I consider trial by jury as the only anchor ever yet imagined by man, by which a government can be held to the principles of its constitution.
Interpretation
Trial by jury is essential for maintaining constitutional integrity in government.
Thomas Jefferson's quote emphasizes the importance of a jury trial as a fundamental mechanism to hold the government accountable to its constitutional principles. He argues that this system serves as an 'anchor,' grounding the actions of the government in the foundational laws that protect citizens' rights and ensure justice.
In practice
During a legal seminar discussing the importance of civil liberties.
The firmness with which the (American) people have withstood the... abuses of the press, the discernment they have manifested between truth and falsehood, show that they may safely be trusted to hear everything true and false and to form a correct judgment between them.
I, place economy among the first & most important republican virtues, & public debt as the greatest of the dangers to be feared
βWe must make our choice between economy and liberty or confusion and servitude...If we run into such debts, we must be taxed in our meat and drink, in our necessities and comforts, in our labor and in our amusements...if we can prevent the government from wasting the labor of the people, under the pretense of caring for them, they will be happy.
Very many and very meritorious were the worthy patriots who assisted in bringing back our government to its republican tack. To preserve it in that, will require unremitting vigilance.
A nation, as a society, forms a moral person, and every member of it is personally responsible for his society.
Timid men prefer the calm of despotism to the tempestuous sea of liberty.
Compassion, in which all ethics must take root, can only attain its full breadth and depth if it embraces all living creatures and does not limit itself to mankind.
This root [the potato], no matter how much you prepare it, is tasteless and floury. It cannot pass for an agreeable food, but it supplies a food sufficiently abundant and sufficiently healthy for men who ask only to sustain themselves. The potato is criticized with reason for being windy, but what matters windiness for the vigorous organisms of peasants and laborers?
When I see an object there is no will; when its sensations are carried to the brain, there comes the reaction, which says "Do this", or "Do not do this", and this state of the ego-substance is what is called will
...When the government goes into the business of destroying trust, it goes into the business of destroying itself.
[The decay of Logic results from an] untroubled assumption that the particular is real and the universal is not.
'Star Trek' episodes always insisted that humanity is on its bumpy way to what will be a glorious future in the 23rd century, in which we will have left most of our old selfishness - and old hatreds and prejudices - far behind us.
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