Declaration Of Independence Quotes - Page 4

• The last time I checked, the Constitution said, 'of the people, by the people and for the people.' That's what the Declaration of Independence says.

  William J. Clinton

  Stupid, Humorous, People

  William J. "Bill" Clinton's campaign speech in California, quoted in Investor's Business Daily, October 25, 1996.

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• As the patriots of seventy-six did to the support of the Declaration of Independence, so to the support of the Constitution and Laws, let every American pledge his life, his property, and his sacred honor;-let every man remember that to violate the law, is to trample on the blood of his father, and to tear the character of his own, and his children's liberty.

  Abraham Lincoln

  Children, Father, Character

  Abraham Lincoln, Don Edward Fehrenbacher (1977). “Abraham Lincoln, a Documentary Portrait Through His Speeches and Writings”, p.39, Stanford University Press

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• They were not mentioned in the Declaration of Independence, they were absent in the Constitution and they were invisible in the new political democracy. They were the women of early America.

  Howard Zinn

  America, Political, Independence

  Howard Zinn (2014). “A People's History of the United States”, p.91, Pan Macmillan

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• The democratic principle, enunciated in the words of the Declaration of Independence, declared that government was secondary, that the people who established it were primary. Thus, the future of democracy depended on the people, and their growing consciousness of what was the decent way to relate to their fellow human beings all over the world.

  Howard Zinn

  Government, People, Independence

  Howard Zinn (2015). “A People's History of the United States: 1492-Present”, p.682, Routledge

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• The Declaration of Independence . . . [is the] declaratory charter of our rights, and the rights of man.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Men, Rights, Independence

  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.58

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• In a sense we've come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men - yes, black men as well as white men - would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness... America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked 'insufficient funds.'

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Fall, Men, Pursuit Of Happiness

  I Have a Dream, delivered 28 August 1963, at the Lincoln Memorial, Washington D.C.

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• What country can preserve its liberties if its rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Country, Freedom, Gun

  Letter toWilliam Stephens Smith, 13 Nov. 1787

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• Surely, if it is the right of the people to "alter or abolish," it is their right to criticize, even severely, policies they believe destructive of the ends for which government has been established. This principle, in the Declaration of Independence, suggests that true patriotism lies in supporting the values the country is supposed to cherish: equality, life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness. When our government compromises, undermines, or attacks those values, it is being unpatriotic.

  Howard Zinn

  Country, Lying, Believe

  Howard Zinn (2013). “A Power Governments Cannot Suppress”, p.112, City Lights Books

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• If the author of the Declaration of Independence were to utter such a sentiment today, the Post Office Department could exclude him from the mail, grand juries could indict him for sedition and criminal syndicalism, legislative committees could seize his private papers and United States Senators would be clamoring for his deportation that he should be sent back to live with the rest of the terrorists.

  Frank I. Cobb

  Office, Independence, Patriotism

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• He has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating it’s most sacred rights of life & liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him, captivating & carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur miserable death in their transportation thither. this piratical warfare, the opprobrium of infidel powers, is the warfare of the christian king of Great Britain. determined to keep open a market where MEN should be bought & sold, he has prostituted his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or to restrain this execrable commerce...

  Thomas Jefferson

  Christian, Kings, War

  Thomas Jefferson’s “original Rough draught” of the Declaration of Independence, founders.archives.gov. June 11 – July 4, 1776.

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• Our adversaries [ the Confederate States of America ] have adopted some declarations of independence in which, unlike the good old one penned by Jefferson, they omit the words "all men are created equal." Why? They have adopted a temporary national constitution, in the preamble of which, unlike our good old one, signed by Washington, they omit "We, the People," and substitute "We, the deputies of the sovereign and independent States." Why? Why this deliberate pressing out of view, the rights of men, and the authority of the people?

  Abraham Lincoln

  Independent, Men, America

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  The highest glory of the American Revolution was this: it connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity.

  John Quincy Adams

  Bible, God, Religious

  Letter to an autograph collector from Washington on April 27, 1837, The Historical Magazine, archive.org. July 1860.

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• A reading of the Declaration of Independence on the steps of a building is widely covered. The events that started the American Revolution were the meetings in homes, pubs, on street corners.

  Harvey Milk

  Reading, Home, Independence

  Harvey Milk (2013). “An Archive of Hope: Harvey Milk's Speeches and Writings”, p.6, Univ of California Press

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• When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Fall, Independence, Republic

  Speech at Civil Rights March,Washington, D.C., 28 Aug. 1963

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• All Americans mourn the passing of the author of the Declaration of Independence, George Jefferson.

  Andy Borowitz

  Funny, Mourning, Independence

  FaceBook post by Andy Borowitz from Jul 25, 2012

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• One battle would do more towards a Declaration of Independence than a long chain of conclusive arguments in a provincial convention or the Continental Congress.

  Samuel Adams

  Long, Independence, Battle

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• Very few Black people ever embraced back to Africa movements, and very few actually, a tiny number actually went back to Africa. They said, "We are going to make America live up to the ideals of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States." They produced one of the world's great cultures; they produced individuals who were just as brilliant and made contributions to the world civilization. In fact, they produced a world-class civilization, the African American civilization, in music, in dance, in oratory, in religion, in writing.

  Henry Louis Gates

  Writing, Civilization, Class

  "Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr". "The Tavis Smiley Show", www.pbs.org. October 21, 2013.

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• My heart trembles when I reflect that God is just

  Thomas Jefferson

  God, Patriotic, Heart

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• The Declaration of Independence has established certain moral confines, and governs in a manner consistent with the spirit under which our nation was founded: Love God; love thy neighbor as thyself.

  Jeremiah Denton

  Independence, Spirit, Moral

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• The Declaration of Independence, the words that launched our nation -- 1,300 words. The Bible, the word of God -- 773,000 words. The Tax Code, the words of politicians -- 7,000,000 words -- and growing!

  Steve Forbes

  Independence, Taxation, Growing

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• Nothing is more disgusting than the crowing about liberty by slaves, as most men are, and the flippant mistaking for freedom of some paper preamble like a Declaration of Independence, or the statute right to vote, by those who have never dared to think or to act.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Freedom, Men, Thinking

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2008). “The Spiritual Emerson: Essential Works by Ralph Waldo Emerson”, p.84, Penguin

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• He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

  Thomas Jefferson

  People, Office, Substance

  Declaration of Independence (1776)

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• The Declaration of Independence is so lucid were afraid of it today. It scares the hell out of every modern bureaucrat, because it tells them there comes a time when we must stop taking orders.

  Karl Hess

  Order, Independence, Scare

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• The founding of our Nation was more than a political event; it was an act of faith, a promise to Americans and to the entire world. The Declaration of Independence declared that people can govern themselves, that they can live in freedom with equal rights, that they can respect the rights of others.

  Jimmy Carter

  Inspirational Life, Rights, People

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• You can't have it both ways. Either our rights come from God, as our Declaration of Independence says, or they come from human choice. If they come from human choice, then our whole way of life is meaningless, it has no foundation.

  Alan Keyes

  Rights, Choices, Independence

  "PBS' Newshour" with Jim Lehrer, www.keyesarchives.com. December 20, 1999.

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