“It is far more rational to suppose that the courts were designed to be an intermediate body between the people and the legislature, in order, among other things, to keep the latter within the limits assigned to their authority.”
Source: The Federalist Papers: A Collection of Essays Written in Favour of the New Constitution
“The voice of the people has been said to be the voice of God; and, however generally this maxim has been quoted and believed, it is not true to fact. The people are turbulent and changing, they seldom judge or determine right.”
Source: Jan.1787-May 1788
“Here, sir, the people govern; here they act by their immediate representatives.”
“How can you trust people who are poor and own no property? ... Inequality of property will exist as long as liberty exists.”
“The legislatures will have better means of information. They can discover the danger at a distance; and possessing all the organs of civil power, and the confidence of the people, they can at once adopt a regular plan of opposition, in which they can combine all the resources of the community. They can readily communicate with each other in the different States, and unite their common forces for the protection of their common liberty.”
Source: The Federalist Papers: A Collection of Essays Written in Favour of the New Constitution
“The experience of past ages may inform us, that when the circumstances of a people render them distressed, their rulers generally recur to severe, cruel, and oppressive measures. Instead of endeavoring to establish their authority in the affection of their subjects, they think they have no security but in their fear.”
Source: The Works of Alexander Hamilton: Miscellanies, 1774-1789: A full vindication; The farmer refuted; Quebec bill; Resolutions in Congress; Letters from Phocion; New-York Legislature, etc
“The states have authority to interpret the Constitution, enforce it, and protect the people from violations of it by the federal government In the first place, there is not a syllable in the plan under consideration which directly empowers the national courts to construe the laws according to the spirit of the Constitution, or which gives them any greater latitude in this respect than may be claimed by the courts of every State.”
“A habit of labor in the people is as essential to the health and rigor of their minds and bodies as it is conducive to the welfare of the state.”
“In a government framed for durable liberty, not less regard must be paid to giving the magistrate a proper degree of authority, to make and execute the laws with rigour, than to guarding against encroachments upon the rights of the community. As too much power leads to despotism, too little leads to anarchy, and both eventually to the ruin of the people.”
Source: 1779-1781
“If it be asked what is to restrain the House of Representatives from making legal discriminations in favor of themselves and a particular class of the society? I answer, the genius of the whole system, the nature of just and constitutional laws, and above all the vigilant and manly spirit which actuates the people of America, a spirit which nourishes freedom, and in return is nourished by it. If this spirit shall ever be so far debased as to tolerate a law not obligatory on the Legislature as well as on the people, the people will be prepared to tolerate anything but liberty.”
Source: The Federalist, on the New Constitution, Written in the Year 1788
“It has been frequently remarked, that it seems to have been reserved to the people of this country to decide, by their conduct and example, the important question, whether societies of men are really capable or not, of establishing good government from reflection and choice, or whether they are forever destined to depend, for their political constitutions, on accident and force.”
Source: The Works of Alexander Hamilton: Comprising His Most Important Official Reports: An Improved Edition of the Federalist, on the New Constitution, Written in 1788; and Pacificus, on the Proclamation of Neutrality, Written in 1793 ...
“The republican principle demands that the deliberate sense of the community should govern the conduct of those to whom they intrust the management of their affairs; but it does not require an unqualified complaisance to every sudden breeze of passion or to every transient impulse which the people may receive from the arts of men, who flatter their prejudices to betray their interests.”
Source: The Federalist Papers and the Constitution of the United States: The Principles of the American Government
“Men give me credit for some genius. All the genius I have lies in this; when I have a subject in hand, I study it profoundly. Day and night it is before me. My mind becomes pervaded with it. Then the effort that I have made is what people are pleased to call the fruit of genius. It is the fruit of labor and thought.”
“The inquiry constantly is what will please, not what will benefit the people. In such a government there can be nothing but temporary expedient, fickleness, and folly.”
Source: Papers: Harold C. Syrett, Editor; Jacob E. Cooke, Associate Editor
“It will be of little avail to the people, that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood; if they be repealed or revised before they are promulgated, or undergo such incessant changes that no man, who knows what the law is to-day, can guess what it will be tomorrow.”
Source: The Essential Federalist: A New Reading of the Federalist Papers
“[If you understood the natural rights of mankind,] [y]ou would be convinced that natural liberty is a gift of the beneficent Creator to the whole human race, and that civil liberty is founded in that, and cannot be wrested from any people without the most manifest violation of justice.”
“It equally proves, that though individual oppression may now and then proceed from the courts of justice, the general liberty of the people can never be endangered from that quarter; I mean so long as the judiciary remains truly distinct from both the legislature and the Executive. For I agree, that "there is no liberty, if the power of judging be not separated from the legislative and executive powers." And it proves, in the last place, that as liberty can have nothing to fear from the judiciary alone, but would have every thing to fear from its union with either of the other departments.”
Source: The Federalist Papers: A Collection of Essays Written in Favour of the New Constitution
“A government ought to contain in itself every power requisite to the full accomplishment of the objects committed to its care, and to the complete execution of the trusts for which it is responsible, free from every other control but a regard to the public good and to the sense of the people.”
Source: The federalist papers
“The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed.”
“...that standing army can never be formidable (threatening) to the liberties of the people, while there is a large body of citizens, little if at all inferior to them in the use of arms.”
“The inhabitants of territories, often the theatre of war, are unavoidably subject to frequent infringements on their rights, which serve to weaken their sense of those rights; and by degrees, the people are brought to consider the soldiery not only as their protectors but as their superiors.”
Source: The Federalist, on the New Constitution ... by A. Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay. With an Appendix Containing the Letters of Pacificus (A. Hamilton) and Helvidius (J. Madison), on the Proclamation of Neutrality of 1793; the Original Articles of Confederation ... Sixth Edition, Etc
“Man is very much a creature of habit. A thing that rarely strikes his senses will generally have but little influence upon his mind. A government continually at a distance and out of sight, can hardly be expected to interest the sensations of the people. The inference is, that the authority of the Union, and the affections of the citizens towards it, will be strengthened rather than weakened by its extension to what are called matters of internal concern.”
Source: America's Founding Documents: The Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, the United States Constitution, the Federalist Papers, and the Bill of Rights
“It has been observed that a pure democracy if it were practicable would be the most perfect government. Experience has proved that no position is more false than this. The ancient democracies in which the people themselves deliberated never possessed one good feature of government. Their very character was tyranny; their figure deformity.”
Source: The works of Alexander Hamilton; compris. his corresp. and his polit. and official writings, excl. of the federalist, civil and military. Ed. by John C. Hamilton
“The people alone have an incontestable, unalienable, and indefeasible right to institute government and to reform, alter, or totally change the same when their protection, safety, prosperity, and happiness require it.”
“What plan for the regulation of the militia may be pursued by the national government is impossible to be foreseen...The project of disciplining all the militia of the United States is as futile as it would be injurious if it were capable of being carried into execution... Little more can reasonably be aimed at with the respect to the people at large than to have them properly armed and equipped ; and in order to see that this be not neglected, it will be necessary to assemble them once or twice in the course of a year.”
“... for it is a truth, which the experience of all ages has attested, that the people are commonly most in danger when the means of insuring their rights are in the possession of those of whom they entertain the least suspicion.”
“If the representatives of the people betray their constituents, there is then no recourse left but in the exertion of that original right of self-defense which is paramount to all positive forms of government.”
Source: America's Founding Documents: The Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, the United States Constitution, the Federalist Papers, and the Bill of Rights
“This balance between the National and State governments ought to be dwelt on with peculiar attention, as it is of the utmost importance. It forms a double security to the people. If one encroaches on their rights they will find a powerful protection in the other. Indeed, they will both be prevented from overpassing their constitutional limits by a certain rivalship, which will ever subsist between them.”
Source: The Works of Alexander Hamilton: Miscellanies, 1774-1789: A full vindication; The farmer refuted; Quebec bill; Resolutions in Congress; Letters from Phocion; New-York Legislature, etc
“The genius of the people will ill brook the inquisitive and peremptory spirit of excise laws.”
“It is by far the safer course to lay [considerations of the future] altogether aside; and to confine our attention wholly to the nature and extent of the powers as they are delineated in the constitution. Everything beyond this, must be left to the prudence and firmness of the people; who, as they will hold the scales in their own hands, it is to be hoped, will always take care to preserve the constitutional equilibrium between the General and State governments.”
“Would they not fear that citizens not less tenacious than conscious of their rights would flock from the remotest extremes of their respective states to the places of election, to overthrow their tyrants, and to substitute men who would be disposed to avenge the violated majesty of the people?”
Source: The Federalist: With Letters of Brutus
“A government, the constitution of which renders it unfit to be trusted with all the powers which a free people ought to delegate to any government, would be an unsafe and improper depositary of the NATIONAL INTERESTS.”
Source: The federalist papers
“Of those men who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the people, commencing demagogues and ending tyrants.”
Source: The Federalist Papers: A Collection of Essays Written in Favour of the New Constitution
“If the federal government should overpass the just bounds of its authority and make a tyrannical use of its powers, the people, whose creature it is, must appeal to the standard they have formed, and take such measures to redress the injury done to the Constitution as the exigency may suggest and prudence justify.”
Source: The Federalist, on the New Constitution, Written in the Year 1788
“What bitter anguish would not the people of Athens have often escaped if their government had contained so provident a safeguard against tyranny of their own passions? Popular liberty might then have escaped the indelible reproach of decreeing to the same citizens the hemlock on one day and statutes the next.”
Source: The Fœderalist: A Collection of Essays, Written in Favor of the New Constitution, as Agreed Upon by the Fœderal Convention, September 17, 1787. Reprinted from the Original Text. With an Historical Introduction and Notes
“It is evident from the state of the country, from the habits of the people, from the experience we have had on the point itself, that it is impracticable to raise any very considerable sums by direct taxation.”
Source: The Federalist, on the New Constitution, Written in 1788
“An over-scrupulous jealousy of danger to the rights of the people, which is more commonly the fault of the head than of the heart, will be represented as mere pretense and artifice, the stale bait for popularity at the expense of the public good.”
Source: The Federalist Papers: The Making of the US Constitution
“The fabric of American empire ought to rest on the solid basis of THE CONSENT OF THE PEOPLE. The streams of national power ought to flow from that pure, original fountain of all legitimate authority.”
Source: The Federalist: With Letters of Brutus
“It was remarked yesterday that a numerous representation was necessary to obtain the confidence of the people. This is not generally true. The confidence of the people will easily be gained by a good administration. This is the true touchstone.”
Source: The works of Alexander Hamilton; compris. his corresp. and his polit. and official writings, excl. of the federalist, civil and military. Ed. by John C. Hamilton
“Here sir, the people govern.”
Source: Selected writings and speeches of Alexander Hamilton
“It is an unquestionable truth, that the body of the people in every country desire sincerely its prosperity. But it is equally unquestionable that they do not possess the discernment and stability necessary for systematic government. To deny that they are frequently led into the grossest of errors, by misinformation and passion, would be a flattery which their own good sense must despise.”
Source: The Works of Alexander Hamilton: Miscellanies, 1774-1789: A full vindication; The farmer refuted; Quebec bill; Resolutions in Congress; Letters from Phocion; New-York Legislature, etc
“It is a just observation that the people commonly intend the Public Good. This often applies to their very errors. But their good sense would despise the adulator who should pretend they always reason right about the means of promoting it.”
Source: The Essential Federalist: A New Reading of the Federalist Papers
“[W]e must extend the authority of the Union to the persons of the citizens - the only proper objects of government.”
Source: The Federalist, on the new constitution, written in 1788, with an appendix, containing the letters of Pacificus and Helvidius on the proclamation of neutrality of 1793, also the original articles of confederation and the constitution of the United States
“It is just observation that the people commonly intend the Public Good.”
Source: The Federalist Papers: A Collection of Essays Written in Favour of the New Constitution
“I expect we shall be told, that the Militia of the country is its natural bulwark, and would be at all times equal to the national defence...The facts, which from our own experience forbid a reliance of this kind, are too recent to permit us to be the dupes of such a suggestion.”
“The representatives of the people, in a popular assembly, seem sometimes to fancy that they are the people themselves, and betray strong symptoms of impatience and disgust at the least sign of opposition from any other quarter; as if the exercise of its rights, by either the executive or judiciary, were a breach of their privilege and an outrage to their dignity.”
Source: The Federalist Papers: A Collection of Essays Written in Favour of the New Constitution
“[T]hough individual oppression may now and then proceed fro the courts of justice, the general liberty of the people can never be endangered from that quarter . . .”
Source: The Essential Federalist: A New Reading of the Federalist Papers
“The interpretation of the laws is the proper and peculiar province of the courts. A constitution is, in fact, and must be regarded by the judges, as fundamental law. It therefore belongs to them to ascertain its meaning, as well as the meaning of any particular act proceeding from the legislative body. If there should happen to be an irreconcilable variance between the two, that which has the superior obligation and validity ought, of course, to be preferred; or, in other words, the Constitution ought to be preferred to the statute, the intention of the people to the intention of their agents.”
Source: The Essential Federalist: A New Reading of the Federalist Papers
“The regular distribution of power into distinct departments; the introduction of legislative balances and checks; the institution of courts composed of judges holding their offices during good behavior; the representation of the people in the legislature by deputies of their own election . . . They are means, and powerful means, by which the excellences of republican government may be retained and its imperfections lessened or avoided.”
Source: The Essential Federalist: A New Reading of the Federalist Papers
“People sometimes attribute my success to my genius; all the genius I know anything about is hard work.”
