Founders Morning Quote

"It behooves you, therefore, to think and act for yourself and your people. The great principles of right and wrong are legible to every reader; to pursue them requires not the aid of many counselors. The whole art of government consists in the art of being honest. Only aim to do your duty, and mankind will give you credit where you fail."

--Thomas Jefferson, A Summary View of the Rights of British America, 1775

Founders Morning Quotes

"The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. If `Thou shalt not covet' and `Thou shalt not steal' were not commandments of Heaven, they must be made inviolable precepts in every society before it can be civilized or made free."

--John Adams, A Defense of the American Constitutions, 1787

Founders Morning Quote

"As parents, we can have no joy, knowing that this government is not sufficiently lasting to ensure any thing which we may bequeath to posterity: And by a plain method of argument, as we are running the next generation into debt, we ought to do the work of it, otherwise we use them meanly and pitifully. In order to discover the line of our duty rightly, we should take our children in our hand, and fix our station a few years farther into life; that eminence will present a prospect, which a few present fears and prejudices conceal from our sight."

--Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776

Founders Morning Quote

"The hour is fast approaching, on which the Honor and Success of this army, and the safety of our bleeding Country depend. Remember officers and Soldiers, that you are Freemen, fighting for the blessings of Liberty - that slavery will be your portion, and that of your posterity, if you do not acquit yourselves like men."

--George Washington, General Orders, August 23, 1776

Founders Morning Quote

"Government, in my humble opinion, should be formed to secure and to enlarge the exercise of the natural rights of its members; and every government, which has not this in view, as its principal object, is not a government of the legitimate kind."

--James Wilson, Lectures on Law, 1790

Founders Morning Quote

"A free people [claim] their rights as derived from the laws of nature, and not as the gift of their chief magistrate."

--Thomas Jefferson, Rights of British America, 1774

Founders Morning Quote

"If men through fear, fraud or mistake, should in terms renounce and give up any essential natural right, the eternal law of reason and the great end of society, would absolutely vacate such renunciation; the right to freedom being the gift of God Almighty, it is not in the power of Man to alienate this gift, and voluntarily become a slave."

--John Adams, Rights of the Colonists, 1772

Founders Morning Quote

It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debts as it goes.
A principle which if acted on would save one-half the wars of the world.
Thomas Jefferson

Founders Morning Quote

"One single object ... [will merit] the endless gratitude of the society: that of restraining the judges from usurping legislation."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to Edward Livingston, March 25, 1825

Founders Morning Quote

"The truth is, that, even with the most secure tenure of office, during good behavior, the danger is not, that the judges will be too firm in resisting public opinion, and in defence of private rights or public liberties; but, that they will be ready to yield themselves to the passions, and politics, and prejudices of the day."

--Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution, 1833

This quote is pertinant to a couple of hot topics today - one being (naturally) the pending Supreme Court confirmation but the other.....

Well that is for you to find out later......

Founders Morning Quote

"[T]here is not a syllable in the plan under consideration which directly empowers the national courts to construe the laws according to the spirit of the Constitution."

--Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 81, 1788

Founders Evening Quotes

"It has long, however, been my opinion, and I have never shrunk from its expression ... that the germ of dissolution of our federal government is in the constitution of the federal Judiciary; ... working like gravity by night and by day, gaining a little today and a little tomorrow, and advancing its noiseless step like a thief, over the field of jurisdiction, until all shall be usurped."

--Thomas Jefferson, letter to Charles Hammond, August 18, 1821

Founders Morning Quote

"The eyes of the world being thus on our Country, it is put the more on its good behavior, and under the greater obligation also, to do justice to the Tree of Liberty by an exhibition of the fine fruits we gather from it."

--James Madison, letter to James Monroe, December 16, 1824

Founders Morning Quote

He that lives upon hope will die fasting.

~Benjamin Franklin

Founders Morning Quote

A special quote for a special day.....

"Our obligations to our country never cease but with our lives."

--John Adams, letter to Benjamin Rush, April 18, 1808

Today is for remembering those who gave it all for our freedoms. May we never take their sacrifices for granted.

Founders Morning Quote

"We have staked the whole of our political institutions upon the capacity of mankind for self-government, upon the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves, to control ourselves, to sustain ourselves according to the Ten Commandments of God."

James Madison

(HT to Morgan Philpot)

Founders Morning Quote

For all of my more Libertarian friends...

"There is no maxim in my opinion which is more liable to be misapplied, and which therefore needs elucidation than the current one that the interest of the majority is the political standard of right and wrong.... In fact it is only reestablishing under another name and a more specious form, force as the measure of right...."

--James Madison, letter to James Monroe, October 5, 1786

Founders Morning Quote

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

--James Madison, speech in the Virginia constitutional convention, December 2, 1829

Regardless of which party is in power, these are words that ALL citizens must never forget.

Founders Morning Quote

"Men, to act with vigour and effect, must have time to mature measures, and judgment and experience, as to the best method of applying them. They must not be hurried on to their conclusions by the passions, or the fears of the multitude. They must deliberate, as well as resolve."

--Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution, January 6, 1833

Founders Morning Quote

"[I]t is Religion and Morality alone, which can establish the Principles upon which Freedom can securely stand....The only foundation of a free Constitution, is pure Virtue, and if this cannot be inspired into our People, in a great Measure, than they have it now, They may change their Rulers, and the forms of Government, but they will not obtain a lasting Liberty."

--John Adams, letter to Zabdiel Adams, 21 June 1776