How can you trust people who are poor and own no property? ... Inequality of property will exist as long as liberty exists.

The system is the best that the present views and circumstances of the country will permit.

...that standing army can never be formidable (threatening) to the liberties of the people, while there is a large body of citizens, little if at all inferior to them in the use of arms.

Take mankind in general, they are vicious-their passions may be operated upon.

Here, sir, the people govern; here they act by their immediate representatives.

The propriety of a law, in a constitutional light, must always be determined by the nature of the powers upon which it is founded.

These are not vague inferences . . . but they are solid conclusions drawn from the natural and necessary progress of human affairs.