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Giving Due Process Its Due
During the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia in 1787, the most heated debates concerned the separation of powers in this emerging democracy. The reason for that concern was emphasized by James Madison in the Federalist Papers, often cited by the Supreme Court as a reliable guide to the intentions of the Framers: "The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands . . . may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny."