What, to the American slave, is your Fourth of July? I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him your celebration is a sham.

The spirit of liberty is the spirit which is not too sure it is right.

I work for a government I despise for ends I think criminal.

The most hateful torment for men is to have knowledge of everything but power over nothing.

No free man shall be taken or imprisoned or dispossessed or outlawed or exiled, or in any way destroyed, nor will we go upon him, nor will we send against him except by the lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land.

O citizens, first acquire wealth; you can practice virtue afterward.

Politics, n. A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles. The conduct of public affairs for private advantage.

The best of all rulers is but a shadowy presence to his subjects.

The vice presidency isn’t worth a pitcher of warm piss.

I shall be an autocrat: that’s my trade. And the good Lord will forgive me: that’s his.

Every country has the government it deserves.

The affairs of the world are no more than so much trickery, and a man who toils for money or honor or whatever else in deference to the wishes of others, rather than because his own desire or needs lead him to do so, will always be a fool.

Treaties, you see, are like girls and roses: they last while they last.