The main objects of all science, the freedom and happiness of man. . . . [are] the sole objects of all legitimate government.

(A plaque with this quotation, with the first phrase omitted, is in the stairwell of the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty.)

I predict future happiness for Americans, if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.

I know no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves ; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education. This is the true corrective of abuses of constitutional power.

Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter

The policy of the American government is to leave their citizens free, neither restraining nor aiding them in their pursuits.

Freedom of religion, freedom of the press, freedom of person under the protection of the habeas corpus; and trial by juries impartially selected, - these principles form the bright constellation which has gone before us