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SCI LIBRARY

The Correspondence of Thomas Jefferson

By Subject


CONSTITUTION / UNITED STATES / BILL OF RIGHTS



No man in the United States, I suppose, approved of every tittle in the Constitution: no one, I believe, approved more of it than I did, and more of it was certainly disapproved by my accuser than by me, and of its parts most vitally republican. Of this the few letters I wrote on the subject (not half a dozen I believe) will be a proof; and for my own satisfaction and justification, I must tax you with the reading of them when I return to where they are. You will there see that my objection to the Constitution was, that it wanted a bill of rights securing freedom of religion, freedom of the press, freedom from standing armies, trial by jury, and a constant habeas corpus act Colonel Hamilton's was, that it wanted a king and house of lords. The sense of America has approved my objection and added the bill of rights1 not the king and lords.

... No government ought to be without censors; and where the press is free, no one ever will. If virtuous, it need not fear the fair operation of attack and defence. Nature has given to man no other means of sifting out the truth, either in religion, law, or politics.

to George Washington, 7 November 1792