Margaret Chase Smith Quotes

There was not a member of the Constitutional Convention who had the least objection to what is contended for by the advocates for a Bill of Rights and trial by jury.

We have a Bill of Rights, we have trial by jury. We have a notion that you are - you're innocent until you're proven guilty. We have all these things.

The critical point is that the Constitution places the right of silence beyond the reach of government.

Trial by jury, the best of all safeguards for the person, the property, and the fame of every individual.

The Bill of Rights

The national emergency no longer justifies abrogation of individual rights of Habeas Corpus and trial by jury on definite charges.

The ancient mode of trial by jury ... ought to remain sacred and inviolable.

No subject ought, in any case, or in any time, to be declared guilty of treason or felony by the legislature.

Everything that is hateful and odious is not necessarily against some part of the Constitution.

Well, summary executions would be very effective. But we have impediments—they're called the Constitution and due process. And we have a responsibility to uphold the Constitution.

It is high time that we remembered that the Constitution, as amended, speaks not only of the freedom of speech but also of trial by jury instead of trial by accusation. Whether it be a criminal prosecution in court or a character prosecution in the Senate, there is little practical distinction when the life of a person has been ruined.

If the prosecution of crime is to be conducted with so little regard for that protection which centuries of English law have given to the individual, we are indeed at the dawn of a new era; and much that we have deemed vital to our liberties, is a delusion.

Authoritative interpretations of the First Amendment guarantees have consistently refused to recognize an exception for any test of truth — whether administered by judges, juries, or administrative officials — and especially one that puts the burden of proving truth on the speaker.

Perjury before Congress is perjury to the American people and an affront to the fundamental principles of our republic and the rule of law. Such behavior cannot be tolerated.

In the past there has been debate as to whether or not traditional rights such as that to trial by jury might be protected or if a Bill of Rights should extend into areas of social and economic policy.

The only thing that counts is the right to know, to speak, to think - that, and the sanctity of the courts. Otherwise it's not America.

The liberty of the press, trial by jury, the Habeas Corpus Writ, even Magna Carta itself, although justly deemed the paladia of freedom, are all inferior considerations, when compared with the general distribution of real property among every class of people.

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

The jury system has come to stand for all we mean by English justice. The scrutiny of 12 honest jurors provides defendants and plaintiffs alike a safeguard from arbitrary perversion of the law.

You in the media ought to be ashamed of yourselves to call the provisions and the guarantees of the Bill of Rights 'Technicalities'. They're not. We are what we are because of those guarantees.

Of the liberty of conscience in matters of religious faith, of speech and of the press; of the trial by jury of the vicinage in civil and criminal cases; of the benefit of the writ of habeas corpus; of the right to keep and bear arms.... If these rights are well defined, and secured against encroachment, it is impossible that government should ever degenerate into tyranny.

When I think of civil liberties I think of the founding principles of the country. The freedoms that are in the First Amendment. But also the fundamental right to privacy.

We must never cease to proclaim in fearless tones the great principles of freedom and the rights of man which are the joint inheritance of the English-speaking world and which through Magna Carta, the Bill of Rights, the Habeas Corpus, trial by jury, and the English common law find their most famous expression in the American Declaration of Independence.

Trial by jury is the palladium of our liberties. I do not know what a palladium is, but I am sure it is a good thing!

If the federal constitution is to be construed so far in connection with the state constitutions, as to leave the trial by jury in civil causes, for instance, secured; on the same principles it would have left the trial by jury in criminal causes, the benefits of the writ of habeas corpus, etc. secured; they all stand on the same footing; they are the common rights of Americans, and have been recognized by the state constitutions.