A rigid economy of the public contributions and absolute interdiction of all useless expenses will go far towards keeping the government honest and unoppressive. Thomas Jefferson, letter to Lafayette, 1823
No pecuniary consideration is more urgent, than the regular redemption and discharge of the public debt: on none can delay be more injurious, or an economy of time more valuable. George Washington, Message to the House of Representatives, December 3, 1793
But with respect to future debt; would it not be wise and just for that nation to declare in the constitution they are forming that neither the legislature, nor the nation itself can validly contract more debt, than they may pay within their own age, or within the term of 19 years. Thomas Jefferson, September 6, 1789
Excessive taxation will carry reason & reflection to every man's door, and particularly in the hour of election. Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Taylor, November 26, 1798
I think we have more machinery of government than is necessary, too many parasites living on the labor of the industrious. Thomas Jefferson, letter to William Ludlow, September 6, 1824
It is a wise rule and should be fundamental in a government disposed to cherish its credit, and at the same time to restrain the use of it within the limits of its faculties, "never to borrow a dollar without laying a tax in the same instant for paying the interest annually, and the principal within a given term; and to consider that tax as pledged to the creditors on the public faith." Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Wayles Eppes, June 24, 1813.
Taxes should be proportioned to what may be annually spared by the individual. Thomas Jefferson, 1784
The principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale. Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Taylor, May 28, 1816
The same prudence which in private life would forbid our paying our own money for unexplained projects, forbids it in the dispensation of the public moneys. Thomas Jefferson, letter to Shelton Gilliam, June 19, 1808.
We must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. Thomas Jefferson, letter to Samuel Kercheval, July 12, 1816
Were we directed from Washington when to sow, and when to reap, we should soon want bread. Thomas Jefferson, Autobiography, 1821
Would it not be better to simplify the system of taxation rather than to spread it over such a variety of subjects and pass through so many new hands. Thomas Jefferson, 1784.
[A] rigid economy of the public contributions and absolute interdiction of all useless expenses will go far towards keeping the government honest and unoppressive. Thomas Jefferson, letter to Marquis de Lafayette, November 4, 1823.
[A] wise and frugal government... shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government. Thomas Jefferson, First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1801
A just security to property is not afforded by that government, under which unequal taxes oppress one species of property and reward another species. James Madison, Essay on Property, March 29, 1792
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, possessing enumerated powers, but an indefinite one, subject to particular exceptions. James Madison, letter to Edmund Pendleton, January 21, 1792.
That the most productive system of finance will always be the least burdensome. James Madison, Federalist No. 39, January 1788.
The apportionment of taxes on the various descriptions of property is an act which seems to require the most exact impartiality; yet there is, perhaps, no legislative act in which greater opportunity and temptation are given to a predominant party to trample on the rules of justice. Every shilling which they overburden the inferior number is a shilling saved to their own pockets. James Madison, Federalist No. 10, November 23, 1787.
It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debts as it goes. A principle which if acted on would save one-half the wars of the world.
To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.
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