Citizens Quote by Elihu Root

The growth of constitutional government, as we now understand it, was promoted by the establishment of two different sets of machinery for making laws…

— Albert Bushnell Hart

[The current governing judicial philosophy is:] If you want something passionately enough, it is guaranteed by the Constitution. No need to fiddle around gathering…

— Robert Bork

The merit of our Constitution was, not that it promotes democracy, but checks it.

— Horatio Seymour

The essence of constitutionalism in a democracy is not merely to shape and condition the nature of majorities, but also to stipulate that certain…

— George Will

It may be considered as an objection inherent in the principle, that as every appeal to the people would carry an implication of some…

— James Madison

“It is ... particularly true of constitutional government that its atmosphere is opinion .... It does not remain fixed in any unchanging form, but…

— Woodrow Wilson

“[T]he success of democracy depends, in the end, on the reliability of the judgments we citizens make, and hence upon our capacity and determination…

— Irving Copi

To maintain the ascendancy of the Constitution over the lawmaking majority is the great and essential point on which the success of the [American]…

— John C. Calhoun

Our Constitution professedly rests upon the good sense and attachment of the people. This basis, weak as it may appear, has not yet been…

— John Quincy Adams

“The Court has a special responsibility to ensure that the Constitution works in practice. While education, including the transmission of our civic values from…

— Stephen Breyer

“The democratic nations that have introduced freedom into their political constitution at the very time when they were augmenting the despotism of their administrative…

— Alexis de Tocqueville

“Constitutionalism as a guiding political tendency will require careful and thoughtful development, as did jurisprudential originalism. But its wide appeal and philosophical depth make…

— Charles Krauthammer