Alex's Dad

" 'Repression!' Is the battle cry of the self-indulgent! To the self-disciplined, it's simply self-control."

--Alex's Dad

Alex's Dad

"If I must consume this poison to partake of your fruit, then I'll pass on the fruit."

--Alex's Dad

Alex's Dad

"Idealism precedes experience. Cynicism follows."

-Alex's Dad

John Adams

"Human nature itself is evermore an advocate for liberty. There is also in human nature a resentment of injury, and indignation against wrong. A love of truth and a veneration of virtue. These amiable passions, are the 'latent spark.' ... If the people are capable of understanding, seeing and feeling the differences between true and false, right and wrong, virtue and vice, to what better principle can the friends of mankind apply than to the sense of this difference?"

--John Adams, the Novanglus, 1775

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George Washington

"And you will, by the dignity of your conduct, afford occasion for posterity to say, when speaking of the glorious example you have exhibited to mankind, had this day been wanting, the world had never seen the last stage of perfection to which human nature is capable of attaining."

--George Washington, The Newburgh Address, 1783

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James Madison

"Ambition must be made to counteract ambition. The interest of the man must be connected with the constitutional rights of the place. It may be a reflection on human nature that such devices should be necessary to control the abuses of government. What is government itself but the greatest of all reflections on human nature?"

--James Madison, Federalist No. 51, 1788

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Alexander Hamilton

"There is a certain enthusiasm in liberty, that makes human nature rise above itself, in acts of bravery and heroism."

--Alexander Hamilton, The Farmer Refuted, 1775

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Benjamin Franklin

"In reality there is perhaps no one of our natural Passions so hard to subdue as Pride. Disguise it, struggle with it, beat it down, stifle it, mortify it as much as one pleases, it is still alive, and will now and then peek out and show itself."

--Benjamin Franklin, Autobiography, 1771

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James Madison

The house of representatives ... can make no law which will not have its full operation on themselves and their friends, as well as the great mass of society. This has always been deemed one of the strongest bonds by which human policy can connect the rulers and the people together. It creates between them that communion of interest, and sympathy of sentiments, of which few governments have furnished examples; but without which every government degenerates into  tyranny.

--James Madison, Federalist No. 57, 1788

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James Madison

"If it be asked, what is to restrain the House of Representatives from making legal discriminations in favor of themselves and a particular class of the society? I answer, the genius of the whole system, the nature of just and constitutional laws, and above all the vigilant and manly spirit which actuates the people of America, a spirit which nourishes freedom, and in return is nourished by it."

--James Madison, Federalist No. 57, 1788

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Benjamin Franklin

"History will also give Occasion to expatiate on the Advantage of Civil Orders and Constitutions, how Men and their Properties are protected by joining in Societies and establishing Government; their Industry encouraged and rewarded, Arts invented, and Life made more comfortable: The Advantages of Liberty, Mischiefs of Licentiousness, Benefits arising from good Laws and a due Execution of Justice. Thus may the first Principles of sound Politicks be fix'd in the Minds of Youth."

--Benjamin Franklin, Proposals Relating to the Education of Youth in Pennsylvania, 1749

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John Maynard Keynes: NO! I'm not kidding!!

"By a continuing process of inflation, government can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens....The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction and does it in a manner that not one man in a million is able to diagnose"

– John Maynard Keynes.

Alexander Hamilton

"To model our political system upon speculations of lasting tranquility, is to calculate on the weaker springs of the human character."

--Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 34, 1788

John Stuart Mill

"State education is a mere contrivance for molding people to be exactly alike one another...in proportion as it is efficient and successful, it establishes a despotism over the mind, leading by a natural tendency to one over the body"

-- John Stuart Mill.

James Madison

"In all very numerous assemblies, of whatever character composed, passion never fails to wrest the sceptre from reason. ... Had every Athenian citizen been a Socrates, every Athenian assembly would still have been a mob."

--James Madison, Federalist No. 55, 1788

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Benjamin Franklin

"They are of the people, and return again to mix with the people, having no more durable preeminence than the different grains of sand in an hourglass. Such an assembly cannot easily become dangerous to liberty. They are the servants of the people, sent together to do the people's business, and promote the public  welfare; their powers must be sufficient, or their duties cannot be performed. They have no profitable appointments, but a mere payment of daily wages, such as are scarcely equivalent to their expences; so that, having no chance for great places, and enormous salaries or pensions, as in some countries, there is no  triguing or bribing for elections." --Benjamin Franklin, letter to George Whatley, 1785

James Madison

"Such will be the relation between the House of Representatives and their constituents. Duty, gratitude, interest, ambition itself, are the cords by which they will be bound to fidelity and sympathy with the great mass of the people."

--James Madison, Federalist No. 57, 1788

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Thanksgiving

"Enter His gates with thanksgiving, and His courts with praise. Give thanks to Him and praise His name. For the LORD is good and His love endures forever; His faithfulness continues through all generations."

--Psalm 100:4-5

Rush Limbaugh

"If you want to make a conservative angry, tell him a lie. If you want to make a liberal angry, tell him the truth!"

--Rush Limbaugh

Rush Limbaugh

"Only thieves 'give back'!"

--Rush Limbaugh

Broken Clock!

"Dwelling on the negative, simply contributes to its power."

--Shirley MacLaine

Alex's Dad

"To All Politicians: Cut Taxes. Cut Spending. Or find a new job!!" --Alex's Dad

Alexander Hamilton

"This balance between the National and State governments ought to be dwelt on with peculiar attention, as it is of the utmost importance. It forms a double security to the people. If one encroaches on their rights they will find a powerful protection in the other. Indeed, they will  both be prevented from overpassing their constitutional limits by a certain rivalship, which will ever subsist between them."

--Alexander Hamilton, speech to the New York Ratifying Convention, 1788

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Thomas Jefferson

"Newspapers ... serve as chimnies to carry off noxious vapors and smoke."

--Thomas Jefferson

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James Madison

"It becomes all therefore who are friends of a Government based on free principles to reflect, that by denying the possibility of a system partly federal and partly consolidated, and who would convert ours into one either wholly federal or wholly consolidated, in neither of which forms have individual rights, public order, and external safety, been all duly maintained, they aim a deadly blow at the last hope of true liberty on the face of the Earth."

--James Madison, Notes on Nullification

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Thomas Jefferson

"Were we directed from Washington when to sow, and when to reap, we should soon want bread."

--Thomas Jefferson

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Thomas Jefferson

"Were we directed from Washington when to sow, and when to reap, we should soon want bread."

--Thomas Jefferson, autobiography, 1821

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Samuel Adams

"It does not take a majority to prevail ... but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men."

--Samuel Adams

James Madison

"In the first place, it is to be remembered, that the general government is not to be charged with the whole power of making and administering laws. Its jurisdiction is limited to certain enumerated objects, which concern all the members of the republic, but which are not to be attained by the separate provisions of any."

--James Madison, Federalist No. 14, 1787  

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Alexander Hamilton

"The great leading objects of the federal government, in which revenue is concerned, are to maintain domestic peace, and provide for the common defense. In these are comprehended the regulation of commerce that is, the whole system of foreign intercourse; the support of armies and navies, and of the civil administration."

--Alexander Hamilton, remarks to the New York Ratifying Convention, 1788  

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Edmund Burke

All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.

--Edmund Burke
Irish orator, philosopher, & politician (1729 - 1797)

George S. Patton

"Politicians are the lowest form of life on earth. And liberal Democrats are the lowest form of politicians."

--George S. Patton
Cited in "The unknown Patton" by Charles M. Provence
Pg 187

Benjamin Franklin

"History affords us many instances of the ruin of states, by the prosecution of measures ill suited to the temper and genius of their people. The ordaining of laws in favor of one part of the nation, to the prejudice and oppression of another, is certainly the most erroneous and mistaken policy. An equal dispensation of protection, rights, privileges, and advantages, is what every part is entitled to, and ought to enjoy... These measures never fail to create great and violent jealousies and animosities between the people favored and the people oppressed; whence a total separation of affections, interests, political obligations, and all manner of connections, by which the whole state is weakened."

--Benjamin Franklin, Emblematical Representations

Thomas Jefferson

"[W]hen all government, domestic and foreign, in little as in great things, shall be drawn to Washington as the center of all power, it will render powerless the checks provided of one government on another."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to Charles Hammond, 1821

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James Madison

"We have seen the mere distinction of color made in the most enlightened period of time, a ground of the most oppressive dominion ever exercised by man over man."

--James Madison

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Thomas Jefferson

"Excessive taxation ... will carry reason and reflection to every man's door, and particularly in the hour of election."

--Thomas Jefferson

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Alexander Hamilton

"While the constitution continues to be read, and its principles known, the states, must, by every rational man, be considered as essential component parts of the union; and therefore the idea of sacrificing the former to the latter is totally inadmissible."

--Alexander Hamilton, speech to the New York Ratifying Convention, 1788  

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Thomas Jefferson

"If we can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people, under the pretence of taking care of them, they must become happy."

--Thomas Jefferson

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Samuel Adams

"[N]either the wisest constitution nor the wisest laws will secure the liberty and happiness of a people whose manners are universally corrupt."

--Samuel Adams

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Thomas Paine

"As parents, we can have no joy, knowing that this government is not sufficiently lasting to ensure any thing which we may bequeath to posterity: And by a plain method of argument, as we are running the next generation into debt, we ought to do the work of it, otherwise we use them meanly and pitifully. In order to discover the line of our duty rightly, we should take our children in our hand, and fix our station a few years farther into life; that eminence will present a prospect, which a few present fears and prejudices conceal from our sight."

--Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776  

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Samuel Adams

"[T]he importance of piety and religion; of industry and frugality; of prudence, economy, regularity and an even government; all ... are essential to the well-being of a family."

--Samuel Adams, letter to Thomas Wells, 1780  

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Thomas Paine

"The cause of America is in a great measure the cause of all mankind."

--Thomas Paine

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John Adams

"As long as Property exists, it will accumulate in Individuals and Families. As long as Marriage exists, Knowledge, Property and Influence will accumulate in Families."

--John Adams, letter to Thomas Jefferson, 1814  

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James Wilson

"It is the duty of parents to maintain their children decently, and according to their circumstances; to protect them according to the dictates of prudence; and to educate them according to the suggestions of a judicious and zealous regard for their usefulness, their respectability and happiness."

--James Wilson, Lectures on Law, 1791  

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George Washington

"I want an American character, that the powers of Europe may be convinced we act for ourselves and not for others; this, in my judgment, is the only way to be respected abroad and happy at home."

--George Washington

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Abigail Adams

"What is it that affectionate parents require of their Children; for all their care, anxiety, and toil on their accounts? Only that they would be wise and virtuous, Benevolent and kind."

--Abigail Adams, letter to John Quincy Adams, 1783  

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James Madison

"Justice is the end of government."

--James Madison

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Samuel Adams

"Religion in a Family is at once its brightest Ornament & its best Security."

--Samuel Adams, letter to Thomas Wells, 1780

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John Quincy Adams

"Posterity -- you will never know how much it has cost my generation to preserve your freedom. I hope you will make good use of it."

--John Quincy Adams

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John Adams

"The foundation of national morality must be laid in private families. ... How is it possible that Children can have any just Sense of the sacred Obligations of Morality or Religion if, from their earliest Infancy, they learn their Mothers live in habitual Infidelity to their fathers, and their fathers in as constant Infidelity to their Mothers?"

--John Adams, Diary, 1778  

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Benjamin Franklin

"[I]n this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes."

--Benjamin Franklin

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Benjamin Franklin

"And as to the Cares, they are chiefly what attend the bringing up of Children; and I would ask any Man who has experienced it, if they are  not the most delightful Cares in the World; and if from that Particular alone, he does not find the Bliss of a double State much greater, instead of being less than he expected."

--Benjamin Franklin, Reply to a Piece of Advice  

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James Wilson

"The most important consequence of marriage is, that the husband and the wife become in law only one person... Upon this principle of union, almost all the other legal consequences of marriage depend. This principle, sublime and refined, deserves to be viewed and examined on every side."

--James Wilson, Of the Natural Rights of Individuals, 1792  

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Thomas Jefferson

"At the establishment of our constitutions, the judiciary bodies were supposed to be the most helpless and harmless members of the government. Experience, however, soon showed in what way they were to become the most dangerous."

--Thomas Jefferson

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Declaration of Independence

"When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."

--Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776  

Secede!

Voltaire

"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities."

--Voltaire

Voltaire

"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities."

--Voltaire

George Washington

"[T]he hour is fast approaching, on which the Honor and Success of this army, and the safety of our bleeding Country depend. Remember officers and Soldiers, that you are Freemen, fighting for the blessings of Liberty -- that slavery will be your portion, and that of your posterity, if you do not acquit yourselves like men."

--George Washington, General Orders, 1776  

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Samuel Adams

"Our unalterable resolution would be to be free. They have attempted to subdue us by force, but God be praised! in vain. Their arts may be more dangerous then their arms. Let us then renounce all treaty with them upon any score but that of total separation, and under God trust our cause to our swords."

--Samuel Adams, letter to James Warren, 1776  

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James Madison

"Equal laws protecting equal rights; the best guarantee of loyalty and love of country."

--James Madison, letter to Jacob de la Motta, 1820  

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James Madison

"Equal laws protecting equal rights; the best guarantee of loyalty and love of country."

--James Madison, letter to Jacob de la Motta, 1820  

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George Washington

"I rejoice in a belief that intellectual light will spring up in the dark corners of the earth; that freedom of enquiry will produce liberality of conduct; that mankind will reverse the absurd position that the many were, made for the few; and that they will not continue slaves in one part of the globe, when they can become freemen in another."

--George Washington, draft of First Inaugural Address, 1789  

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John Adams

"[J]udges, therefore, should be always men of learning and experience in the laws, of exemplary morals, great patience, calmness, coolness, and attention. Their minds should not be distracted with jarring interests; they should not be dependent upon any man, or body of men."

--John Adams

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Thomas Jefferson

"The foundation on which all [constitutions] are built is the natural equality of man, the denial of every preeminence but that annexed to legal office, and particularly the denial of a preeminence by birth."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to George Washington, 1784

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George Washington

"[A] good moral character is the first essential in a man.... It is therefore highly important that you should endeavor not only to be learned but virtuous."

--George Washington

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John Adams

"The dons, the bashaws, the grandees, the patricians, the sachems, the nabobs, call them by what names you please, sigh and groan and fret, and sometimes stamp and foam and curse, but all in vain. The decree is gone forth, and it cannot be recalled, that a more equal liberty than has prevailed in other parts of the earth must be established in America."

--John Adams, letter to Patrick Henry, 1776  

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Thomas Paine

"A nation under a well regulated government, should permit none to remain uninstructed. It is monarchical and aristocratical government only that requires ignorance for its support."

--Thomas Paine, Rights of Man, part 2,

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George Washington

"We must take human nature as we find it, perfection falls not to the share of mortals."

--George Washington

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Thomas Jefferson

"Cherish, therefore, the spirit of our people, and keep alive their attention. Do not be too severe upon their errors, but reclaim them by enlightening them."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to Edward Carrington, 1787  

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Thomas Jefferson

"Enlighten the people, generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like spirits at the dawn of day."
--Thomas Jefferson, letter to Dupont de Nemours, 1816  

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Joseph Story

"No man can well doubt the propriety of placing a president of the United States under the most solemn obligations to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution."

--Joseph Story

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George Washington

"Promote then as an object of primary importance, Institutions for the general diffusion of knowledge. In proportion as the structure of a government gives force to public opinion, it is essential that public opinion should be enlightened."

--George Washington, Farewell Address,

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Thomas Jefferson

"[A] wise and frugal government ... shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government."

--Thomas Jefferson

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Benjamin Franklin

"A fine genius in his own country is like gold in the mine."

--Benjamin Franklin, Poor Richard's Almanack, 1733  

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John Adams

"Liberty cannot be preserved without a general knowledge among the people, who have a right, from the frame of their nature, to knowledge, as their great Creator, who does nothing in vain, has given them understandings, and a desire to know; but besides this, they have a right, an indisputable, unalienable, indefeasible, divine right to that most dreaded and envied kind of knowledge; I mean, of the characters and conduct of their rulers."

--John Adams, Dissertation on Canon and Feudal Law, 1765  

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Benjamin Franklin

"Here comes the orator! With his flood of words, and his drop of reason."

--Benjamin Franklin

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John Adams

"Wisdom and knowledge, as well as virtue, diffused generally among the body of the people, being necessary for the preservation of their rights and liberties, and as these depend on spreading the opportunities and advantages of education in the various parts of the country, and among the different orders of people, it shall be the duty of legislators and magistrates ... to cherish the interest of literature and the sciences, and all seminaries of them."

--John Adams, Thoughts on Government, 1776  

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John Adams

"Laws for the liberal education of the youth, especially of the lower class of the people, are so extremely wise and useful, that, to a humane and generous mind, no expense for this purpose would be thought extravagant."

--John Adams, Thoughts on Government, 1776  

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Alexander Hamilton

"Let us recollect that peace or war will not always be left to our option; that however moderate or unambitious we may be, we cannot count upon the moderation, or hope to extinguish the ambition of others."

--Alexander Hamilton

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George Washington

"The Army (considering the irritable state it is in, its suffering and composition) is a dangerous instrument to play with."

--George Washington, letter to Alexander Hamilton, 1783  

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George Washington

"In proportion as the structure of a government gives force to public opinion, it is essential that public opinion should be enlightened."

--George Washington

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Thomas Jefferson

"Cherish, therefore, the spirit of our people, and keep alive their attention. Do not be too severe upon their errors, but reclaim them by enlightening them. If once they become inattentive to the public affairs, you and I, and Congress, and Assemblies, Judges, and Governors, shall all become wolves."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to Edward Carrington, 1787  

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Thomas Jefferson

"To give to every citizen the information he needs for the transaction of his own business; To enable him to calculate for himself, and to express and preserve his ideas, his contracts and accounts, in writing; To improve, by reading, his morals and faculties; To understand his duties to his neighbors and country, and to discharge with competence the functions confided to him by either; To know his rights; to exercise with order and justice those he retains; to choose with discretion the fiduciary of those he delegates; and to notice their conduct with diligence, with candor, and judgment; And, in general, to observe with intelligence and faithfulness all the social relations under which he shall be placed."

--Thomas Jefferson, Report of the Commissioners for the University of Virginia, 1818  

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Thomas Jefferson

"Newspapers ... serve as chimnies to carry off noxious vapors and smoke."

--Thomas Jefferson

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George Washington

"[W]e ought to deprecate the hazard attending ardent and susceptible minds, from being too strongly, and too early prepossessed in favor of other political systems, before they are capable of appreciating their own."

--George Washington, letter to the Commissioners of the District of Columbia, 1795  

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Benjamin Franklin

"The good Education of Youth has been esteemed by wise Men in all Ages, as the surest Foundation of the Happiness both of private Families and of Common-wealths. Almost all Governments have therefore made it a principal Object of their Attention, to establish and endow with proper Revenues, such Seminaries of Learning, as might supply the succeeding Age with Men qualified to serve the Publick with Honour to themselves, and to their Country."

--Benjamin Franklin, Proposals Relating to the Education of Youth in Pennsylvania, 1749  

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Federal Farmer

"[T]o preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms, and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them."

--Federal Farmer

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Samuel Adams

"No people will tamely surrender their Liberties, nor can any be easily subdued, when knowledge is diffusd and Virtue is preservd. On the Contrary, when People are universally ignorant, and debauchd in their Manners, they will sink under their own weight without the Aid of  foreign Invaders."

--Samuel Adams, letter to James Warren, 1775

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James Madison

"Is there no virtue among us? If there be not, we are in a wretched situation."

--James Madison

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James Madison

"What spectacle can be more edifying or more seasonable, than that of Liberty and Learning, each leaning on the other for their mutual & surest support?"

--James Madison, letter to W.T. Barry, 1822

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James Madison

"A popular Government, without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a Prologue to a Farce or a Tragedy; or, perhaps both. Knowledge will forever govern ignorance: And a people who mean to be their own Governors, must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives."

--James Madison, letter to W.T. Barry, 1822

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James Madison

"The best service that can be rendered to a Country, next to that of giving it liberty, is in diffusing the mental improvement equally essential to the preservation, and the enjoyment of the blessing."

--James Madison, letter to Littleton Dennis Teackle, 1826

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George Washington

"There is but one straight course, and that is to seek truth and pursue it steadily."

--George Washington

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Noah Webster

"It is an object of vast magnitude that systems of education should be adopted and pursued which may not only diffuse a knowledge of the sciences but may implant in the minds of the American youth the principles of virtue and of liberty and inspire them with just and liberal ideas of government and with an inviolable attachment to their own country."

--Noah Webster, On Education of Youth in America, 1790

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George Washington

"Our own Country's Honor, all call upon us for a vigorous and manly exertion, and if we now shamefully fail, we shall become infamous to the whole world. Let us therefore rely upon the goodness of the Cause, and the aid of the supreme Being, in whose hands Victory is, to animate and encourage us to great and noble Actions - The Eyes of all our Countrymen are now upon us, and we shall have their blessings, and praises, if happily we are the instruments of saving them from the Tyranny mediated against them. Let us therefore animate and encourage each other, and shew the whole world, that a Freeman contending for Liberty on his own ground is superior to any slavish mercenary on earth."

--George Washington, General Orders, 1776

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James Madison

"Charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government."

--James Madison

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John Adams

"It should be your care, therefore, and mine, to elevate the minds of our children and exalt their courage; to accelerate and animate their industry and activity; to excite in them an habitual contempt of meanness, abhorrence of injustice and inhumanity, and an ambition to excel in every capacity, faculty, and virtue. If we suffer their minds to grovel and creep in infancy, they will grovel all their lives."

--John Adams, Dissertation on the Canon and Feudal Law, 1756

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Rush Limbaugh

"There are womanly words. And manly deeds!"

--Rush Limbaugh

James Wilson

"Law and liberty cannot rationally become the objects of our love, unless they first become the objects of our knowledge."

--James Wilson, Of the Study of the Law in the United States, 1790

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Joseph Story

"The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered as the palladium of the liberties of a republic."

--Joseph Story

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George Washington

"Knowledge is, in every country, the surest basis of public happiness."

--George Washington, First Annual Message, 1790

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John Adams

"Children should be educated and instructed in the principles of freedom."

--John Adams, Defense of Constitutions, 1787

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George Washington

"There is a rank due to the United States, among nations, which will be withheld, if not absolutely lost, by the reputation of weakness."

--George Washington

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Thomas Jefferson

"To all of which is added a selection from the elementary schools of subjects of the most promising genius, whose parents are too poor to give them further education, to be carried at the public expense through the college and university. The object is to bring into action that mass of talents which lies buried in poverty in every country, for want of the means of development, and thus give activity to a mass of mind, which, in proportion to our population, shall be double or treble of what it is in most countries."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to Jose Correa de Serra, 1817

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Samuel Adams

"Let each citizen remember at the moment he is offering his vote that he is not making a present or a compliment to please an individual -- or at least that he ought not so to do; but that he is executing one of the most solemn trusts in human society for which he is accountable to God and his country."

--Samuel Adams

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Thomas Jefferson

"No one more sincerely wishes the spread of information among mankind than I do, and none has greater confidence in its effect towards supporting free and good government."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to Trustees for the Lottery of East Tennessee College, 1810

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Fisher Ames

"The known propensity of a democracy is to licentiousness which the ambitious call, and ignorant believe to be liberty."

--Fisher Ames, speech in the Massachusetts Ratifying Convention, 1788

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James Madison

"[D]emocracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security, or the rights of property; and have, in general, been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths."

--James Madison, Federalist No. 10, 1787

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John Adams

"Remember democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide."

--John Adams, letter to John Taylor, 1814

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George Mason

"Nothing so strongly impels a man to regard the interest of his constituents, as the certainty of returning to the general mass of the people, from whence he was taken, where he must participate in their burdens."

--George Mason

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John Adams

"[D]emocracy will soon degenerate into an anarchy, such an anarchy that every man will do what is right in his own eyes and no man's life or property or reputation or liberty will be secure, and every one of these will soon mould itself into a system of subordination of all the  moral virtues and intellectual abilities, all the powers of wealth, beauty, wit and science, to the wanton pleasures, the capricious will, and the execrable cruelty of one or a very few."

--John Adams, An Essay on Man's Lust for Power, 1763

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Thomas Paine

"[G]overnment, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one; for when we suffer or are exposed to the same miseries by a government, which we might expect in a country without government, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer."

--Thomas Paine

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Peter Muhlenberg

"There is a time for all things, a time to preach and a time to pray, but those times have passed away. There is a time to fight, and that time has now come."

--Peter Muhlenberg, from a Lutheran sermon read at Woodstock, Virginia, 1776

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Thomas Jefferson

"The multiplication of public offices, increase of expense beyond income, growth and entailment of a public debt, are indications soliciting the employment of the pruning knife."

--Thomas Jefferson

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James Wilson

"The most important consequence of marriage is, that the husband and the wife become in law only one person... Upon this principle of union, almost all the other legal consequences of marriage depend. This principle, sublime and refined, deserves to be viewed and examined on every side."

--James Wilson, Of the Natural Rights of Individuals, 1792  

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Thomas Jefferson

"They are not to do anything they please to provide for the general welfare, but only to lay taxes for that purpose. To consider the latter phrase not as describing the purpose of the first, but as giving a distinct and independent power to do any act they please which may be good for the Union, would render all the preceding and subsequent enumerations of power completely useless. It would reduce the whole instrument to a single phrase, that of instituting a Congress with power to do whatever would be for the good of the United States; and as they would be the sole judges of the good or evil, it would be also a power to do whatever evil they please.... Certainly no such universal power was meant to be given them. It was intended to lace them up straightly within the enumerated powers and those without which, as means, these powers could not be carried into effect."

--Thomas Jefferson, Opinion on National Bank, 1791

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John Paul Jones

An honorable Peace is and always was my first wish! I can take no delight in the effusion of human Blood; but, if this War should continue, I wish to have the most active part in it."

--John Paul Jones, letter to Gouverneur Morris, 1782

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John Adams

"[J]udges ... should be always men of learning and experience in the laws, of exemplary morals, great patience, calmness, coolness, and attention. Their minds should not be distracted with jarring interests; they should not be dependent upon any man, or body of men."

--John Adams

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Thomas Paine

"I love the man that can smile in trouble, that can gather strength from distress, and grow brave by reflection. 'Tis the business of little minds to shrink; but he whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves his conduct, will pursue his principles unto death."

--Thomas Paine, The Crisis, No. 1, 1776

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John Paul Jones

"I wish to have no connection with any ship that does not sail fast; for I intend to go in harm's way."

--John Paul Jones, letter to M. Le Ray de Chaumont, 1778

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George Washington

"We have therefore to resolve to conquer or die: Our won Country's Honor, all call upon us for vigorous and manly exertion, and if we now  shamefully fail, we shall become infamous to the whole world. Let us therefore rely upon the goodness of the Cause, and the aid of the supreme Being, in whose hands Victory is, to animate and encourage us to great and noble Actions."

--George Washington, General Orders, 1776

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George Washington

"The name of American, which belongs to you, in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of Patriotism, more than any appellation derived from local discriminations."

--George Washington

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Patrick Henry

"The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave."

--Patrick Henry, speech at the Virginia Convention, 1775

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John Dickinson and Thomas Jefferson

"With hearts fortified with these animating reflections, we most solemnly, before God and the world, declare, that, exerting the utmost energy of those powers, which our beneficent Creator hath graciously bestowed upon us, the arms we have compelled by our enemies to assume, we will, in defiance of every hazard, with unabating firmness and perseverance employ for the preservation of our liberties; being with one mind resolved to die freemen rather than to live as slaves."

--John Dickinson and Thomas Jefferson, Declaration of the Cause and Necessity of Taking up Arms, 1775

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George Washington

"[P]erfection falls not to the share of mortals." --

George Washington

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Thomas Paine

"These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman."
--Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, No. 1, 1776

Via Patriot Post

James Madison

"I entirely concur in the propriety of resorting to the sense in which the Constitution was accepted and ratified by the nation. In that sense alone it is the legitimate Constitution."
--James Madison, letter to Henry Lee, 1824

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Joseph Story

"Let the American youth never forget, that they possess a noble inheritance, bought by the toils, and sufferings, and blood of their ancestors."

--Joseph Story

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Thomas Jefferson

"They are not to do anything they please to provide for the general welfare, but only to lay taxes for that purpose. To consider the latter phrase not as describing the purpose of the first, but as giving a distinct and independent power to do any act they please which may be good for the Union, would render all the preceding and subsequent enumerations of power completely useless. It would reduce the whole instrument to a single phrase, that of instituting a Congress with power to do whatever would be for the good of the United States; and as they would be the sole judges of the good or evil, it would be also a power to do whatever evil they please.... Certainly no such universal power was meant to be given them. It was intended to lace them up straightly within the enumerated powers and those without which, as means, these powers could not be carried into effect."

--Thomas Jefferson, Opinion on National Bank, 1791

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Thomas Jefferson

"The Constitution on which our Union rests, shall be administered by me [as President] according to the safe and honest meaning contemplated by the plain understanding of the people of the United States at the time of its adoption -- a meaning to be found in the explanations of those who advocated, not those who opposed it, and who opposed it merely lest the construction should be applied which they denounced as possible."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to Mesrs. Eddy, Russel, Thurber, Wheaton and Smith, 1801

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Thomas Jefferson

"Born in other countries, yet believing you could be happy in this, our laws acknowledge, as they should do, your right to join us in society, conforming, as I doubt not you will do, to our established rules. That these rules shall be as equal as prudential considerations will admit, will certainly be the aim of our legislatures, general and particular."

--Thomas Jefferson

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Justice Joseph Story

"The duty imposed upon [the president] to take care, that the laws be faithfully executed, follows out the strong injunctions of his oath of office, that he will 'preserve, protect, and defend the constitution.' The great object of the executive department is to accomplish this purpose; and without it, be the form of government whatever it may, it will be utterly worthless for offence, or defence; for the redress of grievances, or the protection of rights; for the happiness, or good order, or safety of the people."

--Justice Joseph Story

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Thomas Jefferson

"Laws are made for men of ordinary understanding and should, therefore, be construed by the ordinary rules of common sense. Their meaning is not to be sought for in metaphysical subtleties which may make anything mean everything or nothing at pleasure."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to William Johnson, 1823

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Margaret Thatcher

"They have the usual socialist disease; they have run out of other people's money."  

-- Margaret Thatcher

From: Empower Texans &Texans for Fiscal Responsibility

George Washington

"The bosom of America is open to receive not only the Opulent and respectable Stranger, but the oppressed and persecuted of all Nations and Religions; whom we shall welcome to a participation of all our rights and privileges, if by decency and propriety of conduct they appear to merit the enjoyment."

--George Washington

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Joseph Story

"The plain import of the clause is, that congress shall have all the incidental and instrumental powers, necessary and proper to carry into execution all the express powers. It neither enlarges any power specifically granted; nor is it a grant of any new power to congress. But it is merely a declaration for the removal of all uncertainty, that the means of carrying into execution those, otherwise granted, are included in the grant."

--Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution, 1833

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Joseph Story

"The constitution of the United States is to receive a reasonable interpretation of its language, and its powers, keeping in view the objects and purposes, for which those powers were conferred. By a reasonable interpretation, we mean, that in case the words are susceptible of two different senses, the one strict, the other more enlarged, that should be adopted, which is most consonant with the apparent objects and intent of the Constitution."

--Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution, 1833

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James Madison

"There are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations."

--James Madison

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Thomas Jefferson

"On every question of construction carry ourselves back to the time when the Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit manifested in the debates and instead of trying what meaning may be squeezed out of the text or invented against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to William Johnson, 1823

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George Washington

"The spirit of encroachment tends to consolidate the powers of all the departments in one, and thus to create whatever the form of government, a real despotism. A just estimate of that love of power, and proneness to abuse it, which predominates in the human heart is sufficient to satisfy us of the truth of this position."

--George Washington

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Thomas Jefferson

"[T]he true key for the construction of everything doubtful in a law is the intention of the law-makers. This is most safely gathered from the words, but may be sought also in extraneous circumstances provided they do not contradict the express words of the law."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to Albert Gallatin, 1808

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"By exclusive property, the productions of the earth and the means of subsistence are secured and preserved, as well as multiplied. What belongs to no one is wasted by every one. What belongs to one man in particular is the object of his economy and care."

--James Wilson

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Thomas Jefferson

"The construction applied ... to those parts of the Constitution of the United States which delegate Congress a power ... ought not to be construed as themselves to give unlimited powers, nor a part to be so taken as to destroy the whole residue of that instrument."

--Thomas Jefferson, Draft Kentucky Resolutions, 1798

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Thomas Jefferson

"I think we have more machinery of government than is necessary, too many parasites living on the labor of the industrious."

--Thomas Jefferson

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Thomas Jefferson

"Our peculiar security is in the possession of a written Constitution. Let us not make it a blank paper by construction."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to Wilson Nicholas, 1803

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Alexander Hamilton

"[T]he Constitution ought to be the standard of construction for the laws, and that wherever there is an evident opposition, the laws ought to give place to the Constitution. But this doctrine is not deducible from any circumstance peculiar to the plan of convention, but from the general theory of a limited Constitution."

--Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 81

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Captain John Parker

"Don't fire unless fired upon. But if they want a war let it begin here."

--Captain John Parker, commander of the militiamen at Lexington, Massachusetts, on sighting British Troops

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Gen. Anthony McAuliffe

"Nuts!" -- Gen. Anthony McAuliffe
Commander of the 101st Airborne Division, when the German's offered him the chance to surrender.

Via Empower Texans & Texans for Fiscal Responsibility

Samuel Adams

"What a glorious morning this is!"

--Samuel Adams, to John Hancock at the Battle of Lexington, Massachusetts, 1775

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James Wilson

"The first and governing maxim in the interpretation of a statute is to discover the meaning of those who made it."

--James Wilson,
Of the Study of Law in the United States, 1790

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William F. Buckley

"The problem with Socialism is Socialism. The problem with Capitalism is Capitalists."

--William F. Buckley

(Think it through. It's not your first impression!)

Alexander Hamilton

"The prosperity of commerce is now perceived and acknowledged by all enlightened statesmen to be the most useful as well as the most productive source of national wealth, and has accordingly become a primary object of its political cares."

--Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 12

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George Washington

"Harmony, liberal intercourse with all Nations, are recommended by policy, humanity and interest. But even our Commercial policy should  hold an equal and impartial hand: neither seeking nor granting exclusive favours or preferences; consulting the natural course of things; diffusing and diversifying by gentle means the streams of Commerce, but forcing nothing; establishing with Powers so disposed; in order to give trade a stable course."

--George Washington, Farewell Address, 1796

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Alex's Dad

"All evil requires that we voluntarily surrender ourselves to it for it to be victorious over us. It must be so. The natural, eternal laws insist that we are free to choose. Then, in order to defeat evil, we must simply say "no!" and stand our ground. They may hurt us. They may kill us. But they will not be victorious over us without our permission."

--Alex's Dad

Ralph Waldo Emerson

"A foolish consistency is the hobgblin of little minds..."

--Ralph Waldo Emerson

Martin Luther King, Jr

"We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed."

--Martin Luther King, Jr in "Letter from a Birmingham Jail" 16 April 1963

Benjamin Franklin

"All of us who were engaged in the struggle must have observed frequent instances of superintending providence in our favor. To that kind providence we owe this happy opportunity of consulting in peace on the means of establishing our future national felicity. And have we now forgotten that powerful friend? Or do we imagine that we no longer need his assistance? I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth-that God governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the Ground without his Notice, is it probable that an Empire can rise without his Aid?"

--Benjamin Franklin, To Colleagues at the Constitutional Convention

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Samuel Adams

"It does not take a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen on setting brush fires of freedom in the minds of men."

--Samuel Adams

Justice John Marshall

"An unlimited power to tax involves, necessarily, a power to destroy; because there is a limit beyond which no institution and no property can bear taxation."

--Justice John Marshall, McCullough v. Maryland, 1819

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Hunter S. Thompson

"Call on God, but row away from the rocks."

--Hunter S. Thompson

George Washington

"Jealousy, and local policy mix too much in all our public councils for the good government of the Union. In a words, the confederation appears to me to be little more than a shadow without the substance...."

--George Washington, letter to James Warren, 1785

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Thomas Jefferson

"Whatever enables us to go to war, secures our peace."

--Thomas Jefferson

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George Washington

"No morn ever dawned more favorable than ours did; and no day was every more clouded than the present! Wisdom, and good examples are necessary at this time to rescue the political machine from the impending storm."

--George Washington, letter to James Madison, 1786

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George Washington

"It appears to me, then, little short of a miracle, that the Delegates from so many different States ... should unite in forming a system of national Government, so little liable to well founded objections."

--George Washington, letter to Marquis de Lafayette, 1788

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John Adams

"The deliberate union of so great and various a people in such a place, is without all partiality or prejudice, if not the greatest exertion of human understanding, the greatest single effort of national deliberation that the world has ever seen."

--John Adams, quoted in a letter from Rufus King to Theophilus Parsons, 1788

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Thomas Jefferson

"In questions of power, then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution."

--Thomas Jefferson

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Thomas Jefferson

"The example of changing a constitution by assembling the wise men of the state, instead of assembling armies, will be worth as much to the world as the former examples we had give them. The constitution, too, which was the result of our deliberation, is unquestionably the wisest ever yet presented to men."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to David Humphreys, 1789

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James Madison

"Whatever may be the judgement pronounced on the competency of the architects of the Constitution, or whatever may be the destiny of the  edifice prepared by them, I feel it a duty to express my profound and solemn conviction ... that there never was an assembly of men, charged with a great and arduous trust, who were more pure in their motives, or more exclusively or anxiously devoted to the object committed to them."

--James Madison

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James Madison

"It has been said that all Government is an evil. It would be more proper to say that the necessity of any Government is a misfortune. This necessity however exists; and the problem to be solved is, not what form of Government is perfect, but which of the forms is least imperfect."

--James Madison

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James Madison

"You give me a credit to which I have no claim in calling me 'the writer of the Constitution of the United States.' This was not, like the fabled Goddess of Wisdom, the offspring of a single brain. It ought to be regarded as the work of many heads and many hands."

--James Madison, letter to William Cogswell, 1834

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James Madison

"The aim of every political constitution is, or ought to be, first to obtain for rulers men who possess most wisdom to discern, and most virtue to pursue, the common good of the society; and in the next place, to take the most effectual precautions for keeping them virtuous whilst they continue to hold their public trust."

--James Madison, Federalist No. 57

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Alexander Hamilton

"Constitutions of civil government are not to be framed upon a calculation of existing exigencies, but upon a combination of these with the probable exigencies of ages, according to the natural and tried course of human affairs. Nothing, therefore, can be more fallacious than to infer the extent of any power, proper to be lodged in the national government, from an estimate of its immediate necessities."

--Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 34

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Alexander Hamilton

"If it be asked, What is the most sacred duty and the greatest source of our security in a Republic? The answer would be, An inviolable respect for the Constitution and Laws -- the first growing out of the last. ... A sacred respect for the constitutional law is the vital principle, the sustaining energy of a free government."

--Alexander Hamilton, Essay in the American Daily Advertiser, 1794

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Noah Webster

"In the formation of our constitution the wisdom of all ages is collected -- the legislators are antiquity are consulted, as well as the opinions and interests of the millions who are concerned. It short, it is an empire of reason."

--Noah Webster, An Examination into the Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution, 1787

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Alexander Hamilton

"If it be asked, What is the most sacred duty and the greatest source of our security in a Republic? The answer would be, An inviolable respect for the Constitution and Laws - the first growing out of the last."

--Alexander Hamilton

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James Madison

"It is impossible for the man of pious reflection not to perceive in it [the Constitution] a finger of that Almighty hand which has been so frequently and signally extended to our relief in the critical stages of the revolution."

--James Madison, Federalist No. 37

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James Madison

"If Congress can do whatever in their discretion can be done by money, and will promote the General Welfare, the Government is no longer a limited one, possessing enumerated powers, but an indefinite one."

--James Madison

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Alexander Hamilton

"I trust that the proposed Constitution afford a genuine specimen of representative government and republican government; and that it will  answer, in an eminent degree, all the beneficial purposes of society."

--Alexander Hamilton, speech to the New York Ratifying Convention, 1788

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John Adams

"A constitution founded on these principles introduces knowledge among the people, and inspires them with a conscious dignity becoming  freemen; a general emulation takes place, which causes good humor, sociability, good manners, and good morals to be general. That elevation of sentiment inspired by such a government, makes the common people brave and enterprising. That ambition which is inspired by it makes them sober, industrious, and frugal."

--John Adams, Thoughts on Government, 1776

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Patrick Henry

"Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God. I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!"

--Patrick Henry, Speech to the Virginia Convention, March 23, 1775

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Daniel Webster

"Human beings will generally exercise power when they can get it, and they will exercise it most undoubtedly in popular governments under pretense of public safety."

--Daniel Webster

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George Washington

"Next Monday the Convention in Virginia will assemble; we have still good hopes of its adoption here: though by no great plurality of votes. South Carolina has probably decided favourably before this time. The plot thickens fast. A few short weeks will determine the political fate of America for the present generation, and probably produce no small influence on the happiness of society through a long succession of ages to come."

--George Washington, letter to Marquis de Lafayette, 1788

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Benjamin Franklin

"But they have two other Rights; those of sitting when they please, and as long as they please, in which methinks they have the advantage of your Parliament; for they cannot be dissolved by the Breath of a Minister, or sent packing as you were the other day, when it was your earnest desire to have remained longer together."

--Benjamin Franklin, letter to William Strahan, 1784

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James Madison

"For the same reason that the members of the State legislatures will be unlikely to attach themselves sufficiently to national objects, the members of the federal legislature will be likely to attach themselves too much to local objects."

--James Madison, Federalist No. 46

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James Madison

"A local spirit will infallibly prevail much more in the members of Congress than a national spirit will prevail in the legislatures of the particular States."

--James Madison, Federalist No. 46

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Thomas Jefferson

"I think we have more machinery of government than is necessary...."

--Thomas Jefferson

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George Washington

"[A] good moral character is the first essential in a man."

--George Washington

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Thomas Jefferson

"If the present Congress errs in too much talking, how can it be otherwise in a body to which the people send 150 lawyers, whose trade it is to question everything, yield nothing, & talk by the hour? That 150 lawyers should do business together ought not to be expected."

--Thomas Jefferson, autobiography, 1821

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James Madison

"Had every Athenian citizen been a Socrates, every Athenian assembly would still have been a mob."

--James Madison, Federalist No. 55

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James Madison

"One hundred and seventy-three despots would surely be as oppressive as one."

--James Madison, Federalist No. 48

The Haircut

One day a florist went to a barber for a haircut. After the cut, he asked about his bill, and the barber replied, "I cannot accept money from you; I'm doing community service this week." The florist was pleased and left the shop.

When the barber went to open his shop the next morning, there was a "thank you" card and a dozen roses waiting for him at his door.

Later, a police officer came in for a haircut and, when he tried to pay his bill, the barber again replied, "I cannot accept money from you; I'm doing community service this week." The officer was happy and left the shop.

The next morning when the barber went to open up, there was a "thank you" card and a dozen donuts waiting for him at his door.

A Congressman came in for a haircut and, when he went to pay his bill, the barber again replied, "I can not accept money from you; I'm doing community service this week." The Congressman was very happy and left the shop.

The next morning, when the barber went to open up, there were a dozen Congressmen lined up waiting for a free haircut.

And that, my friends, illustrates the fundamental difference between the citizens of our country and the politicians who run it.

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James Madison

"The legislative department is everywhere extending the sphere of its activity and drawing all power into its impetuous vortex."

--James Madison, Federalist No. 48

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Walter E. Williams

"While American politicians and intellectuals have not reached the depths of tyrants such as Lenin, Stalin, Mao and Hitler, they share a common vision. Tyrants denounce free markets and voluntary exchange. They are the chief supporters of reduced private property rights, reduced rights to profits, and they are anti-competition and pro-monopoly. They are pro-control and coercion, by the state. These Americans who run Washington, and their intellectual supporters, believe they have superior wisdom and greater intelligence than the masses. They believe they have been ordained to forcibly impose that wisdom on the rest of us. Like any other tyrant, they have what they consider good reasons for restricting the freedom of others. A tyrant's primary agenda calls for the elimination or attenuation of the market. Why? Markets imply voluntary exchange and tyrants do not trust that people behaving voluntarily will do what the tyrant thinks they should do. Therefore, they seek to replace the market with economic planning and regulation, which is little more than the forcible superseding of other people's plans by the powerful elite. We Americans have forgotten founder Thomas Paine's warning that 'Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.'"

--George Mason University economics professor Walter E. Williams

Via Patriot Post

Alexander Hamilton

"No man in his senses can hesitate in choosing to be free, rather than a slave."

--Alexander Hamilton

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Thomas Jefferson

"It would reduce the whole instrument to a single phrase, that of instituting a Congress with power to do whatever would be for the good of the United States; and as they would be the sole judges of the good or evil, it would be also a power to do whatever evil they please. Certainly no such universal power was meant to be given them. It [the Constitution] was intended to lace them up straightly within the enumerated powers and those without which, as means, these powers could not be carried into effect."

--Thomas Jefferson, Opinion on a National Bank, 1791

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Benjamin Franklin

"It is very imprudent to deprive America of any of her privileges. If her commerce and friendship are of any importance to you, they are to be  had on no other terms than leaving her in the full enjoyment of her rights."

--Benjamin Franklin, Political Observances

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Thomas Jefferson

"War is not the best engine for us to resort to; nature has given us one in our commerce, which if properly managed, will be a better instrument for obliging the interested nations of Europe to treat us with justice."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to Thomas Pickney, 1797

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Alexander Hamilton

"Industry is increased, commodities are multiplied, agriculture and manufacturers flourish: and herein consists the true wealth and prosperity of a state."

--Alexander Hamilton, Report on a National Bank, 1790

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Alexander Hamilton

"Measures which serve to abridge the free competition of foreign Articles, have a tendency to occasion an enhancement of prices."

--Alexander Hamilton, Report on Manufactures, 1791

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John Marshall

"First in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen, he was second to none in humble and enduring scenes of private life. Pious, just humane, temperate, and sincere; uniform dignified, and commanding; his example was as edifying to all around him as were the effects of that example lasting; correct throughout, vice shuddered in his presence and virtue always felt his fostering hand. The purity of his private charter gave effulgence to his public virtues."

--John Marshall, official eulogy of George Washington, delivered by Richard Henry Lee, 1799

Via Patriot Post

Thomas Jefferson

"I think all the world would gain by setting commerce at perfect liberty."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Adams, 1785

Via Patriot Post

"No nation was ever ruined by trade, even seemingly the most disadvantageous."

--Benjamin Franklin and George Whaley, Principles of Trade, 1774

Via Patriot Post

George Washington

"The citizens of the United States of America have the right to applaud themselves for having given to mankind examples of an enlarged and liberal policy worthy of imitation. All possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship. It is now no more that toleration is spoken of as if it were by the indulgence of one class of citizens that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights, for happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens in giving it on all occasions their effectual support."

--George Washington, letter to the Hebrew Congregation of Newport, Rhode Island, 1790

Via Patriot Post

George Washington

"When we assumed the Soldier, we did not lay aside the Citizen; and we shall most sincerely rejoice with you in the happy hour when the establishment of American Liberty, upon the most firm and solid foundations shall enable us to return to our Private Stations in the bosom of a free, peacefully and happy Country."

--George Washington, address to the New York legislature, 1775

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"Citizens by birth or choice of a common country, that country has a right to concentrate your affections. The name of American, which belongs to you, in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of Patriotism, more than any appellation derived from local discriminations."

--George Washington, Farewell Address, 1796

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"Nothing is more essential to the establishment of manners in a State than that all persons employed in places of power and trust must be men of unexceptionable characters."

--Samuel Adams, letter to James Warren, 1775

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George Washington

"[T]he first transactions of a nation, like those of an individual upon his first entrance into life make the deepest impression, and are to form the leading traits in its character."

--George Washington, letter to John Armstrong, 1788

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George Washington

"No compact among men ... can be pronounced everlasting and inviolable, and if I may so express myself, that no Wall of words, that no mound of parchment can be so formed as to stand against the sweeping torrent of boundless ambition on the one side, aided by the sapping current of corrupted morals on the other."

--George Washington, draft of first Inaugural Address, 1789

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George Washington

"Your love of liberty -- your respect for the laws -- your habits of industry -- and your practice of the moral and religious obligations, are the strongest claims to national and individual happiness."

--George Washington, letter to the residents of Boston, 1789

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John Witherspoon on Slavery

"Nothing is more certain than that a general profligacy and corruption of manners make a people ripe for destruction. A good form of government may hold the rotten materials together for some time, but beyond a certain pitch, even the best constitution will be ineffectual, and slavery must ensue."

--John Witherspoon, The Dominion of Providence Over the Passions of Men, 1776

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Thomas Paine

"These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country... What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value."

-- Thomas Paine

Sir Robert Baden-Powell

"The most worth-while thing is to try to put happiness into the lives of others."

--Sir Robert Baden-Powell

Montaigne

"Nothing is so firmly believed as that which least is known."

--Montaigne

Austin Chase

"When the search for truth is confused with political advocacy, the pursuit of knowledge is reduced to the quest for power."

--Austin Chase

Michael Crighton

"The current near hysterical preoccupation with safety is at best a waste of resources and a crimp on the human spirit and at worst an invitation to totalitarianism. Public education is desperately needed."

--Michael Crichton
State of Fear

George Orwell

"Within any important issue, there are always aspects no one wishes to discuss."

--George Orwell

Mark Twain

"There is something fascinating about science; one gets such wholesale returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact."

--Mark Twain

Thomas Jefferson

"In questions of power, then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution."

--Thomas Jefferson, fair copy of the drafts of the Kentucky Resolutions of 1798

Via Patriot Post

George Washington

"Guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism."

--George Washington

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Samuel Adams

"The public cannot be too curious concerning the characters of public men."

--Samuel Adams, letter to James Warren, 1775

George Washington

"[A] good moral character is the first essential in a man, and that the habits contracted at your age are generally indelible, and your conduct here may stamp your character through life. It is therefore highly important that you should endeavor not only to be learned but virtuous."

--George Washington, letter to Steptoe Washington, 1790

Via Patriot Post

Patrick Henry

"They tell us, sir, that we are weak; unable to cope with so formidable an adversary. But when shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week, or the next year? Will it be when we are totally disarmed, and when a British guard shall be stationed in every house? Shall we gather strength by irresolution and inaction? Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance by lying supinely on our backs and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot? Sir, we are not weak if we make a proper use of those means which the God of nature hath placed in our power. The millions of people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that which we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send against us. Besides, sir, we shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations, and who will raise up friends to fight our battles for us. The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave. Besides, sir, we have no election. If we were base enough to desire it, it is now too late to retire from the contest. There is no retreat but in submission and slavery! Our chains are forged! Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston! The war is inevitable--and let it come! I repeat it, sir, let it come.

It is in vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace-- but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!"

--Patrick Henry

Barry Goldwater

"Extremism in the Defense of Liberty is No Vice"

Barry Goldwater

John Locke

"Whenever the legislators endeavor to take away and destroy the property of the people, or to reduce them to slavery under arbitrary power, they put themselves into a state of war with the people, who are thereupon absolved from any further obedience."

--John Locke

Via "Sipsey Street Irregulars"

Alexander Hamilton

"[T]he present Constitution is the standard to which we are to cling. Under its banners, bona fide must we combat our political foes -- rejecting all changes but through the channel itself provides for amendments."

--Alexander Hamilton, letter to James Bayard, 1802

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Plato

"'Thinking' is the soul talking to itself."

-Plato

Alex's Dad

"The best thing I can do for the poor in this world is not to be one of them."

-Alex's Dad

George Bernard Shaw

"Our first duty in life is not to be poor."

-George Bernard Shaw

Thomas Jefferson

"On every unauthoritative exercise of power by the legislature must the people rise in rebellion or their silence be construed into a surrender of that power to them? If so, how many rebellions should we have had already?"

--Thomas Jefferson, Notes on Virginia, Query 12, 1782

Via Patriot Post

Roger Whitaker

" 'If' is for Children."

--Roger Whitaker

George Eliot

"It's never too late to be what you might have been."

--George Eliot

Andre Gide

"Sadness is almost always a form of fatigue."

--Andre Gide

Ronald Reagan

"Government always finds a need for whatever money it gets." 

-- Ronald Reagan

Via Texans for Fiscal Responsibility& the Empower Texans PAC

Benjamin Franklin

"No nation was ever ruined by trade, even seemingly the most disadvantageous."
--Benjamin Franklin and George Whaley, Principles of Trade, 1774

Via Patriot Post

James Madison

"If Congress can do whatever in their discretion can be done by money, and will promote the General Welfare, the Government is no longer a limited one, possessing enumerated powers, but an indefinite one, subject to particular exceptions."

--James Madison, letter to Edmund Pendleton, 1792

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James Madison

"The ultimate authority ... resides in the people alone. ... The advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation ... forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition."

--James Madison
Federalist No. 46

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Mark Twain

"If you don't read the newspaper you are uninformed, if you do read the newspaper you are misinformed."

-- Mark Twain

Via Texans for Fiscal Responsibility & the Empower Texans PAC

Fisher Ames

"We are not to consider ourselves, while here, as at church or school, to listen to the harangues of speculative piety; we are here to talk of the political interests committed to our charge."

--Fisher Ames, speech in the United States House of Representatives, 1789

Via Patriot Post

Federalist

"Every new regulation concerning commerce or revenue; or in any manner affecting the value of the different species of property, presents a new harvest to those who watch the change and can trace its consequences; a harvest reared not by themselves but by the toils and cares of the great body of their fellow citizens. This is a state of things in which it may be said with some truth that laws are made for the few not for the many."

--Federalist No. 62

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Thomas Jefferson

"I think we have more machinery of government than is necessary, too many parasites living on the labor of the industrious."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to William Ludlow, 1824

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Thomas Jefferson

"The principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Taylor, 1816

Via Patriot Post

Thomas Jefferson

"But with respect to future debt; would it not be wise and just for that nation to declare in the constitution they are forming that neither the legislature, nor the nation itself can validly contract more debt, than they may pay within their own age, or within the term of 19 years."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to James Madison, 1789

Via Patriot Post

Alexander Hamilton

"If a well-regulated militia be the most natural defense of a free country, it ought certainly to be under the regulation and at the disposal of that body which is constituted the guardian of the national security. If standing armies are dangerous to liberty, an efficacious power over the militia in the same body ought, as far as possible, to take away the inducement and the pretext to such unfriendly institutions. If the federal government can command the aid of the militia in those emergencies which call for the military arm in support of the civil magistrate, it can the better dispense with the employment of a different kind of force. If it cannot avail itself of the former, it will be obliged to recur to the latter. To render an army unnecessary will be a more certain method of preventing its existence than a thousand prohibitions upon paper."

--Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 29

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Samuel Adams

"Let each citizen remember at the moment he is offering his vote that he is not making a present or a compliment to please an individual -- or at least that he ought not so to do; but that he is executing one of the most solemn trusts in human society for which he is accountable to God and his country."

--Samuel Adams, in the Boston Gazette, 1781

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Samuel Adams

"[N]either the wisest constitution nor the wisest laws will secure the liberty and happiness of a people whose manners are universally corrupt."
--Samuel Adams, essay in The Public Advertiser, 1749

Via Patriot Post

Thomas Jefferson

"The God who gave us life, gave us liberty at the same time; the hand of force may destroy, but cannot disjoin them."
--Thomas Jefferson, Summary View of the Rights of British America, 1774

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Thomas Jefferson

"If we can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people, under the pretence of taking care of them, they must become happy."
--Thomas Jefferson, letter to Thomas Cooper, 1802

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Noah Webster

"In selecting men for office, let principle be your guide. Regard not the particular sect or denomination of the candidate - look to his character...."
--Noah Webster, Letters to a Young Gentleman Commencing His Education, 1789

Via Patriot Post

James Madison

"There are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations."
--James Madison, speech to the Virginia Ratifying Convention, 1788

Via Patriot Post