These quotes are in reference to limited government, abuse of power, public debt, the U.S. Constitution, etc. They range from 55 B.C. (2066 years ago) to the days of our founding fathers and authors of our Constitution to Senator Barry Goldwater in the late 1950′s to President Reagan in the 1980′s and finally to current day. After reading these quotes, please answer these questions. Is today’s government what our founding fathers envisioned? What would they think of the mess we have gotten ourselves into?

Cicero–55B.C. (2066 years ago)

”The budget should be balanced, the Treasury should be refilled, public debt should be reduced, the arrogance of officialdom should be tempered and controlled, and the assistance to foreign lands should be curtailed lest Rome become bankrupt. People must again learn to work, instead of living on public assistance.” (Change one word in this quote and it could have been said today. We all know what happened to the Roman Empire.)

Thomas Jefferson

• “My reading of history convinces me that most bad government results from too much government.”

• “I think myself that we have more machinery of government than is necessary, too many parasites living on the labor of the industrious.”

• “I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.”

• “The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.”

• “A wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor and bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.”

• “To preserve our independence, we must not let our rulers load us with public debt.”

• “Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare but only those specifically enumerated.”

• “I place economy among the first and most important of republic virtues, and public debt as the greatest of the dangers to be feared.”

George Washington

• “Government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force; like fire, a troublesome servant and a fearful master. Never for a moment should it be left to irresponsible action.”

• “A government is like fire, a handy servant, but a dangerous master.”

• “The Constitution is the guide which I never will abandon”

•
‘No pecuniary consideration is more urgent, than the regular redemption and discharge of the public debt: on none can delay be more injurious, or an economy of time more valuable.”

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“Occupants of public offices love power and are prone to abuse it.”

Benjamin Franklin

• “When the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic.”

• “They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither safety nor liberty.”

• “This will be the best security for maintaining our liberties. A nation of well-informed men who have been taught to know and prize the rights which God has given them cannot be enslaved. It is in the religion of ignorance that tyranny begins.”

• “The Constitution only gives people the right to pursue happiness. You have to catch it yourself.”

James Madison

• “It will be of little avail to the people that the laws are made by men of their own choice if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood.”

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

• “No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.”

• “The Constitution of the United States was created by the people of the United States composing the respective states, who alone had the right.”

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

• “You must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.”

John Adams

• “In my many years I have come to a conclusion that one useless man is a shame, two is a law firm, and three or more is a congress. “

• “Power must never be trusted without a check.”

• “There are two ways to conquer and enslave a country. One is by the sword. The other is by debt.”

• “Liberty cannot be preserved without a general knowledge among the people.”

•”If worthless men are sometimes at the head of affairs, it is, I believe, because worthless men are at the tail and the middle”

• “Great is the guilt of an unnecessary war.”

• “When legislature is corrupted, the people are undone.”

Barry Goldwater

• “A government that is big enough to give you all you want is big enough to take it all away.”

• “I will not attempt to discover whether legislation is ‘needed’ before I have first determined whether it is constitutionally permissible.

• “How did our national government grow from a servant with sharply limited powers into a master with virtually unlimited power?”

• “The federal government has moved into every field in which it believes its services are needed … the result is a Leviathan, a vast national authority out of touch with people, and out of their control.”

• “The root evil is that the government is engaged in activities in which it has no legitimate business.”

• “We can be conquered by bombs or by subversion; but we can also be conquered by neglect – by ignoring the Constitution and disregarding the principles of limited government.”

• “Today neither of our two parties maintains a meaningful commitment to the principle of States’ Rights.”

Ronald Reagan

• “Government exists to protect us from each other. Where government has gone beyond its limits is in deciding to protect us from ourselves.”

• “The most terrifying words in the English language are: I’m from the government and I’m here to help.”

• “Government’s view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.”

• “I hope we once again have reminded people that man is not free unless government is limited. There’s a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics: As government expands, liberty contracts.”

• “Government is not a solution to our problem government is the problem.”

• “The federal government did not create the states; the states created the federal government.”

• “No government ever voluntarily reduces itself in size. Government programs, once launched, never disappear. Actually, a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we’ll ever see on this earth!”

• “If you analyze it I believe the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism — The basis of conservatism is a desire for less government interference or less centralized authority or more individual freedom and this is a pretty general description also of what libertarianism is.”

• “Government does not solve problems. It subsidizes them.”

• “Government always finds a need for whatever money it gets.”

Today

People throughout the United States, in all walks of life, are saying exactly what Cicero said 2066 years ago. What can we do about it?