It was expected of me that I was to bow to the name of Andrew Jackson... even at the expense of my conscience and judgement. such a thing was new to me, and a total stranger to my principles.
Whenever I had anything and saw a fellow being suffering, I was more anxious to relieve him than to benefit myself. And this is one of the true secrets of my being a poor man to this day.
We have the right as individuals to give away as much of our own money as we please in charity; but as members of Congress we have no right to appropriate a dollar of the public money.
I would rather be beaten, and be a man, than to be elected and be a little puppy dog.
I now say that the oldest man living never heard of the president of a great nation to come down to open electioneering for his successor. It is treating the nation as if it was the property of a single individual, and he had the right to bequeath it to whom he pleased - the same as a patch of land for which he had the patent.
If one man in the country could take all the money, what was the use of passing any bills about it?
The enemy fought with savage fury, and met death with all its horrors, without shrinking or complaining: not one asked to be spared, but fought as long as they could stand or sit.
I learned to read a little in my primer, to write my own name, and to cypher some in the three first rules in figures. And this was all the schooling I ever had in my life, up to this day. I should have continued longer if it hadn't been that I concluded I couldn't do any longer without a wife, and so I cut out to hunt me one.
It is a huckleberry above my persimmon to cipher out how it is, with six months' schooling only, I, David Crockett, find myself the most popular bookmaker of the day, and such is the demand for my works that I cannot write them half fast enough, no how I can fix it.
I have suffered my self to be politically sacrificed to save my country from ruin and disgrace and if I am never a gain elected I will have the gratification to know that I have done my duty.
No man who has not tried it can imagine what dreadful hard work it is to listen. Splitting gum logs in the dog days is child's play to it. I've tried both, and give the preference to the gum logs.
You may all go to Hell, and I will go to Texas.
For the information of young hunters, I will just say, in this place, that whenever a fellow gets bad lost, the way home is just the way he don't think it is. This rule will hit nine times out of ten.
Throughout the day no time for memorandums now. Go ahead! Liberty and independence forever.
I voted against this Indian bill, and my conscience yet tells me that I gave a good, honest vote, and one that I believe will not make me ashamed in the day of judgment.
The party in power, like Jonah's gourd, grew up quickly, and will quickly fall.
I have always supported measures and principles and not men.
You will find me standing up to my rack, as the people's faithful representative, and the public's most obedient, very humble servant.
We must not permit our respect for the dead or our sympathy for the living to lead us into an act of injustice to the balance of the living.
Fame is like a shaved pig with a greased tail, and it is only after it has slipped through the hands of some thousands, that some fellow, by mere chance, holds on to it!
