Quotation of the Day…

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… is from page 468 of Gordon Wood’s splendid 2009 volume, Empire of Liberty: A History of the Early Republic, 1789-1815:

Precisely because of the exuberantly democratic nature of American politics, the judiciary right from the nation’s beginning acquired a special power that it has never lost. By protecting the rights of minorities of all sorts against popular majorities, it has become a major instrument for both curbing that democracy and maintaining it.

DBx: Pictured here is John Marshall (1755-1855), the fourth Chief Justice of the United States Supreme court.