James Madison Quotes

Quotes about:

• If our nation is ever taken over, it will be taken over from within.

  James Madison

  Taken, Over It, Nations

  209 Copy quote
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  Oppressors can tyrannize only when they achieve a standing army, an enslaved press, and a disarmed populace.

  James Madison

  Strength, Peace, Army

  263 Copy quote

• The future and success of America is not in this Constitution, but in the laws of God upon which this Constitution is founded.

  James Madison

  Law, America, Constitution

  292 Copy quote

• Crisis is the rallying cry of the tyrant.

  James Madison

  Rallying Cry, Tyrants, Presidential

  228 Copy quote
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  The purpose of the Constitution is to restrict the majority's ability to harm a minority.

  James Madison

  Majority, Minorities, Purpose

  201 Copy quote

• 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.

  James Madison

  Gun, Libertarian Party, Assault Weapons

  James Madison, Gaillard Hunt, James Brown Scott (1999). “The Debates in the Federal Convention of 1787: Which Framed the Constitution of the United States of America”, p.690, The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd.

  57 Copy quote
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  Disarm the people- that is the best and most effective way to enslave them.

  James Madison

  Gun, People, Way

  118 Copy quote

• We have staked the whole future of our new nation, not upon the power of government; far from it. We have staked the future of all our political constitutions upon the capacity of each of ourselves to govern ourselves according to the moral principles of the Ten Commandments.

  James Madison

  Bible, God, Religious

  181 Copy quote

• Democracy is the most vile form of government.

  James Madison

  Government, Democracy, Form

  15 Copy quote

• The ultimate authority resides in the people, and that if the federal government got too powerful and overstepped its authority, then the people would develop plans of resistance and resort to arms.

  James Madison

  Powerful, Government, People

  28 Copy quote

• If man is not fit to govern himself, how can he be fit to govern someone else?

  James Madison

  Men, Fit, Ifs

  192 Copy quote
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  Knowledge will forever govern ignorance; and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.

  James Madison

  Education, Wisdom, Freedom

  1822; cited in U.S. Senate, Alleged Assassination Plots (1975).

  121 Copy quote

• We are free today substantially, but the day will come when our Republic will be an impossibility. It will be an impossibility because wealth will be concentrated in the hands of a few. A Republic cannot stand upon bayonets, and when the day comes when the wealth of the nation will be in the hands of a few, then we must rely upon the wisdom of the best elements in the country to readjust the laws of the nations to the changed conditions.

  James Madison

  Wisdom, Country, Hands

  148 Copy quote
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  If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.

  James Madison

  Inspirational, Freedom, Fear

  "The Last Enemy" by Rebecca Sato, www.pbs.org. November 11, 2010.

  226 Copy quote

• The right of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the state shall not be questioned.

  James Madison

  Bears, Defense, Citizens

  42 Copy quote

• Armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few.

  James Madison

  Army, Debt, Libertarian

  James Madison, David B. Mattern (1997). “James Madison's "Advice to My Country"”, p.106, University of Virginia Press

  18 Copy quote

• The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, selfappointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.

  James Madison

  Government, Hands, Independent Judiciary

  The Federalist no. 47 (1788)

  109 Copy quote

• If men were angels, no government would be necessary.

  James Madison

  Adversity, Angel, Men

  The Federalist no. 51 (1788)

  55 Copy quote

• I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments by those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.

  James Madison

  Freedom, Believe, Power

  Speech at Virginia Convention, 5 June 1788

  76 Copy quote

• Democracies have been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property; and in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their death.

  James Madison

  Freedom, Democracies Have, Rights

  Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, John Jay (1842). “The Federalist, on the New Constitution, Written in the Year 1788”, p.46

  59 Copy quote

• A President is impeachable if he attempts to subvert the Constitution.

  James Madison

  President, Constitution, Ifs

  37 Copy quote

• A people armed and free, forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition and is a bulwark for the nation against foreign invasion and domestic oppression.

  James Madison

  Strength, Peace, Ambition

  77 Copy quote

• Wherever there is interest and power to do wrong, wrong will generally be done.

  James Madison

  Reality, Liberty, Done

  James Madison, Ralph Ketcham “Selected Writings of James Madison”, Hackett Publishing

  24 Copy quote

• Democracy was the right of the people to choose their own tyrant.

  James Madison

  Tyrants, People, Democracy

  21 Copy quote

• The people shall not be deprived or abridged of their right to speak, or to publish their sentiments; and the freedom of the press, as one of the great bulwarks of liberty, shall be inviolable.

  James Madison

  People, President, Liberty

  James Madison, Ralph Ketcham “Selected Writings of James Madison”, Hackett Publishing

  45 Copy quote

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