The
government can not give to anyone, anything... That it
has not first, taken... from someone else!
Redistribution of Wealth, by threat of Imprisonment, by the IRS, is
not Justice… it is theft! Akin to Strong Arm Robbery...
It leads to the privation
of personal liberty, and is the
mottus operandi
of Tyranny. Robin Hood was not noble, he was a thief.
Motivation does not divorce anyone
from the commandments of a just God.
Socialism is
antithetical to the Judeo-Christian ethic, and it is, an unapologetic enemy of
liberty.
"The act of
defending any of the cardinal virtues has today all the exhilaration of a vice."
- A Defense of Humilities,
The Defendant, 1901 .. G. K. Chesterton
Freedom & Liberty are embodied in the two
great works of our founders... The Constitution of the United States and the
Declaration of Independence... Next Forth of July, --Remember... The
Fireworks are in the Documents!
-
Quotes from Our Founding Fathers -
"I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man."
-- Thomas Jefferson in a letter to Dr. Benjamin Rush, September 23, 1800.
-- Inscribed in the Jefferson Memorial.
"As nightfall does not come at once, neither does oppression. In both instances, there is a twilight when everything remains seemingly unchanged. And it is in such twilight that we all must be most aware of change in the air -- however slight -- lest we become unwitting victims of the darkness." --- Justice William O. Douglas
"Vice is a monster of so frightful mien, As to be hated, needs but to be seen; Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face, We first endure, then pity, then embrace." --Alexander Pope
"A gun causes crime like matches cause arson.."
"A gun causes crime like flies cause garbage..."
--- Unknown...
"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 prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed one."
-- Thomas Jefferson quoting Cesare Beccaria, Criminologist 1764.
"We, the people are the rightful masters of both Congress and the Courts - not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow men who
pervert the Constitution." --- Abraham Lincoln
The average of the world's great civilizations is about 200 years. These nations generally regressed in the following sequence:
From Bondage to Spiritual Faith -
From Spiritual Faith to great courage
From great courage to Liberty -
From Liberty to Abundance
From Abundance to Selfishness
From Selfishness to Complacency
From Complacency to Apathy -
From Apathy to Dependency
From Dependency... back again to Bondage.
The Cycle of Democracy
By: Alexander Tylor
"To take from one because it is thought that his own industry and that of his father's has acquired too much, in order to spare to others, who, or whose fathers have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association--the guarantee to every one of a free exercise of his industry and the fruits acquired by it."
-- Thomas Jefferson: Note in Tracy's "Political Economy," 1816.
"Whoever claims the right to redistribute the wealth produced by others is claiming the right to treat human beings as chattel."
-- Ayn Rand
"The man who produces while others dispose of his product is a slave."
-- Ayn Rand, author of Atlas Shrugged
"The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing."
-- Edmund Burke 1729-1797
"You have rights antecedent to all earthly governments; rights that cannot be repealed or restrained by human laws; rights derived from the Great Legislator of the Universe."
-- John Adams, Second President of the United States
"It is error alone which needs the support of government. Truth can stand by itself."
-- Thomas Jefferson
"Those people who are not governed by GOD will be ruled by tyrants."
--William Penn
"Maybe I did well and maybe I led the battle but nobody ever said we were going to win this thing at any point in time. Eternal vigilance is required and there have to be people who step up to the plate, who believe in liberty, and who are willing to fight for it."
-- Milton Friedman
"Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it."
-- Thomas Paine: The American Crisis, No. 4, 1777
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
-- Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania (1759)
"There is no safety for honest men except by believing all possible evil of evil men."
-- Edmund Burke
"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, Federalist no. 51.
"It is weakness rather than wickedness which renders men unfit to be trusted with unlimited power."
-- John Adams, 1788
"Those who have been once intoxicated with power and have derived any kind of emolument from it can never willingly abandon it."
-- Edmund Burke
"If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility 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; and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen."
-- Samuel Adams
"The greatest tyrannies are always perpetrated in the name of the noblest causes."
-- Thomas Paine
"The attempt to make heaven on earth invariably produces hell."
-- Karl Popper
"In the beginning of a change the patriot is a scarce man, and brave, and hated and scorned. When his cause succeeds, the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a patriot."
-- Mark Twain
"History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid."
-- Dwight D. Eisenhower, First Inaugural Address, Jan. 20, 1953
"The future doesn't belong to the faint-hearted. It belongs to the brave."
-- Ronald Reagan
"The land of the free will cease to be when it's no longer the home of the brave."
-- Rick Gaber
"Perhaps the meek shall inherit the Earth, but they'll do it in very small plots . . . about 6' by 3'."
-- Robert A. Heinlein"Patrick Henry did not say, 'Give me absolute safety or give me death.' "
-- John Stossel, "20/20", ABC-TV, Aug. 3, 2001
"One man with courage makes a majority."
-- Andrew Jackson, 1832
"A nation which can prefer disgrace to danger is prepared for a master, and deserves one!"
-- Alexander Hamilton
"When you're taking flak, you must be over the target."
-- Jim Robinson
"God grants liberty only to those who love it, and are always ready to guard and defend it."
-- Daniel Webster (1834)
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. ... God forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion; what country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms."
-- Thomas Jefferson to William Stephens Smith, 1787"The issue today is the same as it has been throughout all history, whether man shall be allowed to govern himself or be ruled by a small elite."
-- Thomas Jefferson
"Live free or die."
-- Gen. John Stark, the hero of the battles of Bennington and Bunker Hill.
Now the motto of the state of New Hampshire"All of history attests that the centralization and concentration of power breed despotism."
-- H.A.Scott Trask"The two enemies of the people are criminals and government, so let us tie the second down with the chains of the Constitution so the second will not become the legalized version of the first."
-- Thomas Jefferson"[Oppose] with manly firmness [any] invasions on the rights of the people."
-- Thomas Jefferson: Draft Virginia Constitution, 1776. Papers, 1:338
"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."
-- Patrick Henry, Virginia's Ratification convention, 1788
"Evil is powerless if the good are unafraid."
-- Ronald Wilson Reagan, 1982
"The greatest menace to freedom is an inert people."
-- Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis
"I hold it, that a little rebellion, now and then, is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical."
-- Thomas Jefferson, January 30, 1787
"The right to revolt has sources deep in our history."
-- Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas
"Noncooperation with evil is as much a duty as cooperation with good."
-- Gandhi
"It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people's minds."
-- Samuel Adams"Liberty is a political firewall that limits the damage government can do to the individual."
-- James Bovard
"Private property is the most important guarantee of freedom."
-- F.A. Hayek
"As a man is said to have a right to his property, he may be equally said to have a property in his rights. Where an excess of power prevails, property of no sort is duly respected. No man is safe in his opinions, his person, his faculties, or his possessions."
-- James Madison, National Gazzette, 1792
"The man who produces while others dispose of his product is a slave."
-- Ayn Rand, author of Atlas Shrugged
"Vinegar in freedom tastes better than honey in slavery."
-- old Serbian proverb
"We have rights, as individuals, to give as much of our own money as we please to charity; but as members of Congress we have no right so to appropriate a dollar of public money."
-- David Crockett, U.S. Congressman (1827-1835)
"Now what liberty can there be where property is taken without consent??"
-- Samuel Adams, founding father and leader of the Boston Tea Party
"In the general course of human nature, a power over man's substance amounts to a power over his will."
-- Alexander Hamilton
"Property must be secured, or liberty cannot exist."
-- John Adams
"No freedom is secure if your property rights are not secure."
-- Neal Boortz
"The true foundation of republican government is the equal right of every citizen in his person and property and in their management."
-- Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval, 1816."The moment the idea is admitted into society that Property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence."
-- John Adams
"As a man is said to have a right to his property, he may be equally said to have a property in his rights. Where an excess of power prevails, property of no sort is duly respected. No man is safe in his opinions, his person, his faculties, or his possessions."
-- James Madison, National Gazzette, 1792
"[If government have] a right of demanding ad libitum and of taxing us themselves to the full amount of their demand if we do not comply with it, [this would leave] us without anything we can call property."
-- Thomas Jefferson: Reply to Lord North, 1775. Papers, 1:233
"In a free government almost all other rights would become worthless if the government possessed power over the private fortune of every citizen."
-- Chief Justice John Marshall
"The power to tax involves the power to destroy."
-- Chief Justice John Marshall in the McCulloch v. Maryland ruling, 1819"We're dealing with the oldest political error: the belief that because everyone wants something, government should or must provide it. If the error is pervasive, the result is the total state. If it is completely uprooted, the result is the purely free society."
-- Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr."When your response to everything that is wrong with the world is to say, 'there ought to be a law,' you are saying that you hold freedom very cheap."
-- Dr. Thomas Sowell
"Ambiguously-worded laws can be used against the innocent any time."
-- Greg Perry
"Man is not free unless government is limited."
-- Ronald Reagan: Farewell Speech, 1988
[The purpose of the Constitution is to] "keep the government off the backs of people."
-- Justice William O. Douglas"Abuse of power isn't limited to bad guys in other nations. It happens in our own country if we're not vigilant."
-- Clint Eastwood in an essay he wrote for the January 12, 1997 issue of Parade Magazine
"When given power over others, some human beings (including women) will abuse that power in sickening ways. This is a fact of life."
-- Cathy Young
"It's important to realize that whenever you give power to politicians or bureaucrats, it will be used for what they want, not for what you want."
-- Harry Browne"If once [the people] become inattentive to the public affairs, you and I, and Congress and Assemblies, Judges and Governors, shall all become wolves. It seems to be the law of our general nature, in spite of individual exceptions."
-- Thomas Jefferson to Edward Carrington, 1787"Concentrated power is not rendered harmless by the good intentions of those who create it."
-- Milton Friedman
"The nation which reposes on the pillow of political confidence will sooner or later end its political existence in a deadly lethargy."
-- James Madison
"All power in human hands is liable to be abused."
-- James Madison, December 18, 1825
"...every unjustifiable intrusion by the Government upon the privacy of the individual, whatever the means employed, must be deemed a violation of the Fourth Ammendment."
-- Justice Louis Brandeis (Olmstead v. US)
"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves."
-- William Pitt (the younger), speech on the India Bill, Nov.1783
"The people never give up their liberty but under some delusion."
-- Edmund Burke, 1784
"There's nothing that does so much harm as good intentions."
-- Dr. Milton Friedman, as interviewed in "Is America No. 1?" by John Stossel.
"Good intentions will always be pleaded for every assumption of power. It is hardly too strong to say that the Constitution was made to guard the people against the dangers of good intentions. There are men in all ages who mean to govern well, but they mean to govern. They promise to be good masters, but they mean to be masters."
-- Daniel Webster, as quoted in Hearings on the confirmation of Abe Fortas to be an associate justice of the Supreme Court, p. 108
"There is scarcely a king in a hundred who would not, if he could, follow the example of Pharaoh, get first all the people's money, then all their lands and then make them and their children servants forever."
-- Benjamin Franklin
"Nothing is so permanent as a temporary government program."
-- Dr. Milton Friedman, Nobel-Prize-winning economist.
"Give politicians power and it certainly will be abused eventually -- if not by today's politicians, then by their successors."
-- Harry Browne
"These things I believe:
That government should butt out.
That freedom is our most precious commodity and if we are not eternally vigilant, government will take it all away.
That individual freedom demands individual responsibility.
That government is not a necessary good but an unavoidable evil."
-- Franklyn C. "Lyn" Nofziger, Press Secretary for President Reagan
"Concentrated power is not rendered harmless by the good intentions of those who create it."
-- Dr. Milton Friedman
"Eternal vigilance is only part of the price of freedom. The maturity to live with imperfections is another crucial part of the price of freedom."
-- Dr. Thomas Sowell
"As long as human beings are imperfect, there will always be arguments for extending the power of government to deal with these imperfections. The only logical stopping place is totalitarianism -- unless we realize that tolerating imperfections is the price of freedom."
-- Dr. Thomas Sowell"The United States was supposed to have a limited government because the founders knew governmental power attracts swarms of crooks, demagogues and despots as surely as horse manure attracts swarms of horseflies."
-- Rick Gaber
"The coercive power of government is always a beacon to those who want to dominate others -- summoning the worst dregs of society to Washington to use that power to impose their will upon others."
-- Harry Browne
"Force always attracts men of low morality."
-- Albert Einstein"Any time you give power to government, it will be abused, it will be enlarged, it will be used in ways you never intended."
– Harry Browne on The Drudge Report 7-31-99
"Enlightened statesmen will not always be at the helm."
-- James Madison
"Political power is everywhere the most serious threat to liberty. The more power politicians have, and the more able they are to disregard constitutional rules, the more serious the threat. Precedents for expanding government power are sure to be exploited by politicians more dangerous than those who set the precedents."
-- Jim Powell
"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."
-- Prof. John E. E. D. Acton
"Power draws the corrupted; absolute power would draw the absolutely corrupted."
-- Colin Barth"Grant no power to government you would not want your worst enemies to wield against you."
-- "Smokin'" Joe Freeper"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."
-- Patrick Henry, Virginia's Ratification convention, 1788"The people cannot delegate to government the power to do anything which would be unlawful for them to do themselves."
-- John Locke
"If you would not confront your neighbor and demand his money at the point of a gun to solve every new problem that may appear in your life, you should not allow the government to do it for you."
-- William E. Simon, former Treasury Secretary
"Tyranny is always better organized than freedom."
-- Charles Peguy
"Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free"
-- Ronald Reagan
"Still, if you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed, if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not so costly, you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance for survival. There may be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no chance of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves."
-- Winston Churchill
"Liberty, is one of the most precious gifts heaven has bestowed upon Man. No treasures the earth contains or the sea conceals can be compared to it. For liberty one can rightfully risk one's life."
-- Miguel Cervantes
"The only limit to the oppression of government is the power with which the people show themselves capable of opposing it."
-- Enrico Malatesta
"We are now paying the wages of the 1990s, our holiday from history ... The question before us is very large and very simple: Can--and will--the civilized part of humanity disarm the barbarians who would use the ultimate knowledge for the ultimate destruction?"
-- Dr. Charles Krauthammer
"Civilization does not have to perish. The brutes are winning only by default."
-- Ayn Rand
""The world is a dangerous place to live; not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don't do anything about it."
-- Albert Einstein"The more prohibitions there are, the poorer the people will be. The more laws are promulgated, the more thieves and bandits there will be."
-- Lao-tzu, The Tao Te Ching (believed written in China, 6th century BC).
"An oppressive government is much worse than a man-eating tiger."
-- Kong Fu-Dzuh ("Confucious")
"The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws."
-- Tacitus, Roman senator and historian (A.D. c.56-c.115)
"There is no safe political refuge for those afraid to take responsibility for their own lives."
-- James Bovard
"Make yourself sheep and the wolves will eat you."
-- Benjamin Franklin
"A society of sheep must in time beget a government of wolves."
-- Bertrand de Jouvenal"The penalty good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men."
-- Plato
"As soon as people drop the reins on government, government will leash the people."
-- James Bovard"Government is not reason, and it is not eloquence; it is force! Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master: never for a moment should it be left to irresponsible action."
-- George Washington
"He that always gives way to others will end in having no principles of his own."
-- Aesop
"I am only one, but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. And because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do the something that I can do. What I can do, I should do. And what I should do, by thegrace of God, I will do."
-- Edward Everett Hale
"Not voting is just as bad as voting for evil men because it allows evil to succeed by default. Take a stand with people who support what you really support. Stop cowering and merely complaining about America's pending demise and act in such a way as to truly make a difference."
-- Tom Ambrose
"If mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
-- John Stuart Mill, On Liberty"DO NOT KEEP SILENT when your own ideas and values are being attacked. ...If a dictatorship ever comes to this country, it will be by the default of those who keep silent. We are still free enough to speak. Do we have time? No one can tell."
-- Ayn Rand, Philosophy: Who Needs It
"It behooves every man who values liberty of conscience for himself, to resist invasions of it in the case of others: or their case may, by change of circumstances, become his own."
-- Thomas Jefferson in a letter to Dr. Benjamin Rush, with a Syllabus, Washington, Apr. 21, 1803
"In Germany, the Nazis first came for the communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time there was no one left to speak for me."
-- The statement was written by the Rev. Martin Niemoeller, a German Lutheran pastor who was arrested by the Gestapo in 1938. He was sent to the concentration camp at Dachau, where he remained until he was freed by the Allied forces in 1945.
"When they took the 4th amendment away, I was quiet because I didn't deal drugs. When they took the 6th amendment away, I was quiet because I had never been arrested. When they took the 2nd amendment away, I was quiet because I didn't own a gun. Now they've taken away the 1st amendment, and all I can do is be quiet."
-- Fred Albury
"The Fourth Amendment to the Constitution is the most at risk. The government will challenge our right to be shielded from unreasonable search and seizure by trying to obtain the keys to our encrypted communications. That way, at will, and without a warrant, they will be able to read our e-mail and other documents.
"Ah, you say, I have nothing to hide, so why do I care? In this era of political correctness where the ordinary practices of today become the crimes of tomorrow, it is dangerous to have that view. Perhaps you may want the government to have access to your innermost views. But what do you suppose will happen when you determine that the government has become too repressive and it must be replaced? What do you suppose will happen to you when government officials find out your views before you have had a chance to act upon them?"
Last Updated on Saturday, January 02, 2010 03:54 AM