- “The most sacred of the duties of a government [is] to do equal and impartial justice to all citizens.” ~Thomas Jefferson (1816)
- “If we can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people, under the pretence of taking care of them, they must become happy.” ~Thomas Jefferson (1802)
- “Every government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves, therefore, are its only safe depositories.” ~Thomas Jefferson (1781)
- “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 (1808)
- “I suppose, indeed, that in public life, a man whose political principles have any decided character and who has energy enough to give them effect must always expect to encounter political hostility from those of adverse principles.” ~Thomas Jefferson (1808)
- “The care of human life and happiness, and not their destruction, is the first and only legitimate object of good government.” ~Thomas Jefferson (1809)
- “I will not believe our labors are lost. I shall not die without a hope that light and liberty are on a steady advance.” ~Thomas Jefferson (1821)
- “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 (1816)
