And Now, A Few Words from Abraham Lincoln

“Property is the fruit of labor…property is desirable…is a positive good in the world. That some should be rich shows that others may become rich, and hence is just encouragement to industry and enterprise. Let not him who is houseless pull down the house of another; but let him labor diligently and build one for himself, thus by example assuring that his own shall be safe from violence when built.”  “Reply to New York Workingmen’s Democratic Republican Association” (March 21, 1864)

“What is conservatism? Is it not adherence to the old and tried, against the new and untried?” Lincoln’s Cooper Institute Address, February 27, 1860.

“We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing. With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor; while with others, the same word may mean for some men to do as they please with other men, and the product of other men’s labor. Here are two, not only different, but incompatible things, called by the same name – liberty. And it follows that each of the things is, by the respective parties, called by two different and incompatible names – liberty and tyranny.” “Address at Sanitary Fair, Baltimore, Maryland” (April 18, 1864)

America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.

Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up, and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable – a most sacred right – a right, which we hope and believe, is to liberate the world.

Don’t interfere with anything in the Constitution. That must be maintained, for it is the only safeguard of our liberties.

Let us then turn this government back into the channel in which the framers of the Constitution originally placed it.
July 10, 1858 Speech at Chicago

Don’t interfere with anything in the Constitution. That must be maintained, for it is the only safeguard of our liberties. And not to Democrats alone do I make this appeal, but to all who love these great and true principles.
August 27, 1856 Speech at Kalamazoo, Michigan

I don’t believe in a law to prevent a man from getting rich; it would do more harm than good. So while we do not propose any war upon capital, we do wish to allow the humblest man an equal chance to get rich with everybody else.
March 6, 1860 Speech at New Haven, Connecticut