James Madison Quotes

If we advert to the nature of republican government, we shall find that the censorial power is in the people over the government, and not in the government over the people.

Governments can be useful to the governed only so long as inherent tendencies toward tyranny are restrained.

There is too much government today. We've got to remember the government should be by the people, of the people, and for the people.

The founders had a strong distrust for centralized power in a federal government. So they created a government with checks and balances. This was to prevent any branch of the government from becoming too powerful.

Our great Republic is a government of laws and not of men. Here, the people rule.

Maintaining checks and balances on the power of the Judiciary Branch and the other two branches is vital to keep the form of government set up by our Founding Fathers.

The framers hated the tyranny of King George, but they were also afraid of the mob. That's why they put so many checks and balances into our system, to guard against the excesses of a government that might be inflamed by public passion or perverted by a dictator's whim.

We are a nation that has a government - not the other way around. And this makes us special among the nations of the earth. Our government has no power except that granted to it by the people It is time to check and reverse the growth of government which shows signs of having grown beyond the consent of the governed.

A government, the constitution of which renders it unfit to be trusted with all the powers which a free people ought to delegate to any government, would be an unsafe and improper depositary of the NATIONAL INTERESTS.

Most governments are designed to protect the government from the people, whereas the United States government was organized to protect the people from the government.

The government itself, which is only the mode which the people have chosen to execute their will, is equally liable to be abused and perverted before the people can act through it.

A government ought to contain in itself every power requisite to the full accomplishment of the objects committed to its care, and to the complete execution of the trusts for which it is responsible, free from every other control but a regard to the public good and to the sense of the people.

I do believe that it was through divine providence that the Founding Fathers drafted a document that created a government that didn't trust each other - hence the separation of powers. And then, to close the deal, the Bill of Rights was added to continue to protect individual rights and freedoms.

Democracy is when the people keep a government in check.

A constitution, in the American sense of the word, is a written instrument by which the fundamental powers of the government are established, limited, and defined, and by which these powers are distributed among several departments, for their more safe and useful exercise, for the benefit of the body politic.

In our system of democracy, our government works on a system of checks and balances. Instead of stripping power from the courts, I believe we should follow the process prescribed in our Constitution - consideration of a Constitutional amendment.

In a republic this rule ought to be observed: that the majority should not have the predominant power.

The only sure bulwark of continuing liberty is a government strong enough to protect the interests of the people, and a people strong enough and well enough informed to maintain its sovereign control over the goverment.

It's not tyranny we desire; it's a just, limited, federal government.

What's brilliant about the United States system of government is separation of power. Not only the executive, legislative, judicial branches, but also the independence of the military from civilians, an independent media and press, an independent central bank.

This is a country for, of, and by the people not for, of, and by the government. If we turn it over to them we cannot complain about what they're doing because this is a natural course of men and we have to hold their feet to the fire.

I believe that Americans should be deeply skeptical of government power. You cannot trust people in power. The founders knew that. That's why they divided power among three branches, to set interest against interest.

The Constitution is government's stop sign. It says, you - the three branches of government - can go so far and no farther.

The real difference between the United States and other nations lies not in the words of the preamble to the Constitution, but in the fact that the substantive clauses of that Constitution are enforced by individuals independent of and not beholden to the elected branches.

The checks and balances is a way to prevent government from either devolving into an autocratic tyranny or an autocratic mob mentality.