Spirit of 1776
Words of Wisdom from the Founding Fathers and Southerners of the ante-bellum period
"The government turns every contingency into an excuse for enhancing power in itself."
"You have rights antecedent to all earthly governments; rights that cannot be repealed or restrained by human laws; rights derived from the Great Legislator of the Universe."
"In a state of tranquillity, wealth, and luxury, our descendants would forget the arts of war and the noble activity and zeal which made their ancestors invincible. Every art of corruption would be employed to loosen the bond of union which renders our resistance formidable. When the spirit of liberty which now animates our hearts and gives success to our arms is extinct, our numbers will accelerate our ruin and render us easier victims to tyranny."
"Our contest is not only whether we ourselves shall be free, but whether there shall be left to mankind an asylum on earth for civil and religious liberty."
"The truth is, all might be free if they valued freedom, and defended it as they ought. ... The liberties of our country, the freedom of our civil constitution, are worth defending at all hazards: And it is our duty to defend them against all attacks."
Johm C. Calhoun hailed the right of suffrage as "the indispensable and primary principle in the foundation of a constitutional government," but warned that in order for suffrage to serve this purpose the public must be sufficiently enlightened to understand their own rights under the Constitution and "the interests of the community," and "to appreciate the motives and conduct of those appointed to make and execute the laws."
"The North has adopted a system of revenue and disbursements in which an undue proportion of the burden of taxation has been imposed upon the South, and an undue proportion of its proceeds appropriated to the North."
"… the State was compelled to choose between absolute acquiescence in a ruinous system of oppression, or a resort to her reserved powers--powers of which she alone was the rightful judge …" (*)
"The people of Carolina believe that the Union is a union of States, and not of individuals; that it was formed by the States, and that the citizens of the several States were bound to it through the acts of their several States; that each State ratified the Constitution for itself, and that it was only by such ratification of a State that any obligation was imposed upon its citizens."(*)
* = excerpts from Calhoun's remarks to the U.S. Senate, Feb. 1833)
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." (1759)
At the conclusion of the Constitutional Convention, Benjamin Franklin was asked what have you wrought? He answered, "… a Republic, if you can keep it."
"The sacred rights of mankind are not to be rummaged for, among old parchments, or musty records. They are written, as with a sun beam in the whole volume of human nature, by the hand of the divinity itself; and can never be erased or obscured by mortal power." (1775)
"There is no position which depends on clearer principles, than that every act of a delegated authority, contrary to the tenor of the commission under which it is exercised, is void. No legislative act, therefore, contrary to the Constitution, can be valid. To deny this, would be to affirm, that the deputy is greater than his principal; that the servant is above his master; that the representatives of the people are superior to the people themselves; that men acting by virtue of powers, may do not only what their powers do not authorize, but what they forbid." (from Federalist #78)
"Are we at last brought to such humiliating and debasing degradation, that we cannot be trusted with arms for our defense?"
"Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect everyone who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are inevitably ruined."
"This government subjects everything to the Northern majority. Is there not a settled purpose to the Southern interest? We thus put unbounded power over our own property in hands not having a common interest with us. How can the Southern members prevent the adoption of the most oppressive taxation in the Southern states, as there is a majority in favour in the Northern states?"
"Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death!"
"… towards uniformity. … one half the world fools, …"
"… most corrupt government on the earth …"
"… will of the majority … equal rights … oppression."
"… entangling alliances with none."
"To coerce a State would be more like a declaration of war than an infliction of punishment, and would probably be considered by the party attacked as a dissolution of all previous compacts." (Records of the Debates on the Federal Constitution of 1787)
"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.... No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare."
"The laying a Country desolate with Fire and Sword, declaring War against the natural rights of all Mankind, and extirpating the Defenders thereof from the Face of the Earth, is the Concern of every Man to whom Nature hath given the Power of feeling; …"
"government even in its best state is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one …"
"I draw my idea of the form of government from a principle in nature, which no art can overturn, viz. that the more simple any thing is, the less liable it is to be disordered; and the easier repaired when disordered …"
"The sun never shined on a cause of greater worth." [referring to independence of the American colonies from the English monarchy]
"There is not a fact in all history more indisputable than that the several States which adopted the Constitution of the United States, for the establishment of the government over them, at the time of its adoption were free, sovereign, and independent States; and by no declaration of theirs have they renounced their sovereignty." 1860
"Abolish the Constitution, and the Union is destroyed."