Thomas Jefferson Quotes

Whatever power may be necessary for the National Government a certain portion must necessarily be left in the States. It is impossible for one power to pervade the extreme parts of the U.S. so as to carry equal justice to them.

The right of each State to order and control its own domestic institutions according to its own judgment exclusively is essential to the balance of powers on which the perfection and endurance of our political fabric depends.

the several states who formed that instrument, being sovereign and independent, have the unquestionable right to judge of its infraction; and that a nullification, by those sovereignties, of all unauthorized acts done under colour of that instrument, is the rightful remedy:

I confess I am at a loss to discover what temptation the persons entrusted with the administration of the general government could ever feel to divest the States of the authorities of that description. The regulation of the mere domestic police of a State appears to me to hold out slender allurements to ambition.

Today neither of our two parties maintains a meaningful commitment to the principle of States' Rights. The 10th Amendment is not a 'general assumption' but a rule of law. States rights mean that states have a right to act or not to act, as they see fit, in areas reserved to them.

The word "federalism" you might think that means federalism trumps everything; federalism means federal domination. It does not mean that. It means the exact opposite, in fact. It means the states are sovereign and the federal government cannot tell 'em what to do in so many different ways.

The Constitution of the United States was created by the people of the United States composing the respective states, who alone had the right.

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

The State governments possess inherent advantages, which will ever give them an influence and ascendancy over the National Government, and will for ever preclude the possibility of federal encroachments. That their liberties, indeed, can be subverted by the federal head, is repugnant to every rule of political calculation.

I am encouraged that there's going to be much better dialogue between the federal government and the state of Arizona. I mean, I hope that's not wishful thinking.

There is no direct and immediate connection between the individual citizens of a state and the general government. The relation between them is through the state. The Union is a union of states as communities and not a union of individuals.

What happens when there is a conflict between the Scottish parliament, if it was established, and the Westminster parliament? Who is supreme?

Our political machine, composed of thirteen independent sovereignties, have been perpetually operating against each other and against the federal head ever since the peace.

The danger in our system is that the general government, which represents the interests of the whole, may encroach on the states, which represent the peculiar and local interests, or that the latter may encroach on the former.

I hope in time N. H. as well as the other States will feel the importance of Sovereignty.

For six years the senators are rendered totally and absolutely independent of their States, of whom they ought to be the representatives, without any bond or tie between them: During that time they may join in measures ruinous and destructive to their States, even such as should totally annihilate their State governments, and their States cannot recall them, nor exercise any controul over them.

No no. Mix them up. I’m tired of States’ rights.

The States have always borne primary responsibility for operating the machinery of criminal justice within their borders, and adapting it to their peculiar circumstances.

I cannot recall ever seeing the words “state soverigenty” in the Federal Constituiton. I taught the subject for years, and studied the Constitutional Convention and I don’t ever remember seeing that term.

I was in Europe when the Constitution was planned, and never saw it till after it was established. On receiving it, I wrote strongly to Mr. Madison, urging the want of provision for... an express reservation to the States of all rights not specifically granted to the Union

There is a tension between the flexibility we give states and the accountability we require from states.

As long as there are sovereign nations possessing great power, war is inevitable.

as a barrier between the central government and the respective states and their citizens.

[The new Federal Government] would either triumph over the state governments and reduce them to entire subordination or in the course of a few years … the contests about the boundaries of power between the particular [State] governments and the general government … will produce a dissolution of the union.

It is well known that this was one of the most delicate questions involved in the formation of the Constitution. Like every other of the same difficult character, it was disposed of in the general compromise of interests, which were the subject of deliberation and adjustment, and it is not too much to say, that the Union could never have been formed if the right of interference with this question, on the part of the General Government, had been insisted on.