It is a universal truth that the loss of liberty at home is to be charged to the provisions against danger, real or pretended, from abroad.
If men were angels, no government would be necessary.
In no instance have the churches been guardians of the liberties of the people.
In Europe, charters of liberty have been granted by power. America has set the example and France has followed it, of charters of power granted by liberty. This revolution in the practice of the world...
The happy Union of these States is a wonder their Constitution a miracle their example the hope of Liberty throughout the world.
Perhaps it is a universal truth that the loss of liberty at home is to be charged to provisions against danger, real or pretended, from abroad.
War should only be declared by the authority of the people, whose toils and treasures are to support its burdens, instead of the government which is to reap its fruits.
And I have no doubt that every new example will succeed, as every past one has done, in showing that religion and Government will both exist in greater purity, the less they are mixed together.
I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments by those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.
The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exer...
To suppose that any form of government will secure liberty or happiness without any virtue in the people, is a chimerical idea.
Knowledge will forever govern ignorance and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.
No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.
Whenever a youth is ascertained to possess talents meriting an education which his parents cannot afford, he should be carried forward at the public expense.
Every new and successful example, therefore, of a perfect separation between the ecclesiastical and civil matters, is of importance; and I have no doubt that every new example will succeed, as every p...
If we are to take for the criterion of truth the majority of suffrages, they ought to be gotten from those philosophic and patriotic citizens who cultivate their reason.
Wherever there is interest and power to do wrong, wrong will generally be done.
The loss of liberty at home is to be charged to the provisions against danger, real or imagined, from abroad.
Do not separate text from historical background. If you do, you will have perverted and subverted the Constitution, which can only end in a distorted, bastardized form of illegitimate government.
What is government itself but the greatest of all reflections on human nature?