Thomas Jefferson Quotes About Civil Rights

• No experiment can be more interesting than that we are now trying, and which we trust will end in establishing the fact, that man may be governed by reason and truth. Our first object should therefore be, to leave open to him all the avenues to truth. The most effectual hitherto found, is the freedom of the press. It is, therefore, the first shut up by those who fear the investigation of their actions.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Men, Interesting, Freedom Of Speech

  Thomas Jefferson, Jerry Holmes (2002). “Thomas Jefferson: A Chronology of His Thoughts”, p.192, Rowman & Littlefield

• I consider trial by jury as the only anchor ever yet imagined by man, by which a government can be held to the principles of its constitution.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Men, Anchors, Law

  Thomas Jefferson, Henry Augustine Washington (1859). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence”, p.71

• The liberty of speaking and writing guards our other liberties.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Communication, Writing, Liberty

• By a declaration of rights, I mean one which shall stipulate freedom of religion, freedom of the press, freedom of commerce against monopolies, trial by juries in all cases, no suspensions of the habeas corpus, no standing armies. These are fetters against doing evil which no honest government should decline.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Mean, Army, Rights

  Thomas Jefferson (2011). “Jefferson on Freedom: Wisdom, Advice, and Hints on Freedom, Democracy, and the American Way”, p.11, Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.

• Religious institutions that use government power in support of themselves and force their views on persons of other faiths, or of no faith, undermine all our civil rights. Moreover, state support of an established religion tends to make the clergy unresponsive to their own people, and leads to corruption within religion itself. Erecting the 'wall of separation between church and state,' therefore, is absolutely essential in a free society.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Religious, Wall, Rights

• The press is impotent when it abandons itself to falsehood.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Civil Rights, Abandon, Presses

  Thomas Jefferson (2010). “The Works of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. X (in 12 Volumes): Correspondence and Papers 1803-1807”, p.368, Cosimo, Inc.

• No provision in our Constitution ought to be dearer to man than that which protects the rights of conscience against the enterprises of the civil authority.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Men, America, Rights

  Thomas Jefferson, Richard Holland Johnston, Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association of the United States “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson”

• Where the press is free and every man able to read, all is safe.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Men, President, Safe

  Letter to Charles Yancey, 6 Jan. 1816

• The flames kindled on the Fourth of July, 1776, have spread over too much of the globe to be extinguished by the feeble engines of despotism; on the contrary, they will consume these engines and all who work them.

  Thomas Jefferson

  July, Flames, Too Much

  Thomas Jefferson, Henry Augustine Washington (1854). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence, cont”, p.218

• Whenever 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

  Trust, Rights, Government

  Thomas Jefferson, Jerry Holmes (2002). “Thomas Jefferson: A Chronology of His Thoughts”, p.106, Rowman & Littlefield

• 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.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Patriotic, Rights, Government

  Letter to James Madison, 20 Dec. 1787

• The clergy ... believe that any portion of power confided to me [as President] will be exerted in opposition to their schemes. And they believe rightly: for I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man. But this is all they have to fear from me: and enough, too, in their opinion.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Religious, Believe, Men

  Thomas Jefferson (1900). “The Life and Writings of ...”

• To take from one because it is thought that his own industry and that of his father's has acquired too much, in order to spare to others, who, or whose fathers have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association-the guarantee to every one of a free exercise of his industry and the fruits acquired by it.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Wisdom, Father, Exercise

  Thomas Jefferson (1900). “The Life and Writings of ...”

• All, too, will bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Freedom, Patriotic, Equality

  First Inaugural Address, 4 Mar. 1801

• The most effectual means of preventing the perversion of power into tyranny are to illuminate, as far as practicable, the minds of the people at large, and more especially to give them knowledge of those facts which history exhibits, that possessed thereby of the experience of other ages and countries, they may be enabled to know ambition under all its shapes, and prompt to exert their natural powers to defeat its purposes.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Country, Ambition, Mean

  Thomas Jefferson, Andrew M. Allison (1983). “The Real Thomas Jefferson”, Natl Center for Constitutional

• The true foundation of republican government is the equal right of every citizen in his person and property and in their management.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Government, Southern, Foundation

  Thomas Jefferson (1977). “The Portable Thomas Jefferson”, p.440, Penguin

• Our citizens may be deceived for awhile, and have been deceived; but as long as the presses can be protected, we may trust to them for light.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Light, Long, Citizens

  Thomas Jefferson (2010). “The Works of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. IX (in 12 Volumes)”, p.67, Cosimo, Inc.

• A right to property is founded in our natural wants, in the means with which we are endowed to satisfy these wants, and the right to what we acquire by those means without violating the similar rights of other sensible beings.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Mean, Rights, Want

  Thomas Jefferson, Henry Augustine Washington (1854). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Being His Autobiography, Correspondence, Reports, Messages, Addresses, and Other Writings, Official and Private : Published by the Order of the Joint Committee of Congress on the Library, from the Original Manuscripts, Deposited in the Department of State”, p.591

• I am... for freedom of the press, and against all violations of the Constitution to silence by force and not by reason the complaints or criticisms, just or unjust, of our citizens against the conduct of their agents.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Silence, Political, Criticism

  Thomas Jefferson, Noble E. Cunningham (2001). “The Inaugural Addresses of President Thomas Jefferson, 1801 And 1805”, p.3, University of Missouri Press

• It is left... to the juries, if they think the permanent judges are under any bias whatever in any cause, to take on themselves to judge the law as well as the fact. They never exercise this power but when they suspect partiality in the judges; and by the exercise of this power they have been the firmest bulwarks of English liberty.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Exercise, Thinking, Law

  Thomas Jefferson (1853). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence, cont”, p.82

• the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Rights, Law, Majority Rule

  First Inaugural Address, 4 Mar. 1801

• No government can be maintained without the principle of fear as well as duty. Good men will obey the last, but bad ones the former only. If our government ever fails, it will be from this weakness.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Men, Good Man, Weakness

  Thomas Jefferson (2011). “The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Retirement Series, Volume 7: 28 November 1813 to 30 September 1814”, p.648, Princeton University Press

• The time to guard against corruption and tyranny is before they shall have gotten hold of us. It is better to keep the wolf out of the fold, than to trust to drawing his teeth and talons after he shall have entered.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Drawing, Teeth, Civil Rights

  Thomas Jefferson, Jerry Holmes (2002). “Thomas Jefferson: A Chronology of His Thoughts”, p.40, Rowman & Littlefield

• Most codes extend their definitions of treason to acts not really against one's country. They do not distinguish between acts against the government, and acts against the oppressions of the government. The latter are virtues, yet have furnished more victims to the executioner than the former. Real treasons are rare; oppressions frequent. The unsuccessful strugglers against tyranny have been the chief martyrs of treason laws in all countries.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Country, Real, Government

  Thomas Jefferson (1861). “Correspondence”, p.353

• Our civil rights have no dependence upon our religious opinions more than our opinions in physics or geometry.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Religious, Rights, Opinion

  B. L. Rayner, Thomas Jefferson (1834). “Life of Thomas Jefferson: with selections from the most valuable portions of his voluminious and unrivalled private correspondence : with portrait”, p.138

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