general principle, but not all its limitations: Equal and exact justice
to all men of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political;
peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling
alliances with none; the support of the State governments in all their
rights as the most competent administrations for our domestic concerns,
and the surest bulwarks against anti-republican tendencies; the
preservation of the general government, in its whole constitutional
vigor, as the sheet anchor of our peace at home and safety abroad; a
jealous care of the right of election by the people, a mild and safe
corrective of abuses, which are lopped by the sword of revolution,
where peaceable remedies are unprovided; absolute acquiescence in the
decisions of the majority, the vital principle of republics, from which
there is no appeal but to force, the vital principle and immediate
parent of despotism; a well-disciplined militia, our best reliance in
peace, and for the first moments of war till regulars may relieve them;
the supremacy of the civil over the military authority; economy in
public expense that labor may be lightly burdened; the honest payment of
our debts and sacred preservation of the public faith; encouragement
of agriculture, and of commerce as its handmaid; the diffusion of
information and arraignment of all abuses at the bar of the public
reason; freedom of religion, freedom of the press, and freedom of
person under the protection of the habeas corpus; and trial by juries
impartially selected.

These principles form the bright constellation which has gone before us,
and guided our steps through an age of revolution and reformation: the
wisdom of our sages and the blood of our heroes have been devoted to
their attainment; they should be the creed of our political faith, the
text of civic instruction, the touchstone by which to try the services
of those we trust; and should we wander from them in error or alarm, let