“we have heard as yet only the proceedings of the first day of Burr’s trial, which from the favor of the Marshal and judge promises him all which can depend on them. A grand jury of two federalists, four (Tertium) Quids and ten republicans does not seem to be a fair representation of the state of Virginia. But all this will shew the original error of establishing a judiciary independant of the nation, and which, from the citadel of the law can turn it’s guns on those they were meant to defend, and controul and fashion their proceedings to it’s own will. I have always entertained a high opinion of the Marshal’s integrity and political correctness. But, in a state where there are not more than eight Quids, how five of them should have been summoned on one jury is difficult to explain from accident.”

—  Thomas Jefferson

Letter to John W. Eppes (28 May 1807) https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/99-01-02-5646
1800s, Second Presidential Administration (1805-1809)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "we have heard as yet only the proceedings of the first day of Burr’s trial, which from the favor of the Marshal and jud…" by Thomas Jefferson?
Thomas Jefferson photo
Thomas Jefferson 456
3rd President of the United States of America 1743–1826

Related quotes

James Monroe photo

“What was the origin of our slave population? The evil commenced when we were in our Colonial state, but acts were passed by our Colonial Legislature, prohibiting the importation, of more slaves, into the Colony. These were rejected by the Crown. We declared our independence, and the prohibition of a further importation was among the first acts of state sovereignty. Virginia was the first state which instructed her delegates to declare the colonies independent. She braved all dangers. From Quebec to Boston, and from Boston to Savannah, Virginia shed the blood of her sons. No imputation then can be cast upon her in this matter. She did all that was in her power to do, to prevent the extension of slavery, and to mitigate its evils.”

James Monroe (1758–1831) American politician, 5th President of the United States (in office from 1817 to 1825)

Speech in the Virginia State Convention for altering the Constitution https://books.google.com/books?id=R9ctAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA78&dq=%22The+evil+commenced+when+we+were+in+our+Colonial+state%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CD8Q6AEwBmoVChMIwM7FxfHTxwIViPM-Ch3fiQrs#v=onepage&q=%22The%20evil%20commenced%20when%20we%20were%20in%20our%20Colonial%20state%22&f=false (2 November 1829)

Robert H. Jackson photo

“If religious liberty includes, as it must, the right to communicate such experiences to others, it seems to me an impossible task for juries to separate fancied ones from real ones, dreams from happenings, and hallucinations from true clairvoyance. Such experiences, like some tones and colors, have existence for one, but none at all for another. They cannot be verified to the minds of those whose field of consciousness does not include religious insight. When one comes to trial which turns on any aspect of religious belief or representation, unbelievers among his judges are likely not to understand, and are almost certain not to believe, him.”

Robert H. Jackson (1892–1954) American judge

78 U.S. 93
Judicial opinions, United States v. Ballard (1944)

Johann Gottlieb Fichte photo

“The representation of the self-sufficiency of the I can certainly co-exist with a representation of the self-sufficiency of the thing, though the self-sufficiency of the I itself cannot co-exist with that of the thing. Only one of these two can come first, only one can be the starting point; only one can be independent. The one that comes second, just because it comes second, necessarily becomes dependent upon the one that comes first, with which it is supposed to be connected. Which of these two should come first?”

Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1762–1814) German philosopher

Source: Introduction to Fichte's Science of Knowledge (1797/1798), p. 17-18.

Alexis De Tocqueville photo

“There are at the present time two great nations in the world—allude to the Russians and the Americans— All other nations seem to have nearly reached their national limits, and have only to maintain their power; these alone are proceeding—along a path to which no limit can be perceived.”

Alexis De Tocqueville book Democracy in America

Source: Democracy in America, Volume I (1835), Chapter XV-IXX, Chapter XVIII.

George Mason photo

“That the legislative and executive powers of the State should be separate and distinct from the judiciary; and that the members of the two first may be restrained from oppression, by feeling and participating the burdens of the people, they should, at fixed periods, be reduced to a private station, return into that body from which they were originally taken, and the vacancies be supplied by frequent, certain, and regular elections, in which all, or any part of the former members, to be again eligible, or ineligible, as the laws shall direct.”

George Mason (1725–1792) American delegate from Virginia to the U.S. Constitutional Convention

Article 5
Virginia Declaration of Rights (1776)

Alfred Binet photo

“When making the analysis of matter we impliedly admitted two propositions: first, that sensation is the tertium quid which is interposed between the excitant of our sensory nerves and ourselves; secondly, that the aggregate of our sensations is all we can know of the outer world, so that it is correct to define this last as the collection of our present, past, and possible sensations.”

Alfred Binet (1857–1911) French psychologist and inventor of the first usable intelligence test

Source: The Mind and the Brain, 1907, p. 60; Definition of sensation

Georg Büchner photo

“The state is therefore everyone; the rules within the state are laws which safeguard the welfare of all and which must originate from the welfare of all.”

Georg Büchner The Hessian Courier

The Hessian Courier (1834)

Percy Bysshe Shelley photo

“Should it be proved… that the mysterious principle which regulates the proceedings of the universe, is neither intelligent nor sensitive, yet it is not an inconsistency to suppose at the same time, that the animating power survives the body which it has animated, by laws as independent of any supernatural agent as those through which it first became united with it. Nor, if a future state be clearly proved, does it follow that it will be a state of punishment or reward.”

Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822) English Romantic poet

On a Future State (1815; publ. 1840)

Theodore Dalrymple photo

“If we can sympathise only with the utterly blameless, then we can sympathise with no one, for all of us have contributed to our own misfortunes - it is a consequence of the human condition that we should. But it does nobody any favours to disguise from him the origins of his misfortunes, and pretend that they are all external to him in circumstances in which they are not.”

Theodore Dalrymple (1949) English doctor and writer

Addiction and the Ipswich Murders: Theodore Dalrymple argues that the five murdered women were driven on to the streets not by addiction itself, but by myths about addiction http://www.socialaffairsunit.org.uk/blog/archives/001306.php (December 14, 2006).
The Social Affairs Unit (2006 - 2008)

“These are trials in which the judge, the counsel, the jury, and the witnesses are the criminals, not the accused.”

Katherine Anne Porter (1890–1980) American journalist, essayist, short story writer, novelist, and political activist

The Never-Ending Wrong (1977)
Context: The trial of Jesus of Nazareth, the trial and rehabilitation of Joan of Arc, any one of the witchcraft trials in Salem during 1691, the Moscow trials of 1937 during which Stalin destroyed all of the founders of the 1924 Soviet Revolution, the Sacco-Vanzetti trial of 1920 through 1927 — there are many trials such as these in which the victim was already condemned to death before the trial took place, and it took place only to cover up the real meaning: the accused was to be put to death. These are trials in which the judge, the counsel, the jury, and the witnesses are the criminals, not the accused. For any believer in capital punishment, the fear of an honest mistake on the part of all concerned is cited as the main argument against the final terrible decision to carry out the death sentence. There is the frightful possibility in all such trials as these that the judgment has already been pronounced and the trial is just a mask for murder.

Related topics