Antonin Scalia quotes: wise famous quotes, sayings and quotations by Antonin Scalia

Antonin Scalia Famous Quotes & Sayings

Discover top inspirational quotes from Antonin Scalia on Wise Famous Quotes.

If we cannot have moral feelings against homosexuality, can we have it against murder? Can we have it against other things?

The court's job is to uphold the Constitution and you don't call that off in times of crisis. Would the framers have allowed this practice?

People look at rights as if they were muscles - the more you exercise them, the better they get.

God assumed from the beginning that the wise of the world would view Christians as fools ... and He has not been disappointed.

A search is a search, even if it happens to disclose nothing but the bottom of a turntable.

Mere factual innocence is no reason not to carry
out a death sentence properly reached.

The court makes an amazing amount of decisions that ought to be made by the people.

A Bill of Rights that means what the majority wants it to mean is worthless.

You could have 50 different states having 50 different regulations ... until they were all litigated out.

Why can't the state accede to the public's wishes?

A journalistic purpose could be someone with a Xerox machine in a basement.

It's not up to the courts to invent new minorities that get special protections.

When did it become unconstitutional to exclude homosexual couples from marriage? 1791? 1868, when the 14th Amendment was adopted?

What is a moderate interpretation of the text? Halfway between what it really means and what you'd like it to mean?

There is nothing new in the realization that the Constitution sometimes insulates the criminality of a few in order to protect the privacy of us all.

Campaign promises are - by long democratic tradition - the least binding form of human commitment.

Originalism says that when you consult the text, you give it the meaning it had when it was adopted, not some later modern meaning.

The wise do not investigate such silliness.

The Constitution does not trust judges to make determinations of criminal guilt.

I would not like to be replaced by someone who immediately sets about undoing what I've tried to do for 25-26 years.

I even accept for the sake of argument that sexual orgies eliminate social tensions and ought to be encouraged.

A law can be both economic folly and constitutional.

It's a long, uphill fight to get back to original orthodoxy. We have two 'originalists' on the Supreme Court. That's something.

For in order for capitalism to work
in order for it to produce a good and a stable society
the traditional Christian virtues are essential.

But I also believe that a lot of gun owners would agree that AK-47s belong in the hands of soldiers, not on the streets of our cities.

In a big family the first child is kind of like the first pancake. If it's not perfect, that's okay, there are a lot more coming along.

It is difficult to maintain the illusion that we are interpreting a Constitution, rather than inventing one.

Why in the world would you have it interpreted by nine lawyers?

Words have meaning. And their meaning doesn't change.

Day by day, case by case, the Supreme Court is busy designing a Constitution for a country I do not recognize.

This is so absurd that it has, to my knowledge, never been contemplated.

One can be sophisticated and believe in God. Reason and intellect are not to be laid aside where matters of religion are concerned.

This is an execution, not surgery. Where does that come from, that you must find the method of execution that causes the least pain?

Words no longer have meaning if an Exchange that is not established by a State is "established by the State".

Interior decorating is a rock-hard science compared to psychology practiced by amateurs.

[The Freedom of Information Act is] the Taj Mahal of the Doctrine of Unanticipated Consequences, the Sistine Chapel of Cost-Benefit Analysis Ignored.

I think Thomas Jefferson would have said the more speech, the better.

Certainly the Constitution does not require discrimination on the basis of sex. The only issue is whether it prohibits it. It doesn't.

Certainly one cannot ban cross burning in the sanctity of his bedroom.

It is myopic to base sweeping change on the narrow experience of a few years.

Tyrannies have long lists of rights. What they do not have is structural restraints on the power of government.

I try to be an honest originalist! I will take the bitter with the sweet!

In the eyes of government we are just one race here. It is American.

A written constitution is needed to protect values AGAINST prevailing wisdom.