Suppose you were an idiot, and suppose you were a member of Congress; but I repeat myself.
Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.
The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.
A wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government, and this is necessary to close the circle of our felicities.
The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.
Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys.
That government is best which governs least.
The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in the insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning but without understanding.
Experience teaches us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government's purposes are beneficent.
Government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force...Never for a moment should it be left to irresponsible action.
A Prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our government was founded.
Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive.
The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions that I wish it to be always kept alive.
Nothing is more destructive of respect for the government and the law of the land than passing laws which cannot be enforced.
Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.
There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty.
Prohibition... goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control a man's appetite by legislation and makes a crime out of things that are not crimes... A prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our government was founded.
Take not from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned.
It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies.
Those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.
or simply:
