If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary.
James Madison Quotes
In no part of the constitution is more wisdom to be found, than in the clause which confides the question of war or peace to the legislature, and not to the executive department. Beside the objection to such a mixture to heterogeneous powers, the trust and the temptation would be too great for any one […]
With respect to the words, “general welfare,” I have always regarded them as qualified by the details of power connected with them. To take them in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators.
A reservation of a right to withdraw… is a “conditional” ratification; that it does not make N. York a member of the New Union, and consequently she could not be received on that plan. Compacts must be reciprocal;… this principal would not in such a case be observed. The Constitution requires an adoption “in toto” […]
Those who ratified the Constitution conceived that this is not an indefinite government deriving its powers from the general terms prefixed in the specified powers, but a limited government, tied down to the specified powers which explain and define the general terms.
The constitution supposes, what the History of all Govts. demonstrates, that the Ex. is the branch of power most interested in war, and most prone to it. It has accordingly with studied care, vested the question of war in the Legisl. But the Doctrines lately advanced strike at the root of all these provisions, and […]
The fallacy… lies in confounding a single party with the parties to the Constitutional Compact of the United States. The latter having made the compact may do what they will with it. The former, as one only of the parties, owes fidelity to it, until released by consent or absolved by an intolerable abuse of […]
Conscience is the most sacred of all property; other property depending in part on positive law, the exercise of that, being a natural and inalienable right. To guard a man’s house as his castle, to pay public and enforce private debts with the most exact faith, can give no title to invade a man’s conscience […]
If Congress can do whatever in their discretion can be done by money, and will promote the General Welfare, the Government is no longer a limited one, possessing enumerated powers, but an indefinite one, subject to particular exceptions.
Industry and economy are the only resources… It is vain to wait for money, or temporise. The great desiderata are public and private confidence. No country in the world can do without them… The circulation of confidence is better than the circulation of money. . . Confidence is better than the circulation of money. . […]
