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Judges should interpret the law, not make it.

Judges should be in the business of declaring what the law is using the traditional tools of interpretation, rather than pronouncing the law as they might wish it to be in light of their own political views.

Our role as judges is to interpret the law.

Judges should always behave judicially by adjudicating, never politically by legislating. I leave policy to policymakers. They're preeminent, but they're not omnipotent. In other words, lawmakers decide if laws pass, but judges decide if laws pass muster.

I don't have any respect for judges who arrive at the result first, and then try to figure out some way they can bend the law to reach their particular predilections.

Judges wear legal professionalism and precedent as a mantel that secures legitimacy for their decisions. It's how they distinguish themselves from politicians or administrative agencies, while wielding power that is sometimes much greater than those democratically accountable actors.

Judges are real people with real-world experiences and backgrounds. We cannot expect them to erase their experiences and backgrounds from the mindset that informs their judicial decision-making.

People must be confident that a judge's decisions are determined by the law and only the law. He must be faithful to the Constitution and statutes passed by Congress. Fidelity to the Constitution and the law has been the cornerstone of my life and the hallmark of the kind of judge I have tried to be.

But one way or another, judges perform a very vital function in our society. They have a risky job and they are entitled to security.

Judges are the people who have to protect the rights of individuals, have to protect the rights of minorities, have to protect the rights in the Constitution, have to protect the requirement that the executive and the legislature not simply exercise raw power but adhere to standards of reasonableness and constitutionality.