Albert Gallatin

"The whole of that Bill [of Rights] is a declaration of the right of the people at large or considered as individuals... [I]t establishes some rights of the individual as unalienable and which consequently, no majority has a right to deprive them of."

--Albert Gallatin, letter to Alexander Addison, 1789

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Rabindranath Tagore

Our passions and desires are unruly, but our character subdues these elements into a harmonious whole. Does something similar to this happen in the physical world? Are the elements rebellious, dynamic with individual impulse? And is there a principle in the physical world which dominates them and puts them into an orderly organization?

Candidus

"[I]f the public are bound to yield obedience to laws to which they cannot give their approbation, they are slaves to those who make such laws and enforce them."

--Candidus, in the Boston Gazette, 1772

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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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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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James Madison

"There is not a more important and fundamental principle in legislation, than that the ways and means ought always to face the public engagements; that our appropriations should ever go hand in hand with our promises. To say that the United States should be answerable for twenty-five millions of dollars without knowing whether the ways and means can be provided, and without knowing whether those who are to succeed us will think with us on the subject, would be rash and unjustifiable."

--James Madison, Speech in Congress, 1790

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James Madison

"There is not a more important and fundamental principle in legislation, than that the ways and means ought always to face the public engagements; that our appropriations should ever go hand in hand with our promises. To say that the United States should be answerable for twenty-five millions of dollars without knowing whether the ways and means can be provided, and without knowing whether those who are to succeed us will think with us on the subject, would be rash and unjustifiable."

--James Madison, Speech in Congress, 1790

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Thomas Jefferson

"In our private pursuits it is a great advantage that every honest employment is deemed honorable. I am myself a nail-maker."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to Jean Nicolas DÈmeunier, 1795

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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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Alexander Hamilton

"Of those men who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the people, commencing demagogues and ending tyrants."

--Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 1, 1787

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Baron de Montesquieu Charles-Louis de Secondat

"Useless laws weaken necessary laws."

--Baron de Montesquieu Charles-Louis de Secondat (1689-1755)

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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

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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, subject to particular exceptions."

--James Madison, letter to Edmund Pendleton, 1792

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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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Thomas Jefferson

"This was the object of the Declaration of Independence. Not to find out new principles, or new arguments, never before thought of, not merely to say things which had never been said before; but to place before mankind the common sense of the subject, in terms so plain and firm as to command their assent, and to justify ourselves in the independent stand we are compelled to take. Neither aiming at originality of principle or sentiment, nor yet copied from any particular and previous writing, it was intended to be an expression of the American mind, and to give to that expression the proper tone and spirit called for by the occasion."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to Henry Lee, 1825

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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; and capacity, if wisely improved, and faithfully guarded, of transmitting to their latest posterity all the substantial blessings of life, the peaceful enjoyment of liberty, property, religion, and independence."

--Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution, 1833

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Zacharia Johnson

"[T]he people are not to be disarmed of their weapons. They are left in full possession of them."

--Zacharia Johnson, speech in the Virginia Ratifying Convention, 1788

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Zacharia Johnson

"[T]he people are not to be disarmed of their weapons. They are left in full possession of them."

--Zacharia Johnson, speech in the Virginia Ratifying Convention, 1788

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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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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 consciousness of having discharged that duty which we owe to our country is superior to all other considerations."

--George Washington, letter to James Madison, 1788

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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, 1788

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Nathan Hale

"I am not influenced by the expectation of promotion or pecuniary reward. I wish to be useful, and every kind of service necessary for the public good, become honorable by being necessary."

--Nathan Hale, remark to Captain William Hull, who had attempted to dissuade him from volunteering for a spy mission for General Washington, 1776

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