"It astonishes me to find... [that so many] of our countrymen... should be contented to live under a system which leaves to their governors the power of taking from them the trial by jury in civil cases, freedom of religion, freedom of the press, freedom of commerce, the habeas corpus laws, and of yoking them with a standing army. This is a degeneracy in the principles of liberty... which I [would not have expected for at least] four centuries." - Thomas Jefferson to William Stephens Smith, 1788
"I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves, and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education." - Thomas Jefferson, letter to William C. Jarvis, September 28, 1820
"There has never been a golden age of liberty, and there never will be. People who value freedom will always have to defend it from those who claim the right to wield power over others." - David Boaz