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Ambition without principle never was long under the guidance of good sense.

Alexander Hamilton

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Alexander Hamilton
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Hence, in a state of nature, no man had any moral power to deprive another of his life, limbs, property, or liberty nor the least authority to command or exact obedience from him, except that which arose from the ties of consanguinity.
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In this distribution of powers the wisdom of our constitution is manifested. It is the province and duty of the Executive to preserve to the Nation the blessings of peace. The Legislature alone can interrupt those blessings, by placing the Nation in a state of War.
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The system is the best that the present views and circumstances of the country will permit.
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But might not his [the president's] nomination be overruled? I grant it might, yet this could only be to make place for another nomination by himself. The person ultimately appointed must be object of his preference, though perhaps not in the first degree. It is also not very probable that his nomination would often be overruled.
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When a government betrays the people by amassing too much power and becoming tyrannical, the people have no choice but to exercise their original right of self-defense — to fight the government.
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We are now forming a republican government. Real liberty is never found in despotism or the extremes of democracy, but in moderate governments.
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[A] power equal to every possible contingency must exist somewhere in the government . . .
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Take mankind as they are, and what are they governed by? Their passions.
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Men are rather reasoning than reasonable animals for the most part governed by the impulse of passion.
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The passions of a revolution are apt to hurry even good men into excesses.
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A powerful, victorious ally is yet another name for master.
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What is the most sacred duty and the greatest source of our security in a Republic? An inviolable respect for the Constitution and Laws.
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Here sir, the people govern.
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It is a general principle of human nature, that a man will be interested in whatever he possesses, in proportion to the firmness or precariousness of the tenure by which he holds it.
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While the constitution continues to be read, and its principles known, the states, must, by every rational man, be considered as essential component parts of the union and therefore the idea of sacrificing the former to the latter is totally inadmissible.
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The Achaeans soon experienced, as often happens, that a victorious and powerful ally is but another name for a master.
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Would they not fear that citizens not less tenacious than conscious of their rights would flock from the remotest extremes of their respective states to the places of election, to overthrow their tyrants, and to substitute men who would be disposed to avenge the violated majesty of the people?
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. . . [The Judicial Branch] may truly be said to have neither FORCE nor WILL, but merely judgment and must ultimately depend upon the aid of the executive arm even for the efficacy of its judgments.
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The same rule that teaches the propriety of a partition between the various branches of power, teaches us likewise that this partition ought to be so contrived as to render the one independent of the other.
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If the Constitution is adopted (and it was) the Union will be in fact and in theory an association of States or a Confederacy.
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