“In a government which is emphatically stiled a government of laws, the least possible range ought to be left for the discretion of the judge.”

Source: Reports of Cases Argued and Adjudged in the Supreme Court of the United States (1804) https://books.google.com/books?id=Wxm9qWvls8YC&pg=PR3

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William Cranch 1
United States federal judge (1769-1855) 1769–1855

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Variant: "That government is best which governs least"; reported in Paul F. Boller, Jr., and John George, They Never Said It: A Book of Fake Quotes, Misquotes, & Misleading Attributions (1989), p. 56

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