“ Jefferson appeared to his enemies as an American version of Candide; Hamilton as an American Machiavelli. Joseph J. Ellis
“ It was no accident that the beau ideal of his (John Adams') political philosophy was balance, since he projected onto the world the conflicting passions he felt inside himself and regarded government… Joseph J. Ellis
“ Lincoln once said that America was founded on a proposition that was written by Jefferson in 1776. We are really founded on an argument about what that proposition means. Joseph J. Ellis
“ In fact, the past is not history, but a much vaster region of the dead, gone, unknowable, or forgotten. History is what we choose to remember, and we have no alternative but to do our choosing now. Joseph J. Ellis
“ The strategic center of the rebellion was not a place – not New York, Philadelphia, not the Hudson corridor – but the Continental Army itself. Joseph J. Ellis
“ Having now finished the work assigned me, Washington solemnly said, I retire from the great theatre of Action. . . . I here offer my Commission, and take my leave of all the enjoyments of public life.… Joseph J. Ellis
“ Richard Russell, the segregationist senator from Georgia, warned President Lyndon Johnson that if he signed the Voting Rights Act, the Democratic Party would lose the South for the next thirty years,… Joseph J. Ellis
“ Clinton had displayed his lifelong tendency to make enemies of all his superiors, who never seemed to appreciate his advice as much as he thought it deserved. Joseph J. Ellis
“ And the only thing to do with a sin is to confess, do penance and then, after some kind of decent interval, ask for forgiveness. Joseph J. Ellis
“ The great sin of the originalists is not to harbor a political agenda but to claim they do not, and to base that claim on a level of historical understanding they demonstrably do not possess. Joseph J. Ellis
“ If you knew how the journey was going to end, you could afford to be patient along the path. Joseph J. Ellis
“ The first is the political tale of how thirteen colonies came together and agreed on the decision to secede from the British Empire. Here the center point is the Continental Congress, and the leading… Joseph J. Ellis
“ One-year enlistment had proven problematic since the troops were scheduled to rotate out of the army just when they had begun to internalize the discipline of military service and became reliable sold… Joseph J. Ellis
“ In a very real sense, we are complicitous in their achievement, since we are the audience for which they were performing; knowing we would be watching helped to keep them on their best behavior. Joseph J. Ellis
“ The Constitution was intended less to resolve arguments than to make argument itself the solution. Joseph J. Ellis
“ P. 274 ...his trademark decision to surrender power as commander in chief and then president, was not...a sign that he had conquered his ambitions, but rather that he fully realized that all ambitions… Joseph J. Ellis
“ Adams had gone to Harvard, Jefferson to William and Mary. Washington had gone to war. Joseph J. Ellis
“ Contemporaries of Alexander Hamilton noticed his conspicuous sense of self-possession, his unique combination of serenity and energy. Joseph J. Ellis
“ But if insecurity was the primal source of Hamilton's incredibly energy, one would have to conclude that providence had conspired to produce at the most opportune moment perhaps the most creative liab… Joseph J. Ellis
“ Like the classic it has become, the Farewell Address has demonstrated the capacity to assume different shapes in different eras, to change color, if you will, in varying shades of light. Joseph J. Ellis
