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The foundations of national morality must be laid in private families.

John Adams

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John Adams
Age: 90 †
Born: 1735
Born: October 19
Died: 1826
Died: July 4
2Nd U.S. President
Diplomat
Lawyer
Political Philosopher
Politician
Statesperson
Braintree
Massachusetts
President Adams
J. Adams
President John Adams
Families
Morality
Private
Foundation
National
Must
Foundations
Laid

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They shall not be expected to acknowledge us until we have acknowledged ourselves.
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The idea of infidelity [a disbelief in the inspiration of the Scriptures or the divine origin of Christianity] cannot be treated with too much resentment or too much horror. The man who can think of it with patience is a traitor in his heart and ought to be execrated [denounced] as one who adds the deepest hypocrisy to the blackest treason.
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Arms in the hands of citizens may be used at individual discretion... in private self-defense.
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Make Things rather than Persons the subjects of conversations.
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The only foundation of a free Constitution, is pure Virtue, and if this cannot be inspired into our People, in a great Measure, than they have it now. They may change their Rulers, and the forms of Government, but they will not obtain a lasting Liberty.
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Always stand on principle even if you stand alone.
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Liberty, once lost, is lost forever.
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Power always thinks... that it is doing God's service when it is violating all his laws.
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Let us tenderly and kindly cherish, therefore, the means of knowledge. Let us dare to read, think, speak, and write.
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The consequences arising from the continual accumulation of public debts in other countries ought to admonish us to prevent their growth in our own.
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Let every sluice of knowledge be opened and set a-flowing.
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Negro Slavery is an evil of Colossal magnitude. I am therefore utterly averse to the admission of Slavery into the Missouri Territory, and heartily wish that every Constitutional measure may be adopted for the preservation of it.
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Individuals have conquered themselves. Nations and large bodies of men, never.
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Honor is truly sacred, but holds a lower rank in the scale of moral excellence than virtue. Indeed the former is part of the latter, and consequently has not equal pretensions to support a frame of government productive of human happiness.
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There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty.
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National defense is one of the cardinal duties of a statesman, and that there is an obligation to perform such a duty absolutely irrespective of party politics or factional differences.
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Each individual of the society has a right to be protected by it in the enjoyment of his life, liberty, and property, according to standing laws.
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Several country towns, within my observation, have at least a dozen taverns. Here the time, the money, the health and the modesty, of most that are young and of many old, are wasted. Here diseases, vicious habits, bastards and legislators are frequently spawned.
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I always consider the settlement of America with reverence and wonder, as the opening of a grand scene and design in providence, for the illumination of the ignorant and the emancipation of the slavish part of mankind all over the earth.
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No good government but what is republican... the very definition of a republic is 'an empire of laws, and not of men.'
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