Laws that forbid the carrying of arms . . . disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes . . . Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man.

For themselves they fought, for themselves they conquered, and for themselves alone they have they have right to hold.

It is a [disputed] question, whether the circulation of paper, rather than of specie [gold and silver coin], is a good or an evil I believe it to be one of those cases where mercantile clamor will bear down reason, until it is corrected by ruin.

In defense of our persons and properties under actual violation, we took up arms. When that violence shall be removed, when hostilities shall cease on the part of the aggressors, hostilities shall cease on our part also.

The right of self-government does not comprehend the government of others.

Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms of government those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny.

The man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them, in-as-much as he who knows nothing is nearer to the truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehood and errors.