On the Constitution
- "I consider the foundation of the Constitution as laid on this ground: That 'all powers not delegated to the United States, by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States or to the people' (10th Amendment). To take a single step beyond the boundaries thus specifically drawn around the powers of Congress, is to take possession of a boundless field of power, no longer susceptible to any definition." – Thomas Jefferson*
On Government Spending
- "To avoid the necessity of a permanent debt and its inevitable consequences, I have advocated and endeavored to carry into effect the policy of confining the appropriations for the public service to such objects only as are clearly with the constitutional authority of the Federal Government." – Martin Van Buren
- "Under our scheme of government the waste of public money is a crime against the citizen…" – Grover Cleveland
- "Once the coffers of the federal government are opened to the public, there will be no shutting them again." – Grover Cleveland
On Government
- "That government is best which governs the least, because its people discipline themselves." – Thomas Jefferson
On Immigration
- "The admitted right of a government to prevent the influx of elements hostile to its internal peace and security may not be questioned, even where there is not treaty stipulation on the subject." – Grover Cleveland
On Today's Housing Crisis
- "Those who look to the action of this government for specific aid to the citizen to relieve embarrassments arising from losses by revulsions in commerce and credit, lose sight of the ends for which it was created, and the powers with which it is clothed. It was established to give security to us all. … It was not intended to confer special favors on individuals. The less government interferes with private pursuits, the better for the general prosperity." Martin Van Buren
On Taxes
- "The simple and plain duty which we owe the people is to reduce taxation to the necessary expenses of an economical operation of the Government and to restore to the business of the country the money which we hold in the Treasury through the perversion of governmental powers…. unnecessary and extravagant appropriations… besides the demoralization of all just conceptions of public duty which it entails, stimulates a habit of reckless improvidence not in the least consistent with the mission of our people or of the high and beneficent purposes of our government." – Grover Cleveland
- "To compel a man to furnish funds for the propagation of ideas he disbelieves and abhors
is sinful and tyrannical." – Thomas Jefferson
On the Right to Bear Arms
- "Certainly one of the chief guarantees of freedom under any government, no matter how popular and respected, is the right of citizens to keep and bear arms…. The right of citizens to bear arms is just one guarantee against arbitrary government, one more safeguard against the tyranny which now appears remote in America but which historically has proven to be always possible." – Hubert H. Humphrey
- "No free man shall ever be de-barred the use of arms." – Thomas Jefferson
- "Americans need never fear their government because of the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation." – James Madison
On the National Debt
- "I am one of those who do not believe that a national debt is a national blessing, but
rather a curse to a republic; inasmuch as it is calculated to raise around the administration a moneyed aristocracy dangerous to the liberties of the country." – Andrew Jackson - "We must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. We must make our election between economy and liberty or profusion and servitude. If we run into such debt, as that we must be taxed in our meat and in our drink, in our necessaries and our comforts, in our labors and our amusements, for our calling and our creeds…[we will] have no time to think, no means of calling our miss-managers to account but be glad to obtain subsistence by hiring ourselves to rivet their chains on the necks of our fellow-sufferers…And this is the tendency of all human governments. A departure from principle in one instance becomes a precedent for [another ]… till the bulk of society is reduced to be mere automatons of misery…And the fore-horse of this frightful team is public debt. Taxation follows that, and in its train wretchedness and oppression." – Thomas Jefferson
On War and Peace
- "Peace, above all things, is to be desired, but blood must sometimes be spilled to obtain it on equable and lasting terms." – Andrew Jackson
On Welfare
- "Dependence begets subservience and venality, suffocates the germ of virtue, and prepares fit tools for the designs of ambition." – Thomas Jefferson
On Foreign Policy
- "Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty." – John Kennedy
On National Security
- "There are no short cuts to national security. There are only short cuts to defeat." – Adlai Stevenson
On the End of America
- "It is only when the people become ignorant and corrupt, when they degenerate into a populace, that they are incapable of exercising their sovereignty. Usurpation is then an easy attainment, and an usurper soon found. The people themselves become the willing instruments of their own debasement and ruin." – James Monroe
On Congress
- "The passion for office among members of Congress is very great, if not absolutely disreputable, and greatly embarrasses the operations of the Government. They create offices by their own votes and then seek to fill them themselves." – James K. Polk
On Personal Responsibility
- "In the long run, we shape our lives, and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility." – Eleanor Roosevelt
On Liberals
- "The liberal left can be as rigid and destructive as any force in American life." – Daniel Patrick Moynihan
On Liberty
- "We do not move forward by curtailing people's liberty because we are afraid of what they may do or say." – Eleanor Roosevelt
- "The only sure bulwark of continuing liberty is a government strong enough to protect the interests of the people, and a people strong enough and well enough informed to maintain its sovereign control over the government." – Franklin D. Roosevelt
On the Military
- "I have been to the front lines and seen the boys. The Marines I have seen around the world have the cleanest bodies, the filthiest minds, the highest morale, and the lowest morals of any group of animals I have ever seen. Thank God for the United States Marine Corps!" – Eleanor Roosevelt
*Thomas Jefferson was a member of the Democratic-Republican Party. It has been argued that Jefferson was the first Republican president, but he is also the darling of the Democrat Party, often called "the party of Jefferson.". For that reason, I consider him a Democrat for the purpose of this article.
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