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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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James Madison
Age: 85 †
Born: 1751
Born: March 16
Died: 1836
Died: June 28
4Th U.S. President
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Port Conway
Virginia
James Madison
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More quotes by James Madison

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No free country has ever been without Parties, which are a natural offspring of freedom.
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[Restraints on the press] in all ages, have debauched morals, depressed liberty, shackled religion, supported despotism, and deluged the scaffold with blood.
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The express authority of the people alone could give validity to the Constitution.
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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.
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The American people are too well schooled in the duty and practice of submitting to the will of the majority to permit any serious uneasiness on that account
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In all great changes of established governments, forms ought to give way to substance
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It is to be the assent and ratification of the several States, derived from the supreme authority in each State, the authority of the people themselves. The act, therefore establishing the Constitution, will not be a NATIONAL, but a FEDERAL act.
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Our Constitution represents the work of the finger of Almighty God.
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What spectacle can be more edifying or more seasonable, than that of Liberty and Learning, each leaning on the other for their mutual and surest support?
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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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The ultimate authority resides in the people, and that if the federal government got too powerful and overstepped its authority, then the people would develop plans of resistance and resort to arms.
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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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If men were angels, there would be no need of government.
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These considerations and many others that might be mentioned prove, and experience confirms it, that artisans and manufacturers will commonly be disposed to bestow their votes on merchants.
James Madison
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It may well happen that the public voice, pronounced by the representatives of the people, will be more constant to the public good than if pronounced by the people themselves.
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An efficient militia is authorized and contemplated by the Constitution and required by the spirit and safety of free government.
James Madison
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This policy of supplying by opposite and rival interests, the defect of better motives, might be traced through the whole system of human affairs, both private and public.
James Madison
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The executive has no right, in any case, to decide the question, whether there is or is not cause for declaring war.
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If Congress can employ money indefinitely to the general welfare... they may appoint teachers in every state... The powers of Congress would subvert the very foundation, the very nature of the limited government established by the people of America.
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[Christianity] existed and flourishes, not only without the support of human laws, but in spite of every opposition from them.
James Madison