John Marshall Quotes (1755-1835)

“A dead soldier ties down no personnel behind the lines. A maimed soldier requires on average 40 personnel in the medevac chain.”

“Taken as a whole, their [the Indus Valley people’s] religion is so characteristically Indian as hardly to be distinguished from still living Hinduism.”

“The law regards man as man, and takes no account of his surroundings or of his color when his civil rights as guaranteed by the supreme law of the land are involved.”

“No political dreamer was ever wild enough to think of breaking down the lines which separate the States, and of compounding the American people into one common mass.”

“Had Thomas Nash been an impressed American, the homicide on board the Hermoine, would, most certainly, not have been murder. The act of impressing an American is an act of lawless violence. The confinement on board a vessel is a continuation of that violence, and in additional outrage. Death committed within the United States, in resisting such violence, would not have been murder.”

“Without this guarantee that one may not be deprived of his rights, neither liberty nor property, without due process of law, the State's monopoly over techniques for binding conflict resolution could hardly be said to be acceptable under our scheme of things. Only by providing that the social enforcement mechanism must function strictly within these bounds can we hope to maintain an ordered society that is also just."”

“We have found at Mohenjodaro evidence of practically every one that is capable of formative expression, viz of the cults of Shiva and the Mother goddess, of the Nagas and tree deities , of animal tree and stone worship, of phallism and of the practice of Yoga. We have seen, moreover, that although there are no visible traces Of Saktism at Mohenjodaro, there are strong reasons for believing that it existed on the Indian soil from a very early period..”

“The dissemination of the individual's opinions on matters of public interest is for us, in the historic words of the Declaration of Independence, an 'unalienable right' that 'governments are instituted among men to secure.' History shows us that the Founders were not always convinced that unlimited discussion of public issues would be 'for the benefit of all of us' but that they firmly adhered to the proposition that the 'true liberty of the press' permitted 'every man to publish his opinion'.”

“But, taken as a whole, their religion is so characteristically Indian as hardly to be distinguishable from still living Hinduism or at least from that aspect of it which is bound up with animism and the cults of Siva and the Mother Goddess — still the two most potent forces in popular worship. Among the many revelations that Mohenjo-daro and Harappa have had in Store for us, none perhaps is more remarkable than this discovery that Saivism has a history going back to the Chalcolithic Age or perhaps even further still, and that it thus takes its place as the most ancient living faith in the world.”

“All this made the British archaeologist John Marshall, who took charge of the excavations at Mohenjo-daro, remark in wonder: There is nothing that we know of in pre-historic Egypt or Mesopotamia or anywhere else in Western Asia to compare with the well-built baths and commodious houses of the citizens of Mohenjo-daro. In those countries, much money and thought were lavished on the building of magnificent temples for the gods and on the palaces and tombs of kings, but the rest of the people seemingly had to content themselves with insignificant dwellings of mud. In the Indus Valley, the picture is reversed and the finest structures are those erected for the convenience of the citizen’s.”

“The danger is perhaps not great if the people of one State, through their legislature, decide that Lady Chatterley's Lover goes so far beyond the acceptable standards of candor that it will be deemed offensive and non-sellable, for the State next door is still free to make its own choice. At least we do not have one uniform standard. But the dangers to free thought and expression are truly great if the Federal Government imposes a blanket ban over the Nation on such a book. [...] The fact that the people of one State cannot read some of the works of D. H. Lawrence seems to me, if not wise or desirable, at least acceptable. But that no person in the United States should be allowed to do so seems to me to be intolerable, and violative of both the letter and spirit of the First Amendment.”

“In fact, when the eye perceives bright light one of four reactions may take place. These are, in order of increasing brightness: dazzle, after image formation, flash blindness, and irreversible damage. Most individuals will have experienced dazzle as a result of oncoming car headlights and persistent after images from accidentally staring at the filament of an incandescent bulb. Both dazzle and after images will distort vision for some seconds to minutes. Flash blindness occurs when an extremely bright flash is discharged, usually at night, and again vision is temporarily lost. All three reactions would be useful in temporarily disabling a pilot and causing him to abort close approach to a target. If even higher irradiances reach the retina then irreversible damage may occur. In practice, a laser system that will dazzle at one mile may permanently blind at closer range.”

“A Chinaman can ride in the same passenger coach with white citizens of the United States, while citizens of the black race in Louisiana, many of whom, perhaps, risked their lives for the preservation of the Union, who are entitled, by law, to participate in the political control of the State and nation, who are not excluded, by law or by reason of their race, from public stations of any kind, and who have all the legal rights that belong to white citizens, are yet declared to be criminals, liable to imprisonment, if they ride in a public coach occupied by citizens of the white race. He does not object, nor, perhaps, would he object to separate coaches for his race if his rights under the law were recognized. But he objecting, and ought never to cease objecting, to the proposition that citizens of the white and black race can be adjudged criminals because they sit, or claim the right to sit, in the same public coach on a public highway.”

“In view of the constitution, in the eye of the law, there is in this country no superior, dominant, ruling class of citizens. There is no caste here. Our constitution is color-blind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens. In respect of civil rights, all citizens are equal before the law. The humblest is the peer of the most powerful. The law regards man as man, and takes no account of his surroundings or of his color when his civil rights as guaranteed by the supreme law of the land are involved. It is difficult to reconcile that boast with a state of the law which, practically, puts the brand of servitude and degradation upon a large class of our fellow-citizens, our equals before the law... We boast of the freedom enjoyed by our people above all other peoples. But it is difficult to reconcile that boast with a state of the law which, practically, puts the brand of servitude and degradation upon a large class of our fellow citizens, our equals before the law. The thin disguise of 'equal' accommodations for passengers in railroad coaches will not mislead anyone, nor atone for the wrong this day done... I cannot see but that, according to the principles this day announced, such state legislation, although conceived in hostility to, and enacted for the purpose of humiliating, citizens of the United States of a particular race, would be held to be consistent with the constitution.”

“Seldom has a battle, in which greater numbers were not engaged, been so important in its consequences as that of Cowpens.”

“No one admires more than I do the extraordinary powers of Marshall's mind; no one respects more his amiable deportment in private life. He is the most unpretending and unassuming of men. His abilities and his virtues render him an ornament not only to Virginia, but to our nature.”

“My gift of John Marshall to the people of the United States was the proudest act of my life. There is no act of my life on which I reflect with more pleasure. I have given to my country a judge equal to a Hole, Holt, or a Mansfield.”

“This practice of Judge Marshall, of travelling out of his case to prescribe what the law would be in a most case not before the court, is very irregular and very censurable.”