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James Madison Quotes
These James Madison Quotes are from the years 1792-1813 and cover the
period from the early days of the new government under the US Constitution to
the early days of Madison's second term as President. These inspirational quotes are taken from his
own letters, writings and speeches, such as his inaugural addresses and state of the
union speeches. These James Madison Quotes cover such topics
as the necessity for the government to respect private property, the importance of
freedom of the press and the Constitution's limitations on federal power.
James Madison is known as the Father of the US Constitution and became the 4th
President of the United States. These James Madison Quotes are listed chronologically
and there are links to more both before and after this period at the bottom of the page.
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James Madison |
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James Madison Quotes
"Conscience is the most sacred of all property." - Essay on Property,
March 29, 1792
"A just security to property is not afforded by that government, under which
unequal taxes oppress one species of property and reward another species."
- Essay on Property, March 29, 1792
"The government of the United States is a definite government, confined to
specified objects. It is not like state governments, whose powers are more
general. Charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government."
- Speech in the House of Representatives, January 10, 1794
"I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which
granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money
of their constituents." - Annals of Congress, House of Representatives,
January 10, 1794
 Montpelier -
Home of
James Madison
"The right of freely examining public characters and measures, and of free
communication among the people thereon... has ever been justly deemed the only
effectual guardian of every other right." - Virginia Resolution of 1798, 1798
"The right of electing the members of the government constitutes more
particularly the essence of a free and responsible government. The value
and efficacy of this right depends on the knowledge of the comparative
merits and demerits of the candidates for public trust, and on the equal
freedom, consequently, of examining and discussing these merits and demerits
of the candidates respectively." - Report on the Virginia Resolutions,
1798
"Perhaps it is a universal truth that the loss of liberty at home is to be
charged against provisions against danger, real or pretended from abroad."
- Letter to Thomas Jefferson,
May 13, 1798
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James Madison Quotes
"This Assembly doth explicitly and peremptorily declare, that it views the
powers of the federal government, as resulting from the compact, to which
the states are parties, as limited by the plain sense and intention of the
instrument constituting the compact; as no further valid than they are
authorized by the grants enumerated in that compact; and that in case of
deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exercise of other powers, not granted
by the said compact, the states who are parties thereto, have the right,
and are in duty bound, to interpose, for arresting the progress of the
evil, and for maintaining within their respective limits, the authorities,
rights and liberties appertaining to them." - Virginia Resolution of
1798, December 21, 1798
"Resolved, That the General Assembly of Virginia, doth unequivocally express
a firm resolution to maintain and defend the Constitution of the United
States, and the Constitution of this State, against every aggression
either foreign or domestic, and that they will support the Government
of the United States in all measures warranted by the former." - Virginia
Resolution of 1798, December 21, 1798
"The right of freely examining public characters and measures, and of free
communication among the people thereon... has ever been justly deemed the
only effectual guardian of every other right." - Virginia Resolutions,
December 21, 1798
"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?" - Report on the
Virginia Resolutions, January 20, 1800
"The Constitution is nicely balanced with the federative and popular
principles; the Senate are the guardians of the former, and the House
of Representatives of the latter; and any attempts to destroy this
balance, under whatever specious names or pretences they may be presented,
should be watched with a jealous eye." - Speech in the United States
Congress, December, 1803
"We have all been encouraged to feel in the guardianship and guidance
of that Almighty Being, whose power regulates the destiny of nations."
-
First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1809
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James Madison Quotes
"I repair to the post assigned me with no other discouragement than
what springs from my own inadequacy to its high duties. If I do not
sink under the weight of this deep conviction it is because I find
some support in a consciousness of the purposes and a confidence in
the principles which I bring with me into this arduous service. To
cherish peace and friendly intercourse with all nations having
correspondent dispositions; to maintain sincere neutrality toward
belligerent nations; to prefer in all cases amicable discussion and
reasonable accommodation of differences to a decision of them by an
appeal to arms; to exclude foreign intrigues and foreign partialities,
so degrading to all countries and so baneful to free ones; to foster a
spirit of independence too just to invade the rights of others, too
proud to surrender our own, too liberal to indulge unworthy prejudices
ourselves and too elevated not to look down upon them in others; to hold
the union of the States as the basis of their peace and happiness; to
support the Constitution, which is the cement of the Union, as well in
its limitations as in its authorities; to respect the rights and authorities
reserved to the States and to the people as equally incorporated with and
essential to the success of the general system; to avoid the slightest
interference with the right of conscience or the functions of religion, so
wisely exempted from civil jurisdiction; to preserve in their full energy
the other salutary provisions in behalf of private and personal rights,
and of the freedom of the
press; to observe economy in public expenditures;
to liberate the public resources by an honorable discharge of the public
debts; to keep within the requisite limits a standing military force,
always remembering that an armed and trained militia is the firmest bulwark
of republics - that without standing armies their liberty can never be in
danger, nor with large ones safe; to promote by authorized means improvements
friendly to agriculture, to manufactures, and to external as well as internal
commerce; to favor in like manner the advancement of science and the diffusion
of information as the best aliment to true liberty; to carry on the benevolent
plans which have been so meritoriously applied to the conversion of our
aboriginal neighbors from the degradation and wretchedness of savage life
to a participation of the improvements of which the human mind and manners
are susceptible in a civilized state - as far as sentiments and intentions
such as these can aid the fulfillment of my duty, they will be a resource
which can not fail me." - First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1809
"American citizens are instrumental in carrying on a traffic in enslaved
Africans, equally in violation of the laws of humanity and in defiance of
those of their own country. The same just and benevolent motives which
produced interdiction in force against this criminal conduct will doubtless
be felt by Congress in devising further means of suppressing the evil."
- State of the Union, December 5, 1810
"Whilst it is universally admitted that a well-instructed people alone can
be permanently a free people, and whilst it is evident that the means of
diffusing and improving useful knowledge form so small a proportion of the
expenditures for national purposes, I can not presume it to be unseasonable
to invite your attention to the advantages of superadding to the means of
education provided by the several States a seminary of learning instituted
by the National Legislature within the limits of their exclusive jurisdiction,
the expense of which might be defrayed or reimbursed out of the vacant grounds
which have accrued to the nation within those limits.
Need some more James Madison
Quotes? Read on!
Such an institution, though local in its legal character, would be universal
in its beneficial effects. By enlightening the opinions, by expanding the
patriotism, and by assimilating the principles, the sentiments, and the
manners of those who might resort to this temple of science, to be redistributed
in due time through every part of the community, sources of jealousy and prejudice
would be diminished, the features of national character would be multiplied, and
greater extent given to social harmony. But, above all, a well-constituted
seminary in the center of the nation is recommended by the consideration that
the additional instruction emanating from it would contribute not less to
strengthen the foundations than to adorn the structure of our free and happy
system of government." - State of the Union, December 5, 1810
"The war [of 1812] has proved... that our free Government, like other free
Governments, though slow in its early movements, acquires, in its progress, a
force proportioned to its freedom..." - State of the Union, December 7,
1813
"To exclude foreign intrigues and foreign partialities, so degrading to all
countries and so baneful to free ones; to foster a spirit of independence too
just to invade the rights of others, too proud to surrender our own, too
liberal to indulge unworthy prejudices ourselves and too elevated not to
look down upon them in others; to hold the union of the States on the basis
of their peace and happiness; to support the Constitution, which is the
cement of the Union, as well in its limitations as in its authorities; to
respect the rights and authorities reserved to the States and to the people
as equally incorporated with and essential to the success of the general...
as far as sentiments and intentions such as these can aid the fulfillment of
my duty, they will be a resource which can not fail me." - Second Inaugural
Address, March, 1813
"To render the justice of the war on our part the more conspicuous, the
reluctance to commence it was followed by the earliest and strongest
manifestations of a disposition to arrest its progress. The sword was
scarcely out of the scabbard before the enemy was apprised of the reasonable
terms on which it would be resheathed." - Second Inaugural Address, March,
1813
"I do therefore issue this my proclamation, recommending to all who shall be
piously disposed to unite their hearts and voices in addressing at one and
the same time their vows and adorations to the Great Parent and Sovereign
of the Universe that they assemble on the second Thursday of September next
in their respective religious congregations to render Him thanks for the
many blessings He has bestowed on the people of the United States: that He
has blessed them with a land capable of yielding all the necessaries and
requisites of human life, with ample means for convenient exchanges with
foreign countries; that He has blessed the labors employed in its cultivation
and improvement; that He is now blessing the exertions to extend and establish
the arts and manufactures which will secure within ourselves supplies too
important to remain dependent on the precarious policy or the peaceable
dispositions of other nations, and particularly that He has blessed the
United States with a Political constitution founded on the will and authority
of the whole people and guaranteeing to each Individual security, not only of
his person and his property, but of those sacred rights of conscience so
essential to his present happiness and so dear to his future hopes; that
with those expressions of devout thankfulness be joined supplications to
the same Almighty Power that He would look down with compassion on our
infirmities: that He would pardon our manifold transgressions and awaken
and strengthen in all the wholesome purposes of repentance and amendment:
that in this season of trial and calamity He would preside in a particular
manner over our public councils and inspire all citizens with a love of
their country and with those fraternal affections and that mutual confidence
which have so happy a tendency to make us safe at home and respected abroad:
and that as He was graciously pleased heretofore to smile on our struggles
against the attempts of the Government of the Empire of which these States
then made a part to wrest from them the rights and privileges to which they
were entitled in common with every other Part and to raise them to the station
or an independent and sovereign people, so He would now be pleased in like
manner to bestow His blessing on our arms in resisting the hostile and
persevering efforts of the same power to degrade us on the ocean, the
common inheritance of all, from rights and immunities belonging and
essential to the American people as a coequal member of the great community
of independent nations; and that, inspiring our enemies with moderation,
with justice, and with that spirit of reasonable accommodation which our
country has continued to manifest, we may be enabled to beat our swords
into Plowshares and to enjoy in peace every man the fruits of his honest
industry and the rewards of his lawful enterprise." - Proclamation,
July 23, 1813
"The destiny of the United States [is] to be a great, a flourishing, and a
powerful nation..." - State of the Union, December, 1813
 If you liked our James Madison Quotes,
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You can visit Montpelier, James Madison's home today. It has lots of memorabilia
and things to do. Visit the
Montpelier website here.
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