-
A power has risen up in the government greater than the people themselves, consisting of many and various and powerful interests, combined into one mass, and held together by the cohesive power of the vast surplus in the banks.
John C. Calhoun -
Let a durable and firm peace be established and this government be confined rigidly to the few great objects for which it was instituted, leaving the States to contend in generous rivalry to develop, by the arts of peace, their respective resources, and a scene of prosperity and happiness would follow, heretofore unequaled on the globe.
John C. Calhoun
-
Be assured that, as certain as Congress transcends its assigned limits and usurps powers never conferred, or stretches those conferred beyond the proper limits, so surely will the fruits of its usurpation pass into the hands of the Executive. In seeking to become master, it but makes a master in the person of the President.
John C. Calhoun -
True consistency, that of the prudent and the wise, is to act in conformity with circumstances and not to act always the same way under a change of circumstances.
John C. Calhoun -
There was no measure that required greater caution or more severe scrutiny than one to impose taxes or raise a loan, be the form what it may. I hold that government has no right to do either, except when the public service makes it imperiously necessary, and then only to the extent that it requires.
John C. Calhoun -
It is no less the duty of the minority than a majority to endeavour to defend the country.
John C. Calhoun -
It is a fundamental rule with me not to vote for a loan or tax bill till I am satisfied it is necessary for the public service, and then not if the deficiency can be avoided by lopping off unnecessary objects of expenditure or the enforcement of an exact and judicious economy in the public disbursements.
John C. Calhoun -
I am utterly opposed to all equivocation or obscure expressions in our public acts. We are bound to say plainly what we mean to say. If we mean negotiation and compromise, let us say it distinctly and plainly instead of sending to the President a resolution on which he may put whatever interpretation he pleases.
John C. Calhoun
-
I would rather be an independent senator, governed by my own views, going for the good of the country, uncontrolled by any thing which mortal man can bring to bear upon me, than to be president of the United States, put there as presidents of the United States have been for many years past.
John C. Calhoun -
How can this full, perfect, just and supreme voice of the people, embodied in the Constitution, be brought to bear, habitually and steadily, in counteracting the fatal tendency of the government to the absolute and despotic control of the numerical majority?
John C. Calhoun -
Were there no contrariety of interests, nothing would be more simple and easy than to form and preserve free institutions. The right of suffrage alone would be a sufficient guarantee. It is the conflict of opposing interests which renders it the most difficult work of man.
John C. Calhoun -
The very essence of a free government consists in considering offices as public trusts, bestowed for the good of the country, and not for the benefit of an individual or a party.
John C. Calhoun -
None but a people advanced to a high state of moral and intellectual excellence are capable in a civilized condition of forming and maintaining free governments, and among those who are so far advanced, very few indeed have had the good fortune to form constitutions capable of endurance.
John C. Calhoun -
By nature, every individual has the right to govern himself; and governments, whether founded on majorities or minorities, must derive their right from the assent, expressed or implied, of the governed,, and be subject to such limitations as they may impose.
John C. Calhoun
-
I saw that the incorporation of Texas into this Union would be indispensable both to her safety and ours. I saw that it was impossible she could stand as an independent power between us and Mexico without becoming the scene of intrigue of foreign powers, alike destructive of the peace and security of both Texas and ourselves.
John C. Calhoun -
In my opinion, any navy less than that which would give us the habitual command of our own coast and seas would be little short of useless.
John C. Calhoun -
Many in the South once believed that slavery was a moral and political evil. That folly and delusion are gone. We see it now in its true light, and regard it as the most safe and stable basis for free institutions in the world.
John C. Calhoun -
Beware the wrath of a patient adversary.
John C. Calhoun -
In its exterior relations - abroad - this government is the sole and exclusive representative of the united majesty, sovereignty, and power of the States, constituting this great and glorious Union. To the rest of the world, we are one. Neither State nor State government is known beyond our borders. Within, it is different.
John C. Calhoun -
I hold that there is a mysterious connection between the fate of this country and that of Mexico; so much so that her independence and capability of sustaining herself are almost as essential to our prosperity and the maintenance of our institutions as they are to hers.
John C. Calhoun
-
The interval between the decay of the old and the formation and establishment of the new constitutes a period of transition which must always necessarily be one of uncertainty, confusion, error, and wild and fierce fanaticism.
John C. Calhoun -
The Union next to our liberties the most dear. May we all remember that it can only be preserved by respecting the rights of the States, and distributing equally the benefits and burdens of the Union.
John C. Calhoun -
War, in our country, ought never to be resorted to but when it is clearly justifiable and necessary; so much so as not to require the aid of logic to convince our understanding nor the ardour of eloquence to inflame our passions. There are many reasons why this country should never resort to it but for causes the most urgent and necessary.
John C. Calhoun -
We are as good judges of our interest and safety, and the means of preserving them, as the non-slaveholding States are of theirs, and rather better than they can be of ours.
John C. Calhoun