All Thomas Jefferson Quotes
- The ultimate arbiter is the people of the Union. Arbiter
- The power of making war often prevents it. Antiwar
- With earnest prayers to all my friends to cherish mutual good will, to promote harmony and conciliation, and above all things to let the love… Affectionate
- It would reduce the whole instrument to a single phrase, that of instituting a Congress with power to do whatever would be for the good… Carried
- On every unauthoritative exercise of power by the legislature must the people rise in rebellion or their silence be construed into a surrender of that… Congress
- The example of changing a constitution by assembling the wise men of the state, instead of assembling armies, will be worth as much to the… Armies
- [The Federal Convention] is really an assembly of demigods. Assembly
- Our peculiar security is in the possession of a written Constitution. Let us not make it a blank paper by construction. Blank
- The construction applied . . . to those parts of the Constitution of the United States which delegate Congress a power . . . ought… Applied
- [T]he true key for the construction of everything doubtful in a law is the intention of the law-makers. This is most safely gathered from the… Circumstances
- Laws are made for men of ordinary understanding and should, therefore, be construed by the ordinary rules of common sense. Their meaning is not to… Anything Mean
- The Constitution on which our Union rests, shall be administered by me [as President] according to the safe and honest meaning contemplated by the plain… According
- One single object . . . [will merit] the endless gratitude of the society: that of restraining the judges from usurping legislation. Endless
- A judiciary independent of a king or executive alone, is a good thing; but independence of the will of the nation is a solecism, at… Alone
- 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… Alone
- [T]he opinion which gives to the judges the right to decide what laws are constitutional and what not, not only for themselves, in their, own… Action
- The great object of my fear is the federal judiciary. That body, like gravity, ever acting, with noiseless foot, and unalarming advance, gaining ground step… Acting
- Legislators invent too many devices for subdividing property, only taking care to let their subdivisions go hand in hand with the natural affections of the… Affection
- We lay it down as a fundamental, that laws, to be just, must give a reciprocation of right; that, without this, they are mere arbitrary… Arbitrary
- The instability of our laws is really an immense evil. I think it would be well to provide in our constitutions that there shall always… Bare
- During the course of administration, and in order to disturb it, the artillery of the press has been levelled against us, charged with whatsoever its… Abuse
- Newspapers . . . serve as chimnies to carry off noxious vapors and smoke. Carry
- It is so difficult to draw a clear line of separation between the abuse and the wholesome use of the press, that as yet we… Abuse
- From forty years' experience of the wretched guess-work of the newspapers of what is not done in open daylight, and of their falsehood even as… Almost Never
- Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. Truth itself becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle. The real extent… Becomes