Government is about coercion. Limiting government is the single most important instrument for guaranteeing liberty. We're working on a third generation which has little in the way of education about what our Constitution means and why it was written. Thus, we've fallen easy prey to charlatens, quacks, and hustlers.
Before my tenure, people didn't seem to think that citizens had a right to limit the size of their government.
Given the low level of competence among politicians, every American should become a libertarian. The government that governs least is certainly the best choice when fools, opportunists and grafters run it. When power is for sale, then the government power should be severely limited. When power is abused, then the less power the better.
We can't let 535 people continue to limit the progress of a nation of more than 300 million.
And as a matter of fact, governments don't act, governments only react. The bankers make the decisions, and then governments decide how are we going to adjust to this. Government can't do anything unless the bank gives them the money to do it.
I feel that if people investigate the emergence of government, of State power - if they examine the logic of State power historically, and more specifically in the United States - they will find that the concept of limited government is not tenable once they adopt some type of libertarian principle.
The moment you abate anything from the full rights of men to each govern himself, and suffer any artificial positive limitation upon those rights, from that moment the whole organization of government becomes a consideration of convenience.
Can government really be active and, at the same time, limited? History suggests otherwise.
Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.
It is necessary to curb the power of government. This is the task of all constitutions, bills of rights and laws. This is the meaning of all struggles which men have fought for liberty.
The [U.S.] Constitution is a limitation on the government, not on private individuals ... it does not prescribe the conduct of private individuals, only the conduct of the government ... it is not a charter for government power, but a charter of the citizen's protection against the government.
I hope we once again have reminded people that man is not free unless government is limited. There's a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics: As government expands, liberty contracts.
So far as this has gone, I am satisfied to see a spirit prevailing that promises to send the system out free from those vexations and abuses that might be warranted by the terms of the Constitution. It must never be forgotten, however, that the liberties of the people are not so safe under the gracious manner of government, as by the limitation of power.
We need a president willing to embrace the idea that Washington is not the answer to all, or even most, of our problems, regardless of who is in charge.
It's not tyranny we desire; it's a just, limited, federal government.
There are some who think that the government is limited in how many corruption cases it can bring against Wall Street, because juries can't understand the complexity of the financial schemes involved. But in 'U.S.A. v. Carollo,' that turned out not to be true.
Term-limitation is the latest manifestation of public irresponsibility.
Limited government must come politically, not judicially.
Our submission to general principles is necessary because we cannot be guided in our practical action by full knowledge and evaluation of the consequences. So long as men are not omniscient, the only way in which freedom can be given to the individual is by such general rules to delimit the sphere in which the decision is his. There can be no freedom if the government is not limited to particular kinds of action but can use its powers in any ways which serve particular ends.
...[the federal] government [has no authority] to deliver a service,...and there's no evidence to show that government has ever been efficient [at] delivering...service.
The object and practice of liberty lies in the limitation of government power.
The man who puts all the guns and all the decision-making power into the hands of the central government and then says, ‘Limit yourself’; it is he who is truly the impractical utopian.
One could argue the GOP made no progress on limiting government in their four years of total control from 2002 to 2006. If anything, government expanded like never before.
We have a government of limited power under the Constitution, and we have got to work out our problems on the basis of law.
I consider it…as subverting the fundamental and characteristic principle of the Government…and as bidding defiance to the sense in which the Constitution is known to have been proposed, advocated, and adopted. If Congress can do whatever in their discretion can be done by money, and will promote the General Welfare, the Government is no longer a limited one.
Personally, I believe that government, rather than money, tends to be the primary factor limiting the development of new technologies.
