Limited Government Quotes - Page 4

• Whensoever the General Government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Government, Liberty, Void

  Thomas Jefferson (1977). “The Portable Thomas Jefferson”, p.228, Penguin

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• Our legislators are not sufficiently apprized of the rightful limits of their power; that their true office is to declare and enforce only our natural rights and duties, and to take none of them from us.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Rights, Office, Liberty

  Thomas Jefferson, Henry Augustine Washington (1854). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence, cont”, p.3

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• Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death!

  Patrick Henry

  Death, Sweet, Freedom

  Speech in Virginia Convention, Richmond, Va., 23 Mar. 1775.

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• Politics ought to be the part-time profession of every citizen who would protect the rights and privileges of free people and who would preserve what is good and fruitful in our national heritage.

  Dwight D. Eisenhower

  Peace, Freedom, Rights

  Eisenhower, Dwight D. (1960). “Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1954”, p.219, Best Books on

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• You do not examine legislation in the light of the benefits it will convey if properly administered, but in the light of the wrongs it would do and the harms it would cause if improperly administered.

  Lyndon B. Johnson

  Inspirational, Light, Government

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• Time is the only thing you can't buy.

  Nicole Lapin

  Oxford, Libertarian Party, Liberty

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• You can only be free if I am free.

  Clarence Darrow

  Freedom, Liberty, Libertarian

  Clarence Darrow (2012). “Attorney for the Damned: Clarence Darrow in the Courtroom”, p.140, University of Chicago Press

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• For an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Gun, Men, Strong Arms

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• I have sworn upon the altar of god.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Religious, Government, Faith Religion

  Letter to Benjamin Rush, 23 Sept. 1800

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• There was no one left to speak for me.

  Martin Niemoller

  Speaking Up, Bystanders, Nwo

  "First they came". Poem by Martin Niemoller,

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• The laws that forbid the carrying of arms...disarm only those who are
  neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes. Can it be supposed that
  those who have the courage to violate the most sacred laws of humanity...will
  respect the less important and arbitrary ones... Such laws make things worse
  for the assaulted and better for the assailants, they serve rather to
  encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with
  greater confidence than an armed man.

  Cesare Beccaria

  Men, Gun, Law

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• The ideal tyranny is that which is ignorantly self-administered by its victims. The most perfect slaves are, therefore, those which blissfully and unawaredly enslave themselves.

  Donald James

  Self, Perfect, Historical

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• The most dangerous man to any government is the man who is able to think things out for himself.

  H. L. Mencken

  Men, Thinking, Social Taboos

  H.L. Mencken (2012). “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.145, Vintage

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• When the tyrant has disposed of foreign enemies by conquest...and there is nothing to fear from them, then he is always stirring up some war

  Plato

  Peace, War, Tyrants

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• Emergency does not increase granted power or remove or diminish the restrictions imposed upon power granted or reserved. The Constitution was adopted in a period of grave emergency. Its grants of power to the federal government and its limitations of the power of the States were determined in the light of emergency, and they are not altered by emergency.

  Charles Evans Hughes

  Light, Government, Liberty

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• The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Religious, Government, Political

  Thomas Jefferson (1854). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Inaugural addresses and messages. Replies to public addresses. Indian addresses. Miscellaneous: 1. Notes on Virginia; 2. Biographical sketches of distinguished men; 3. The batture of New Orleans”, p.400

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• The greater the power, the more dangerous the abuse.

  Edmund Burke

  Bullying, Freedom, Work

  Speech on the Middlesex Election, 7 February 1771, in 'The Speeches' (1854)

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• So long as the people do not care to exercise their freedom, those who wish to tyrannize will do so; for tyrants are active and ardent, and will devote themselves in the name of any number of gods, religious and otherwise, to put shackles upon sleeping men.

  Voltaire

  Religious, Fear, Sleep

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• Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed, as they are in almost every country in Europe.

  Noah Webster

  Country, Army, Gun

  Noah Webster (1787). “An Examination Into the Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution Proposed by the Late Convention Held at Philadelphia: With Answers to the Principal Objections that Have Been Raised Against the System”, p.43

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• If there is any principle of the Constitution that more imperatively calls for attachment than any other it is the principle of free thought, not free thought for those who agree with us but freedom for the thought that we hate.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Freedom, Hate, Attachment

  United States v. Schwimmer (dissenting opinion) (1929)

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• And you cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they can and should do for themselves.

  William J. H. Boetcker

  Strength, Leadership, Peace

  "Ten Cannots". Book by William J. H. Boetcker, 1916.

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• The nine most terrifying words in the English language are "I'm from the government, and I'm here to help."

  Ronald Reagan

  Government, Nine, Helping

  United States. President (1981-1989 : Reagan), Ronald Reagan (1982). “Ronald Reagan”

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• Good intentions will always be pleaded, for every assumption of power; but they cannot justify it ... It is hardly too strong to say, that the Constitution was made to guard the people against the dangers of good intention, real or pretended.

  Daniel Webster

  Strong, Real, Gun

  Daniel Webster (1854). “The speeches of Daniel Webster and his master-pieces”, p.282

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• I own that I am not a friend to a very energetic government. It is always oppressive.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Life And Love, Government, Liberty

  Thomas Jefferson, Joyce Appleby, Terence Ball (1999). “Jefferson: Political Writings”, p.19, Cambridge University Press

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• Man is not free unless government is limited.

  Ronald Reagan

  Men, Liberty, Libertarian

  Farewell Address to the Nation, delivered 11 January 1989, Washington D.C.

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