John Adams

• “Great is the guilt of an unnecessary war.” -John Adams

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  –John Adams

  war

• “There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty.” -John Adams

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  –John Adams

  trust

• “Abuse of words has been the great instrument of sophistry and chicanery, of party, faction, and division of society.” -John Adams

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  –John Adams

  society

• “Liberty, according to my metaphysics is a self-determining power in an intellectual agent. It implies thought and choice and power.” -John Adams

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  –John Adams

  power

• “I must not write a word to you about politics, because you are a woman.” -John Adams

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  –John Adams

  politics

• “All the perplexities, confusion and distress in America arise, not from defects in their Constitution or Confederation, not from want of honor or virtue, so much as from the downright ignorance of the nature of coin, credit and circulation.” -John Adams

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  –John Adams

  nature

• “A government of laws, and not of men.” -John Adams

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  –John Adams

  men

• “Liberty cannot be preserved without general knowledge among the people.” -John Adams

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  –John Adams

  knowledge

• “When people talk of the freedom of writing, speaking or thinking I cannot choose but laugh. No such thing ever existed. No such thing now exists but I hope it will exist. But it must be hundreds of years after you and I shall write and speak no more.” -John Adams

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  –John Adams

  hope

• “The happiness of society is the end of government.” -John Adams

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  –John Adams

  happiness

• “Great is the guilt of an unnecessary war.” -John Adams

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  –John Adams

  great

• “The essence of a free government consists in an effectual control of rivalries.” -John Adams

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  –John Adams

  government

• “Power always thinks… that it is doing God’s service when it is violating all his laws.” -John Adams

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  –John Adams

  god

• “When people talk of the freedom of writing, speaking or thinking I cannot choose but laugh. No such thing ever existed. No such thing now exists but I hope it will exist. But it must be hundreds of years after you and I shall write and speak no more.” -John Adams

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  –John Adams

  freedom

• “Fear is the foundation of most governments.” -John Adams

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  –John Adams

  fear

• “I always consider the settlement of America with reverence and wonder, as the opening of a grand scene and design in providence, for the illumination of the ignorant and the emancipation of the slavish part of mankind all over the earth.” -John Adams

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  –John Adams

  design

• Old minds are like old horses you must exercise them if you wish to keep them in working order. – John Adams

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  –John Adams

  age

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