- “When a business or an individual spends more than it makes, it goes bankrupt. When government does it, it sends you the bill. And when government does it for 40 years, the bill comes in two ways: higher taxes and inflation. Make no mistake about it, inflation is a tax and not by accident.” –Ronald Reagan
The Gipper
Champions of Liberty . . .
- “I am commonly opposed to those who modestly assume the rank of champions of liberty, and make a very patriotic noise about the people. It is the stale artifice which has duped the world a thousand times, and yet, though detected, it is still successful.” –Fisher Ames, letter to George Richard Minot, 23 June 1789
Government’s Control Over The Governed . . .
- “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.” –James Madison, Federalist No. 51
Limiting the Government . . .
- “Wise politicians will be cautious about fettering the government with restrictions that cannot be observed, because they know that every break of the fundamental laws, though dictated by necessity, impairs that sacred reverence which ought to be maintained in the breast of rulers towards the constitution of a country.” –Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 25, 21 December 1787
True Patriots . . .
- “It does not take a majority to prevail . . . but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men.” –Samuel Adams
Limitations of Constitution . . .
- “The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite.” –James Madison, Federalist No. 45
Ordaining of laws in favor of one part of the nation
- “The ordaining of laws in favor of one part of the nation, to the prejudice and oppression of another, is certainly the most erroneous and mistaken policy. An equal dispensation of protection, rights, privileges, and advantages, is what every part is entitled to, and ought to enjoy.” –Benjamin Franklin, Emblematical Representations, circa 1774
Oh, those wordy politicians . . .
- “Here comes the orator! With his flood of words, and his drop of reason.” –Benjamin Franklin
The Twin Sisters . . .
- “Far from being rivals or enemies, religion and law are twin sisters, friends, and mutual assistants. Indeed, these two sciences run into each other. The divine law, as discovered by reason and the moral sense, forms an essential part of both.” –James Wilson, law lectures at the University of Pennsylvania
It still isn’t impossible . . .
- “It has ever been my hobby-horse to see rising in America an empire of liberty, and a prospect of two or three hundred millions of freemen, without one noble or one king among them. You say it is impossible. If I should agree with you in this, I would still say, let us try the experiment, and preserve our equality as long as we can.” –John Adams, letter to Count Sarsfield, 3 February 1786
