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Tag Tag Self-government
Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters.
Benjamin Franklin Letter to the Abbés Chalut and Arnoux · 1787

Quotes

“Knowlege is power.”

Thomas Jefferson · Letter to George Ticknor, 1817 · Primary source

“I heartily accept the motto,—‘That government is best which governs least;’ and I should like to see it acted up to more rapidly and systematically.”

Henry David Thoreau · Resistance to Civil Government, 1849 · Primary source

“Of our political revolution of ’76, we all are justly proud. It has given us a degree of political freedom, far exceeding that of any other nation of the earth. In it the world has found a solution of the long mooted problem, as to the capability of man to govern himself. In it was the germ which has vegetated, and still is to grow and expand into the universal liberty of mankind.”

Abraham Lincoln · Temperance Address, 1842 · Primary source

Works

Benjamin Franklin · 1787
Letter to the Abbés Chalut and Arnoux

A brief reflection on civic virtue, political freedom, social disorder, and the prospects for stable self-government in post-Revolutionary America.

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Related Tags

Knowledge 18 Freedom 15 Liberty 8 Popular sovereignty 4 Limited government 4 Individual liberty 4 Political authority 3 Public education 3 Political stability 3 American Revolution 2 Political freedom 2 Civic virtue 2 Corruption 2 Universal liberty 1 State power 1 Enlightenment 1 Legislatures 1 American republic 1