Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Thomas Jefferson on Protecting the Rights of the People (3 of 3)

clipped from etext.virginia.edu


"We may consider each generation as a distinct nation, with a right, by the will of its majority, to bind themselves, but none to bind the succeeding generation, more than the inhabitants of another country." --Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 1813. ME 13:270


"[As to] the question whether, by the laws of nature, one generation of men can, by any act of theirs, bind those which are to follow them? I say, by the laws of nature, there being between generation and generation, as between nation and nation, no other obligatory law." --Thomas Jefferson to Joseph C. Cabell, 1814. ME 14:67


"I may err in my measures, but never shall deflect from the intention to fortify the public liberty by every possible means, and to put it out of the power of the few to riot on the labors of the many." --Thomas Jefferson to John Tyler, 1804. ME 11:33


"[Oppose] with manly firmness [any] invasions on the rights of the people." --Thomas Jefferson: Draft Virginia Constitution, 1776. (*) Papers 1:338

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