Liberty is to faction what air is to fire.

... the State Legislatures will jealously and closely watch the operations of this Government, and be able to resist with more effect every assumption of power, than any other power on earth can do; and the greatest opponents to a Federal Government admit the State Legislatures to be sure guardians of the people's liberty.

[Christianity] existed and flourishes, not only without the support of human laws, but in spite of every opposition from them.

To refer the power in question to the clause "to provide for the common defense and general welfare" would be contrary to the established and consistent rules of interpretation, as rendering the special and careful enumeration of powers which follow the clause nugatory and improper. Such a view of the Constitution would have the effect of giving to Congress a general power of legislation instead of the defined and limited one hitherto understood to belong to them, the terms "common defense and general welfare" embracing every object and act within the purview of a legislative trust.

What is here a right towards men, is a duty towards the Creator.

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

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