Thomas Jefferson Quotes
This commonwealth does upon the most deliberate reconsideration declare, that the said alien and sedition laws, are in their opinion, palpable violations of the said constitution
Actually it was Thomas Jefferson who had drafted most of the language. This attack was aimed at President John Adams, the big supporter of the unpopular Alien and Sedition laws, and the man Jefferson was intent on unseating at the end of his first term. He did and destroyed the Federalist Party in the process.
Kentucky, Resolution of the Legislature Against the Alien & Sedition Act, December 3, 1799
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Johnson, fundamentally an inveterate racist, tried to kill all attempts at protecting Negro rights after the Civil War. Congress rewrote the Bill to obtain enough signatures and then passed it over the President’s Veto later in the year.
President John Adams, once he became President, was greatly disturbed by the insults and attacks on him and his Federalist Party by many newspapers who preferred Thomas Jefferson and his view of democracy and freedom. Many of his supporters were also concerned about the new different immigrants that were coming to America in large numbers—–namely Roman Catholics. Adams and his Federalists passed the Alien and Sedition Acts which not only worked against new immigrants but was the first major attempt at government censorship of the press in American History. Ironically, these laws—–a blight on American democratic history—–were finally repealed in large part due to the effort of Adams son, John Quincy Adams, who served int the House of Representatives after his presidency and had always been an inveterate foe of the laws that his father had instituted.
Note the use of the phrase “against the government.” One of the unique aspects of the American Constitution and The Bill of Rights is that the government is considered a potential and even probable infringer on the liberties of the people. It is almost as though the government was the potential enemy. Modern libertarians state this very explicitly and it is ever present in the views of both the right and left wings of American politics. Most centrists recoil at the thought that some citizens see the government as the enemy, but even in America there have been times where the government has infringed on the rights of citizens only to have the courts or future administrations and Congresses correct the error.
In 1836 the House of Representatives adopted the so-called "Gag Rule" whereby the house could not act on all further petitions regarding slavery, even though thousands of petitions were being received. Adams was one of the few who protested the Gag Rule:. Adams even submitted petitions with which he did not agree:. Every year Adams attempted to get the Gag Rule repealed. He was even threatened with censure for his efforts, but his status as an ex-president protected him. Finally, in 1844, Adams' perennial resolution carried:
Three Chicago Aldermen had marched on an art school demanding that a painting they found offensive be removed from public display. The police seized the painting, prompting a lawsuit.
It is ironic that Pakistan, the creation of Jinnah’s efforts, has to a great extent adopted Sharia (Islamic Law) resulting in severe curtailment of freedom of speech and thought. Professors languish in jail for not teaching the history of Muhammed in the orthodox way, people are sentenced to death for what the local mullahs regard as blasphemy—results which from Jinnah’s point of view were terrible.
President John Adams Alien and Sedition Acts were amongst the worst laws ever passed in America. It totally violated the First Amendment but at the time the Supreme Court had not ruled on the laws which prohibited criticizing the government. Ironically, it was Adams’s son, John Quincy Adams who finally led the repeal effort.
Not the current Daily News. He was very critical of the NY State Legislature changing the laws affecting wills and inheritance in order to benefit some special interest when there was a profound effect on millions of other people that had not been considered by the legislature, the majority of which had never even read the legislation, but were following party leader’s instructions or that of powerful committee chairmen.
He, in a speech to Parliament, had criticized the Iranian Judiciary on several counts, He was then reprimanded for doing so.
Thomas Jefferson was an American statesman, diplomat, lawyer, architect, philosopher, and Founding Father who served as the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He had previously served as the second vice president of the United States under John Adams between 1797 and 1801. The principal author of the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson was a proponent of democracy, republicanism, and individual rights, motivating American colonists to break from the Kingdom of Great Britain and form a new nation; he produced formative documents and decisions at both the state and national levels.
