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A representative assembly, although extremely well qualified, and absolutely necessary, as a branch of the legislative, is unfit to exercise the executive power, for want of two essential properties, secrecy and dispatch.

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
Well
Although
Qualified
Unfit
Property
Representatives
Legislative
Absolutely
Executives
Properties
Necessary
Branches
Representative
Exercise
Separation
Secrecy
Two
Extremely
Assembly
Power
Essential
Branch
Wells
Essentials
Executive
Dispatch

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This would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it.
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The Christian religion is, above all the religions that ever prevailed or existed in ancient or modern times, the religion of wisdom, virtue, equity and humanity.
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Because power corrupts, society's demands for moral authority and character increase as the importance of the position increases.
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There is something very unnatural and odious in a government a thousand leagues off. A whole government of our own choice, managed by persons whom we love, revere, and can confide in, has charms in it for which men will fight.
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But America is a great, unwieldy Body. Its Progress must be slow. It is like a large Fleet sailing under Convoy. The fleetest Sailors must wait for the dullest and slowest. Like a Coach and six-the swiftest Horses must be slackened and the slowest quickened, that all may keep an even Pace.
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I must not write a word to you about politics, because you are a woman.
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But a Constitution of Government once changed from Freedom, can never be restored. Liberty, once lost, is lost forever.
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If we take a survey of the greatest actions...in the world...we shall find the authors of them all to have been persons whose Brains had been shaken out of their natural position.
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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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If the way to do good to my country were to render myself popular, I could easily do it. But extravagant popularity is not the road to public advantage.
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A pen is certainly an excellent instrument to fix a man's attention and to inflame his ambition.
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Where annual elections end, there slavery begins ... Humility, patience, and moderation, without which every man in power becomes a ravenous beast of prey.
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Modesty is a virtue that can never thrive in public.
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I desire no other inscription over my gravestone than: 'Here lies John Adams, who took upon himself the responsibility of peace with France in the year 1800'.
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I never engaged in public affairs for my own interest, pleasure, envy, jealousy, avarice or ambition, or even the desire of fame
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During the whole time I sat with him in Congress, I never heard him utter three sentences together.
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What havoc, said I to myself, would these manners make in America! Our governors, our judges, our senators or representatives, and even our ministers, would be appointed by harlots, for money and their judgments, decrees, and decisions, be sold to repay themselves, or, perhaps, to procure the smiles of profligate females.
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Human passions unbridled by morality and religion...would break the stronges cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net.
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My History of the Jesuits is in four volumes.... This society has been a greater calamity to mankind than the French Revolution, or Napoleon's despotism or ideology. It has obstructed progress of reformation and the improvement of the human mind in society much longer and more fatally.
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I drink no cider, but feast on Philadelphia beer.
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