James Buchanan quotes

1791–1868 · Cove Gap, PA

• After becoming citizens they are entitled, under the Constitution and laws, to be placed on a perfect equality with native-born citizens, and in this character they should ever be kindly recognized.

• It is an evil omen of the times that men have undertaken to calculate the mere material value of the Union.

• Our own country could alone have exhibited so grand and striking a spectacle of the capacity of man for self-government.

• We ought to cultivate peace, commerce, and friendship with all nations, and this not merely as the best means of promoting our own material interests, but in a spirit of Christian benevolence toward our fellow-men, wherever their lot may be cast.

• Public virtue is the vital spirit of republics, and history proves that when this has decayed and the love of money has usurped its place, although the forms of free government may remain for a season, the substance has departed forever.