West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette · ¶93

“That is the safe twofold rule; nor is the first part of it any whit less important than the second; nay, more; today it is the part which most requires to be emphasized. Eor just here comes in a consideration of very great weight. Great and, indeed, inestimable as are the advantages in a popular government of this conservative influence, — the power of the judiciary to disregard unconstitutional legislation, — it should be remembered that the exercise of it, even when unavoidable, is always attended with a serious evil, namely, that the correction of legislative mistakes comes from the outside, and the people thus lose the political experience, and the moral education and stimulus that come from fighting the question out in the ordinary way, and correcting their own errors. If the decision in Munn v. Illinois and the ‘Granger Cases,’ twenty-five years ago, and in the ‘Legal Tender…

U. S. Reports, bound volume
U. S. Reports, volume 319, at 624 (Library of Congress) · transcription: Caselaw Access Project
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