Justice & Law Quote by William O. Douglas

There is acid in Douglas's politeness here: a justice quoting an imaginary rule of etiquette as if it were law. "Must come to adore" turns the courtroom from a venue of grievance into a chapel, and the punchline lands in the phrase "new gloss" - lawyerly understatement for a constitutional betrayal. A "gloss" is supposed to clarify; Douglas implies the Court has started repainting the First Amendment until it says the opposite of what it protects.

The specific intent is warning-by-mockery. Douglas is attacking a judicial posture that treats protest as contamination: litigants may speak only if they flatter the institution, accept its premises, and package dissent in tones the bench finds respectable. His line also needles the hypocrisy at the heart of "neutral" procedure. When courts demand decorum that conveniently maps onto deference, they are not merely keeping order; they are editing the politics out of political claims.

The subtext is about power deciding what counts as speech. Protest is messy, accusatory, often aimed at the very legitimacy of the system hearing it. By framing adoration as the admission price, Douglas suggests the Court is policing not just volume or time-and-place, but viewpoint - the one kind of regulation the First Amendment is supposed to treat as radioactive.

Contextually, Douglas's era saw heightened anxiety about dissent: labor agitation, civil rights demonstrations, Vietnam-era unrest, and recurring pressure to criminalize "disrespect" under the banner of public order and national unity. His jab anticipates a familiar modern pattern: institutions preaching free expression while quietly preferring applause.