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Any reading not of a vicious species must be a good substitute for the amusements too apt to fill up the leisure of the labouring classes.

James Madison

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James Madison
Age: 85 †
Born: 1751
Born: March 16
Died: 1836
Died: June 28
4Th U.S. President
Diplomat
Lawyer
Philosopher
Politician
Slaveholder
Statesperson
Writer
Port Conway
Virginia
James Madison
Jr.
President Madison
J. Madison
Madison
Good
Substitutes
Classes
Leisure
Fill
Labouring
Species
Amusements
Class
Amusement
Reading
Substitute
Must
Vicious

More quotes by James Madison

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No power over the freedom of religion [is] delegated to the United States by the Constitution.
James Madison
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If we advert to the nature of republican government, we shall find that the censorial power is in the people over the government, and not in the government over the people.
James Madison
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The political truths declared in that solemn manner acquire by degrees the character of fundamental maxims of free Government, and as they become incorporated with national sentiment, counteract the impulses of interest and passion.
James Madison
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Stability in government is essential to national character and to the advantages annexed to it, as well as to that repose and confidence in the minds of the people, which are among the chief blessings of civil society.
James Madison
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The invasion of private rights is chiefly to be apprehended, not from acts of Government contrary to the sense of its constituents, but from acts in which the Government is the mere instrument of the major number of the Constituents.
James Madison
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The purpose of separation of church and state is to keep forever from these shores the ceaseless strife that has soaked the soil of Europe with blood for centuries.
James Madison
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The better proof of reverence for that holy name would be not to profane it by making it a topic of legislative discussion.
James Madison
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The two great points of difference between a democracy and a republic are: first, the delegation of the government, in the latter,to a small number of citizens elected by the rest secondly, the greater number of citizens and greater sphere of country over which the latter may be extended.
James Madison
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The number of individuals employed under the Constitution of the United States will be much smaller than the number employed under the particular States.
James Madison
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The most productive system of finance will always be the least burdensome.
James Madison
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I have ever regarded the freedom of religious opinions and worship as equally belonging to every sect.
James Madison
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What a perversion of the normal order of things! ... to make power the primary and central object of the social system, and Liberty but its satellite.
James Madison
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Our Constitution represents the work of the finger of Almighty God.
James Madison
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At cheaper and nearer seats of Learning parents with slender incomes may place their sons in a course of education putting them on a level with the sons of the Richest.
James Madison
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The strongest passions and most dangerous weaknesses of the human breast ambition, avarice, vanity, the honorable or venal love of fame, are all in conspiracy against the desire and duty of peace.
James Madison
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I am unable to conceive that the state legislatures which must feel so many motives to watch, and which possess so many means of counteracting the federal legislature, would fail either to detect or to defeat a conspiracy of the latter against the liberties of their common constituencies.
James Madison
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I should not regret a fair and full trial of the entire abolition of capital punishment.
James Madison
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A sincere and steadfast co-operation in promoting such a reconstruction of our political system as would provide for the permanent liberty and happiness of the United States.
James Madison
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I do not conceive that power is given to the President and Senate to dismember the empire, or to alienate any great, essential right. I do not think the whole legislative authority have this power. The exercise of the power must be consistent with the object of the delegation.
James Madison
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That is not a just government, nor is property secure under it, where the property which a man has in his personal safety and personal liberty, is violated by arbitrary seizures of one class of citizens for the service of the rest.
James Madison