"The concentrating of powers in the same..." - Quote by Thomas Jefferson
The concentrating of powers in the same hands is precisely the definition of despotic government. It will be no alleviation that these powers will be exercised by a plurality of hands, and not by a single one.
More by Thomas Jefferson
“I have much confidence that we shall proceed successfully for ages to come. My hope of its duration is built much on the enlargement of the resources of life going hand in hand with the enlargement of territory.”
“An individual, thinking himself injured, makes more noise than a State.”
“The parent storms, the child looks on, catches the lineaments of wrath, puts on the same airs in the circle of smaller slaves, gives a loose to the worst of passions, and thus nursed, educated and daily exercised in tyranny, cannot but be stamped by it with odious peculiarities.”
More on Despotism
“Despotism is unjust to everybody, including the despot, who was probably made for better things.”
“You do not know the unfathomable cowardice of humanity...servile in the face of force, pitiless in the face of weakness, implacable before blunders, indulgent before crimes...and patient to the point of martyrdom before all the violences of bold despotism.”
“When the white man governs himself, that is self-government; but when he governs himself and also governs another man, that is more than self-government - that is despotism.”
More on Power
“That this privilege of giving or of withholding our monies is an important barrier against the undue exertion of prerogative, which if left altogether without control may be exercised to our great oppression; and all history shews how efficacious is its intercession for redress of grievances and re-establishment of rights, and how improvident would be the surrender of so powerful a mediator”
“All authority belongs to the people.”
“For the power of Man to make himself what he pleases means... the power of some men to make other men what THEY please.”