I hope that we have not labored in vain, and that our experiment will still prove that men can be governed by reason.

When a uniform exercise of kindness to prisoners on our part has been returned by as uniform severity on the part of our enemies,you must excuse me for saying it is high time, by other lessons, to teach respect to the dictates of humanity; in such a case, retaliation becomes an act of benevolence.

When the people are afraid of the government, that's tyranny. But when the government is afraid of the people, that's liberty.

We must train and classify the whole of our male citizens, and make military instruction a regular part of collegiate education.

[T]he opinion which gives to the judges the right to decide what laws are constitutional and what not, not only for themselves, in their, own sphere of action, but for the Legislature and Executive also in their spheres, would make the Judiciary a despotic branch.

I hope we shall . . . crush in [its] birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations.

The cutting of heads is become so much a la mode, that one is apt to feel of a morning whether their own is on their shoulders.