"If men were angels, no government would be……" — James Madison
"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. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions."
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James Madison
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461 Quotes by James Madison
James Madison has 461 quotes on this site.
A few more worth reading:
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The Alien bill proposed in the Senate is a monster that must forever disgrace its parents.
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It was by the sober sense of our citizens that we were safely and steadily conducted from monarchy to republicanism,…
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The characters and events depicted in the damn bible are fictitious. Any similarity to actual persons, living or dead, is…
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Who does not see that the same authority which can establish Christianity, in exclusion of all other Religions, may establish…
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If there be a principle that ought not to be questioned within the United States, it is that every man…
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It is proper to take alarm at the first experiment on our liberties. We hold this prudent jealousy to be…
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Ambition must be made to counteract ambition.
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Crisis is the rallying cry of the tyrant.
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A standing army is one of the greatest mischief that can possibly happen.
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War is in fact the true nurse of executive aggrandizement
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The power to declare war, including the power of judging the causes of war, is fully and exclusively vested in…
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The constitution supposes, what the History of all Governments demonstrates, that the Executive is the branch of power most interested…
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More Administered Quotes
This quote is filed under Administered Quotes,
one of 82 quotes in that category. Here are a few more:
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Law and order are the medicine of the body politic and when the body politic gets sick, medicine must be…
— B R Ambedkar
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Words of comfort, skillfully administered, are the oldest therapy known to man.
— Louis Nizer
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This worship, given therefore to the Trinity of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, above…
— Pope John Paul II
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If the public safety be provided, liberty and propriety secured, justice administered, virtue encouraged, vice suppressed, and the true interest…
— Algernon Sidney
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The ideal tyranny is that which is ignorantly self-administered by its victims. The most perfect slaves are, therefore, those which…
— Donald James
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If one really wishes to know how justice is administered in a country, one does not question the policemen, the…
— James A. Baldwin
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Again, a law may be both constitutional and expedient, and yet may be administered in an unjust and unfair way.
— Abraham Lincoln
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Wherever we find the Word of God surely preached and heard, and the sacraments administered according to the institution of…
— John Calvin
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According to the National Crime Survey administered by the Bureau of the Census and the National Institute of Justice, it…
— Gary Kleck
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The famous Greek physician Hippocrates administered musical treatments to his patients in 400 B.C. Although this type of treatment did…
— Corinne Heline
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As long as our government is administered for the good of the people, and is regulated by their will; as…
— Andrew Jackson
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Capital punishment would be more effective as a preventive measure if it were administered prior to the crime.
— Woody Allen
See all 82 Administered Quotes »