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I own myself the friend to a very free system of commerce, and hold it as a truth, that commercial shackles are generally unjust, oppressive and impolitic.

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
Friend
Hold
System
Shackles
Free
Oppressive
Truth
Unjust
Commerce
Commercial
Generally

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Whenever a youth is ascertained to possess talents meriting an education which his parents cannot afford, he should be carried forward at the public expense.
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[In a democracy] a common passion or interest will, in almost every case , be felt by a majority of the whole a communication and concert results from the form of government itself and there is nothing to check the inducements to sacrifice the weaker party or an obnoxious individual.
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No government, any more than an individual, will long be respected without being truly respectable nor be truly respectable, without possessing a certain portion of order and stability.
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Our opinions agree as to the evil, moral, political, and economical, of slavery.
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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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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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There is an evil which ought to be guarded against in the indefinite accumulation of property from the capacity of holding it in perpetuity by...corporations. The power of all corporations ought to be limited in this respect. The growing wealth acquired by them never fails to be a source of abuses.
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Torrents of blood have been spilt in the old world, by vain attempts of the secular arm, to extinguish Religious discord, by proscribing all difference in religious opinion. Time has at length revealed the true remedy. Every relaxation of narrow and rigorous policy, wherever it has been tried, has been found to assuage the disease.
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THE Constitution proposed by the convention may be considered under two general points of view. The FIRST relates to the sum or quantity of power which it vests in the government, including the restraints imposed on the States. The SECOND, to the particular structure of the government, and the distribution of this power among its branches.
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Our Constitution represents the work of the finger of Almighty God.
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Congress should not establish a religion, and enforce the legal observation of it by law, nor compel men to worship God in any Manner contrary to their conscience.
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As long as the reason of man continues fallible, and he is at liberty to exercise it, different opinions will be formed.
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The problem to be solved is, not what form of government is perfect, but which of the forms is least imperfect.
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Experience has instructed us that no skill in the science of government has yet been able to discriminate and define, with sufficient certainty, its three great provinces the legislative, executive, and judiciary or even the privileges and powers of the different legislative branches.
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The constitution supposes, what the History of all Governments demonstrates, that the Executive is the branch of power most interested in war, and most prone to it.
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It is the duty of every man to render to the Creator such homage...Before any man can be considered as a member of Civil Society, he must be considered as a subject of the Governor of the Universe.
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In a free government the security for civil rights must be the same as that for religious rights.
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Learned Institutions ought to be favorite objects with every free people. They throw that light over the public mind which is the best security against crafty and dangerous encroachments on the public liberty.
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Government is instituted to protect property of every sort as well that which lies in the various rights of individuals, as that which the term particularly expresses. This being the end of government, that alone is a just government which impartially secures to every man whatever is his own.
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The essence of Government is power and power, lodged as it must be in human hands, will ever be liable to abuse.
James Madison