The rights of persons, and the rights of property, are the objects, for the protection of which Government was instituted.

Let me recommend the best medicine in the world: a long journey, at a mild season, through a pleasant country, in easy stages.

[T]he bill exceeds the rightful authority to which governments are limited by the essential distinction between civil and religious functions, and violates in particular the article of the Constitution of the United States which declares that Congress shall make no law respecting a religious establishment.... This particular church, therefore, would so far be a religious establishment by law, a legal force and sanction being given to certain articles in its constitution and administration.

In all the co-temporary discussions and comments, which the Constitution underwent, it was constantly justified and recommended on the ground, that the powers not given to the government, were withheld from it.

The best service that can be rendered to a Country, next to that of giving it liberty, is in diffusing the mental improvement equally essential to the preservation, and the enjoyment of the blessing.

Who does not see that the same authority which can establish Christianity, in exclusion of all other Religions, may establish with the same ease any particular sect of Christians, in exclusion of all other Sects?

The power to declare war, including the power of judging the causes of war, is fully and exclusively vested in the legislature.