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The opinions of men should not be the object of any government. Our civil rights are no more dependent on our religious beliefs than they are dependent upon our thoughts about geometry or physics!

Thomas Jefferson

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Thomas Jefferson
Age: 83 †
Born: 1743
Born: April 2
Died: 1826
Died: July 4
3Rd U.S. President
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Establish the eternal truth that acquiescence under insult is not the way to escape war.
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The government created by this compact was not made the exclusive or final judge of the extent of the powers delegated to itself since that would have made its discretion, and not the Constitution, the measure of its powers.
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In a government bottomed on the will of all, the... liberty of every individual citizen becomes interesting to all.
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I could say much about politics, our only entertainment here, but you would not care a fig about that.
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Hemp is one of the greatest, most important substances of our nation
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I had rather ask an enlargement of power from the nation, where it is found necessary, than to assume it by a construction which would make our powers boundless.
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I believe from what I have lately seen that we should be substantially safe were our Citizens Armed, but we have not as many Arms as we have Enemies in the State.
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The concentrating of powers in the same hands is precisely the definition of despotic government. It will be no alleviation that these powers will be exercised by a plurality of hands, and not by a single one.
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He who permits himself to tell a lie once, finds it much easier to do it a second and third time, till at length it becomes habitual he tells lies without attending to it, and truths without the world's believing him. This falsehood of the tongue leads to that of the heart, and in time depraves all its good dispositions.
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For here we are not afraid to follow truth wherever it may lead.
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Stock dealers and banking companies, by the aid of a paper system, are enriching themselves to the ruin of our country, and swaying the government by their possession of the printing presses, which their wealth commands and by any other means, not always honorable to the character of our countrymen.
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It is an insult to our citizens to question whether they are rational beings or not, and blasphemy against religion to suppose it cannot stand the test of truth and reason.
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Taste cannot be controlled by law. We must resist at all costs any attempt to regulate our individual freedoms and to legislate our personal moralities.
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besides the comfort of knowlege, every science is auxiliary to every other.
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No man has done everything he can who has done only his best.
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Preachers dread the advance of science as witches do the approach of daylight.
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The opinions and beliefs of men follow involuntarily the evidence proposed to their minds.
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It is too late in the day for men of sincerity to pretend they believe in the Platonic mysticisms that three are one, and one is three and yet that the one is not three, and the three are not one.
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The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases.
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