Editing Marbury v. Madison (section)

===Marbury's legal remedy===
Turning to the second question, the Court said that the law provided Marbury a remedy for Madison's unlawful withholding of his commission. Marshall wrote that "it is a general and indisputable rule, that where there is a legal right, there is also a legal remedy by suit or action at law, whenever that right is invaded." This rule derives from the ancient Roman legal maxim {{lang|la|ubi jus, ibi remedium}} ("where there is a legal right, there is a legal remedy"), which was well established in the English [[common law]].{{sfnp|Amar|1989|p=447}}{{sfnp|Amar|1987|pp=1485–86}} In what the American legal scholar [[Akhil Reed Amar]] called "one of the most important and inspiring passages" of the opinion,{{sfnp|Amar|1987|p=1486}} Marshall wrote:
{{Blockquote
|text=The very essence of civil liberty certainly consists in the right of every individual to claim the protection of the laws whenever he receives an injury.
|source=''Marbury'', 5 U.S. at 163.
}}
The Court then confirmed that a [[mandamus|writ of mandamus]]{{mdash}}a type of court order that commands a government official to perform an act his official duties legally require him to perform{{mdash}}was the proper remedy for Marbury's situation.{{sfnp|Brest|Levinson|Balkin|Amar|2018|pp=124–25}} But this raised the issue of whether the Court, which was part of the judicial branch of the government, had the power to command Madison, who as secretary of state was part of the executive branch of the government.{{sfnp|Chemerinsky|2019|loc=§&nbsp;2.2.1, p. 41}} The Court held that so long as the remedy involved a mandatory duty to a specific person and not a political matter left to discretion, the courts could provide the legal remedy.{{sfnp|Chemerinsky|2019|loc=§ 2.2.1, pp. 42–43}} Borrowing a phrase John Adams had drafted in 1779 for the [[Constitution of Massachusetts|Massachusetts State Constitution]], Marshall wrote: "The government of the United States has been emphatically termed a government of laws, and not of men."<ref>{{harvp|Chemerinsky|2019|loc=§&nbsp;2.2.1, p. 41}}, quoting ''Marbury'', 5 U.S. at 163.</ref>