John Marshall Quotes & Sayings

“The constitution is either a superior paramount law, unchangeable by ordinary means, or it is on a level with ordinary legislative acts, alterable when the legislature shall please to alter it. It is emphatically the province and duty of the judicial department to say what the law is. This is the very essence of judicial duty.”

“To listen well is as powerful a means of communication and influence as to talk well.”

“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.”

“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.”

“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.”

“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.”

“The most lively fancy aided by the strongest description cannot equal the reality of the opera.”

“The power to tax is the power to destroy.”

“What is it that makes us trust our judges? Their independence in office and manner of appointment.”

“During intervals of humanity, some disposition has been manifested to permit the return of those who have never offended, who have been banished by a terror which the government itself has reprobated, & to permit in case of arrestation, an investigation of the fact of emigration as well as of the identity of the person accus'd.”