A share in the sovereignty of the state, which is exercised by the citizens at large, in voting at elections is one of the most important rights of the subject, and in a republic ought to stand foremost in the estimation of the law...That portion of the sovereignty, to which each individual is entitled, can never be too highly prized. It is that for which we have fought and bled.

I go further, and affirm that bills of rights, in the sense and to the extent in which they are contended for, are not only unnecessary in the proposed Constitution, but would even be dangerous. They would contain various exceptions to powers not granted; and on this very account, would afford a colorable pretext to claim more than were granted. For why declare that things shall not be done which there is no power to do?

A habit of labor in the people is as essential to the health and rigor of their minds and bodies as it is conducive to the welfare of the state.

Of those men who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the people, commencing demagogues and ending tyrants.

The laws of certain states . . . give an ownership in the service of Negroes as personal property . . . . But being men, by the laws of God and nature, they were capable of acquiring liberty - and when the captor in war . . . thought fit to give them liberty, the gift was not only valid, but irrevocable.

The prosperity of commerce is now perceived and acknowledged by all enlightened statesmen to be the most useful as well as the most productive source of national wealth, and has accordingly become a primary object of their political cares.

A national debt, if it is not excessive, will be to us a national blessing.