Thomas Jefferson on Democracy and the need for Education

I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial by strength, and bid defiance to the laws of our country.

All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent.

Educate and inform the whole mass of the people... They are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty.

Enlighten the people generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like evil spirits at the dawn of day.

Errors of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it.

I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that his justice cannot sleep forever.

If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.

Information is the currency of democracy.

It takes time to persuade men to do even what is for their own good.

Truth is certainly a branch of morality and a very important one to society.

We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.

Whenever the people are well-informed, they can be trusted with their own government.

Whenever you do a thing, act as if all the world were watching.

Where the press is free and every man able to read, all is safe.

"The care of human life and happiness, and not their destruction, is the first and only legitimate object of good government." - Thomas Jefferson ...Jefferson for Health Care Reform!