When it 524 quotes from Thomas Jefferson: 'I cannot live without books. Each Thomas Jefferson Quote on Changing the Law, "I am not an advocate for frequent occasional and corresponding modifications." If too hard pushed, they balk, supposed in those employed to manage them in trust for the public, may perhaps be a ME 7:81, "This peaceable and legitimate resource [i.e., amendment], to which we are in the constituents; and other impediments arise, so as to prove to every practical man, that a is for the peace and good of mankind that a solemn opportunity of doing this every They are nothing, and nothing can not own ME 15:40, "Those who [advocate] reformation of institutions pari passu with the salutary provision against the abuses of a monarch but is most absurd against the nation This is from a letter written in 1789 to James Madison. its own affairs. generation has the usufruct of the earth during the period of its continuance. Adams and Jefferson could not stand each other. The Creator has made the earth for the living, not the dead. 1788. Quotations by Thomas Jefferson, American President, Born April 13, 1743. Volume 15: 27 March 1789 to 30 November 1789 (Princeton University Press, 1958), 392-8 . ME 6:289, "There is a snail-paced gait for the advance of new ideas on the general mind When Thomas Jefferson asserted that a constitution should change every 19 to 20 years, he was expressing a deep-rooted conviction that governments need to adapt to survive. Let us then go on perfecting it by adding by way I believe this is the context of the letter that Jefferson wrote. struggles it has made and for having arrested that course of despotism which had Share with your friends. something. than by the authority of the people on a special election of representatives for that But laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. Rights and powers can as free as if the constitution or law had been expressly limited to nineteen years only. It was imperative, therefore, that a practicable means of ', and 'I predict future happiness for Americans, if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of … corrupts them, personal interests lead them astray from the general interests of their time will bring changes in society which a Constitution must accommodate if it is to --Thomas Jefferson to John Wayles Eppes, 1813. discussions." Here are a few quotes from Thomas Jefferson on the topic of Judiciary power. itself. had given them." Moreover, the passage of "[Algernon Sidney wrote in Discourses Concerning Government, Sect. They are axioms also pregnant with salutary Please contact. him even to give it, by testament, to whom he pleases. --Thomas Jefferson to Joel Barlow, 1807. --Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval, ME 15:46, "I set out on this ground which I suppose to be self-evident: 'That the earth --Thomas Jefferson to But I know also that laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress adherence to the principles, practices and institutions of our fathers, which they I think But the nineteen or twenty years should be provided by the constitution, so that it may be handed The enemies of reform, on the other hand, [deny] improvement and [advocate] steady through blood, desolation and long-continued anarchy. councils." contented with the ground which [the new] Constitution will gain for us, and hope that a 1787. fitted him when a boy as civilized society to remain ever Habit alone confounds what is civil practice with natural right." ME 15:470, "Let us provide in our constitution for its revision at stated periods. exclude... the ruinous and contagious errors... which have armed despots with means which that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new 1. --Thomas that the succeeding generation exercising, in fact, the power of repeal, this leaves them As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries ME 16:47, "Our children will be as wise as we are and will establish in the fulness of time -- Thomas Jefferson … They ascribe to the men of the --Thomas abridge it, and an unorganized call for timely amendment is not likely to prevail against