The policy of the American government is to leave their citizens free, neither restraining nor aiding them in their pursuits.

The Constitution on which our Union rests, shall be administered by me [as President] according to the safe and honest meaning contemplated by the plain understanding of the people of the United States at the time of its adoption - a meaning to be found in the explanations of those who advocated, not those who opposed it, and who opposed it merely lest the construction should be applied which they denounced as possible.

Being myself a warm zealot for the attainment & enjoiment by all mankind of as much liberty as each may exercise without injury to the equal liberty of his fellow citizens, I have lamented that in France the endeavors to obtain this should have been attended with the effusion of so much blood.

If you have to eat crow, eat it while it's young and tender.

The best defense of democracy is an informed electorate.

For an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man.

The cost of freedom is eternal vigilance