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The nation which reposes on the pillow of political confidence, will sooner or later end its political existence in a deadly lethargy.

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
Political
Deadly
Ends
Sooner
Later
Confidence
Nation
Reposes
Existence
Lethargy
Politics
Repose
Nations
Pillow

More quotes by James Madison

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It is sufficiently obvious, that persons and property are the two great subjects on which Governments are to act and that the rights of persons, and the rights of property, are the objects, for the protection of which Government was instituted. These rights cannot well be separated.
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The free system of government we have established is so congenial with reason, with common sense, and with a universal feeling, that it must produce approbation and a desire of imitation, as avenues may be found for truth to the knowledge of nations.
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[A] mere demarcation on parchment of the constitutional limits of the several departments is not a sufficient guard against those encroachments which lead to a tyrannical concentration of all the powers of government in the same hands.
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The future and success of America is not in this Constitution, but in the laws of God upon which this Constitution is founded.
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Of all the enemies of public liberty, war is perhaps the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other.
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Because we hold it for 'a fundamental and undeniable truth', that religion or 'the duty which we owe to our Creator' and the manner of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and conviction, not by force or violence.
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We have seen that the tendency of republican governments is to an aggrandizement of the legislative at the expense of the other departments. The appeals to the people, therefore, would usually be made by the executive and judiciary departments.
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We may be assured by past experience, that such a practice [as some states charging high taxes on goods from other states] would be introduced by future contrivances and both by that and a common knowledge of human affairs, that it would nourish unceasing animosities, and not improbably terminate in serious interruptions of the public tranquility.
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No free country has ever been without Parties, which are a natural offspring of freedom.
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[R]efusing or not refusing to execute a law to stamp it with its final character . . . makes the Judiciary department paramount in fact to the Legislature, which was never intended and can never be proper.
James Madison
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History records that the money changers have used every form of abuse, intrigue, deceit, and violent means possible to maintain their control over governments by controlling money and it's issuance.
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Those who hold and those who are without property have ever formed distinct interests in society.
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There is a degree of depravity in mankind which requires a certain degree of circumspection and distrust.
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Oppressors can tyrannize only when they achieve a standing army, an enslaved press, and a disarmed populace.
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A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.
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[The Republican Party] consists of those who, believing in the doctrine that mankind are capable of governing themselves and hating hereditary power as an insult to the reason and an outrage to the rights of men, are naturally offended at every public measure that does not appeal to the understanding and to the general interest of the community.
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Charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government.
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In Republics, the great danger is, that the majority may not sufficiently respect the rights of the minority.
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Who does not see that . . . the same authority which can force a citizen to contribute three pence only of his property for the support of any one establishment, may force him to conform to any other establishment in all cases whatsoever?
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For the same reason that the members of the State legislatures will be unlikely to attach themselves sufficiently to national objects, the members of the federal legislature will be likely to attach themselves too much to local objects.
James Madison