詹姆斯·麥迪遜的十大憲法製定金句

• "The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government, are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite."

• "If men were angels, no government would be necessary."

• "The happy Union of these States is a wonder; their Constitution a miracle; their example the hope of Liberty throughout the world."

• "The accumulation of all powers legislative, executive and judiciary in the same hands, whether of one, a few or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny."

• "In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself."

• "If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary."

• "The essence of Government is power; and power, lodged as it must be in human hands, will ever be liable to abuse."

• "It will be of little avail to the people, that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood; if they be repealed or revised before they are promulgated, or undergo such incessant changes that no man, who knows what the law is today, can guess what it will be tomorrow."

• "Conscience is the most sacred of all property."

• "The preservation of the sacred fire of liberty, and the destiny of the Republican model of Government, are justly considered as deeply, perhaps as finally staked, on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people."