I do not like [in the new Federal Constitution] the omission of a Bill of Rights providing clearly and without the aid of sophisms for... protection against standing armies
Thomas JeffersonNothing is more certainly written in the book of fate than that these people are to be free.
Thomas JeffersonLet those flatter, who fear: it is not an American art. To give praise where it is not due, might be well from the venal, but would ill beseem those who are asserting the rights of human nature.
Thomas Jefferson