Framers Quotes - Page 2

• My political curiosity, exclusive of my anxious solicitude for the public welfare, leads me to ask who authorized them (the framers of the Constitution) to speak the language of 'We, the People,' instead of 'We, the States'?

  Patrick Henry

  People, Political, Curiosity

  14 Copy quote

• The framers knew that liberty is a fragile thing, and so should we.

  William J. Brennan

  Liberty, Fragile Things, Should

  19 Copy quote

• A strong body makes the mind strong.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Strong, Exercise, Gun

  Thomas Jefferson (1829). “Memoirs, Correspondence, and Private Papers of Thomas Jefferson: Late President of the United States”, p.287

  18 Copy quote

  Show source

• Let us face reality. The framers (of the Constitution) have simply been too shrewd for us. They have outwitted us. They designed separate institutions that cannot be unified by mechanical linkages frail bridges(or) tinkering. If we are to turn the founders upside down we must directly confront the Constitutional structure they erected.

  James MacGregor Burns

  Reality, Bridges, Tinkering

  15 Copy quote

• Can any of us refute the wisdom of Madison and the other framers? Can anyone look at the carnage in Iran, the bloodshed in Northern Ireland or the bombs bursting in Lebanon and yet question the dangers of injecting religious issues into the affairs of state?

  Barry Goldwater

  Religious, Iran, Issues

  Barry Morris Goldwater, C. C. Goldwater (2007). “The Conscience of a Conservative”, p.132, Princeton University Press

  34 Copy quote

  Show source

• The Framers of the First Amendment were not concerned with preventing government from abridging their freedom to speak about crops and cockfighting, or with protecting the expressive activity of topless dancers, which of late has found some shelter under the First Amendment. Rather, the Framers cherished unabridged freedom of political communication.

  George Will

  Communication, Government, Dancer

  George F. Will (2003). “With a Happy Eye, But...: America and the World, 1997--2002”, p.278, Simon and Schuster

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• All in all, the framers would probably agree that it's better to impeach too often than too seldom. If presidents can't be virtuous, they should at least be nervous.

  Joseph Sobran

  President, Nervous, Should

  11 Copy quote

• Games played with the ball, and others of that nature, are too violent for the body and stamp no character on the mind.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Character, Gun, Games

  Quoted in Colin Jarman The Guinness Dictionary of Sports Quotations (1990).

  14 Copy quote

  Show source

• As you know, I have over the years written critically about the U.N. I have consistently stressed in my writings that American leadership is critical to the success of the U.N., an effective U.N., one that is true to the original intent of its charter's framers.

  John Bolton

  Writing, Years, Stressed

  4 Copy quote

• The very inclusion of the right to keep and bear arms in the Bill of Rights shows that the framers of the Constitution considered it an individual right.

  Samuel Ray Cummings

  Rights, Bears, Arms

  4 Copy quote

• Americans - not just starting thirty years ago but going back to the beginning, when we were rebelling against King George - we've always been of two minds about the government, which is why the framers wrote the Constitution the way they did.

  William J. Clinton

  Kings, Government, Years

  "Bill Clinton: Someone We Can All Agree On". Interview with Charles P.Pierce and Mark Warren, www.esquire.com. January 18, 2012.

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• 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 inevitably ruined.

  Patrick Henry

  Giving Up, 4th Of July, Jealous

  Virginia's U.S. Constitution ratification convention, June 5, 1788.

  91 Copy quote

  Show source

• The Constitution created a framework, not a Ouija board, precisely because the Framers understood that prospect of a nation ruled for centuries by dead prophets would be the very opposite of freedom.

  Dahlia Lithwick

  Opposites, Boards, Would Be

  4 Copy quote

• That, in part, is why the Constitution's framers gave justices life tenure ? to enable them to rule wherever the law and the Constitution led them, without obligation or fear of political reprisal. Former Republican president Gerald Ford recently paid tribute to John Paul Stevens, his only appointee to the Supreme Court, who is also far more liberal than Republicans expected. He has served his nation well, ... with dignity, intellect and without partisan political concerns.

  Gerald R. Ford

  Law, Justice, Political

  7 Copy quote

• To preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of people always possess arms.

  Richard Henry Lee

  Gun, Strong Arms, People

  Richard Henry Lee (1978). “Letters from the Federal farmer to the Republican”, Univ of Alabama Pr

  107 Copy quote

  Show source

• Apparently a great many people have forgotten that the framers of our Constitution went to such great effort to create an independent judicial branch that would not be subject to retaliation by either the executive branch or the legislative branch because of some decision made by those judges.

  Sandra Day O'Connor

  Independent, Judging, People

  58 Copy quote

• Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed, as they are in almost every country in Europe.

  Noah Webster

  Country, Army, Gun

  Noah Webster (1787). “An Examination Into the Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution Proposed by the Late Convention Held at Philadelphia: With Answers to the Principal Objections that Have Been Raised Against the System”, p.43

  28 Copy quote

  Show source

• The people have a right to keep and bear arms.

  Patrick Henry

  Gun, People, Second Amendment

  23 Copy quote

• Patriotic feelings will surely swell, prompting proud proclamations of the wisdom, foresight, and sense of justice shared by the Framers and reflected in a written document now yellowed with age . . . [F]or many Americans the bicentennial celebration will be little more than a blind pilgrimage to the shrine of the original document now stored in a vault in the National Archives. [Progressive]

  Thurgood Marshall

  Patriotic, Justice, Feelings

  18 Copy quote

• If our free society is to endure, those who govern must recognize human dignity and accept the enforcement of constitutional limitations on their power conceived by the Framers . . . . Such recognition will not come from a technical understanding of the organs of government, or the new forms of wealth they administer. It requires something different, something deeper-a personal confrontation with the wellsprings of our society.

  William J. Brennan

  Government, Understanding, Different

  12 Copy quote

• The Framers were no more interested in binding future Americans to a set of divinely inspired commandments than any of us would wish to be bound by them.

  Dahlia Lithwick

  Wish, Inspired, Binding

  4 Copy quote

• If the Constitution framers would come back today, they would have contempt for most of us.

  Walter E. Williams

  Today, Constitution, Contempt

  7 Copy quote

• Almighty Framer of the Skies!O let our pure devotion rise,Like Incense in thy Sight!Wrapt in impenetrable Shade,The Texture of our Souls were made,Till thy Command gave Light.

  Thomas Chatterton

  Sky, Light, Sight

  Thomas Chatterton, Charles Bonnycastle Willcox (1842). “The Poetical Works of Thomas Chatterton: Acknowledged poems. Chatterton's will. Miscellaneous prose works”, p.324

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• The powers of the sword are in the hands of the yeomanry of America from sixteen to sixty. The militia of these free commonwealths, entitled and accustomed to their arms, when compared with any possible army, must be tremendous and irresistible. Who are the militia? Are they not ourselves? Is it feared, then, that we shall turn our arms each man against his own bosom. Congress has no power to disarm the militia.

  Tench Coxe

  Gun, Second Amendment, Arms

  The Pennsylvania Gazette, February 20, 1788.

  12 Copy quote

  Show source

• The great decisions of government cannot be dictated by the concerns of religious factions. We have succeeded for 205 years in keeping the affairs of state separate from the uncompromising idealism of religious groups and we mustn't stop now. To retreat from that separation would violate the principles of conservatism and the values upon which the framers built this democratic republic.

  Barry Goldwater

  Religious, Government, Years

  "Excerpts From Goldwater Remarks". Remarks in the Congressional Record, www.nytimes.com. September 15, 1981.

  17 Copy quote

  Show source