,
5 tweets,
2 min read
Read on Twitter
“[W]e must never forget that it is a _constitution_ we are expounding.”
Chief Justice Marshall for a unanimous #SCOTUS in McCulloch v. Maryland, decided exactly 200 years ago today:
law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/t…
Chief Justice Marshall for a unanimous #SCOTUS in McCulloch v. Maryland, decided exactly 200 years ago today:
law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/t…
"A Constitution, to contain an accurate detail of all the subdivisions of which its great powers will admit, and of all the means by which they may be carried into execution, would partake of the prolixity of a legal code, and could scarcely be embraced by the human mind."
"It would probably never be understood by the public. Its nature, therefore, requires that only its great outlines should be marked, its important objects designated, and the minor ingredients which compose those objects be deduced from the nature of the objects themselves."
"That this idea was entertained by the framers of the American Constitution is not only to be inferred from the nature of the instrument, but from the language. Why else were some of the limitations found in the 9th section of the 1st article introduced?"
"It is also in some degree warranted by their having omitted to use any restrictive term which might prevent its receiving a fair and just interpretation. In considering this question, then, we must never forget that it is a _Constitution_ we are expounding."
