Willem Anthony Ockerse Quotes
One single constitution cannot hold good for each and every republic.
Willem Anthony Ockerse, 1760–1826, Dutch Reformed Pastor, Stock Broker, Author, Politician and Patriot Revolutionist, 1798, Quoted in Simon Schama, Patriots & Liberators: Revolution in the Netherlands 1780-1813
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Apparently the “faults and errors” of England and the United States in their constitutions were not so bad after all and it was Poland who subsequently had to rewrite and adopt new constitutions thereafter until 1997 when they seem to have adopted most of the “faults and errors.”
Marshall is famous for, as Chief Justice, establishing the principle that the Judiciary can override Congress and the Executive in determining Constitutionality. However, as this quotation illustrates this principle had been discussed in open debate on the ratification of the Constitution. It was not simply a grab for power by a Chief justice; he uttered this quotation long before he ever suspected he would be a judge but actually spent much of his career in the executive and legislative branch of government.
Dickinson was one of those who argued for a very weak executive (President)
Mason’s view prevailed. What is interesting is that Mason saw the State as the State Legislature as opposed to the people of the state directly voting for the Senators as we do today.
At the start of the state of Israel, he wanted a written Constitution. However the first 60 person Knesset failed to agree upon enough to generate one. Nimerous attempts have been made, but there are few significant constitutional positions that a majority of the fractious Israeli population can agree upon. Israel at the end of te 20th century had given up on a constitution and became a legislative and common law nation. It is perhaps the hardest nation in which to practive law in that the common law that is recognized is based on Turkish Ottoman Law, Englaish Law and Jordanian law. Each of these was controlling at times in the recent past.
Powell was the Secretary of State and Addington kept advising the administration that as long as the President was acting in defense of the country in his capacity as Commander in Chief, he did not have to obey any existing laws that had been Constitutionally passed which in the opinion of the President restricted or limited the President or the executive branch. Addington was an attorney and Assistant to the Vice President, but he was given much responsibility for administration policy. Powell the Secretary of State of the Administration could not have disagreed more and although most politicians including Republicans disagreed with the Addington thesis, Powell was one of the few Republicans to criticize the Addington position.
