HEMISFEAR
11-24-08, 08:40.29 AM
Thomas Jefferson:
1. My reading of history convinces me that most bad government results from too much government.
2. Information is the currency of democracy.
3. If there is one principle more deeply rooted in the mind of every American, it is that we should have nothing to do with conquest.
4. I sincerely believe that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies, and that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale.
5. I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.
6. I own that I am not a friend to a very energetic government. It is always oppressive.
7. I never considered a difference of opinion in politics, in religion, in philosophy, as cause for withdrawing from a friend.
8. I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial by strength, and bid defiance to the laws of our country.
9. I hope our wisdom will grow with our power, and teach us, that the less we use our power the greater it will be.
10. I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.
11. I have no fear that the result of our experiment will be that men may be trusted to govern themselves without a master.
12. I have no ambition to govern men; it is a painful and thankless office.
13. I abhor war and view it as the greatest scourge of mankind.
14. History, in general, only informs us of what bad government is.
15. Force is the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism.
16. For a people who are free, and who mean to remain so, a well-organized and armed militia is their best security.
17. Experience hath shown, that even under the best forms of government those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny.
18. Every generation needs a new revolution.
19. Every citizen should be a soldier. This was the case with the Greeks and Romans, and must be that of every free state.
20. Enlighten the people generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like evil spirits at the dawn of day.
21. Educate and inform the whole mass of the people... They are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty.
22. Conquest is not in our principles. It is inconsistent with our government.
23. Commerce with all nations, alliance with none, should be our motto.
24. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and the corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property until their children wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.... The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.
25. All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent.
26. A wise and frugal government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor and bread it has earned - this is the sum of good government.
27. A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine.
28. A Bill of Rights is what the people are entitled to against every government, and what no just government should refuse, or rest on inference.
29. My reading of history convinces me that most bad government results from too much government.
30. No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms.
1. My reading of history convinces me that most bad government results from too much government.
2. Information is the currency of democracy.
3. If there is one principle more deeply rooted in the mind of every American, it is that we should have nothing to do with conquest.
4. I sincerely believe that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies, and that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale.
5. I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.
6. I own that I am not a friend to a very energetic government. It is always oppressive.
7. I never considered a difference of opinion in politics, in religion, in philosophy, as cause for withdrawing from a friend.
8. I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial by strength, and bid defiance to the laws of our country.
9. I hope our wisdom will grow with our power, and teach us, that the less we use our power the greater it will be.
10. I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.
11. I have no fear that the result of our experiment will be that men may be trusted to govern themselves without a master.
12. I have no ambition to govern men; it is a painful and thankless office.
13. I abhor war and view it as the greatest scourge of mankind.
14. History, in general, only informs us of what bad government is.
15. Force is the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism.
16. For a people who are free, and who mean to remain so, a well-organized and armed militia is their best security.
17. Experience hath shown, that even under the best forms of government those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny.
18. Every generation needs a new revolution.
19. Every citizen should be a soldier. This was the case with the Greeks and Romans, and must be that of every free state.
20. Enlighten the people generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like evil spirits at the dawn of day.
21. Educate and inform the whole mass of the people... They are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty.
22. Conquest is not in our principles. It is inconsistent with our government.
23. Commerce with all nations, alliance with none, should be our motto.
24. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and the corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property until their children wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.... The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.
25. All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent.
26. A wise and frugal government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor and bread it has earned - this is the sum of good government.
27. A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine.
28. A Bill of Rights is what the people are entitled to against every government, and what no just government should refuse, or rest on inference.
29. My reading of history convinces me that most bad government results from too much government.
30. No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms.