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We are not final because we are infallible, but infallible only because we are final.

Robert H. Jackson

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Robert H. Jackson
Age: 62 †
Born: 1892
Born: February 13
Died: 1954
Died: October 9
Former Associate Justice Of The Supreme Court Of The United States
Judge
Lawyer
Politician
Robert Houghwout Jackson
Constitution
Authority
Honor
Justice
Law
Infallible
Skepticism
Final
Finals

More quotes by Robert H. Jackson

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Your job today tells me nothing of your future--your use of your leisure today tells me just what your tomorrow will be.
Robert H. Jackson
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It is only the words of the bill that have presidential approval, where that approval is given. It is not to be supposed that in signing a bill the President endorses the whole Congressional Record.
Robert H. Jackson
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In this court the parties changed positions as nimbly as if dancing a quadrille.
Robert H. Jackson
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Due process requires some definite link, some minimum connection, between a state and the person, property or transaction it seeks to tax.
Robert H. Jackson
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One's right to life, liberty, and property depends on the outcome of no election.
Robert H. Jackson
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The most odious of all oppressions are those which mask as justice.
Robert H. Jackson
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Not every defeat of authority is a gain for individual freedom, nor every judicial rescue of a convict a victory for liberty.
Robert H. Jackson
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When the Supreme Court moved to Washington in 1800, it was provided with no books, which probably accounts for the high quality of early opinions.
Robert H. Jackson
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The duty to disclose knowledge of crime rests upon all citizens.
Robert H. Jackson
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Perhaps you have heard about the college executives who were discussing what they wanted to do after retirement age. One hoped to run a prison or school of correction so that the alumni would never come back to visit. Another chose to manage an orphan asylum so that he would not be plagued with advice from parents.
Robert H. Jackson
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I see no reason why I should be consciously wrong today because I was unconsciously wrong yesterday.
Robert H. Jackson
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This Court is forever adding new stories to the temples of constitutional law, and the temples have a way of collapsing when one story too many is added.
Robert H. Jackson
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I used to say that, as Solicitor General, I made three arguments of every case. First came the one that I planned-as I thought, logical, coherent, complete. Second was the one actually presented-interrupted, incoherent, disjointed, disappointing. The third was the utterly devastating argument that I thought of after going to bed that night.
Robert H. Jackson
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Our people do not want barren theories from their democracy. Maury Maverick has expressed very quaintly, but clearly, what they really want when he says: 'We Americans want to talk, pray, think as we please and eat regular'.
Robert H. Jackson
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The very purpose of a bill of rights is to withdraw certain subjects from...political controversy, to place them beyond the reach of majorities.
Robert H. Jackson
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The very purpose of a Bill of Rights was to withdraw certain subjects from the vicissitudes of political controversy. One's right to life, liberty and property, to free speech, a free press, freedom of worship and assembly may not be submitted to vote they depend on no elections.
Robert H. Jackson
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In our country are evangelists and zealots of many different political, economic and religious persuasions whose fanatical conviction is that all thought is divinely classified into two kinds - that which is their own and that which is false and dangerous.
Robert H. Jackson
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The day that this country ceases to be free for irreligion it will cease to be free for religion - except for the sect that can win political power.
Robert H. Jackson
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There is danger that, if the Court does not temper its doctrinaire logic with a little practical wisdom, it will convert the constitutional Bill of Rights into a suicide pact.
Robert H. Jackson
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It is possible to hold a faith with enough confidence to believe that what should be rendered to God does not need to be decided and collected by Caesar.
Robert H. Jackson