In the circumstances in which the Republic finds itself, the constitution cannot be inaugurated; it would destroy itself ... The provisional government of France is revolutionary until there is peace.
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(October 10, 1793) [Source: Oeuvres Compl?tes de Saint-Just, vol. 2 (2 vols., Paris, 1908), pp. 83-88]Louis Antoine de Saint-Just
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The aim of constitutional government is to preserve the Republic; that of revolutionary government is to lay its foundation.
Maximilien Robespierre
It may be said that the conditions are glorious for the French Republic: it must be confessed that they are; and there is not a Briton but who ought honestly to rejoice that such is the fact. The people of France resisted, as they ought to do, the whole combination of powers who would have imposed upon them a constitution contrary to their own will. Their's was the cause of liberty—the cause of mankind at large. They had every obstacle to oppose which imagination can suggest—but they have triumphed over such obstacles—their cause has been crowned with an everlasting triumph...We have not, I acknowledge, obtained the objects for which the War was undertaken—so much the better—I rejoice that we have not. I like the Peace the more on this very account.
Charles James Fox
Weapons for what? (?Armas, para qué?) To fight against whom? Against the revolutionary government, that has the support of the whole people? … Weapons for what? Hiding weapons for what? To blackmail the President of the Republic? To threaten to break the peace here? To create organizations of gangsters? Is it that we are going to return to gangsterism? Is it that we will return to daily shootouts in the capital? Weapons for what?
Fidel Castro
The Declaration was not a protest against government but against the excesses of government. It prescribed the proper role of government to secure the rights of individuals and to effect their safety and their happiness. In modern society, no individual can do this all alone, so government is not necessarily evil but a necessary good.
The framers of the Constitution feared a central government that was too strong, as many Americans rightly do today. The framers of the Constitution, after their experience under the Articles, feared a central government that was too weak, as many Americans rightly do today. They spent days studying all of the contemporary governments of Europe and concluded with Dr. Franklin that all contained the seeds of their own destruction. So the framers built something new, drawing upon their English traditions, on the Roman Republic, on the uniquely American institution of the town meeting.Jerry Ford
The Declaration was not a protest against government but against the excesses of government. It prescribed the proper role of government to secure the rights of individuals and to effect their safety and their happiness. In modern society, no individual can do this all alone, so government is not necessarily evil but a necessary good.
The framers of the Constitution feared a central government that was too strong, as many Americans rightly do today. The framers of the Constitution, after their experience under the Articles, feared a central government that was too weak, as many Americans rightly do today. They spent days studying all of the contemporary governments of Europe and concluded with Dr. Franklin that all contained the seeds of their own destruction. So the framers built something new, drawing upon their English traditions, on the Roman Republic, on the uniquely American institution of the town meeting.Gerald Ford
Saint-Just, Louis Antoine de
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