The constitution is either a superior paramount law, unchangeable by ordinary means, or it is on a level with ordinary legislative acts, alterable when the legislature shall please to alter it. It is emphatically the province and duty of the judicial department to say what the law is. This is the very essence of judicial duty.
Interpretation
The constitution must be considered either an unchangeable supreme law or a regular law that can be amended by lawmakers.
John Marshall emphasizes the fundamental relationship between the constitution and legislative acts, arguing that the constitution holds a unique status as either a supreme, unchangeable law or something that can be easily altered. Furthermore, he asserts that it is the responsibility of the judiciary to interpret the law, underscoring the essential role the judiciary plays in maintaining the rule of law.
In practice
During a debate on the importance of the judiciary, this quote can be used to illustrate the role of judicial review.
The particular phraseology of the Constitution of the United States confirms and strengthens the principle, supposed to be essential to all written constitutions, that a law repugnant to the Constitution is void; and that courts, as well as other departments, are bound by that instrument.
A corporation is an artificial being, invisible, intangible, and existing only in contemplation of law.
If the agency of the mother in forming the character of her children is, in truth, so considerable, as I think it - if she does so much toward making her son what she would wish him to be - how essential is it that she should be fitted for the beneficial performance of these important duties.
The constitution controls any legislative act repugnant to it.
The federal government is acknowledged by all to be one of enumerated powers. The principle, that it can exercise only the powers granted to it . . . is now universally admitted.
The government of the United States has been emphatically termed a government of laws, and not of men. It will certainly cease to deserve this high appellation, if the laws furnish no remedy for the violation of a vested legal right.
Reaching a conclusion has to start with what the parties are arguing, but examining in all situations carefully the facts as they prove them or not prove them, the record as they create it, and then making a decision that is limited to what the law says on the facts before the judge.
On the whole, we think of our consumers - other judges, lawyers, the public. The law that the Supreme Court establishes is the law that they must live by, so all things considered, it's better to have it clearer than confusing.
To force a lawyer on a defendant can only lead him to believe that the law contrives against him.
The Sixth Amendment secures to persons charged with crime the right to be tried by an impartial jury reflecting a fair cross-section of the community.
Statutes authorizing unreasonable searches were the core concern of the framers of the 4th Amendment.
The task of a judge is not to make the law - it is to apply the law.
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