Quotes from James Madison

What is here a right towards men, is a duty towards the Creator.

If men were angels, there would be no need of government.

Congress should not establish a religion, and enforce the legal observation of it by law, nor compel men to worship God in any Manner contrary to their conscience.

It is possible that these may all be insufficient to control the caprice and wickedness of man. But are they not all that government will admit, and all that human prudence can devise?

The smaller the number and the more permanent and conspicuous the station of men in power, the stronger must be the interest which they will individually feel in whatever concerns the government.

The circulation of confidence is better than the circulation of money.

History records that the money changers have used every form of abuse, intrigue, deceit, and violent means possible to maintain their control over governments by controlling money and it's issuance.

In suits at common law, trial by jury in civil cases is as essential to secure the liberty of the people as any one of the pre-existent rights of nature.

If we advert to the nature of republican government, we shall find that the censorial power is in the people over the government, and not in the government over the people.

[Religious liberty was] in its nature an inalienable right ... because the opinions of men, depending only upon the evidence contemplated by their minds, cannot follow the dictates of other men.

But the mere circumstance of complexion cannot deprive them of the character of men.

Man is known to be a selfish, as well as a social being.

A certain degree of preparation for war . . . affords also the best security for the continuance of peace.

Philosophy is common sense with big words.

Enlightened statesmen will not always be at the helm.

The protection of these faculties is the first object of government.

The nation which reposes on the pillow of political confidence, will sooner or later end its political existence in a deadly lethargy.

Precedents once established are so much positive power.

In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.

Liberty may be endangered by the abuse of liberty, but also by the abuse of power.

The truth was that all men having power ought to be distrusted to a certain degree.

The essence of Government is power; and power, lodged as it must be in human hands, will ever be liable to abuse.

Wherever there is interest and power to do wrong, wrong will generally be done.

What a perversion of the normal order of things! ... to make power the primary and central object of the social system, and Liberty but its satellite.