Jean-Jacques Rousseau Quotes

Whoever refuses to obey the general will will be forced to do so by the entire body; this means merely that he will be forced to be free.

It is self-evident that no number of men, by conspiring, and calling themselves a government, can acquire any rights whatever over other men, or other men's property, which they had not before, as individuals.

The laws receive their force and authority from an oath of fidelity, either tacit or expressed, which living subjects have sworn to their sovereign, in order to restrain the intestine fermentation of the private interest of individuals.

The body-politic is formed by a voluntary association of individuals: It is a social compact, by which the whole people covenants with each citizen, and each citizen with the whole people, that all shall be governed by certain laws for the common good. It is the duty of the people, therefore, in framing a Constitution of Government, to provide for an equitable mode of making laws, as well as for an impartial interpretation, and a faithful execution of them; that every man may, at all times, find his security in them.

A body politic is a social compact by which the whole people covenants with each citizen, and each citizen with the whole people, that all shall be governed by certain laws for the common good.

… by consenting with others to make one body-politic under government, a man puts himself under an obligation to every one of that society to submit to the determination of the majority, and to be concluded by it.

Formerly government was the responsibility of people; now people were the responsibility of government.

I think it is definitely right to listen to the Party and follow up government's instructions.

The proper balance between individual liberty and central authority is a very ancient problem.

No man ever freely surrendered a portion of his own liberty for the sake of the public good; such a chimera appears only in fiction. If it were possible, we would each prefer that the pacts binding others did not bind us; every man sees himself as the centre of all the world's affairs.

If nationality is consent, the state is compulsion.

Society exists for the benefit of its members, not the members for the benefit of society.

Government loses its claim to legitimacy when it fails to fulfill its obligations.

Trial by jury. Live wherever you can make a living. How could a government based on such principles fail?

And so, today, if the state can no longer appeal to the old moral principles that belong to the Christian tradition, it will be forced to create a new official faith and new moral principles which will be binding on its citizens.

A contract for the establishment of government, being nothing but a voluntary contract between individuals for their mutual benefit, differs, in nothing that is essential to its validity, from any other contract between man and man, or between nation and nation.

I now add, farther, that the apostle's argument is so far from proving it to be the duty of people to obey, and submit to, such rulers as act in contradiction to the public good, and so to the design of their office, that it proves the direct contrary.

The nation is formed through the law of nature alone. Government stems from the will of nation. The nation stands before all things and is the source of all things. Its will is always law. Above it and before it is but the law of nature alone. By virtue of its very existence, the nation is all things that it may be. The nation cannot surrender its right to a tyrant.

Governments rather depend upon men, than men upon governments.

Ask not what you can do for your country; ask what your government is doing to you.

The preservation of the laws was the sole reason which induced men to allow of, and to elect a superior; that is the true origin of sovereign power.

If my fellow citizens want to go to Hell I will help them. It's my job.

… the origin of all civil government, justly established, must be a voluntary compact, between the rulers and the ruled; and must be liable to such limitations, as are necessary for the security of the absolute rights of the latter; for what original title can any man or set of men have, to govern others, except their own consent?

It is a maxim that in every Government, there must exist, somewhere a Supreme, Sovereign, absolute, and uncontrollable Power; But this Power resides, always in the body of the People, and it never was, or can be delegated, to one Man, or a few.

Americans, by means of the Declaration of Independence and the Preamble of the Constitution, entered into a social contract which the successive generations assent to yet change its meanings with the changing contexts of different times.