The Meaning of Law

The general principle on which we have heretofore insisted that the meaning of a written law is to be found in its terms, and that we are not at liberty to resort the extrinsic facts and circumstances to ascertain what the framers might have intended, has frequently been declared to apply to the Constitution. Stat. & Const. Law, 2nd ed. p. 552.
In Sturges v. Crowninshield, Chief Justice Thurgood Marshall said: "It is well settled that the spirit of a Constitution is to be respected no less than its letter; yet that spirit is to be collected from its words, and neither the practice of legislative bodies, nor other extrinsic circunstances, can control its clear language. 4 Wheat. 202. 203, 4 L. ed.550.
In Newell v. People 7 N.Y. 9. Courts, in the interpretation of Constitutions, have little to do with the argument ab inconvenienti, and should not "bend the Constitution to suit the law of the hour." That inconvenience may and will arise from an adherence to the Constitution may be conceded; but this affords no reason for construing away its provisions. It is not for the courts or the legislators to supply these defects. This is for the people who made that instrument.
My rule has ever been to follow the fundamental law as it is written, regardless of consequences. If the law does not work well, the people can amend it, and inconveniences can be borne long enough to wait that process. But if the legislature, or the courts, undertake to cure defects by forced and unnatural constructions, they inflict a wound upon the Constitution which nothing can heal. One step taken by the legislature or the judiciary in enlarging the powers of the government opens the door for another, which will be sure to follow; and so the process goes on until all respect for the fundamental law is lost, and the powers of the government are just what those in authority please to call them.