Mike Pence Quotes

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

In a republic, that paradise of debility, the politician is a petty tyrant who obeys the laws.

This Republic was called into being, organized, and is upheld, by a great political doctrine.

The growth of constitutional government, as we now understand it, was promoted by the establishment of two different sets of machinery for making laws and carrying on government.

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

But Connecticut and Rhode Island have originally realized the most perfect polity as to a legislature.

That our government should have been maintained in its original form from its establishment until now is not much to be wondered at. It had many props to support it through that period, which now are decayed and crumbled away. Through that period, it was felt by all to be an undecided experiment; now, it is understood to be a successful one.

Our Founding Fathers crafted a constitutional Republic for the first time in the history of the world because they were shaping a form of government that would not have the failures of a democracy in it, but had the representation of democracy in it.

As I understand the American Founders, the most brilliant and daring idea they had was that it's possible to create a free society that could stay free forever.

The only legitimate right to govern is an express grant of power from the governed.

A good constitution is infinitely better than the best despot.

Constitutional government, as designed by the framers, will survive only with a righteous people.

I am persuaded no Constitution was ever before so well calculated as ours for extensive empire and self-government.

It is not be consolidation, or concentration of powers, but by their distribution, that good government is effected.

No, my friend, the way to have good and safe government, is not to trust it all to one, but to divide it among the many.

We’ve come pretty far on this old, rickety, 18th century, political system, and I for one like it.

The legislative body possesses with us a great advantage over that of those countries where it may be adjourned or dissolved at the pleasure of the executive authority. It is self-moving and self-dependent. Although it may be convened by the executive, it cannot be adjourned or dissolved by it.

The Greek and Roman republics asserted the state to the detriment of individual freedom; modern republics either do the same, or assert individual freedom to the detriment of the state. The American republic has been instituted by Providence to realize the freedom of each other with advantage to the other.

The ancient democracies, in which the people themselves deliberated, never possessed one feature of good government. Their very character was tyranny; their figure, deformity. When they assembled, the field of debate presented an ungovernable mob, not only incapable of deliberation, but prepared for every enormity.

Form such a national government that we think best adapted for the good of the whole.

As for us BRITONS, thank Heaven, we have a better Sense of Government deliver’d to us from our Ancestors. We have the Notion of A PUBLIC and A CONSTITUTION; how a Legislative, and how an Executive is model’d.

We may define a republic to be … a government which derives all its powers directly or indirectly from the great body of the people, and is administered by persons holding their offices during pleasure for a limited period, or during good behavior.

Federalism, though it may be the most perfect [system] and the most capable of bringing happiness to human society, is nevertheless the most detrimental to the interests of our infant countries. Generally speaking our citizens are not yet able to exercise their rights fully and for themselves, because they lack the political virtues that charecterise true republics

The [founding] fathers hoped not to create a system of party government under a constitution, but rather a constitutional government that would check and control parties.

The infinitely wise and good Being has given us the sum and substance of the most perfect form of civil government in his word.... I mean that ancient plan of civil policy, delineated for the chosen tribes of Israel. In that divinely authorized constitution, we find no king, no despot, no emperor, no tyrant, no perpetual dictator allowed of.