"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have .... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases." -Thomas Jefferson
"Most people, sometime in their lives, stumble across truth. Most jump up, brush themselves off, and hurry on about their business as if nothing had happened." --Sir Winston Churchill
"We are not weak, if we make proper use of those means which the God of nature hath placed in our power... The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave." -- Patrick Henry
"Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph." -- Thomas Paine
"I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones." -- Albert Einstein
"I swear upon the altar of God, eternal hostility to every form of tyranny over the mind of man." -- Thomas Jefferson
"Society in every state is a blessing, but government, even in its best state is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one." -- Thomas Paine
"Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide." -- John Adams
"If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquillity of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you; May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen." -- Samuel Adams
"A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it a superficial appearance of being right." -- Thomas Paine
"The militia of the United States consists of all able-bodied males at least 17 years of age..." -- Title 10, Section 311 of the U.S. Code.
"Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom of Europe. the supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any bands of regular troops that can be, on any pretense, raised in the United States." -- Noah Webster
"A militia, when properly formed, are in fact the people themselves...and include all men capable of bearing arms." -- Richard Henry Lee
"It is our duty still to endeavor to avoid war; but if it shall actually take place, no matter by whom brought on, we must defend ourselves. If our house be on fire, without inquiring whether it was fired from within or without, we must try to extinguish it." --Thomas Jefferson to James Lewis, Jr., 1798.
"The Constitution shall never be construed to authorize Congress to prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable citizens, from keeping their own arms." -- Samuel Adams
"To disarm the people (is) the best and most effectual way to enslave them..." -- George Mason
"Laws that forbid the carrying of arms...disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes...Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man." -- Thomas Jefferson
Ronald Reagan's Cabinet once discussed the idea of requiring a national ID card... After about an hour of discussion President Reagan asked "Why don't we just mark them with 666?" It was never mentioned again.
"Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms [of government] those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny." -- Thomas Jefferson
"The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as they are injurious to others." -- Thomas Jefferson
"There will never be a really free and enlightened State until the State comes to recognize the individual as a higher and independent power, from which all its own power and authority are derived, and treats him accordingly." -- Henry David Thoreau
"To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical." -- Thomas Jefferson
"The strength of the Constitution lies entirely in the determination of each citizen to defend it. Only if every single citizen feels duty bound to do his share in this defense are the constitutional rights secure." -- Albert Einstein
"In the beginning of a change, the Patriot is a scarce man, Brave, Hated, and Scorned. When his cause succeeds however,the timid join him, For then it costs nothing to be a Patriot." -- Mark Twain
"The very atmosphere of firearms anywhere and everywhere restrains evil interference - they deserve a place of honor with all that's good" -- George Washington
"Among the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look upon the act of depriving a whole nation of arms, as the blackest." -- Mahatma Ghandi
"A government big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take everything you have." -- Barry Goldwater
"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." -- Edmund Burke (1729-1797)
"Do not separate text from historical background. If you do, you will have perverted and subverted the Constitution, which can only end in a distorted, bastardized form of illegitimate government." -- James Madison
"During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act." --George Orwell
"It is not the function of the government to keep the citizen from falling into error; it is the function of the citizen to keep the government from falling into error." -- U.S. Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Parker, Chief Prosecutor for the United States of America at the Nurnberg Trials
"How soon we forget history..."Government is not reason. Government is not eloquence. It is force. And, like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master." -- George Washington
"If 'pro' is the opposite of 'con' what is the opposite of 'progress'?" -- Paul Harvey
"The beauty of the second amendment is that it will not be needed until they try to take it." --Thomas Jefferson
"Some regard private enterprise as if it were a predatory tiger to be shot. Others look upon it as a cow that they can milk. Only a handful see it for what it really is--the strong horse that pulls the whole cart." -- Winston Churchill
"You can't get rid of poverty by giving people money." -- P.J. O'Rourke
"Timid men prefer the calm of despotism to the tempestuous sea of liberty." -- Thomas Jefferson
"The militia is the dread of tyrants and the guard of freemen." -- Gov. R. Lucas, former Major General of the Ohio Militia, 1832
"Firearms are second only to the Constitution in importance; they are the peoples' liberty's teeth." -- George Washington
"The world is filled with violence. Because criminals carry guns, we decent law-abiding citizens should also have guns. Otherwise they will win and the decent people will loose." -- James Earl Jones
"A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed." -- United States Constitution, Second Amendment, 1789
"A Bill of Rights is what the people are entitled to against every government, and what no just government should refuse, or rest on inference." -- Thomas Jefferson
"To preserve liberty it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them..." -- Richard Henry Lee
"I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people, except for a few public officials." -- George Mason
"The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government." -- Thomas Jefferson
"Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect everyone who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are ruined...The great object is that every man be armed. Everyone who is able might have a gun. -- Patrick Henry
"The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed." -- Alexander Hamilton
"Does the government fear us? Or do we fear the government? When the people fear the government, tyranny has found victory. The federal government is our servant, not our master!" -- Thomas Jefferson
"The ideal tyranny is that which is ignorantly self-administered by its victims. The most perfect slaves are, therefore, those which blissfully and unawaredly enslave themselves." -- Dresden James
"The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases. -- Thomas Jefferson
"Freedom and liberty lose out by default because good people are not vigilant." - Archbishop Desmond Tutu
"Nay, the number of armies importeth not much, where the people is of weak courage; for as Virgil saith, "It never troubles the wolf how many the sheep be." -- Sir Francis Bacon, Essays, 1625.
"Freedom of the press is not an end in itself but a means...to a free society." -- Felix Frankfurter
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." -- Thomas Jefferson, The Declaration of Independence
"...they who do not learn from History are DOOMED to repeat it."
"...to disarm the people [is] the best and most effective way to enslave them..." -- George Mason
"When you read in the newspaper that the government has taken Walter Williams' guns, then you will know that Walter Williams is dead." --Dr. Walter Williams , George Mason University Economics Dept.
"It is both possible and moral, to love one's country and hate its government." -- Dr. Walter Williams , George Mason University Economics Dept.
"The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not." -- Thomas Jefferson
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free...it expects what never was and never will be."
- Thomas Jefferson
"Americans [have] the right and advantage of being armed--unlike citizens of other countries whose governments are afraid to trust people with arms." -- James Madison
"Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it." -- Judge Learned Hand
"Anyone in a free society where the laws are unjust has an obligation to break the law." -- Henry David Thoreau
"The true foundation of republican government is the equal right of every citizen in his person and property and in their management."
- Thomas Jefferson
"Nothing... is unchangeable but the inherent and unalienable rights of man." -- Thomas Jefferson
"I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it." -- Thomas Jefferson
"The freedom and happiness of man... are the sole objects of all legitimate government." -- Thomas Jefferson
"Our liberty cannot be guarded but by the freedom of the press, nor that be limited without danger of losing it." -- Thomas Jefferson
"None but an armed nation can dispense with a standing army. To keep ours armed and disciplined is therefore at all times important." -- Thomas Jefferson
"...the tree of liberty must from time to time be refreshed with the blood of tyrants and patriots" -- Thomas Jefferson
"If the States do not have the right to secede, then they have no rights at all." -- Dr. Walter Williams , George Mason University Economics Dept.
"Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds." -- Albert Einstein
"The constitutions of most of our States assert that all power is inherent in the people; that... it is their right and duty to be at all times armed." -- Thomas Jefferson to John Cartwright, 1824.
"No freeman shall be debarred the use of arms (within his own lands or tenements)." -- Thomas Jefferson: Draft Virginia Constitution with (his note added), 1776. Papers, 1:353
"We must make our election between economy and liberty, or profusion and servitude." -- Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval, 1816.
"I am not a friend to a very energetic government. It is always oppressive." -- Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 1787.
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety...." -- Benjamin Franklin
"There are many men of principle in both parties in America, but there is no party of principle." -- Alexis de Tocqueville
"An armed society is a polite society." -- Robert A. Heinlein
"If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their money, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks], will deprive the people of their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered." -- Thomas Jefferson
"[The] governor [is] constitutionally the commander of the militia of the State, that is to say, of every man in it able to bear arms." -- Thomas Jefferson to A. L. C. Destutt de Tracy, 1811
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." -- United States Constitution, Tenth Amendment
