And to Virginia governor Edmund Randolph, who also favored a bill of rights, he explained, The human race is too apt to rush from one extreme to another.… For now, the cry is power; give Congress...

Respect," he declared, "forms the basis of every negotiation with these powers. The respect which one power has for another, is in the exact proportion of the means which they respectively have of...

Monroe also saved Tom Paine, whose revolutionary fervor had inspired him to become a French citizen and win a seat in the Convention. When Paine voted against executing King Louis XVI, however,...

history informs us that the passage of dethroned monarchs is short from prison to the grave.18

He was curious, courteous, open - never arrogant or condescending - and generous to a fault. Abigail Adams later noted his agreeable affability, unassuming manner, and polite attentions to all orders...

At the end of June 1783, Monroe's first year of government service came to an end. Although he had accomplished nothing, he had done no less than his colleagues - which is exactly what Virginia...

which are plainly adapted to that end

By March 1766, colonist boycotts had proved so costly to British merchants that Parliament repealed the stamp tax without having collected a single penny.

America is on the point of bursting into flames

He supported Jefferson's proposed Land Ordinance of 1784,22 ceding Virginia's western territory to Congress for division into fourteen future states in which "there shall be neither slavery nor...

Daniel Shays, a farmer struggling to keep his property, convinced neighbors that Boston legislators were colluding with judges and lawyers to raise property taxes and foreclose when farmers found it...

Napoléon Bonaparte-proclaimed an end to private property. The earth belongs to no one; its fruits belong to every one, declared François Noël Babeuf. There is but one sun, one air for all to...

Monroe's presidency made poor men rich, turned political allies into friends, and united a divided people as no president had done since Washington.

Now he recognized that protection of national interests was the raison d'être of all governments, whether born of revolution or not. Expansion of individual liberties had simply been a by-product of...

Lafayette was a splendid man...with a marvelous, self-depreciating sense of humor. He was, for example, balding noticeably when he reached an Indian outpost...and he calmed his wife's anxieties by...

Everyone that is not a noble," he lamented, "is a slave.

Contrary to the writings of some historians, Monroe's proclamation was entirely his own creation-not Adam's. The assertion that Adams authored the "Monroe Doctrine" is not only untrue, it borders on...

He believed the future of the nation was at stake, and he returned day after day to fight his war against the "slaveocracy." And Quincy voters sent him back to Congress again and again. Louisa fretted...