Top 100 Judicial Quotes

One of the litmus tests for judicial conservatism is the idea of judicial restraint – that courts should give substantial deference to the decisions of the political process. When Congress and the president enact a law, conservatives generally say, judges should avoid ‘legislating from the bench.’

Obama and Biden want a bench crammed full of liberal judicial activists, and it’s up to the American people to tell them ‘no.’

As Alexander Hamilton said in ‘The Federalist Papers,’ law is about the exercise of judgment and not will. Judicial activism is best understood as substituting judicial opinion for the command of law. The law is not an infinitely malleable tool.

When it comes to revamping our bail laws, we can’t rely on judicial discretion alone.

Empirical evidence collected and analyzed by political scientists demonstrates that judicial pensions are the most important factor in a Justice’s decision to retire, far more important than the party of the President or which political party has control of the Senate.

I’m not in charge of judgments in Iran. The judicial system in Iran is an independent body of its own, and it follows the laws, and it must operate according to the law.

The judicial system is the most expensive machine ever invented for finding out what happened and what to do about it.

You want to know what judicial activism is? Judicial activism is judges imposing their policy preferences on the words of the Constitution.

The overreach of the judiciary can be attributed to, one, the inability of the executive to deliver; and two, the tendency to issue judicial pronouncements for national good. The second element is dangerous because that’s the function of the government.

What’s brilliant about the United States system of government is separation of power. Not only the executive, legislative, judicial branches, but also the independence of the military from civilians, an independent media and press, an independent central bank.

Popularity makes no law invulnerable to invalidation. Americans accept judicial supervision of their democracy – judicial review of popular but possibly unconstitutional statutes – because they know that if the Constitution is truly to constitute the nation, it must trump some majority preferences.

I want to differentiate between stability and security: Stability comes from the hearts of people and acceptance of the judicial system. Security comes from the barrel of a gun and the threat of the use of force.

So the danger of conservative judicial activism has been averted for another year. Stay tuned.

It is true that there have been excesses of judicial activism.

Historically, the judicial branch has often been the sole protector of the rights of minority groups against the will of the popular majority.

When Congress exercises the powers delegated to it by the Constitution, it may impose affirmative obligations on executive and judicial officers of state and local governments as well as ordinary citizens.

I had a very long discussion with Justice Gorsuch in my office, and he pointed out to me that he is a co-author of a whole book on precedent. So, someone who devotes that much time to writing a book on precedent, I think, understands how important a principle that is in our judicial system.

The judicial system of Rwanda is not subordinate to France or France’s interests.

The Constitution guarantees due process, not judicial process.

Imagine a judicial nominee said ‘my experience as a white man makes me better than a Latina woman.’ Wouldn’t they have to withdraw? New racism is no better than old racism.

A decision by the Supreme Court to subject Guantanamo to judicial review would eliminate these advantages.

The Founding Fathers built our judicial system to withstand the special interest pressures that beset the political branches of government.

There is hardly a political question in the United States which does not sooner or later turn into a judicial one.

Governments can and do expropriate investors or discriminate against them. Domestic judicial and administrative systems provide investors with one option for protecting themselves.

Some Republicans support gay rights, but prefer progress through legislative action or majority rule at the ballot box, rather than judicial action.

Since I have difficulty defining merit and what merit alone means – and in any context, whether it’s judicial or otherwise – I accept that different experiences in and of itself, bring merit to the system.

An important and fundamental premise of the American judicial system is the presumption of innocence, that is until proven guilty.

It is the union of independence and dependence of these branches – legislative, executive and judicial – and of the governmental functions possessed by each of them, that constitutes the marvellous genius of this unrivalled document.

Conservative voters increasingly understand that the one legacy a president can leave is his judicial appointments.

Now that judges embrace forcibly starving someone to death, Congress should use its appropriation power to starve the judicial budget.

It is hard to see Judge Roberts as a judicial activist who would place ideological purity or a particular agenda above or ahead the need for thoughtful legal reasoning.

Our Parliamentary system has simply failed to meet the challenge of judicial activism.

If there is a nuclear tactic being used here, I submit it is the use of that obstruction where a willful minority blocks a bipartisan majority from voting on the President’s judicial nominees.

The activists will not stop in trying to impose their extreme views on the rest of us, and they have now plotted out a state-by-state strategy to increase the number of judicial decisions redefining marriage without the voice of the people being heard.

I’ve learned that the Court will continue to change the meaning of the Constitution. Although all of the Justices have expressed the importance of judicial restraint, the Court inevitably makes new law every time it interprets the Constitution.

Back in 2005, Judicial Watch uncovered a Border Patrol survey conducted by the Bush administration in 2004 to determine what impact amnesty would have on illegal immigration. Want to take a guess at the outcome? Even the rumor of Mr. Bush’s amnesty program led to a sharp spike in illegal immigration.

Conservative Justices have a history of not standing by their professed commitment to judicial restraint.

My judicial philosophy is straightforward.

The Senate should consider a rule ensuring that every judicial nominee receives a vote by the Senate within 180 days of being nominated by the president.

Since the day the Obama administration first launched its duplicitous Benghazi cover story, Judicial Watch has been pressing for the full truth.

If people around the world knew how well people at Guantanamo Bay are treating prisoners, they would not fall prey to the accusations that some in our Chamber are making. They are all receiving judicial review.

The Supreme Court’s most conservative Justices have presented themselves as great respecters of precedent and opponents of ‘judicial activism’ – of judges using the Constitution to strike down laws passed by the elected branches of government. If they are true to those principles, they should uphold rent control.

In ‘Bush v. Gore,’ five justices had a partisan outcome in mind and then made up the judicial principle to justify it, while claiming that the decision would not be precedent for any future cases.

Elected president of the Republic, I would immediately, and with no hesitation, carry out the battle plan against Islamist terrorism and against judicial laxity.

The first session of the Congress of the United States under the Constitution was devoted principally to the problems of immediate revenues and administrative and judicial organization.

The administration of George W. Bush, emboldened by the Sept. 11 attacks and the backing of a Republican Congress, has sought to further extend presidential power over national security. Most of the expansion has taken place in secret, making Congressional or judicial supervision particularly difficult.

Everything from who sits on your local board of education to the prosecutors and judicial appointments in your area and much more are all impacted by who holds political office.

Of course, conservatives always claim to be against judicial activism.

Now judicial review, beloved by conservatives, can, of course, fulfill the excellent function of declaring government interventions and tyrannies unconstitutional. But it can also validate and legitimize the government in the eyes of the people by declaring these actions valid and constitutional.

The notion that Congress can change the meaning given a constitutional provision by the Court is subversive of the function of judicial review; and it is not the less so because the Court promises to allow it only when the Constitution is moved to the left.

The hardest problems of all in law enforcement are those involving a conflict of law and local customs. History has recorded many occasions when the moral sense of a nation produced judicial decisions, such as the 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education, which required difficult local adjustments.

The majority in the Senate is prepared to restore the Senate’s traditions and precedents to ensure that regardless of party, any president’s judicial nominees, after full and fair debate, receive a simple up-or-down vote on the Senate floor.

An application of judicial power that does not rest on facts is worse than mindless, it is inherently dangerous. If its deployment does not rest on facts – cold, hard, solid facts, established either by admissions or by trials – it serves no lawful or moral purpose and is simply an engine of oppression.

You have a good judicial system in the U.S., as you have learned from the Nixon-Watergate period.

In America, we divide federal power between the legislative, executive and judicial branches so that no one holds too much power. This is sixth-grade civics: Congress writes the laws; the president executes the laws; and the courts apply those laws fairly and dispassionately to cases.

Judicial Watch is pleased that Justice Anthony Kennedy’s retirement from the Supreme Court will provide President Trump another opportunity to nominate a constitutional conservative who will honor the Constitution and the rule of law, rather than legislate from the bench.

Trump is not the victim of the judicial system; he is or has been the defendant in 3,500 lawsuits – that’s not the mark of a victim but rather a perpetrator.

My Catholic faith is the foundation of my worldview, and my judicial duty is governed, from beginning to end, by the law.

The language of judicial decision is mainly the language of logic. And the logical method and form flatter that longing for certainty and for repose which is in every human mind. But certainty generally is illusion, and repose is not the destiny of man.

The American people have made clear that they want justices who have proven records of judicial restraint – exactly the kind of justices that Obama and Biden cannot abide.

There’s no such thing as judicial supremacy.

The lack of judicial accountability exemplified by the lack of a system of selecting judges and of dealing with complaints against them, has indeed led to the system gradually losing its integrity.

The Court’s legitimacy arises from the source of its authority – which is, of course, the Constitution – and is best preserved by adhering to decision methods that neither expand nor contract but legitimize the power of judicial review.

Some of the most impressive judicial nominees are grossly mistreated.

I don’t trust Santa Barbara as far as I can spit. I am afraid that if I went back there, it’s possible that I could be run through their system, their judicial system, and wind up in some county jail where I could be killed and I’m not gonna take that chance.

South Korea is a vigorous democracy, with strong judicial institutions and a commitment to the rule of law.

I had the longest judicial vacancy in the history of the United States – on the Eastern District of North Carolina. Not many people know that.

Let there be no reservation or doubt that I believe the Senate should vote on each and every judicial appointment made by the President of the United States and that no rule or procedure should ever stop the Senate from exercising its constitutional responsibility.

If judicial review means anything, it is that judicial restraint does not allow everything.

Judicial review has been a part of our democracy in this constitutional government for over 200 years.

The power of protest depends not only on how many turn out, but also on what legislative, judicial, and civil society institutions exist to enact the will of those marching in the streets.

We ought not to forget that the government, through all its departments, judicial as well as others, is administered by delegated and responsible agents; and that the power which really controls, ultimately, all the movements, is not in the agents, but those who elect or appoint them.

Judicial Watch has taken the lead nationwide in defending state voter ID laws and other commonsense election integrity measures, filing amicus briefs in the Supreme Court and in several circuit courts of appeal and trial courts.

Without any direction from Congress, our judicial branch has unilaterally created and defined qualified immunity.

Apparently a great many people have forgotten that the framers of our Constitution went to such great effort to create an independent judicial branch that would not be subject to retaliation by either the executive branch or the legislative branch because of some decision made by those judges.

Though the critics are loud and the temptations to join them may be many, mark me down too as a believer that the traditional account of the judicial role Justice Scalia defended will endure.

A Judicial Bureau of Investigation under an independent Judicial Complaints Commission, should be set up to investigate complaints against judges.

Judicial abuse occurs when judges substitute their own political views for the law.

The idea that there aren’t mistakes made constantly in the judicial system is too obvious even to need to mention.

We all have trust in the judicial systems.

I’m a part of major league rugby. We had a league meeting to decide what to do with anthem protests, and even though I personally agree with what they say they are protesting as inequality and judicial system and incarceration rates among minorities, we decided all should stand and respect every national anthem.

The only procedure under the Constitution to deal with judicial misconduct is impeachment, which needs to be initiated by at least 100 MPs and has been found to be totally impractical and virtually useless.

The vote by the Judiciary Committee reflects the fact that John Roberts is an exceptional nominee with a conservative judicial philosophy – a philosophy that represents mainstream America.

Judicial Watch’s FOIA lawsuits have already shown the Obama State Department was corruptly targeting President Trump.

The Constitution is not a panacea for every blot upon the public welfare. Nor should this Court, ordained as a judicial body, be thought of as a general haven for reform movements.

In the political context fair means somebody that will vote for the unions or for the business. It can’t mean that in the judicial context or we’re in real trouble.

While there’s always plenty of room for improvement, our government is actually quite effective and efficient. Our military and judicial systems and national parks are the best in the world. Unlike in countries where government corruption is rampant, I’ve never once been solicited for a bribe.

Over the years, Judicial Watch reported on the many times Hillary and Bill Clinton used her position as secretary of state to reward their friends and line the coffers of their own foundation.

Judicial judgment must take deep account of the day before yesterday in order that yesterday may not paralyze today.

The president does not have any obligation to make a consensus appointment here. What the president’s obligation is, is to pick a judicial conservative, and I believe that’s what he’s gonna do.

Illegal immigration is crisis for our country. It is an open door for drugs, criminals, and potential terrorists to enter our country. It is straining our economy, adding costs to our judicial, healthcare, and education systems.

Helen Zille, formidable leader of the Democratic Alliance, routinely vilified as representing white interests only, is trying to make sure everyone knows that the case against Zuma is strong and is trying to have it investigated in a judicial review.

The judge is forced for the most part to reach his audience through the medium of the press whose reporting of judicial decisions is all too often inaccurate and superficial.

Roe v. Wade used raw judicial power to overturn the democratically passed laws in every state in the country and remove state restrictions on abortion.

Judge Sotomayor is a liberal judicial activist of the first order who thinks her own personal political agenda is more important that the law as written.

Over the years, Judicial Watch has called out many White House conflicts of interest.

We have enacted many economic reforms but also others that have an impact on the overall investment climate. For instance, I launched a very important constitutional reform on judicial certainty that completely restarted the whole of the courts system in Ukraine.

The executive branch has grown too strong, the judicial branch too arrogant and the legislative branch too stupid.

My judicial philosophy is fidelity to the law.

Jon Tester needs to be held accountable for his extreme partisan liberal record of supporting President Obama’s judicial nominees 99% of the time but then opposing President Trump’s nominees.