Constitution Quotes

No society can make a perpetual constitution, or even a perpetual law. The earth belongs always to the living generation… Every constitution then, and every law, naturally expires at the end of 19 years.

Those who ratified the Constitution conceived that this is not an indefinite government deriving its powers from the general terms prefixed in the specified powers, but a limited government, tied down to the specified powers which explain and define the general terms.

The United States Constitution has proven itself the most marvelously elastic compilation of rules of government ever written.

The Constitution was built for rough as well as smooth roads. In time of war the nation simply changes gears and takes the harder going under the same power.

If the function of this Court is to be essentially no different from that of a legislature, if the considerations governing constitutional construction are to be substantially those that underlie legislation, then indeed judges should not have life tenure and they should be made directly responsible to the electorate.

Constitutions are intended to preserve practical and substantial rights, not to maintain theories.

What’s the Constitution between friends?

I confess that there are several parts of this Constitution which I do not at present approve, but I am not sure I shall never approve them. For having lived long, I have experienced many instances of being obliged by better information, or fuller consideration, to change opinions even on important subjects, which I once […]

Constitutional rights like others are matters of degree.

The great generalities of the Constitution have a content and significance that vary from age to age.