An alliance or coalition between Government and religion cannot be too carefully guarded against......Every new and successful example therefore of a PERFECT SEPARATION between ecclesiastical and civil matters is of importance........religion and government will exist in greater purity, without (rather) than with the aid of government.

I should not regret a fair and full trial of the entire abolition of capital punishment.

War contains so much folly, as well as wickedness, that much is to be hoped from the progress of reason.

[Property] embraces everything to which a man may attach a value and have a right.

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

Testimony of all ages forces us to admit that war is among the most dangerous enemies to liberty, and that the executive is the branch most favored by it of all the branches of Power.

If Congress can employ money indefinitely to the general welfare... they may appoint teachers in every state... The powers of Congress would subvert the very foundation, the very nature of the limited government established by the people of America.