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Its objects are CONTRACTS with foreign nations which have the force of law, but derive it from the obligations of good faith.

Alexander Hamilton

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Alexander Hamilton
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Government implies the power of making laws. It is essential to the idea of a law, that it be attended with a sanction or, in other words, a penalty or punishment for disobedience.
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[In the event of war, Americans would] resort for repose and security to institutions which have a tendency to destroy their civil and political rights. To be more safe they, at length, become willing to run the risk of being less free.
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The variety of more minute interests, which will necessarily fall under the superintendence of the local administrations . . . cannot be particularized without involving a detail too tedious and uninteresting to compensate for the instruction it might afford.
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There can be no limitation of that authority which is to provide for the defense and protection of the community in any matter essential to the formation, direction, or support of the NATIONAL FORCES.
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Opinion, whether well or ill-founded, is the governing principle of human affairs
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The institution of delegated power implies that there is a portion of virtue and honor among mankind which may be a reasonable foundation of confidence.
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Experience teaches, that men are often so much governed by what they are accustomed to see and practice, that the simplest and most obvious improvements . . . are adopted with hesitation, reluctance, and slow gradations.
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A feeble executive implies a feeble execution of the government. A feeble execution is but another phrase for a bad execution and a government ill executed, whatever may be its theory, must be, in practice, a bad government.
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The fabric of American empire ought to rest on the solid basis of THE CONSENT OF THE PEOPLE. The streams of national power ought to flow from that pure, original fountain of all legitimate authority.
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The voice of the people has been said to be the voice of God and, however generally this maxim has been quoted and believed, it is not true to fact. The people are turbulent and changing, they seldom judge or determine right.
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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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There is perhaps, nothing more likely to disturb the tranquillity of nations, than their being bound to mutual contributions for any common object that does not yield an equal and coincident benefit. For it is an observation as true, as it is trite, that there is nothing men differ so readily about as the payment of money.
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One great error is that we suppose mankind more honest than they are.
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To answer the purpose of the adversaries of the Constitution, they ought to prove, not merely that particular provisions in it are not the best, which might have been imagined but that the plan upon the whole is bad and pernicious.
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Ambition without principle never was long under the guidance of good sense.
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Divide et impera must be the motto of every nation that either hates or fears us.
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Man is a reasoning rather than a reasonable animal.
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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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Learn to think continentally.
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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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