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[The] government has room to scale back individual rights during wartime without violating the Constitution. The Constitution just sets minimums. Most of the rights that you enjoy go way beyond what the Constitution requires.

Antonin Scalia

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Antonin Scalia
Age: 79 †
Born: 1936
Born: March 11
Died: 2016
Died: February 13
Associate Justice Of The Supreme Court Of The United States
Judge
Lawyer
Professor
Trenton
New Jersey
Antonin Gregory Scalia
Scalia
Antonin G. Scalia
Enjoy
Sets
Individual
Scales
Government
Requires
Back
Constitution
Minimums
Without
Room
Violating
Way
Beyond
Wartime
Rooms
Minimum
Rights
Scale

More quotes by Antonin Scalia

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Scalia said the court had pretty much signed on to the so-called homosexual agenda, adding: Let me be clear that I have nothing against homosexuals, or any other group, promoting their agenda through normal democratic means.
Antonin Scalia
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You could have 50 different states having 50 different regulations... until they were all litigated out.
Antonin Scalia
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The Court today completes the process of converting Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 from a guarantee that race or sex will not be the basis for often will.
Antonin Scalia
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Why can't the state accede to the public's wishes?
Antonin Scalia
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I even accept for the sake of argument that sexual orgies eliminate social tensions and ought to be encouraged.
Antonin Scalia
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Many Americans do not want persons who openly engage in homosexual conduct as partners in their business, as scoutmasters for their children, as teachers in their children's schools, or as boarders in their home. They view this as protecting themselves and their families from a lifestyle that they believe to be immoral and destructive.
Antonin Scalia
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Words no longer have meaning if an Exchange that is not established by a State is established by the State.
Antonin Scalia
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If we're picking people to draw out of their own conscience and experience a 'new' Constitution, we should not look principally for good lawyers. We should look to people who agree with us. When we are in that mode, you realize we have rendered the Constitution useless.
Antonin Scalia
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[If critics of the Pledge of Allegiance persuaded the public it should be changed] then we could eliminate under God from the Pledge of Allegiance, that could be democratically done.
Antonin Scalia
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To allow the policy question of same-sex marriage to be considered and resolved by a select, patrician, highly unrepresentative panel of nine is to violate a principle even more fundamental than no taxation without representation: no social transformation without representation.
Antonin Scalia
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The wise do not investigate such silliness.
Antonin Scalia
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If it were up to me, I would put in jail every sandal-wearing, scruffy-bearded weirdo who burns the American flag. But I am not king.
Antonin Scalia
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Bear in mind that brains and learning, like muscle and physical skill, are articles of commerce. They are bought and sold. You can hire them by the year or by the hour. The only thing in the world not for sale is character.
Antonin Scalia
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It's a long, uphill fight to get back to original orthodoxy. We have two 'originalists' on the Supreme Court. That's something.
Antonin Scalia
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If you think aficionados of a living Constitution want to bring you flexibility, think again. You think the death penalty is a good idea? Persuade your fellow citizens to adopt it. You want a right to abortion? Persuade your fellow citizens and enact it. That's flexibility.
Antonin Scalia
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The attitude of people associating guns with nothing but crime, that is what has to be changed. I grew up at a time when people were not afraid of people with firearms.
Antonin Scalia
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Certainly the Constitution does not require discrimination on the basis of sex. The only issue is whether it prohibits it. It doesn't.
Antonin Scalia
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Power tends to corrupt. But the power in Washington resides in Congress, if it wants to use it. It can do anything-it can stop the Vietnam War. It can make its will felt, if it can ever get its act together to do anything.
Antonin Scalia
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When did it become unconstitutional to exclude homosexual couples from marriage? 1791? 1868, when the 14th Amendment was adopted?
Antonin Scalia
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The principal purpose of stare decisis is to protect reliance interest and further stability in the law.
Antonin Scalia