Tag Archives: Federal Government

First Principles: States and Their Militias Serve A Powerful Check To the Ambition and Power of the Federal Government

“Besides the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation, the existence of subordinate governments, to which the people are attached and by which the militia officers are appointed, forms a barrier … Continue reading

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First Principles: The Composition of the Federal Judiciary Makes or Breaks Our Constitution and Therefore Our Nation

“It has long, however, been my opinion, and I have never shrunk from its expression … that the germ of dissolution of our federal government is in the constitution of the federal Judiciary; working like gravity by night and by … Continue reading

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First Principles: The Constitution Forbids the Federal Government From Meddling In the Free Exercise of Faith

“I consider the government of the United States as interdicted by the Constitution from intermeddling with religious institutions, their doctrines, discipline, or exercises. This results not only from the provision that no law shall be made respecting the establishment or … Continue reading

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First Principles: The Federal Government Should Be Most Focused On External Goals

“Another not unimportant consideration is, that the powers of the general government will be, and indeed must be, principally employed upon external objects, such as war, peace, negotiations with foreign powers, and foreign commerce.” – Joseph Story (1833)     … Continue reading

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First Principles: The People Have A Right To Redress Governmental Excess

“If the federal government should overpass the just bounds of its authority and make a tyrannical use of its powers, the people … must appeal to the standard they have formed, and take such measures to redress the injury done … Continue reading

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First Principles: The Bill of Rights Is To Prevent the Encroachment of the Federal Government On Private Rights

“The invasion of private rights is chiefly to be apprehended, not from acts of Government contrary to the sense of its constituents, but from acts in which the Government is the mere instrument of the major number of the Constituents.” … Continue reading

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First Principles: The Federal Government Has Definitive Roles

“The government of the United States is a definite government, confined to specified objects. It is not like the state governments whose powers are more general.”– James Madison This quote is taken from a speech in the House of Representatives … Continue reading

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