James Madison Jr. was an American statesman, lawyer, diplomat, philosopher and Founding Father who served as the fourth president of the United States from 1809 to 1817. He wrote the first drafts of the U.S. Constitution, co-wrote the Federalist Papers and sponsored the Bill of Rights. Inspirational James Madison quotes on immigration, guns, political parties, education, electoral college, and first amendment will broaden your horizon.
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Most Famous James Madison Quotes
In no instance have the churches been guardians of the liberties of the people.
But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflection on human nature?
Expirience is the oracle of truth
Democracy is the most vile form of government.
The operations of the federal government will be most extensive and important in times of war and danger; those of the State governments, in times of peace and security.
Liberty may be endangered by the abuses of liberty as well as by the abuses of power.
Let me recommend the best medicine in the world a long journey at a mild season through a pleasant country in easy stages.
Americans have the right and advantage of being armed – unlike the citizens of other countries whose governments are afraid to trust the people with arms.
Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind, and unfits it for every noble enterprise, every expanded prospect. [Letter to William Bradford Jr. April 1 1774]
Of all the enemies to public liberty, war is perhaps the most to be dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other.
The means of defense against foreign danger historically have become the instruments of tyranny at home
[The Senate] ought to be so constituted as to protect the minority of the opulent against the majority.
Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprize, every expanded prospect.
The censorial power is in the people over the government, and not in the government over the people.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted.
If tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.
Learned institutions ought to be favorite objects with every free people. They throw that light over the public mind which is the best security against crafty and dangerous encroachments on the public liberty.
A good Government implies two things: first, fidelity to the object of Government, which is the happiness of the People; secondly, a knowledge of the means by which that object can be best attained.
I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.
The Presidency alone unites the conjectures of the public.
As a man is said to have a right to his property, he may be equally said to have a property in his rights.
Charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government.
Philosophy is common sense with big words.
Knowledge will forever govern ignorance: And a people who mean to be their own Governors, must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.
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.
Liberty is to faction what air is to fire…
Knowledge will forever govern ignorance.
The advancement and diffusion of knowledge is the only guardian of true liberty.
You must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place, oblige it to control itself.
Inspirational James Madison Quotes
If we are to be one Nation in any respect, it clearly ought to be in respect to other Nations.
All men having power ought to be distrusted to a certain degree
History records that the money changers have used every form of abuse, intrigue, deceit, and violent means possible to maintain their control over governments by controlling money and it’s issuance.
Liberty may be endangered by the abuse of liberty, but also by the abuse of power.
Despotism can only exist in darkness, and there are too many lights now in the political firmament, to permit it to remain anywhere, as it has heretofore done, almost everywhere.
The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite.
Where an excess of power prevails, property of no sort is duly respected. No man is safe in his opinions, his person, his faculties or his possessions.
Knowledge will forever govern ignorance, and a people who mean to be their own governors, must arm themselves with the power knowledge gives.
If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary.
The means of defense against foreign danger, have been always the instruments of tyranny at home.
I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents.
No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.
Where we see the same faults followed regularly by the same misfortunes, we may reasonably think that if we could have known the first we might have avoided the others.
Equal laws protecting equal rights…the best guarantee of loyalty and love of country.
