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ShareThomas Jefferson, third President of the United States and principal author of the Declaration of Independence has been consistently ranked by scholars as one of the greatest of U.S. presidents. There are plenty of quotes attributed to Jefferson circulating on the Internet, some of which appear to have been fabricated. The following set of quotes has been checked for verifiable attribution to Thomas Jefferson. As one reads these quotes, it is easy to see evidence of struggles that continue to this day, and yet the common sense eloquence of these statements from the early years of our nation rings truer today than ever.
On government
“A wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.”
Thomas Jefferson’s First Inaugural Address, 4 March 1801
“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.”
Confirmed in the Jeffersonian Cyclopedia
“It is not by the consolidation or concentration of powers, but by their distribution that good government is effected.”
Memoirs, Correspondence and Private Papers of Thomas Jefferson
On the Constitution
“I consider the foundation of the Constitution as laid on this ground: That all powers not delegated to the United States, by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States or to the people.”
The Writings of Thomas Jefferson
“Our legislators are not sufficiently apprized of the rightful limits of their power; that their true office is to declare and enforce only our natural rights and duties, and to take none of them from us.”
The Writings of Thomas Jefferson
On liberty
“I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty, than those attending too small a degree of it.”
Letter to Archibald Stuart, 23 December 1791
“Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add ‘within the limits of the law’ because law is often but the tyrant’s will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual.”
Letter to Isaac H. Tiffany, 1819
On taxes
“To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is sinful and tyrannical.”
The Works of Thomas Jefferson
On the news media
“Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. Truth itself becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle. I will add, that the man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them; inasmuch as he who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods & errors.”
Letter to John Norvell, 11 June 1807
On national debt
“It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debts as it goes. A principle which if acted on would save one-half the wars of the world.”
Confirmed in the Jeffersonian Cyclopedia
“I sincerely believe… that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale.”
Letter to John Taylor, 28 May 1816
On firearms
“No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms.”
Draft Constitution for Virginia, June 1776
John F. Kennedy stated at a White House dinner honoring Nobel Prize winners in 1962: “This is perhaps the assembly of the most intelligence ever to gather at one time in the White House with the exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone.”
The Jefferson Memorial, Washington, D.C.
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As current as ever, which is not surprising, as Truth doesn’t change.
These quotes should be on billboards on the way to our elected officials places of work.