• “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. I love liberty as well as anybody. I am proud of it, as the true title of our people to distinction above others; but…I would guard it by making the laws strong enough to protect it.” ~Fisher Ames, letter to George Richard Minot, 1789
  

Political interests . . .

• “We are not to consider ourselves, while here, as at church or school, to listen to the harangues of speculative piety; we are here to talk of the political interests committed to our charge.” –Fisher Ames, speech in the United States House of Representatives, 1789
  

The propensity of a democracy . . .

• “The known propensity of a democracy is to licentiousness which the ambitious call, and ignorant believe to be liberty.” –Fisher Ames, speech in the Massachusetts Ratifying Convention, 1788

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. I love liberty as well as anybody. I am proud of it, as the true title of our people to distinction above others; but … I would guard it by making the laws strong enough to protect it.” –Fisher Ames, letter to George Richard Minot, 1789
  

We are, heart and soul, friends to the freedom of the press . . .

• “We are, heart and soul, friends to the freedom of the press. It is however, the prostituted companion of liberty, and somehow or other, we know not how, its efficient auxiliary. It follows the substance like its shade; but while a man walks erect, he may observe that his shadow is almost always in the dirt. It corrupts, it deceives, it inflames. It strips virtue of her honors, and lends to faction its wildfire and its poisoned arms, and in the end is its own enemy and the usurper’s ally, It would be easy to enlarge on its evils. They are in England, they are here, they are everywhere. It is a precious pest, and a necessary mischief, and there would be no liberty without it.” –Fisher Ames, Review of the Pamphlet on the State of the British Constitution, 1807
  

Protecting 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. I love liberty as well as anybody. I am proud of it, as the true title of our people to distinction above others; but … I would guard it by making the laws strong enough to protect it.” –Fisher Ames, letter to George Richard Minot, 1789
  

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