Actually, the first person who expressed such an opinion was - wait for it - Thomas Jefferson.
Jefferson offered one of the earliest formulations of the sentiment, although not of the phrase. In 1803, Jefferson's ambassadors to
France arranged the purchase of the
Louisiana territory in conflict with Jefferson's personal belief that the Constitution did not bestow upon the federal government the right to acquire or possess foreign territory. Due to political considerations, however, Jefferson disregarded his constitutional doubts, signed the proposed treaty, and sent it to the Senate for ratification. In justifying his actions, he later wrote:
Stop dissing Tommie Jefferson! That's my job!
The actual formulation of the phrase came from a riot case in Chicago.
In the 1949 case
Terminiello v. City of Chicago, the
majority opinion by Justice
William O. Douglas overturned the
disorderly conduct conviction of a priest whose rantings at a rally had incited a riot. The court held that Chicago's
breach of the peace ordinance violated the
First Amendment.
Associate Justice
Robert Jackson wrote a twenty-four page dissent in response to the court's four page decision, which concluded:
"The choice is not between order and liberty. It is between liberty with order and anarchy without either. There is danger that, if the court does not temper its doctrinaire logic with a little practical wisdom, it will convert the constitutional Bill of Rights into a suicide pact."
Oh, allowing people to spread Covid because "Freedom".
Letting crazy people own guns because the Founding Slave Rapists couldn't clearly define a militia.
You know, crazy stuff like that which gets people killed.
