The emigrants although of different parties and different religious sects all flew from persecution in pursuit of liberty.

If it was wise, manly, and patriotic for us to establish a free government, it is equally wise to attend to the necessary means of its preservation.

The emigrants although of different parties and different religious sects all flew from persecution in pursuit of liberty.

The best form of government is that which is most likely to prevent the greatest sum of evil.

How prone all human institutions have been to decay; how subject the best-formed and most wisely organized governments have been to lose their check and totally dissolve; how difficult it has been for mankind, in all ages and countries, to preserve their dearest rights and best privileges, impelled as it were by an irresistible fate of despotism.

The American continents, by the free and independent condition by which they have assumed and maintained, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers.

It is only when the people become ignorant and corrupt, when they degenerate into a populace, that they are incapable of exercising their sovereignty.