To all general purposes we have uniformly been one people, each individual citizen everywhere enjoying the same national rights, privileges, and protection.
In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place, oblige it to control itself.
A national debt, if it is not excessive, will be to us a national blessing.
Nobody expects to trust his body overmuch after the age of fifty.
The inquiry constantly is what will please, not what will benefit the people. In such a government there can be nothing but temporary expedient, fickleness, and folly.
Let us recollect that peace or war will not always be left to our option; that however moderate or unambitious we may be, we cannot count upon the moderation, or hope to extinguish the ambition of others.
It's not tyranny we desire; it's a just, limited, federal government.
Real firmness is good for anything; strut is good for nothing.
Unless your government is respectable, foreigners will invade your rights; and to maintain tranquillity, it must be respectable - even to observe neutrality, you must have a strong government.
Men are rather reasoning than reasonable animals, for the most part governed by the impulse of passion.
Here, sir, the people govern; here they act by their immediate representatives.
I never expect to see a perfect work from an imperfect man.
In the usual progress of things, the necessities of a nation in every stage of its existence will be found at least equal to its resources.
Even to observe neutrality you must have a strong government.
Power over a man's subsistence is power over his will.
