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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.

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
Life
Property
Laws
Standing
Liberty
Law
Society
Protected
Individual
Enjoyment
Right
According

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[T]he liberty, the unalienable, indefeasible rights of men, the honor and dignity of human nature, the grandeur and glory of the public, and the universal happiness of individuals, were never so skillfully and successfully consulted as in that most excellent monument of human art, the common law of England.
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If national pride is ever justifiable or excusable it is when it springs, not from power or riches, grandeur or glory, but from conviction of national innocence, information and benevolence.
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The Declaration of Independence I always considered as a theatrical show. Jefferson ran away with all the stage effect of that... and all the glory of it.
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It is much easier to pull down a government, in such a conjuncture of affairs as we have seen, than to build up, at such a season as the present.
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I would define liberty to be a power to do as we would be done by. The definition of liberty to be the power of doing whatever the law permits, meaning the civil laws, does not seem satisfactory.
John Adams
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I have examined all religions, as well as my narrow sphere, my straightened means, and my busy life, would allow and the result is that the Bible is the best Book in the world. It contains more philosophy than all the libraries I have seen.
John Adams
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There is nothing I dread so much as the division of the republic into two great parties, each arranged under its leader, and concerting measures in opposition to each other. This, in my humble apprehension, is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our constitution.
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Public business must always be done by somebody. It will be done by somebody or other. If wise man decline, others will not if honest man refuse it, others will not.
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There is not an enemy so stout, as to storm and take the fortress of the mind, Unless its infirmity turn traitor, and Fear unbar the gates.
John Adams
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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.
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You are apprehensive of monarchy I, of aristocracy. I would therefore have given more power to the President and less to the Senate.
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The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the law of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence.
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I consider a decent respect for Christianity among the best recommendations for public service.
John Adams
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Resistance to sudden violence, for the preservation not only of my person, my limbs, and life, but of my property, is an indisputable right of nature which I have never surrendered to the public by the compact of society, and which perhaps, I could not surrender if I would.
John Adams
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Whenever serious art loses track of its roots in the vernacular, then it begins to atrophy.
John Adams
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All the perplexities, confusion and distress in America arise, not from defects in their Constitution or Confederation, not from want of honor or virtue, so much as from the downright ignorance of the nature of coin, credit and circulation.
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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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Every measure of prudence, therefore, ought to be assumed for the eventual total extirpation of slavery from the United States ... I have, throughout my whole life, held the practice of slavery in ... abhorrence.
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They worry one another like mastiffs, scrambling for rank and pay like apes for nuts.
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When philosophic reason is clear and certain by intuition or necessary induction, no subsequent revelation supported by prophecies or miracles can supersede it.
John Adams