Alexander Hamilton Principle Quotations

Opinion, whether well or ill-founded, is the governing principle of human affairs

Ambition without principle never was long under the guidance of good sense.

Money is, with propriety, considered as the vital principle of the body politic; as that which sustains its life and motion, and enables it to perform its most essential functions.

...great Ambition, unchecked by principle, or the love of Glory, is an unruly Tyrant...

I propose . . . . The conformity of the proposed Constitution to the true principles of republican government.

It is a general principle of human nature, that a man will be interested in whatever he possesses, in proportion to the firmness or precariousness of the tenure by which he holds it...

It is a singular capriciousness of the human mind, that after all the admonitions we have had from experience on this head, there should still be found men, who object to the new constitution for deviating from a principle which has been found the bane of the old.

The only constitutional exception to the power of making treaties is, that it shall not change the Constitution.… On natural principles, a treaty, which should manifestly betray or sacrifice primary interests of the state, would be null.

In disquisitions of every kind there are certain primary truths, or first principles, upon which all subsequent reasoning must depend.

There is no position which depends on clearer principles than that every act of a delegated authority, contrary to the commission under which it is exercised, is void. No legislative act, therefore, contrary to the Constitution, can be valid.