We may... affirm that the balance of power in a society accompanies the balance of property in land. The only possible way, then, of preserving the balance of power on the side of liberty and public virtue is to make the acquisition of land easy to every member of society; to make a division of the land into small quantities, so that the multitude may be possessed of landed estates.
John AdamsIf the way to do good to my country were to render myself popular, I could easily do it. But extravagant popularity is not the road to public advantage.
John AdamsAs to the history of the revolution, my ideas may be peculiar, perhaps singular. What do we mean by the revolution? The war? That was no part of the revolution; it was only an effect and consequence of it. The revolution was in the minds of the people, and this was effected from 1760 to 1775, in the course of fifteen years, before a drop of blood was shed at Lexington.
John AdamsNo good government but what is republican... the very definition of a republic is 'an empire of laws, and not of men.'
John Adams