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Opinion, whether well or ill-founded, is the governing principle of human affairs

Alexander Hamilton

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More quotes by Alexander Hamilton

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Safety from external danger is the most powerful director of national conduct. To be more safe, [nations] at length become willing to run the risk of being less free.
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Those who do not industrialize become hewers of wood and hawkers of water
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[I]n framing a Government for a nation we ought, in those provisions which are designed to be permanent, to calculate not on temporary, but on permanent causes of expence.
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The true principle of government is this - make the system compleat in its structure give a perfect proportion and balance to its parts and the powers you give it will never affect your security.
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Money is, with propriety, considered as the vital principle of the body politic as that which sustains its life and motion, and enables it to perform its most essential functions.
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Every nation ought to have a right to provide for its own happiness.
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A government, the constitution of which renders it unfit to be trusted with all the powers which a free people ought to delegate to any government, would be an unsafe and improper depositary of the NATIONAL INTERESTS.
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As riches increase and accumulate in few hands . . . the tendency of things will be to depart from the republican standard.
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To model our political system upon speculations of lasting tranquility, is to calculate on the weaker springs of the human character.
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It was remarked yesterday that a numerous representation was necessary to obtain the confidence of the people. This is not generally true. The confidence of the people will easily be gained by a good administration. This is the true touchstone.
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Necessity, especially in politics, often occasions false hopes, false reasonings, and a system of measures, correspondingly erroneous.
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If it be said that the legislative body are themselves the constitutional judges of their own powers, and that the construction they put upon them is conclusive upon the other departments, it may be answered, that this cannot be the natural presumption, where it is not be collected from any particular provisions in the Constitution.
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The idea of restraining the legislative authority, in the means of providing for the national defense, is one of those refinements which owe their origin to a zeal for liberty more ardent than enlightened.
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Now, mark my words. So long as we are a young and virtuous people, this instument will bind us together in mutual interests, mutual welfare, and mutual happiness. But when we become old and corrupt, it will bind no longer.
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CREDIT supposes specific and permanent funds for the punctual payment of interest, with a moral certainty of a final redemption of the principal.
Alexander Hamilton
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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.
Alexander Hamilton
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The local interest of a State ought in every case to give way to the interests of the Union. For when a sacrifice of one or the other is necessary, the former becomes only an apparent, partial interest, and should yield, on the principle that the smaller good ought never to oppose the greater good.
Alexander Hamilton
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We must make the best of those ills which cannot be avoided.
Alexander Hamilton
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The truth is, after all the declamations we have heard, that the Constitution is itself, in every rational sense, and to every useful purpose, A BILL OF RIGHTS.
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Civil liberty is only natural liberty, modified and secured by the sanctions of civil society. It is not a thing, in its own nature, precarious and dependent on human will and caprice but it is conformable to the constitution of man, as well as necessary to the well-being of society.
Alexander Hamilton