in my humble apprehension, is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our constitution.
It is difficult to maintain the illusion that we are interpreting a Constitution, rather than inventing one.
We believe in constitutional action in normal times;
we believe in revolutionary action in exceptional times.
Though liberty is established by law, we must be vigilant, for liberty to enslave us is always present under that very liberty. Our Constitution speaks of the "general welfare of the people." Under that phrase all sorts of excesses can be employed by lusting tyrants to make us bondsmen.
History teaches that grave threats to liberty often come in times of urgency, when constitutional rights seem too extravagant to endure.
A sacred respect for the constitutional law is the vital principle, the sustaining energy of a free government.
Don't interfere with anything in the Constitution.
That must be maintained, for it is the only safeguard of our liberties.
Firearms stand next in importance to the Constitution itself.
But a Constitution of Government once changed from Freedom, can never be restored. Liberty, once lost, is lost forever.
Often Satan injects pride into the believer's spirit, evoking in him an attitude of self-importance and of self-conceit. He causes him to esteem himself a very outstanding person, one who is indispensable in God's work. Such a spirit constitutes one of the major reasons for the fall of believers.
We live in a country that talks about being the home of the brave and the land of the free, and we have the highest incarceration rate in the world.
I prefer someone who burns the flag and then wraps themselves up in the Constitution over someone who burns the Constitution and then wraps themselves up in the flag.
Secularism is not only in our constitution but also in our veins.
We worship Mother Nature too. We believe that the world is our family.
The American Constitution was not written to protect criminals;
it was written to protect the government from becoming criminals.
This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it.
Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or exercise their revolutionary right to overthrow it.
Freedom of speech is a principal pillar of a free government;
when this support is taken away, the constitution of a free society is dissolved, and tyranny is erected on its ruins. Republics and limited monarchies derive their strength and vigor from a popular examination into the action of the magistrates.
We have staked the whole future of our new nation, not upon the power of government; far from it. We have staked the future of all our political constitutions upon the capacity of each of ourselves to govern ourselves according to the moral principles of the Ten Commandments.
The Constitution is the guide which I never will abandon.
Our republican system was meant for a homogeneous people.
As long as blacks continue to live with the whites they constitute a threat to the national life. Family life may also collapse and the increase of mixed breed bastards may some day challenge the supremacy of the white man.
Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed;
as they are in almost every kingdom of Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops that can be, on any pretence, raised in the United States.
In the United States, the Constitution is a health chart left by the Founding Fathers which shows whether or not the body politic is in good health. If the national body is found to be in poor health, the Founding Fathers also left a prescription for the restoration of health called the Declaration of Independence.
To those who cite the first amendment as reason for excluding God from more and more of our institutions and everyday life, may I just say: The first amendment of the Constitution was not written to protect the people of this country from religious values; it was written to protect religious values from government tyranny.
To the contrary, the government they devised was defective from the start, requiring several amendments, a civil war and momentous social transformation to attain the system of constitutional government, and its respect for the individual freedoms and human rights, we hold as fundamental today.
The fundamental difference between Islamic government, on the one hand, and constitutional monarchy and republics, on the other, is this: whereas the representatives of the people or the monarch in such regimes engage in legislation, in Islam the legislative power and competence to establish laws belong exclusively to God Almighty.
Classifications and distinctions based on race or color have no moral or legal validity in our society. They are contrary to our constitution and laws.
There is no negro problem. The problem is whether the American people have loyalty enough, honor enough, patriotism enough, to live up to their own constitution
The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organised habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country.
The Constitution is the origin and measure of legislative authority.
It says to legislators, thus far ye shall go and no farther. Not a particle of it should be shaken; not a pebble of it should be removed.
Our union is now complete; our constitution composed, established, and approved. You are now the guardians of your own liberties.