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In questions of power, then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution.
--Thomas Jefferson
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America's Constitution is one of the most elegant documents ever written, the blueprint of the world's oldest and most stable democracy. It is only a few pages in length, but the nation that the Constitution's Framers architected has had a new presidential election like clockwork every four years for over 200 years without interruption. In all that time, the Constitution has been amended only a handful of times (twenty-six, if you count all the Amendments, but the first ten of them came as a single package, and the 18th was a debacle repealed by the 21st). An engineer would call any airplane that flew that long with such a safety record a successful design.
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Democracy is when two wolves and a lamb vote on what to eat for dinner.
--P.J. O'Rourke
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While around the world both democracy and the free market are gaining ground, few understand that democracy is a necessary but not sufficient condition for a just and prosperous society. There must be limitations on what the majority can decide, or better still, the government must be explicitly authorized to decide only certain things. This philosophy of delegation of authority is unique to the US Constitution, and is fundamental to its success.
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Liberty has never come from the government. Liberty has always come from the subjects of government. The history of liberty is the history of resistance. The history of liberty is a history of the limitation of governmental power, not the increase of it.
--Woodrow Wilson
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Unfortunately, the Constitution was greatly weakened in 1937, when, under pressure from President Roosevelt, the Supreme Court ruled to end strict interpretation and unchain the federal government. This experimental design change has proved a disastrous mistake, allowing the enormous expansion in parasitic government. It is time to return to the Constitution's original interpretation: every American should be familiar with it and the other founding documents, and should be able to name every amendment in the Bill of Rights. You can find copies and resources at the Constitution Society and at The National Archives and Records Administration. The Cato Institute has numerous analyses of constitutional issues, and offers a nifty shirt-pocket Constitution for only a buck. Check out The Legal Times for the latest constitutional doings and distortions.
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(The Framers of the Constitution) knew from vivid, personal experience that freedom depends on effective restraints against the accumulation of power in a single authority. ... Government does not have an unlimited claim on the earnings of individuals. One of the foremost precepts of the natural law is man's right to the possession and the use of his property. And a man's earnings are his property as much as his land and the house in which he lives. ...
--Barry Goldwater
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