Abraham Lincoln Quotes

The first duty of a state is to provide for its own conservation. Until that point is secured, it can preserve and protect nothing else. But, if possible, it has greater interest in acting according to strict law than even the subject himself. For if the people see that the law is violated to crush them, they will certainly despise the law. They, or their party, will be easily led to violate it, whenever they can, by all the means in their power. Except in cases of direct war, whenever government abandons law, it proclaims anarchy.

It will give satisfaction to the people; and be a happy means, under providence, of preventing popular commotions, mobs, bloodshed and civil war.

Democracy is usually seen as a pacifying force that “draws the teeth” from conflict.

It's important to show that, while authorizing the demonstrations and promoting diversity of opinion, the Republic can't allow itself to be undermined from within.

If notwithstanding, a Rebellion of the same Kind now afflicts this Country, we should not infer that this Institution is useless, or should be laid aside; but just the Reverse.

Our country is not in crisis; there are no tanks in the streets. No matter what the outcome of the president's situation, life in America will go on. Our lives will continue to be filled with practical matters, not constitutional ones.

Men may die, but the fabric of free institutions remain unshaken.

When the government violates the people's rights, insurrection is ... the most sacred of rights and the most indispensable of duties.

When the government violates the people's rights, insurrection is, for the people … the most sacred of the rights and the most indispensable of duties.

Broken eggs cannot be mended.... This government cannot much longer play a game in which it stakes all, and its enemies stake nothing. Those enemies must understand that they cannot experiment for ten years trying to destroy the government, and if they fail, still come back into the Union unhurt.

Is it possible to tolerate the state order being undermined from morning to night because doing so is supposedly a democratic obligation.

I still believe that a fight between two brothers should not destroy peace and harmony and bring trouble to the common man.

Where there is law, and where there is government, there is security.

Law and order are more fragile than we might think.

I am not worried about this country ever going Communist. We have too much sense for that

The culture of a revolution is not necessarily compatible with the culture of a Constitutional Democracy

The government bodies known to you have presented me a resignation demand. Taking into account that the execution of the constitutional power of the president in the situation that has been created could pose serious danger to the stability of the country, I accept that demand and announce my resignation.

The word SECURITY is the first and last chapter of the constitution of France.

Rebellion against a king may be pardoned, or lightly punished, but the man who dares to rebel against the laws of a republic ought to suffer death.

The American war is over; but this far from being the case with the American revolution. On the contrary, nothing but the first act of the drama is closed. It remains yet to establish and perfect our new forms of government, and to prepare the principles, morals, and manners of our citizens for these forms of government after they are established and brought to perfection.

One should not maintain a dispute.

What security have you for your own safety if every man of vile temper, of low instincts, of base purpose, can find in his own heart a higher law than that which is the rule of society, the Constitution, and the Bible? These higher-law preachers should be tarred and feathered, and whipped by those they have thus instigated. This, my friends, is what was called in good old revolutionary times, Lynch Law. It is sometimes the very best law, because it deals summary justice upon those who would otherwise escape from all other kinds of punishment.

Public liberty, with internal peace and order, has flourished almost without interruption.

People must accept that their governments cannot guarantee absolute safety. A measure of insecurity is the price of liberty and democracy. It’s a price worth paying.

The whole point is to accommodate one right with another. Yes, that will leave some people disappointed, even angry, but the idea of the Constitution is to promote freedom, not to make everyone happy.