Our Constitution represents the work of the finger of Almighty God.

In no part of the Constitution is more wisdom to be found than in the clause which confides the question of war or peace to the legislature, and not the executive department. ... The trust and the temptation would be too great for any one man.

The problem to be solved is, not what form of government is perfect, but which of the forms is least imperfect.

An efficient militia is authorized and contemplated by the Constitution and required by the spirit and safety of free government.

The strongest passions and most dangerous weaknesses of the human breast; ambition, avarice, vanity, the honorable or venal love of fame, are all in conspiracy against the desire and duty of peace.

How a regulation so unjust in itself, so foreign to the authority of Congress, and so hurtful to the sale of public land, and smelling so strongly of an antiquated bigotry, could have received the countenance of a committee is truly a matter of astonishment.

Can it be of less consequence that the meaning of a Constitution should be fixed and known, than a meaning of a law should be so?