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>>I am writing to thank you for your impressive compilation of Jefferson >>quotes on the WEB. I accessed it through the University of Virginia and >>since I work at Monticello, I have found it to be a great resource. As you >>can imagine, we get lots of queries regarding Jefferson quotes and I got one >>that I am hoping you can help with: >> >>"Where the people fear the government, you have tyranny. Where the >>goverments fears the people, you have liberty." >> >>It does not sound like this belongs in the "spurious" category, but I have >>not been unable to unearth a source. Any ideas? Many thanks for your kind words about my website. I also get lots of queries about Jefferson quotes, and, in fact, have been asked about this particular quote before. While the idea expressed does sound "Jeffersonian" as you suggest, the style is not Jefferson's, in my opinion. It does not have his elegant use of words. If Jefferson had written something like this, he almost certainly would have said "there is tyranny," not "you have...", and he probably would have used "when," not "where," since he was always very precise in his choice of words. I have not run across this quote in my search of authentic sources. It is difficult, and usually impossible, to prove a negative, so I always warn inquirers that I could be wrong. But it my opinion, this is not an authentic Jefferson quote. Sorry I can't help more than that. +++++++++ I have read every word of the 20 vol. set of the Memorial Edition of Jefferson's Writings, and I am quite sure it is not in there. I have also not seen it quoted by any Jefferson scholar that I have read. >It >sure is a good >quotation, though. Here are some authentic Jefferson quotes which you might be able to use: "No government can continue good but under the control of the people." --Thomas Jefferson to John Adams, 1819. ME 15:233 "However certain forms of government are better calculated than others to protect individuals in the free exercise of their natural rights, and are at the same time themselves better guarded against degeneracy, yet experience [has] shown that, even under the best forms, those entrusted with power have, in time and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny." --Thomas Jefferson: Diffusion of Knowledge Bill, 1779. Papers, 2:526 "We shall... secure the continuance of purity in our government by the salutary, peaceable, and regular control of the people." -- Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval, 1816. ME 15:71 Best wishes, Eyler Coates