“The principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale.” –Thomas Jefferson
The principle of spending money . . .
A good moral character . . .
- “[A] good moral character is the first essential in a man, and that the habits contracted at your age are generally indelible, and your conduct here may stamp your character through life. It is therefore highly important that you should endeavor not only to be learned but virtuous.” –George Washington, letter to Steptoe Washington, 1790
Let principle be your guide . . .
- “In selecting men for office, let principle be your guide. Regard not the particular sect or denomination of the candidate – look to his character….” –Noah Webster, Letters to a Young Gentleman Commencing His Education, 1789
It will be of little avail . . .
- “It will be of little avail to the people that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood; if they be repealed or revised before they are promulgated, or undergo such incessant changes that no man who knows what the law is today can guess what it will be to-morrow.” –Federalist No. 62
Wherever the people are well-informed . . .
- “It is to me a new and consolatory proof that wherever the people are well-informed they can be trusted with their own government; that whenever things get so far wrong as to attract their notice, they may be relied on to set them to rights.” –Thomas Jefferson
The God who gave us life . . .
- “The God who gave us life, gave us liberty at the same time; the hand of force may destroy, but cannot disjoin them.” –Thomas Jefferson, Summary View of the Rights of British America, 1774
The machinery of government . . .
- “I think we have more machinery of government than is necessary, too many parasites living on the labor of the industrious.” –Thomas Jefferson, letter to William Ludlow, 1824
The same prudence . . .
- “The same prudence which in private life would forbid our paying our own money for unexplained projects, forbids it in the dispensation of the public moneys.” –Thomas Jefferson, letter to Shelton Gilliam, 1808
Nothing is more essential . . .
- “Nothing is more essential to the establishment of manners in a State than that all persons employed in places of power and trust must be men of unexceptionable characters.” –Samuel Adams
The duty imposed . . .
- “The duty imposed upon him to take care, that the laws be faithfully executed, follows out the strong injunctions of his oath of office, that he will ‘preserve, protect, and defend the constitution.’ The great object of the executive department is to accomplish this purpose; and without it, be the form of government whatever it may, it will be utterly worthless for offence, or defence; for the redress of grievances, or the protection of rights; for the happiness, or good order, or safety of the people.” –Justice Joseph Story
