A Black-robed Oligarchy

"To consider the judges as the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions [is] a very dangerous doctrine indeed, and one which would place us under the despotism of an oligarchy… The Constitution has erected no such single tribunal, knowing that to whatever hands confided, with the corruptions of time and party, its members would become despots … The Constitution on this hypothesis is a mere thing of wax in the hands of the judiciary, which they may twist and shape into any form they please. "

--Thomas Jefferson, in letters to William C. Jarvis and Spencer Roane, [1820. ME 15:277; 1819. ME 15:212]
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