If the General Government should be left dependent on the State Legislatures, it would be happy for us if we had never met in this room.
John DickinsonRead
Our liberties do not come from charters; for these are only the declaration of pre-existing rights. They do not depend on parchments or seals; but come from the King of Kings and the Lord of all the earth.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Liberties are inherent and cannot be granted or taken away by documents or authority.
This quote by John Dickinson emphasizes that true liberties and rights are not bestowed by governmental charters or legal documents but are inherent and pre-existing. It suggests that these freedoms are derived from a higher moral authority, indicating a belief in a divine source of rights that transcends human-made laws.
Themes
LibertyRightsFreedomAuthorityPhilosophy
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about the importance of individual rights, this quote can highlight the intrinsic nature of freedom.
More from John Dickinson
All quotes →Then join hand in hand, brave Americans all! By uniting we stand, by dividing we fall.
John DickinsonRead
As in forming a political society, each individual contributes some of his rights, in order that he may, from a common stock of rights, derive greater benefits, than he could from merely his own; so, in forming a confederation, each political society should contribute such a share of their rights, as will, from a common stock of these rights, produce the largest quantity of benefits for them.
John DickinsonRead
No free people ever existed, or can ever exist, without keeping the purse strings in their own hands. Where this is the case, they have a constitutional check upon the administration, which may thereby by brought into order without violence. But when such a power is not lodged in the people, oppression proceeds uncontrolled in its career, till the governed, transported into rage, seek redress in the midst of blood and confusion.
John DickinsonRead
The rights essential to happiness. . . . We claim them from a higher source - from the King of kings and Lord of all the earth.
John DickinsonRead
Let our government be like that of the solar system. Let the general government be like the sun and the states the planets, repelled yet attracted, and the whole moving regularly and harmoniously in several orbits.
John DickinsonRead
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