Abraham Lincoln

« Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves. »

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« America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves. »

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« These capitalists generally act harmoniously and in concert to fleece the people, and now that they have got into a quarrel with themselves, we are called upon to appropriate the people's money to settle the quarrel. »

Speech to Illinois legislature (January 1837); This is "Lincoln's First Reported Speech", found in theSangamo Journal(28 January 1837) according toMcClure's Magazine(March 1896); also inLincoln's Complete Works(1905) ed. byNicolayand Hay, Vol. 1, p. 24

« It has so happened in all ages of the world, that some have laboured, and others have, without labour, enjoyed a large proportion of the fruits. This is wrong, and should not continue. To each labourer the whole product of his labour, or as nearly as possible, is a most worthy object of any good government. »

The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln edited by Roy P. Basler, Volume I, "Fragments of a Tariff Discussion" (1 December 1847)

« Any people anywhere being inclined and having the power have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable, a most sacred right — a right which we hope and believe is to liberate the world. Nor is this right confined to cases in which the whole people of an existing government may choose to exercise it. Any portion of such people that can may revolutionize and make their own of so much of the territory as they inhabit. »

Speech in the United States House of Representatives(12 January 1848)

« Allow the President to invade a neighboring nation, whenever he shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion, and you allow him to do so, whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary for such purpose, and you allow him to make war at pleasure. Study to see if you can fix any limit to his power in this respect, after having given him so much as you propose. If, to-day, he should choose to say he thinks it necessary to invade Canada, to prevent the British from invading us, how could you stop him? You may say to him, "I see no probability of the British invading us" but he will say to you, "Be silent; I see it, if you don't." The provision of the Constitution giving the war making power to Congress was dictated, as I understand it, by the following reasons. Kings had always been involving and impoverishing their people in wars, pretending generally, if not always, that the good of the people was the object. This, our Convention understood to be the most oppressive of all Kingly oppressions; and they resolved to so frame the Constitution that no one man should hold the power of bringing this oppression upon us. But your view destroys the whole matter, and places our President where kings have always stood. »

Letter, while US Congressman, to his friend and law-partnerWilliam H. Herndon, opposing theMexican-American War(15 February 1848)

« The legitimate object of government, is to do for a community of people, whatever they need to have done, but can not do, at all, or can not, so well do, for themselves - in their separate, and individual capacities. In all that the people can individually do as well for themselves, government ought not to interfere. The desirable things which the individuals of a people can not do, or can not well do, for themselves, fall into two classes: those which have relation to wrongs, and those which have not. Each of these branch off into an infinite variety of subdivisions. The first - that in relation to wrongs - embraces all crimes, misdemeanors, and nonperformance of contracts. The other embraces all which, in its nature, and without wrong, requires combined action, as public roads and highways, public schools, charities, pauperism, orphanage, estates of the deceased, and the machinery of government itself. From this it appears that if all men were just, there still would be some, though not so much, need for government. »

Fragment on Government(1 July 1854?) in "The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln", ed. Roy P. Basler, Vol. 2, pp. 220-221

« Don't interfere with anything in the Constitution. That must be maintained, for it is the only safeguard of our liberties. And not to Democrats alone do I make this appeal, but to all who love these great and true principles. »

Speech at Kalamazoo, Michigan (27 August 1856),Collected Works1:391

« As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy. Whatever differs from this, to the extent of the difference, is no democracy. »

Definition of Democracy; see Roy P. Basler, ed.,The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, vol. 2(New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1953), p. 532

« All I ask for the negro is that if you not like him, let him alone. If God gave him but little let him enjoy. »

Speech in Springfield, Illinois(17 July 1858)

« Negro equality! Fudge!! How long, in the government of a God, great enough to make and maintain this Universe, shall there continue to be knaves to vend, and fools to gulp, so low a piece of demagougeism as this? »

Fragments: Notes for Speeches, September 1859,The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln(1953) Vol. III; No transcripts or reports exist indicating that he ever actually used this expression in any of his speeches.

« Stand with anybody that stands RIGHT. Stand with him while he is right and PART with him when he goes wrong. »

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