# March 16

Quotes of the day from previous years:

## 2004

    Do not say, "I follow the one true path of the Spirit", but rather, "I have found the Spirit walking on my path", for the Spirit walks on all paths. ~ Khalil Gibran
   * selected by Kalki

## 2005

    If in my lifetime the problem of non-free software is solved, I could perhaps relax and write software again. But I might instead try to help deal with the world's larger problems. Standing up to an evil system is exhilarating, and now I have a taste for it. ~ Richard Stallman (born 16 March 1953)
   * selected by Kalki

## 2006

    Down these mean streets a man must go who is not himself mean, who is neither tarnished nor afraid. The detective must be a complete man and a common man and yet an unusual man. He must be, to use a rather weathered phrase, a man of honor. He talks as the man of his age talks, that is, with rude wit, a lively sense of the grotesque, a disgust for sham, and a contempt for pettiness. ~ Raymond Chandler
   * proposed by IP 220.233.188.149

## 2007

    If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. ~ James Madison (born 16 March 1751)
   * selected by Kalki

## 2008

    Wherever the real power in a Government lies, there is the danger of oppression. In our Governments, the real power lies in the majority of the Community, and the invasion of private rights is chiefly to be apprehended, not from the acts of Government contrary to the sense of its constituents, but from acts in which the Government is the mere instrument of the major number of the Constituents. ~ James Madison
   * proposed by Kalki

## 2009

    Love, whether newly born, or aroused from a deathlike slumber, must always create sunshine, filling the heart so full of radiance, that it overflows upon the outward world. ~ Nathaniel Hawthorne (from The Scarlet Letter first published on this date in 1850)
   * proposed by Kalki

## 2010

    I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations. ~ James Madison (born 16 March 1751)
   * proposed by Kalki

## 2011

    One can start from the perspective of a religious naturalist or from the perspective of the world religions and arrive at the same place: a moral imperative that this Earth and its creatures be respected and cherished. ~ Ursula Goodenough
   * proposed by Zarbon

## 2012

    A popular Government without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a Prologue to a Farce or a Tragedy, or perhaps both. Knowledge will forever govern ignorance: And a people who mean to be their own Governors, must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives. ~ James Madison
   * proposed by bystander

## 2013

* Each time dawn appears, the mystery is there in its entirety.
* ~ René Daumal ~
   * proposed by Kalki

## 2014

* Art has a double face, of expression and illusion, just like science has a double face: the reality of error and the phantom of truth.
* ~ René Daumal ~
   * proposed by Zarbon

## 2015

* The Big Bang, the formation of stars and planets, the origin and evolution of life on this planet, the advent of human consciousness and the resultant evolution of cultures — this is the story, the one story, that has the potential to unite us, because it happens to be true.
* ~ Ursula Goodenough ~
   * proposed by Zarbon

## 2016

* There are tremendous actual differences in values. Some value systems, such as the ones that motivate "honor killings", deserve to be morally condemned and rejected. But there are many other variations in values within the bounds of decency.
* ~ Richard Stallman ~
   * proposed by Kalki

## 2017

* You can't have thought without emotion, and one emotion is fear, and making an important decision on the basis of fear is not a good idea. So develop your courage.
* ~ Ursula Goodenough ~
   * proposed by Kalki

## 2018

* Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive is extended; its influence in dealing out offices, honors, and emoluments is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force, of the people. The same malignant aspect in republicanism may be traced in the inequality of fortunes, and the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war, and in the degeneracy of manners and of morals engendered by both. No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.
* ~ James Madison ~
   * proposed by Kalki

## 2019

* Odious ideas are not entitled to hide from criticism behind the human shield of their believers' feelings.
* ~ Richard Stallman ~
   * proposed by Kalki

## 2020

* We have seen the mere distinction of colour made in the most enlightened period of time, a ground of the most oppressive dominion ever exercised by man over man. What has been the source of those unjust laws complained of among ourselves? Has it not been the real or supposed interest of the major number? Debtors have defrauded their creditors. The landed interest has borne hard on the mercantile interest. The Holders of one species of property have thrown a disproportion of taxes on the holders of another species. The lesson we are to draw from the whole is that where a majority are united by a common sentiment, and have an opportunity, the rights of the minor party become insecure.
* ~ James Madison ~
   * proposed by Illegitimate Barrister

## 2021

* I don't have a problem with someone using their talents to become successful, I just don't think the highest calling is success. Things like freedom and the expansion of knowledge are beyond success, beyond the personal. Personal success is not wrong, but it is limited in importance, and once you have enough of it it is a shame to keep striving for that, instead of for truth, beauty, or justice.
* ~ Richard Stallman ~
   * proposed by Kalki

## 2022

* It is here, in war-torn Kyiv, that history is being made. It is here, that freedom fights against the world of tyranny. It is here that the future of us all hangs in the balance.
* ~ Mateusz Morawiecki ~
   * proposed by Kalki

## 2023

* We want to replace proprietary software, with its unjust social system with Free Software and its ethical social system. And so we develop free replacements for proprietary software, and other free programs whenever we get an idea, so that the world can live in freedom. The part that uses computers, at least, in that one area of life. Because winning and maintaining freedom in general is a much bigger, much broader and harder activity, but this is one part of it.
* ~ Richard Stallman ~
   * proposed by Kalki

## 2024

* I like mindful people. Fear prevents mindfulness, and then greed marches in because you are fearful, so you feel like you have to shore everything up.
* ~ Ursula Goodenough ~
   * proposed by Kalki

## 2025

* The accumulation of all powers, Legislative, Executive, and Judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.
* ~ James Madison ~
   * proposed by Kalki

## 2026

    Rank or add further suggestions…
The Quote of the Day (QOTD) is a prominent feature of the Wikiquote Main Page. Thank you for submitting, reviewing, and ranking suggestions!

   ## Ranking system

    4 : Excellent – should definitely be used. (This is the utmost ranking and should be used by any editor for only one quote at a time for each date.)
    3 : Very Good – strong desire to see it used.
    2 : Good – some desire to see it used.
    1 : Acceptable – but with no particular desire to see it used.
    0 : Not acceptable – not appropriate for use as a quote of the day.
    An averaging of the rankings provided to each suggestion produces it’s general ranking in considerations for selection of Quote of the Day. The selections made are usually chosen from the top ranked options existing on the page, but the provision of highly ranked late additions, especially in regard to special events (most commonly in regard to the deaths of famous people, or other major social or physical occurrences), always remain an option for final selections.
    Thank you for participating!

## Suggestions

    DOB: René Daumal · Ursula Goodenough · James Madison · Richard Stallman.
The Soviet occupation of Afghanistan gave us the Taliban. The American occupation of Saudi Arabia gave us bin Laden and Al Qaeda. The Israeli occupation of Lebanon gave us Hezbollah. Let us see what the American occupation of Iraq is going to give us. ~ As'ad AbuKhalil
* 2 Zarbon 02:37, 11 March 2009 (UTC)
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 01:18, 16 March 2016 (UTC) 2 Kalki 09:12, 13 March 2009 (UTC) with a slight lean toward 4.
* 2 InvisibleSun 23:38, 15 March 2009 (UTC)
It is still not enough for language to have clarity and content … it must also have a goal and an imperative. Otherwise from language we descend to chatter, from chatter to babble and from babble to confusion. ~ René Daumal
* 2 Zarbon 02:37, 11 March 2009 (UTC)
* 3 Kalki 09:12, 13 March 2009 (UTC)
* 2 InvisibleSun 23:38, 15 March 2009 (UTC)
Thy spirit, Independence, let me share, Lord of the lion-heart and eagle-eye. Thy steps I follow with my bosom bare, Nor heed the storm that howls along the sky. ~ Tobias Smollett
* 2 Zarbon 02:37, 11 March 2009 (UTC)
* 3 Kalki 09:12, 13 March 2009 (UTC)
* 3 InvisibleSun 23:38, 15 March 2009 (UTC)
Death is the price paid to have trees, and clams and birds and grasshoppers, and death is the price paid to have human consciousness, to be aware of all that shimmering awareness and all that love. ~ Ursula Goodenough
* 2 Zarbon 02:37, 11 March 2009 (UTC)
* 3 Kalki 09:12, 13 March 2009 (UTC)
* 3 InvisibleSun 23:38, 15 March 2009 (UTC)
* Truth is one, but error proliferates. Man tracks it down and cuts it up into little pieces hoping to turn it into grains of truth. But the ultimate atom will always essentially be an error, a miscalculation.
* ~ René Daumal ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 02:49, 15 March 2013 (UTC) with a lean toward 4.
* You cannot always stay on the summits. You have to come down again . . .
* ~ René Daumal ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 02:49, 15 March 2013 (UTC) with a lean toward 4.
* Alpinism is the art of climbing mountains by confronting the greatest dangers with the greatest prudence. Art is used here to mean the accomplishment of knowledge in action.
* ~ René Daumal ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 02:49, 15 March 2013 (UTC) with a lean toward 4.
* Stallman's Law: Now that corporations dominate society and write the laws, each advance or change in technology is an opening for them to further restrict or mistreat its users.
* ~ Richard Stallman ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 23:23, 15 March 2019 (UTC)
* Laws that oppress people have no moral authority.
* ~ Richard Stallman ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 23:23, 15 March 2019 (UTC)
* Isn't it ironic that the proprietary software developers call us communists? We are the ones who have provided for a free market, where they allow only monopoly. … if the users chooses this proprietary software package, he then falls into this monopoly for support … the only way to escape from monopoly is to escape from proprietary software, and that is what the free software movement is all about. We want you to escape and our work is to help you escape. We hope you will escape to the free world. The free world is the new continent in cyberspace that we have built so we can live here in freedom. It's impossible to live in freedom in the old world of cyberspace, where every program has its feudal lord that bullies and mistreats the users. So, to live in freedom we have to build a new continent. Because this is a virtual continent, it has room for everyone, and there are no immigration restrictions. And because there were never indigenous peoples in cyberspace, there is also no issue of taking away their land. So everyone is welcome in the free world, come to the free world, live with us in freedom. The free software movement aims for the liberation of cyberspace and everyone in it.
* ~ Richard Stallman ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 23:23, 15 March 2019 (UTC)
* I am a pessimist by nature. Many people can only keep on fighting when they expect to win. I'm not like that, I always expect to lose. I fight anyway, and sometimes I win. I'm not the main leader in this particular battle. The Electronic Frontier Foundation is fighting. Public Knowledge is fighting. People need to get involved politically. At this point people should go to the EFF website and the Public Knowledge website, and continue doing so over the coming weeks to see how they can get involved in this coming campaign. It's going to take a lot of people spending probably at least twenty minutes. If you care enough about your freedom to spend twenty minutes on it, if you can tear yourself away from whatever little job it is you're doing this week, and next week, and so on. Spend a little time fighting for your freedom, and we can win.
* ~ Richard Stallman ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 23:23, 15 March 2019 (UTC) with a lean toward 4.
* It is hard to write a simple definition of something as varied as hacking, but I think what these activities have in common is playfulness, cleverness, and exploration. Thus, hacking means exploring the limits of what is possible, in a spirit of playful cleverness. Activities that display playful cleverness have "hack value".
* ~ Richard Stallman ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 23:23, 15 March 2019 (UTC)
* Geeks like to think that they can ignore politics, you can leave politics alone, but politics won't leave you alone.
* ~ Richard Stallman ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 23:23, 15 March 2019 (UTC)
    Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another: "What! You too? I thought I was the only one."
* proposed by 0XxFairyTailxX0----
* This was initially misplaced on the page, and is actually a paraphrase of a statement by C. S. Lewis; I would probably rank the corrected statement a 3 were it a proposed for Lewis's birthdate of November 29. ~ ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 23:51, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
* If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* In a free Government, the security for civil rights must be the same as that for religious rights. It consists in the one case in the multiplicity of interests, and in the other in the multiplicity of sects. The degree of security in both cases, will depend on the number of interests and sects; and this may be presumed to depend on the extent of country and number of People comprehended under the same Government.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Where annual elections end, tyranny begins.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Torrents of blood have been spilt in the old world, by vain attempts of the secular arm, to extinguish Religious discord, by proscribing all difference in Religious opinion. Time has at length revealed the true remedy. Every relaxation of narrow and rigorous policy, wherever it has been tried, has been found to assuage the disease. The American Theatre has exhibited proofs that equal and compleat liberty, if it does not wholly eradicate it, sufficiently destroys its malignant influence on the health and prosperity of the State. … What mischiefs may not be dreaded, should this enemy to the public quiet be armed with the force of a law?
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Attempts to enforce by legal sanctions, acts obnoxious to so great a proportion of Citizens, tend to enervate the laws in general, and to slacken the bands of Society. If it be difficult to execute any law which is not generally deemed necessary or salutary, what must be the case, where it is deemed invalid and dangerous? And what may be the effect of so striking an example of impotency in the Government, on its general authority?
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* The United States while they wish for war with no nation, will buy peace with none, it being a principle incorporated into the settled policy of America, that as peace is better than war, so war is better than tribute.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Is it not safer to adhere to a right pinciple, and trust to its consequences, than confide in the reasoning however specious in favor of a wrong one.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* We are always to keep in mind that it is safer to trust the consequences of a right principle, than reasonings in support of a bad one.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Religion & Govt. will both exist in greater purity, the less they are mixed together.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* The essence of Government is power; and power, lodged as it must be in human hands, will ever be liable to abuse.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Some degree of abuse is inseparable from the proper use of every thing; and in no instance is this more true than in that of the press. It has accordingly been decided, by the practice of the states, that it is better to leave a few of its noxious branches to their luxuriant growth, than, by pruning them away, to injure the vigor of those yielding the proper fruits. And can the wisdom of this policy be doubted by any one who reflects that to the press alone, checkered as it is with abuses, the world is indebted for all the triumphs which have been gained by reason and humanity over error and oppression?
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* All men having power ought to be distrusted, to a certain degree.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less in all places, pride and indolence in the Clergy, ignorance and servility in the laity, in both, superstition, bigotry and persecution.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprize, every expanded prospect.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Conscience is the most sacred of all property; other property depending in part on positive law, the exercise of that being a natural and unalienable right.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long be safe companions to liberty. The means of defence against foreign danger have been always the instruments of tyranny at home. Among the Romans it was a standing maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt was apprehended. Throughout all Europe, the armies kept up under the pretext of defending, have enslaved the people.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* We hold it for a fundamental and undeniable truth, “that Religion or the duty which we owe to our Creator and the Manner of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and conviction, not by force or violence.” The Religion then of every man must be left to the conviction and conscience of every man; and it is the right of every man to exercise it as these may dictate. This right is in its nature an unalienable right.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* The free men of America did not wait till usurped power had strengthened itself by exercise, and entangled the question in precedents. They saw all the consequences in the principle, and they avoided the consequences by denying the principle. We revere this lesson too much soon to forget it. Who does not see that the same authority which can establish Christianity, in exclusion of all other Religions, may establish with the same ease any particular sect of Christians, in exclusion of all other Sects? that the same authority which can force a citizen to contribute three pence only of his property for the support of any one establishment, may force him to conform to any other establishment in all cases whatsoever?
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Rulers who wished to subvert the public liberty, may have found an established Clergy convenient auxiliaries. A just Government instituted to secure & perpetuate it needs them not. Such a Government will be best supported by protecting every Citizen in the enjoyment of his Religion with the same equal hand which protects his person and his property; by neither invading the equal rights of any Sect, nor suffering any Sect to invade those of another.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* It is an established maxim that birth is a criterion of allegiance. Birth however derives its force sometimes from place and sometimes from parentage, but in general place is the most certain criterion; it is what applies in the United States; it will therefore be unnecessary to investigate any other.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Wherever the real power in a Government lies, there is the danger of oppression. In our Governments, the real power lies in the majority of the Community, and the invasion of private rights is chiefly to be apprehended, not from the acts of Government contrary to the sense of its constituents, but from acts in which the Government is the mere instrument of the major number of the constituents.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Since the general civilization of mankind, I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power, than by violent and sudden usurpations; but, on a candid examination of history, we shall find that turbulence, violence, and abuse of power, by the majority trampling on the rights of the minority, have produced factions and commotions, which, in republics, have, more frequently than any other cause, produced despotism. If we go over the whole history of ancient and modern republics, we shall find their destruction to have generally resulted from those causes.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* By a faction, I understand a number of citizens, whether amounting to a majority or a minority of the whole, who are united and actuated by some common impulse of passion, or of interest, adversed to the rights of other citizens, or to the permanent and aggregate interests of the community.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Liberty is to faction what air is to fire, an aliment without which it instantly expires. But it could not be less folly to abolish liberty, which is essential to political life, because it nourishes faction, than it would be to wish the annihilation of air, which is essential to animal life, because it imparts to fire its destructive agency.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* As long as the reason of man continues fallible, and he is at liberty to exercise it, different opinions will be formed. As long as the connection subsists between his reason and his self-love, his opinions and his passions will have a reciprocal influence on each other; and the former will be objects to which the latter will attach themselves.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* From the protection of different and unequal faculties of acquiring property, the possession of different degrees and kinds of property immediately results; and from the influence of these on the sentiments and views of the respective proprietors, ensues a division of the society into different interests and parties. The latent causes of faction are thus sown in the nature of man; and we see them everywhere brought into different degrees of activity, according to the different circumstances of civil society.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* A zeal for different opinions concerning religion, concerning government, and many other points, as well of speculation as of practice; an attachment to different leaders ambitiously contending for pre-eminence and power; or to persons of other descriptions whose fortunes have been interesting to the human passions, have, in turn, divided mankind into parties, inflamed them with mutual animosity, and rendered them much more disposed to vex and oppress each other than to co-operate for their common good. So strong is this propensity of mankind to fall into mutual animosities, that where no substantial occasion presents itself, the most frivolous and fanciful distinctions have been sufficient to kindle their unfriendly passions and excite their most violent conflicts. But the most common and durable source of factions has been the various and unequal distribution of property. Those who hold, and those who are without property, have ever formed distinct interests in society.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* It is of great importance in a republic, not only to guard the society against the oppression of its rulers, but to guard one part of the society against the injustice of the other part. Different interests necessarily exist in different classes of citizens. If a majority be united by a common interest, the rights of the minority will be insecure. There are but two methods of providing against this evil: the one by creating a will in the community independent of the majority, that is, of the society itself; the other, by comprehending in the society so many separate descriptions of citizens as will render an unjust combination of a majority of the whole very improbable, if not impracticable.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* A pure Democracy, by which I mean a Society consisting of a small number of citizens, who assemble and administer the Government in person, can admit of no cure for the mischiefs of faction. A common passion or interest will, in almost every case, be felt by a majority of the whole; a communication and concert result from the form of Government itself; and there is nothing to check the inducements to sacrifice the weaker party, or an obnoxious individual. Hence it is, that such Democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security, or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives, as they have been violent in their deaths.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* The apportionment of taxes on the various descriptions of property is an act which seems to require the most exact impartiality; yet there is, perhaps, no legislative act in which greater opportunity and temptation are given to a predominant party to trample on the rules of justice. Every shilling which they overburden the inferior number is a shilling saved to their own pockets.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Enlightened statesmen will not always be at the helm.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Ambition must be made to counteract ambition.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* The smaller the society, the fewer probably will be the distinct parties and interests composing it; the fewer the distinct parties and interests, the more frequently will a majority be found of the same party; and the smaller the number of individuals composing a majority, and the smaller the compass within which they are placed, the more easily will they concert and execute their plans of oppression. Extend the sphere, and you take in a greater variety of parties and interests; you make it less probable that a majority of the whole will have a common motive to invade the rights of other citizens; or if such a common motive exists, it will be more difficult for all who feel it to discover their own strength, and to act in unison with each other.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Is it not the glory of the people of America, that, whilst they have paid a decent regard to the opinions of former times and other nations, they have not suffered a blind veneration for antiquity, for custom, or for names, to overrule the suggestions of their own good sense, the knowledge of their own situation, and the lessons of their own experience? To this manly spirit, posterity will be indebted for the possession, and the world for the example, of the numerous innovations displayed on the American theatre, in favor of private rights and public happiness.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Should an unwarrantable measure of the federal government be unpopular in particular States, which would seldom fail to be the case, or even a warrantable measure be so, which may sometimes be the case, the means of opposition to it are powerful and at hand.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* If it be true that all Governments rest on opinion, it is no less true, that the strength of opinion in each individual, and its practical influence on his conduct, depend much on the number which he supposes to have entertained the same opinion. The reason of man, like man himself, is timid and cautious when left alone; and acquires firmness and confidence, in proportion to the number with which it is associated.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* As the people are the only legitimate fountain of power, and it is from them that the constitutional charter, under which the several branches of government hold their power, is derived, it seems strictly consonant to the republican theory, to recur to the same original authority, not only whenever it may be necessary to enlarge, diminish, or new-model the powers of the government, but also whenever any one of the departments may commit encroachments on the chartered authorities of the others.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Justice is the end of Government. It is the end of civil society. It ever has been, and ever will be pursued, until it be obtained, or until liberty be lost in the pursuit.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Perhaps it is a universal truth that the loss of liberty at home is to be charged to provisions against danger real or pretended from abroad.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Wherever the real power in a Government lies, there is the danger of oppression. In our Governments the real power lies in the majority of the Community, and the invasion of private rights is chiefly to be apprehended, not from acts of Government contrary to the sense of its constituents, but from acts in which the Government is the mere instrument of the major number of the Constituents.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* Wherever there is an interest and power to do wrong, wrong will generally be done, and not less readily by a powerful & interested party than by a powerful and interested prince.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* A popular Government without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a Prologue to a Farce or a Tragedy, or perhaps both. Knowledge will forever govern ignorance: And a people who mean to be their own Governors, must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* No man is allowed to be a judge in his own cause; because his interest would certainly bias his judgment, and, not improbably, corrupt his integrity. With equal, nay with greater reason, a body of men are unfit to be both judges and parties at the same time.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)
* No government, any more than an individual, will long be respected without being truly respectable; nor be truly respectable without possessing a certain portion of order and stability.
* ~ James Madison ~
* 3 ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 22:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)