All James Madison Quotes
- Experience assures us, that the efficacy of the provision has been greatly over-rated; and that some more adequate defense is indispensably necessary for the more… Adequate
- Frequent elections are unquestionably the only policy by which this dependence and sympathy can be effectually secured. But what particular degree of frequency may be… Absolutely
- Experience has instructed us that no skill in the science of government has yet been able to discriminate and define, with sufficient certainty, its three… Able
- It is a melancholy reflection that liberty should be equally exposed to danger whether the government have too much power or too little power and… Danger
- The danger from legislative usurpations, which, by assembling all power in the same hands, must lead to the same tyranny as is threatened by executive… All
- The inference to which we are brought is that the causes of faction cannot be removed and that relief is only to be sought in… Brought
- The smaller the society, the fewer probably will be the distinct parties and interests composing it; the fewer the distinct parties and interests, the more… Composing
- Extend the sphere and you take in a greater variety of parties and interests; you make it less probable that a majority of the whole… Citizens
- Bills of attainder, ex-post facto laws and laws impairing the obligation of contracts are contrary to the first principles of the social compact, and to… Bills
- A just security to property is not afforded by that government, under which unequal taxes oppress one species of property and reward another species. Afforded
- The apportionment of taxes on the various descriptions of property is an act which seems to require the most exact impartiality; yet there is, perhaps,… Act
- The people of the U.S. owe their Independence & their liberty, to the wisdom of descrying in the minute tax of 3 pence on tea,… Agst
- It is a principle incorporated into the settled policy of America, that as peace is better than war, war is better than tribute. America
- In Europe, charters of liberty have been granted by power. America has set the example . . . of charters of power granted by liberty.… America
- No free country has ever been without Parties, which are a natural offspring of freedom. Been
- In civilized communities, property as well as personal rights are the essential object of the laws, which encourage industry by securing the enjoyment of its… Affection
- If justice, good faith, honor, gratitude and all the other qualities which enoble the character of a nation, and fulfill the ends of Government be… Acquire
- Liberty is to faction, what air is to fire, an aliment without which it instantly expires. But it could not be a less folly to… Abolish
- Popular liberty might then have escaped the indelible reproach of decreeing to the same citizens, the hemlock on one day, and statues on the next. Citizens
- No man will subject himself to the ridicule of pretending that any natural connection subsists between the sun or the seasons, and the period within… Afford
- If this spirit shall ever be so far debased, as to tolerate a law not obligatory on the legislature, as well as on the people,… Any
- Our country, if it does justice to itself, will be the workshop of liberty to the civilized world. Civilized
- It is sufficiently obvious, that persons and property are the two great subjects on which Governments are to act; and that the rights of persons,… Act
- The invasion of private rights is chiefly to be apprehended, not from acts of Government contrary to the sense of its constituents, but from acts… Acts
- If they are incorporated into the Constitution, independent tribunals of justice will consider themselves in a peculiar manner the guardians of those rights; they will… Assumption