Applause, mingled with boos and hisses, is about all that the average voter is able or willing to contribute to read more

Applause, mingled with boos and hisses, is about all that the average voter is able or willing to contribute to public life.

No government ought to be without censors; and where the press is free no one ever will.

No government ought to be without censors; and where the press is free no one ever will.

Government is an unnecessary evil. Human beings, when accustomed to taking responsibility for their own behavior, can cooperate on a read more

Government is an unnecessary evil. Human beings, when accustomed to taking responsibility for their own behavior, can cooperate on a basis of mutual trust and helpfulness.

A government big enough to give you everything you want is strong enough to take everything you have.

A government big enough to give you everything you want is strong enough to take everything you have.

Our government is the potent, the omnipresent teacher. For good
or for ill, it teaches the whole people by read more

Our government is the potent, the omnipresent teacher. For good
or for ill, it teaches the whole people by its example. Crime is
contagious. If the government becomes a law-breaker, it breeds
contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto
himself; it invites anarchy.

I like to believe that people in the long run are going to do more to promote peace than our read more

I like to believe that people in the long run are going to do more to promote peace than our governments. Indeed, I think that people want peace so much that one of these days governments had better get out of the way and let them have it.

"The liberties of our country, the freedoms of our civil Constitution are worth defending at all hazards; it is our read more

"The liberties of our country, the freedoms of our civil Constitution are worth defending at all hazards; it is our duty to defend them against all attacks. We have received them as a fair inheritance from our worthy ancestors. They purchased them for us with toil and danger and expense of treasure and blood. It will bring a mark of everlasting infamy on the present generation – enlightened as it is – if we should suffer them to be wrested from us by violence without a struggle, or to be cheated out of them by the artifices of designing men." -Samuel Adams

It is error alone which needs the support of government. Truth can stand by itself.

It is error alone which needs the support of government. Truth can stand by itself.

For in reason, all government without the consent of the governed is the very definition of slavery.

For in reason, all government without the consent of the governed is the very definition of slavery.