Alexander Hamilton -

I have learned to hold popular opinion of no value.

In the general course of human nature, A power over a man's subsistence amounts to a power over his will.

In the main it will be found that a power over a man's support (salary) is a power over his will.

It's not tyranny we desire; it's a just, limited, federal government.

Those who stand for nothing fall for anything.

When the sword is once drawn, the passions of men observe no bounds of moderation.

“The sacred rights of mankind are not to be rummaged for among old parchments or musty records. They are written, as with a sunbeam, in the whole volume of human nature, by the hand of the divinity itself; and can never be erased.”

“" Ah, this is the constitution," he said. "Now, mark my words. So long as we are a young and virtuous people, this instrument will bind us together in mutual interests, mutual welfare, and mutual happiness. But when we become old and corrupt, it will bind no longer."”





Samuel Adams -

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

It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people's minds.

The Constitution shall never be construed... to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms.

The natural liberty of man is to be free from any superior power on Earth, and not to be under the will or legislative authority of man, but only to have the law of nature for his rule.

“Among the natural rights of the colonists are these: First a right to life, secondly to liberty, and thirdly to property; together with the right to defend them in the best manner they can”

“We have this day restored the Sovereign to Whom all men ought to be obedient. He reigns in heaven and from the rising to the setting of the sun, let His kingdom come.”

“Contemplate the mangled bodies of your countrymen, and then say 'what should be the reward of such sacrifices?'

Bid us and our posterity bow the knee, supplicate the friendship and plough, and sow, and reap, to glut the avarice of the men who have let loose on us the dogs of war to riot in our blood and hunt us from the face of the earth? If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than the animated contest of freedom, go from us n peace.  We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen!”

“The liberties of our country, the freedom of our civil constitution, are worth defending against all hazards: And it is our duty to defend them against all attacks.”

“A general dissolution of principles and manners will more surely overthrow the liberties of America than the whole force of the common enemy. While the people are virtuous they cannot be subdued; but when once they lose their virtue then will be ready to surrender their liberties to the first external or internal invader.”





Thomas Jefferson  -

Determine never to be idle...It is wonderful how much may be done if we are always doing.

Enlighten the people, generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like spirits at the dawn of day.

Every citizen should be a soldier. This was the case with the Greeks and Romans, and must be that of every free state.

I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies.

I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.

I'm a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work the more I have of it.

In matters of style, swim with the current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock.

Never spend your money before you have it.

The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.
(Back then this was the ONLY form of news.  I assume this would expand today to TV, Radio and Internet News as well)

The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions, that I wish it always to be kept alive.

The will of the people is the only legitimate foundation of any government, and to protect its free expression should be our first object.

Walking is the best possible exercise. Habituate yourself to walk very far.

We confide in our strength, without boasting of it; we respect that of others, without fearing it.

I have the consolation of having added nothing to my private fortune during my public service, and of retiring with hands clean as they are empty.

If our house be on fire, without inquiring whether it was fired from within or without, we must try to extinguish it.

An honest man can feel no pleasure in the exercise of power over his fellow citizens.

I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it.







George Washington  -

A government is like fire, a handy servant, but a dangerous master.

How soon we forget history... Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.

A slender acquaintance with the world must convince every man that actions, not words, are the true criterion of the attachment of friends.

Arbitrary power is most easily established on the ruins of liberty abused to licentiousness.

Associate yourself with men of good quality if you esteem your own reputation. It is better be alone than in bad company.

Be courteous to all, but close with few, and let those few be well tried before you give them your confidence.

Discipline is the soul of an army. It makes small numbers formidable; procures success to the weak, and esteem to all.

Few men have virtue to withstand the highest bidder.

Firearms are second only to the Constitution in importance; they are the peoples' liberty's teeth.

Guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism.

I have no other view than to promote the public good, and am unambitious of honors not founded in the approbation of my Country.

I hope I shall possess firmness and virtue enough to maintain what I consider the most enviable of all titles, the character of an honest man.

I walk on untrodden ground. There is scarcely any part of my conduct which may not hereafter be drawn into precedent.

If the freedom of speech is taken away then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.

If we desire to avoid insult, we must be able to repel it; if we desire to secure peace, one of the most powerful instruments of our rising prosperity, it must be known, that we are at all times ready for War.

It is impossible to rightly govern a nation without God and the Bible.

It is our true policy to steer clear of entangling alliances with any portion of the foreign world.

Tyranny... It is the child of avarice, the brother of iniquity, and the father of mischief.

It may be laid down as a primary position, and the basis of our system, that every Citizen who enjoys the protection of a Free Government, owes not only a proportion of his property, but even of his personal services to the defense of it.

It will be found an unjust and unwise jealousy to deprive a man of his natural liberty upon the supposition he may abuse it.

Labor to keep alive in your breast that little spark of celestial fire, called conscience.

Over grown military establishments are under any form of government inauspicious to liberty, and are to be regarded as particularly hostile to republican liberty.

Some day, following the example of the United States of America, there will be a United States of Europe.

The Constitution is the guide which I never will abandon.

The constitution vests the power of declaring war in Congress; therefore no offensive expedition of importance can be undertaken until after they shall have deliberated upon the subject and authorized such a measure.

The marvel of all history is the patience with which men and women submit to burdens unnecessarily laid upon them by their governments.

The time is near at hand which must determine whether Americans are to be free men or slaves.

The very atmosphere of firearms anywhere and everywhere restrains evil interference - they deserve a place of honor with all that's good.

To be prepared for war is one of the most effective means of preserving peace.

Truth will ultimately prevail where there is pains to bring it to light.

We should not look back unless it is to derive useful lessons from past errors, and for the purpose of profiting by dearly bought experience.

When firearms go, all goes. We need them every hour.

When we assumed the Soldier, we did not lay aside the Citizen.

Worry is the interest paid by those who borrow trouble.








James Madison  -

A well regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, trained in arms, is the best most natural defense of a free country.

All men having power ought to be distrusted to a certain degree.

As a man is said to have a right to his property, he may be equally said to have a property in his rights.

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.

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.

If men were angels, no government would be necessary.

If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.

In Republics, the great danger is, that the majority may not sufficiently respect the rights of the minority.

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.

It will be of little avail to the people that the laws are made by men of their own choice if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood.

Knowledge will forever govern ignorance; and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.

Learned Institutions ought to be favorite objects with every free people. They throw that light over the public

mind which is the best security against crafty and dangerous encroachments on the public liberty.

No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.

Of all the enemies of public liberty, war is perhaps the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other.

Philosophy is common sense with big words.

Such democracies 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.

The advancement and diffusion of knowledge is the only guardian of true liberty.

The Constitution of the United States was created by the people of the United States composing the respective states, who alone had the right to ratify it.

The Constitution preserves the advantage of being armed which Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation where the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms.

The essence of Government is power; and power, lodged as it must be in human hands, will ever be liable to abuse.

The executive has no right, in any case, to decide the question, whether there is or is not cause for declaring war.

The loss of liberty at home is to be charged to the provisions against danger, real or imagined, from abroad.

The means of defense against foreign danger historically have become the instruments of tyranny at home.

We are right to take alarm at the first experiment upon our liberties.

What is government itself but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary.





Theodore Roosevelt  -

A man who has never gone to school may steal from a freight car; but if he has a university education, he may steal the whole railroad.

A man who is good enough to shed his blood for the country is good enough to be given a square deal afterwards.

A thorough knowledge of the Bible is worth more than a college education.

A typical vice of American politics is the avoidance of saying anything real on real issues.

A vote is like a rifle; its usefulness depends upon the character of the user.

Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people.

Believe you can and you're halfway there.

Character, in the long run, is the decisive factor in the life of an individual and of nations alike.

Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.

Don't hit at all if it is honorably possible to avoid hitting; but never hit softly.

Every immigrant who comes here should be required within five years to learn English or leave the country.

Far better is it to dare mighty things, to win glorius triumphs, even though checkered by failure... than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much, because they live in a gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat.

Great thoughts speak only to the thoughtful mind, but great actions speak to all mankind.

I am only an average man but, by George, I work harder at it than the average man.

I care not what others think of what I do, but I care very much about what I think of what I do! That is character!

If you could kick the person in the pants responsible for most of your trouble, you wouldn't sit for a month.

In a moment of decision the best thing you can do is the right thing. The worst thing you can do is nothing.

It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed.

Never throughout history has a man who lived a life of ease left a name worth remembering.

Nobody cares how much you know, until they know how much you care.

Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far.

The government is us; we are the government, you and I.

The human body has two ends on it: one to create with and one to sit on. Sometimes people get their ends reversed.

When this happens they need a kick in the seat of the pants.

The man who loves other countries as much as his own stands on a level with the man who loves other women as much as he loves his own wife.

The pacifist is as surely a traitor to his country and to humanity as is the most brutal wrongdoer.

There can be no fifty-fifty Americanism in this country. There is room here for only 100 percent. Americanism, only for those who are Americans and nothing else.

Wars are, of course, as a rule to be avoided; but they are far better than certain kinds of peace.








Misc.  -

My definition of a free society is a society where it is safe to be unpopular.
   Adlai E. Stevenson Jr. (1900 - 1965), Speech in Detroit, 7 Oct. 1952

If you want to be free, there is but one way; it is to guarantee an equally full measure of liberty to all your neighbors. There is no other.
   Carl Schurz (1829 - 1906)

Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.
   George Bernard Shaw (1856 - 1950)

The First Amendment is often inconvenient. But that is besides the point. Inconvenience does not absolve the government of its obligation to tolerate speech.
   Justice Anthony Kennedy (1936 - )

Patterning your life around other's opinions is nothing more than slavery.
   Lawana Blackwell, The Dowry of Miss Lydia Clark, 1999

Nobody can give you freedom. Nobody can give you equality or justice or anything. If you're a man, you take it.
   Malcolm X (1925 - 1965), Malcolm X Speaks, 1965

Self-reliance is the only road to true freedom, and being one's own person is its ultimate reward.
   Patricia Sampson

To know what you prefer instead of humbly saying Amen to what the world tells you that you ought to prefer, is to have kept your soul alive.
   Robert Louis Stevenson (1850 - 1894)

Thomas Paine -

Arms discourage and keep the invader and plunderer in awe, and preserve order in the world as well as property... Horrid mischief would ensue were the law-abiding deprived of the use of them.

Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.

He who is the author of a war lets loose the whole contagion of hell and opens a vein that bleeds a nation to death.

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.

If there must be trouble, let it be in my day, that my child may have peace.

If we do not hang together, we shall surely hang separately.

Lead, follow, or get out of the way.

That government is best which governs least.

The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph.

The instant formal government is abolished, society begins to act. A general association takes place, and common interest produces common security.

The real man smiles in trouble, gathers strength from distress, and grows brave by reflection.

The strength and power of despotism consists wholly in the fear of resistance.

These are times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.

Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it.

'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.

To say that any people are not fit for freedom, is to make poverty their choice, and to say they had rather be loaded with taxes than not.

We have it in our power to begin the world over again.