George Sutherland Quotes
A corporation, we have held, is not a "citizen," within the meaning of the privileges and immunities clause … But a corporation is a "person" within the meaning of the equal protection and due process of law clauses.
This quotation is a good example of the hair splitting that is often required in deciding constitutional law.
George Sutherland, 1862-1942, U. S. Supreme Court Justice, Grosjean vs. American Press, 1935
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
The call for individual liberty and the right of personal property by clergy is surprising to many. This Cahier was the consensus of the Clergy of Blois in 1789. There were cahiers of several provinces of France—some by the clergy, some by the nobles. What is fascinating is the emergence of many of the pre-Revolutionary French concepts. The example of the American revolution and its principles was known throughout the educated classes of France.
A constant major issue in industrial democracies are the perceptions, rights and responsibilities of corporations. For those like Romney, corporations should have all the privileges, empathy, rights and obligations of individual people. To most others a corporation is morally and practically a different entity. See {586119}.
McCain held this view despite the fact that most other politicians of his party supported removal of any corporate restraints.
Romney was trying to explain that the Supreme Court had recently ruled that for purposes of placing limits on campaign donations, corporations were entitled to the same rights of free speech and contributing money as people. The candidate chose this statement to express that view. However, the way Romney phrased it made many people suspect that perhaps, because of his lifetime corporate activity, he really thought that there were no differences between corporations and people. This suspicion reinforced a public feeling that Romney was much more corporately oriented than he was people oriented, and that hurt Romney with many voters.
This issue arose in 2014 with the Citizens United Case, when a 5-4 decision of the Supreme Court held that political contributions were a form of political speech and corporations had the right of Freedom of Speech. This time there were 4 dissenters.
Plessy v. Ferguson was one of the worst Supreme Court Decisions in American history. It held that states could provide and/or mandate racially segregated facilities and institutions so long as they were equal.
While in general this is a reasonable view. The Supreme Court is supposed to deal with the big issues of the law. However, in this case, the “fact” was very strong evidence that another person committed a murder and not the man who was convicted. He even confessed. How critics asked could it be constitutional to execute an innocent man. See {635414} for one of the sharpest dissents in court history.
Rynnymede was the location in England where the Barons of the realm confronted King John and forced him to sign the Magna Carta. This was the first event that limited the powers of the King
The choice is usually contrasted between guilty persons going free, rather an innocent one be adjudicated guilty. But here the justice tells us that the avoidance of an innocent person being subject to easy arrest is important enough to have a system where guilty people sometimes escape justice.
The FBI had obtained a court order requiring apple to write software that could hack into a person's iPhone. Apple, with most other hi-tech companies in support, filed a motion with the court opposing the order. The FBI shortly thereafter withdrew its request for the order saying that they had found other solutions, when they had originally told the court that there were no other solutions.
George Alexander Sutherland was an English-born U.S. jurist and politician. One of four appointments to the Supreme Court by President Warren G. Harding, he served as an Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court between 1922 and 1938. As a member of the Republican Party, he also represented Utah in both houses of Congress.
