There is something so far-fetched and so extravagant in the idea of danger to liberty from the militia that one is at a loss whether to treat it with gravity or with raillery; whether to consider it as a mere trial of skill, like the paradoxes of rhetoricians; as a disingenuous artifice to instil prejudices at any price; or as the serious.
Alexander HamiltonGreat Ambition, unchecked by principle, or the love of Glory, is an unruly Tyrant.
Alexander Hamilton[T]here is not a syllable in the plan under consideration which directly empowers the national courts to construe the laws according to the spirit of the Constitution.
Alexander HamiltonThey are not rules prescribed by the sovereign to the subject, but agreements between sovereign and sovereign.
Alexander HamiltonThe institution of delegated power implies that there is a portion of virtue and honor among mankind which may be a reasonable foundation of confidence.
Alexander HamiltonWhat bitter anguish would not the people of Athens have often escaped if their government had contained so provident a safeguard against tyranny of their own passions? Popular liberty might then have escaped the indelible reproach of decreeing to the same citizens the hemlock on one day and statutes the next.
Alexander Hamilton