Some claim that Marshall’s views represented an early model for a big federal government and liberal judicial activism. The claim is untrue, as I'll explain.
A portrait of Chief Justice John Marshall, 1834, by Rembrandt Peale. Oil on canvas. Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. Public Domain
Robert G. Natelson, a former constitutional law professor who is senior fellow in constitutional jurisprudence at the Independence Institute in Denver, authored “The Original Constitution” (4th ed., 2025). He is a contributor to the Heritage Foundation’s “Heritage Guide to the Constitution.”