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Quips and Quotes

Quotations and humor about life, liberty and property rights 

“Government is not reason. It is not eloquence. Government is force; like fire it is a dangerous servant -- and a fearful master.” ~ George Washington

“The people never give up their liberties but under some delusion.” ~ Edmund Burke

"You can't love jobs and hate those who create them." ~ David Cote, CEO, Honeywell

"Patriotism is supporting your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it." ~ Mark Twain

"The essence of Government is power; and power, lodged as it must be in human hands, will ever be liable to abuse." ~ James Madison

“Among the natural rights of the colonists are these: First a right to life, secondly to liberty, and thirdly to property; together with the right to defend them in the best manner they can.” ~ Samuel Adams

"God grants liberty only to those who love it, and are always ready to guard and defend it." ~ Daniel Webster

"Sometimes the law defends plunder and participates in it. Thus the beneficiaries are spared the shame and danger that their acts would otherwise involve...But how is this legal plunder to be identified? Quite simply. See if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them and gives it to the other persons to whom it doesn't belong. See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime. Then abolish that law without delay...No legal plunder; this is the principle of justice, peace, order, stability, harmony and logic." ~ Frederic Bastiat

"Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is the highest political end." ~ Lord Acton

"If ever time should come, when vain and aspiring men shall possess the highest seats in Government, our country will stand in need of its experienced patriots to prevent its ruin." ~ Samuel Adams

"Now more than ever before, the people are responsible for the character of their Congress. If that body be ignorant, reckless and corrupt, it is because the people tolerate ignorance, recklessness and corruption. If it be intelligent, brave and pure, it is because the people demand these high qualities to represent them in the national legislature.... If the next centennial does not find us a great nation ... it will be because those who represent the enterprise, the culture, and the morality of the nation do not aid in controlling the political forces." ~ President James Garfield

"Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant, to step over the ocean, and crush us at a blow? Never! -- All the armies of Europe, Asia and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest; with a Bonaparte for a commander, could not by force, take a drink from the Ohio, or make a track on the Blue Ridge, in a trial of a Thousand years. At what point, then, is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide." ~ Abraham Lincoln

"In framing a government, which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed, and in the next place, oblige it to control itself." ~ James Madison

"It is proper to take alarm at the first experiment upon our liberties. We hold this prudent jealousy to be the first duty of citizens and one of the noblest characteristics of the late Revolution...The freemen of America did not wait till usurped power had strengthened itself by exercise and entangled the question in precedents. They saw all the consequences in the principle, and they avoided the consequences by denying the principle. We revere this lesson too much ...to forget it." ~ James Madison

"The sacred rights of mankind are not to be rummaged for among old parchments or musty records. They are written, as with a sunbeam, in the whole volume of human nature by the hand of the Divinity itself, and can never be erased or obscured by mortal power." ~ Alexander Hamilton

"(T)he foundation of our national policy will be laid in the pure and immutable principles of private morality; ...the propitious smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right which Heaven itself has ordained..." ~ George Washington

"Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." ~ John Adams

"Can the liberties of a nation be sure when we remove their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people, that these liberties are a gift from God?" ~ Thomas Jefferson

"The general principles upon which the Fathers achieved independence were the general principals of Christianity… I will avow that I believed and now believe that those general principles of Christianity are as eternal and immutable as the existence and attributes of God." ~ John Adams

"God governs in the affairs of man. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without His aid? We have been assured in the Sacred Writings that except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it. I firmly believe this. I also believe that, without His concurring aid, we shall succeed in this political building no better than the builders of Babel." ~ Benjamin Franklin

"It cannot be emphasized too clearly and too often that this nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religion, but on the gospel of Jesus Christ. For this very reason, peoples of other faiths have been afforded asylum, prosperity, and freedom of worship here." ~ Patrick Henry

“Bad men cannot make good citizens. It is when a people forget God that tyrants forge their chains. A vitiated state of morals, a corrupted public conscience, is incompatible with freedom. No free government, or the blessings of liberty, can be preserved to any people but by a firm adherence to justice, moderation, temperance, frugality, and virtue; and by...recurrence to fundamental principles.” ~ Patrick Henry

"The trouble with Socialism is, sooner or later you run out of other people's money." ~ Margaret Thatcher

"When you subsidize poverty and failure, you get more of both." ~ James Dale Davidson

"The more corrupt the state, the more it legislates." ~ Tacitus

"A Liberal is a person who will give away everything he doesn't own." ~ Unknown

"In the beginning of a change, the patriot is a scarce man, brave, hated, and scorned. When his cause succeeds, the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a a patriot" ~ Mark Twain.