A Worthy Quote

[nChrist]

Founder's Quote Daily

"How strangely will the Tools of a Tyrant pervert the plain Meaning of Words!"

--Samuel Adams, 1776

[nChrist]

Founder's Quote Daily

"If the president alone was vested with the power of appointing all officers, and was left to select a council for himself, he would be liable to be deceived by flatterers and pretenders to patriotism."

--Roger Sherman, 1789

[nChrist]

Founder's Quote Daily

"The judiciary of the United States is the subtle corps of sappers and miners constantly working under ground to undermine the foundations of our confederated fabric. They are construing our constitution from a co-ordination of a general and special government to a general and supreme one alone."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to Thomas Ritchie, 1820

[nChrist]

Founder's Quote Daily

"But while property is considered as the basis of the freedom of the American yeomanry, there are other auxiliary supports; among which is the information of the people. In no country, is education so general -- in no country, have the body of the people such a knowledge of the rights of men and the principles of government. This knowledge, joined with a keen sense of liberty and a watchful jealousy, will guard our constitutions and awaken the people to an instantaneous resistance of encroachments."

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

[nChrist]

Founder's Quote Daily

"All see, and most admire, the glare which hovers round the external trappings of elevated office. To me there is nothing in it, beyond the lustre which may be reflected from its connection with a power of promoting human felicity."

--George Washington, letter to Catherine MacAuly Graham, 1790

[nChrist]

Founder's Quote Daily

"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 Paper XIV, 1787

[nChrist]

Founder's Quote Daily

"A Constitution is not the act of a Government, but of a people constituting a government, and a government without a constitution is a power without right."

--Thomas Paine, Rights of Man, 1791

[nChrist]

Founder's Quote Daily

"If the representatives of the people betray their constituents, there is then no resource left but in the exertion of that original right of self-defense which is paramount to all positives forms of government, and which against the usurpations of the national rulers, may be exerted with infinitely better prospect of success than against those of the rulers of an individual state."

--Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 28, 1787

[nChrist]

Founders Quote Daily

"Hence as a private man has a right to say what wages he will give in his private affairs, so has a Community to determine what they will give and grant of their substance for the Administration of public affairs."

--Samuel Adams, A State of the Rights of the Colonists, 1772

[nChrist]

Founder's Quote Daily

"In observations on this subject, we hear the legislature mentioned as the people's representatives. The distinction, intimated by concealed implication, through probably, not avowed upon reflection, is, that the executive and judicial powers are not connected with the people by a relation so strong or near or dear. But is high time that we should chastise our prejudices; and that we should look upon the different parts of government with a just and impartial eye."

--James Wilson, Lectures on Law, 1791

[nChrist]

Founder's Quote Daily

"A little matter will move a party, but it must be something great that moves a nation."

--Thomas Paine, Rights of Man, 1791

[nChrist]

Founder's Quote Daily

"Is the power who is jealous of our prosperity, a proper power to govern us? Whoever says No, to this question, is an Independant for independency means no more than this, whether we shall make our own laws, or, whether the King, the greatest enemy this continent hath, or can have, shall tell us there shall be no laws but such as I like."

--Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776

[nChrist]

Founder's Quote Daily

"An elective despotism was not the government we fought for; but one in which the powers of government should be so divided and balanced among the several bodies of magistracy as that no one could transcend their legal limits without being effectually checked and restrained by the others."

--James Madison, Federalist No. 58, 1788

[nChrist]

Founder's Quote Daily

"An elective despotism was not the government we fought for; but one in which the powers of government should be so divided and balanced among the several bodies of magistracy as that no one could transcend their legal limits without being effectually checked and restrained by the others."

--James Madison, Federalist No. 58, 1788

[nChrist]

Founder's Quote Daily

"The bordering states if any ... will be most likely by direct violence, to excite war with other nations; and nothing can so effectually obviate that danger, as a national government, whose wisdom and prudence will not be diminished by the passions which actuate the parties immediately interested."

--John Jay, Federalist No. 3, 1787