John Adams Quotes

Without the pen of Paine, the sword of Washington would have been wielded in vain.

… persons, whose design, from the beginning of their opposition to the Stamp Act, was to throw off all subordination and connection with Great Britain; who meant by every fiction, falsehood and fraud, to delude the people from their due allegiance, to throw the subsisting Governments into anarchy, to incite the ignorant and vulgar to arms, and with those arms to establish American Independence --- were Congregational and Presbyterian republicans, or men of bankrupt fortunes, overwhelmed in debt to the British merchants.

Religious doctrine and rhetoric … contributed in a fundamental way to the coming of the American Revolution and its final success …. Where political theory advised caution, religious doctrine demanded action. By turning Colonial resistance into a righteous cause, and by carrying the message to all ranks and in all parts of the colonies, ministers did the work of secular radicalism and did it better.

If not for John Adams leading a revolution against Great Britain...This would be the BAFTAs.

While most Americans know about the Boston Tea Party, few are aware of the Liberty Tree and how important it was to fanning the flames of rebellion that led to the revolution in 1775 and the Declaration of Independence.

Americans have always been amongst the most revolutionary people of the world.

[Referring to Patrick Henry:] ... a man of desperate circumstances ... who excited the People to join in ... outrageous and rebellious Practices.

The Revolution in America signaled the beginning of a new political era, that this revolution would necessarily determine an important progress in world civilization and that before long, it would cause great changes in the social order which then existed in Europe.

There is a hundred times more enthusiasm for this revolution in any café in Paris than there is in all the United States together.

The taverns were the headquarters of the American Revolution.

The American Revolution was a conservative revolution.

Patriotic smugglers in the War of Independence become unpatriotic smugglers after the revolution.

The general temper of the People, as well here as other parts of America, is very warm. They look upon the Chastisement of Boston to be purposely vigorous, and held up by way of intimidation to all America; and in short that Boston is suffering in the Common Cause.

This [passing the Prohibitory Act] puts us in a complete war with America.

Quite naturally, the men who led in stirring up the revolt against Great Britain and in keeping the fighting temper of the Revolutionists at the proper heat were the boldest and most radical thinkers - men like Samuel Adams, Thomas Paine, Patrick Henry, and Thomas Jefferson.

The United States was born in revolution and nurtured by struggle. Throughout our history, the American people have befriended and supported all those who seek independence and a better way of life.

Without Virginia, as we must all acknowledge--without her Patrick Henry among the people, her Lees and Jefferson in the forum, and her Washington in the field--I will not say that the cause of American liberty and American independence must have been ultimately defeated--no, no, there was no ultimate defeat for that cause in the decrees of the Most High; but it must have been delayed, postponed, perplexed, and to many eyes and hearts rendered seemingly hopeless.

Revolutions are the produce of passion, not of sober and tranquil reason.

The American revolutionaries believed in the power of the word. But they had only word of mouth and the printing press. We have the Internet.

I was born in revolution.

You can kill a revolutionary but you can never kill the revolution.

In January 1776, Thomas Paine issued 'Common Sense,' advocating independence from Great Britain.

All political revolutions, not affected by foreign conquest, originate in moral revolutions. The subversion of established institutions is merely one consequence of the previous subversion of established opinions.

I don't know what the next American revolution is going to be like, but we might be able to imagine it if your imagination were rich enough.

The progress of the American Revolution has been so rapid and such the alteration of manners, the blending of characters, and the new train of ideas that almost universally prevail, that the principles which animated to the noblest exertions have been nearly annihilated.