top of page
.png){kind=small}
"The ultimate touchstone of constitutionality is the Constitution itself and not what we have said about it."
Standard
Customized
Exlpore more Constitution quotes
"Neither James Madison, for whom this lecture is named, nor any of the other Framers of the Constitution, were oblivious, careless, or otherwise unaware of the words they chose for the document and its Bill of Rights."
"As a matter of traditional and sound constitutional doctrine, an amendment to the Constitution should be the last resort when all other measures have proved inadequate."
"The basic guarantees of our Constitution are warrants for the here and now, and unless there is an overwhelmingly compelling reason, they are to be promptly fulfilled."
"Simultaneously with the establishment of the Constitution, Virginia ceded to the United States her domain, which then extended to the Mississippi, and was even claimed to extend to the Pacific Ocean."
"The Constitution has not greatly bothered any wartime President."
"The merit of our Constitution was, not that it promotes democracy, but checks it."
"A new constitution should be more amendable. A needlessly confusing system of courts should be altered to produce an arrangement that would be simple, responsible, and less awkward."
"The relationship between press and politician - protected by the Constitution and designed to be happily adversarial - becomes sour, raw and confrontational."
"Be assured, fellow citizens, that in a democracy it is the laws that guard the person of the citizen and the constitution of the state, whereas the despot and the oligarch find their protection in suspicion and in armed guards."
"The fact that we're protected under that Constitution in exercising the right of free speech, it's a wonderful thing. You've got to come from somewhere else to realize how valuable it is."
Explore more quotes by Felix Frankfurter
"We forget that the most successful statesmen have been professionals. Lincoln was a professional politician."
"The history of liberty has largely been the history of the observance of procedural safeguards."
"As a member of this court I am not justified in writing my private notions of policy into the Constitution, no matter how deeply I may cherish them or how mischievous I may deem their disregard."
"It is a wise man who said that there is no greater inequality than the equal treatment of unequals."
"It is a fair summary of history to say that the safeguards of liberty have been forged in controversies involving not very nice people."
"The mark of a truly civilized man is confidence in the strength and security derived from the inquiring mind."
"It must take account of what it decrees for today in order that today may not paralyze tomorrow."
bottom of page