Quote #44

We do not sit as a superlegislature to weigh the wisdom of legislation.

More from William O. Douglas

  1. We deal with a right of privacy older than the Bill of Rights-older than our political parties, older than our school system.
  2. We who have the final word can speak softly or angrily. We can seek to challenge and annoy, as we need not stay docile and quiet.
  3. The way to combat noxious ideas is with other ideas. The way to combat falsehoods is with truth.
  4. When a legislature undertakes to proscribe the exercise of a citizen's constitutional rights it acts lawlessly and the citizen can take mat…
  5. The right to revolt has sources deep in our history.
  6. At the constitutional level where we work, ninety percent of any decision is emotional. The rational part of us supplies the reasons for su…
  7. The privacy and dignity of our citizens [are] being whittled away by sometimes imperceptible steps. Taken individually, each step may be of…
  8. The great and invigorating influences in American life have been the unorthodox: the people who challenge an existing institution or way of…

All William O. Douglas quotes