Property rights

Explore 22 quotes about Property rights

The first man who, having fenced in a piece of land, said, "This is mine," and found people naïve enough to believe him, that man was the true founder of civil society.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Discourse on Inequality

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Topic

Civil society Property rights

Author

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Source

Discourse on Inequality

Genre

Political literature

Language

French

Time

1755 1750s 18th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Rousseau, Jean-Jacques. Discours sur l'origine et les fondemonts de l'inegalite parmi les hommes [Discourse on the Origin and Basis of Inequality Among Men]. Amsterdam: Marc-Michel Rey, 1755, pt. 2.

Current Citation

Rousseau, Jean-Jacques. Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, translated by Donald A. Cress. Hackett, 1992, pt. 2.

Sell a country! Why not sell the air, the clouds and the great sea, as well as the earth? Did not the Great Spirit make them all for the use of his children?

Tecumseh

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Topic

Property rights

Speaker

Tecumseh

Language

English

Time

1810 1810s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Tecumseh. Speech to General William Henry Harrison. 14 Aug. 1810, Council at Vincennes, Indiana Territory, USA.

Current Citation

Tecumseh. Quoted in A History of the Indians of the United States, written by Angie Debo. University of Oklahoma Press, 2013.

My position as regards the moneyed interests can be put in a few words. In every civilized society property rights must be carefully safeguarded; ordinarily, and in the great majority of cases, human rights and property rights are fundamentally and in the long run identical; but when it clearly appears that there is a real conflict between them, human rights must have the upper hand, for property belongs to man and not man to property.

Theodore Roosevelt

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Topic

Property rights

Speaker

Theodore Roosevelt

Medium

Speech

Genre

Political speech

Language

English

Time

1910 1910s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Roosevelt, Theodore, Jr. "Citizenship in a Republic." 23 Apr. 1910, Sorbonne University, Paris, France.

Current Citation

Roosevelt, Theodore, Jr. "Citizenship in a Republic." Theodore Roosevelt, Jr.: Letters and Speeches, edited by Louis Auchincloss. Library of America, 2004.

The theory of the Communists may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of private property.

Karl Marx

The Communist Manifesto

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Topic

Property rights Communism Political theory Politics

Author

Karl Marx

Source

The Communist Manifesto

Medium

Pamphlet

Genre

Political literature Economic literature

Language

German

Time

1848 1840s 19th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Marx, Karl and Friedrich Engels [published anonymously]. Manifest der kommunistischen Partei [Manifesto of the Communist Party]. London: Gedruckt in der Office der Bildungs-Gesellschaft für Arbeiter, 1848.

Current Citation

Marx, Karl and Friedrich Engels. The Communist Manifesto, translated by Samuel Moore and Friedrich Engels. Penguin Classics, 2002.

By avarice and selfishness, and a grovelling habit, from which none of us is free, of regarding the soil as property...the landscape is deformed.

Henry David Thoreau

Walden

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Topic

Property rights Environmental destruction

Author

Henry David Thoreau

Source

The Bean-Field Walden

Genre

Autobiography and memoir

Language

English

Time

1854 1850s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Thoreau, Henry David. "The Bean-Field." Walden; or, Life in the Woods. Boston: Ticknor and Fields, 1854.

Current Citation

Thoreau, Henry David. "The Bean-Field." Walden and Civil Disobedience. Signet, 2012.

I know of no country, indeed, where the love of money has taken a stronger hold on the affections of men, and where a profounder contempt is expressed for the theory of the permanent equality of property.

Alexis de Tocqueville

Democracy in America

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Topic

Love of money Property rights Greed Money America

Author

Alexis de Tocqueville

Source

Democracy in America

Genre

Political literature

Language

French

Time

1835 1830s 19th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Tocqueville, Alexis De. De La Democratie en Amerique [Democracy in America]. Vol. 1, London: Saunders and Otley, 1835, ch. 3.

Current Citation

Tocqueville, Alexis De. Democracy in America: The Complete and Unabridged Volumes I and II, translated by Henry Reeve. Bantam Classics, 2000, vol. 1, ch. 3.

All Property indeed, except the Savage’s temporary Cabin, his Bow, his Matchcoat, and other little Acquisitions absolutely necessary for his Subsistence, seems to me to be the Creature of public Convention. Hence the Public has the Right of Regulating Descents & all other Conveyances of Property, and even of limiting the Quantity & the Uses of it.

Benjamin Franklin

Read this letter at the National Archives website

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Topic

Property rights Government regulation Government Political theory

Author

Benjamin Franklin

Source

Letters of Benjamin Franklin

Medium

Letter

Language

English

Time

1783 1780s 18th century

Era

American Revolutionary Period

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Franklin, Benjamin. Letter to Robert Morris. 25 Dec. 1783.

Current Citation

Franklin, Benjamin."Paris, 1776-1785: Robert Morris, December 26, 1783." Benjamin Franklin: Autobiography, Poor Richard, and Later Writings, edited by J. A. Leo Lemay. Library of America, 2005.

Property is theft.

Pierre-Joseph Proudhon

Read What is Property? at marxists.org

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Topic

Property rights

Author

Pierre-Joseph Proudhon

Source

What is Property?

Genre

Political literature Philosophical literature

Language

French

Time

1840 1840s 19th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Proudhon, Pierre-Joseph. Qu'est-ce que la propriété? Recherche sur le principe du droit et du gouvernement [What Is Property? Or, an Inquiry into the Principle of Right and Government]. Paris: 1840, preface.

Current Citation

Proudhon, Pierre-Joseph. Proudhon: What is Property?, edited and translated by Donald R. Kelley and Bonnie G. Smith. Cambridge University Press, 1994, preface.

One does not sell the earth upon which the people walk.

Crazy Horse

Quoted in Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, by Dee Brown

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Topic

Property rights

Speaker

Crazy Horse

Author

Dee Brown

Source

Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee

Language

English

Time

1970 1970s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Witko, Tashunka. Quoted in Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, written by Dee Brown. Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1970, ch. 12.

The great and chief end, therefore, of men's uniting into commonwealths and putting themselves under government is the preservation of their property.

John Locke

Two Treatises of Government

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Topic

Purpose of government Property rights Political theory Politics

Author

John Locke

Source

Second Treatise of Civil Government Two Treatises of Government

Medium

Treatise

Genre

Political literature

Language

English

Time

1690 1690s 17th century

Era

Age of Enlightenment

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Locke, John. "Second Treatise of Civil Government." Two Treatises of Government. London: Awnsham Churchill, 1690, ch. 9, sect. 124.

Current Citation

Locke, John. Second Treatise of Civil Government, edited by C. B. Macpherson. Hackett Publishing Company, 1980, ch. 9, sect. 124.

I'm gonna give you to the count of 10, to get your ugly, yella, no-good keister off my property, before I pump your guts full of lead! 1...2...10!

Home Alone

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Topic

Castle doctrine Property rights

Speaker

Johnny

Actor

Ralph Foody

Source

Home Alone

Medium

Film

Genre

Christmas (film) Comedy (film) Christmas Comedy

Statement Type

Threat

Language

English

Time

1990 1990s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Home Alone. Directed by Chris Columbus, Hughes Entertainment , 1990.

Land is the only thing in the world that amounts to anything, for 'tis the only thing in this world that lasts...'Tis the only thing worth working for, worth fighting for—worth dying for.

Margaret Mitchell

Gone with the Wind

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Topic

Land Property rights

Author

Margaret Mitchell

Source

Gone with the Wind

Medium

Novel

Language

English

Time

1936 1930s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Mitchell, Margaret. Gone with the Wind. Macmillan Publishers, 1936, pt. 1, ch. 2.

Current Citation

Mitchell, Margaret. Gone with the Wind. Scribner, 2007, pt. 1, ch. 2.

What we call real estate—the solid ground to build a house on—is the broad foundation on which nearly all the guilt of this world rests.

Nathaniel Hawthorne

The House of Seven Gables

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Topic

Property rights

Author

Nathaniel Hawthorne

Source

The House of Seven Gables

Medium

Novel

Language

English

Time

1851 1850s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The House of the Seven Gables: A Romance. Boston: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields, 1851, ch. 17.

Current Citation

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The House of the Seven Gables, edited by Robert S. Levine. W. W. Norton & Company, 2020, ch. 17.

Give a man the secure possession of bleak rock, and he will turn it into a garden; give him nine years lease of a garden, and he will convert it into a desert.

Arthur Young

More information about this quote

Topic

Pride of ownership Property rights

Author

Arthur Young

Medium

Personal journal

Language

English

Time

1792 1790s 18th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Young, Arthur. Journal entry. 30 July 1787.

Private property is a natural fruit of labor, a product of intense activity of man, acquired trough his energetic determination to ensure and develop with his own strength his own existence and that of his family, and to create for himself and his own an existence of just freedom, not only economic, but also political, cultural and religious.

Pope Pius XII

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Topic

Property rights

Speaker

Pope Pius XII

Medium

Radio broadcast Speech

Language

Italian

Time

1944 1940s 20th century

Authentication Score 1

Citation

Pope Pius XII. "Radiomessaggio di su Santita Pio XII Nel V Anniversario Dall'inizio della Guerra Mondiale [Radio Message from His Holiness Pius XII on the Fifth Anniversary of the Beginning of the World War]." Federal Communications Commission. 1 Sept. 1944, Vatican City, Rome, Italy.

The most common and durable source of factions has been the various and unequal distribution of property.

James Madison

Federalist 10

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Topic

Political faction Property rights Politics

Author

James Madison

Source

Federalist 10 The Federalist Papers

Medium

Essay

Genre

Political literature

Language

English

Time

1787 1780s 18th century

Era

American Revolutionary Period

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Madison, James [published as Publius]. "Federalist No. 10: The Same Subject Continued: The Union as a Safeguard Against Domestic Faction and Insurrection." Daily Advertiser, 22 Nov. 1787.

Current Citation

Madison, James. "No. 10: An extensive republic a remedy for mischiefs of faction.--Madison." The Federalist: A Commentary on the Constitution of the United States, edited by Robert Scigliano. The Modern Library, 2001.

Man...has by nature a power...to preserve his property—that is, his life, liberty, and estate—against the injuries and attempts of other men.

John Locke

Two Treatises of Government

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Topic

Property rights Natural law

Author

John Locke

Source

Second Treatise of Civil Government Two Treatises of Government

Medium

Treatise

Genre

Political literature

Statement Type

Precepts and axioms

Language

English

Time

1690 1690s 17th century

Era

Age of Enlightenment

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Locke, John. "Second Treatise of Civil Government." Two Treatises of Government. London: Awnsham Churchill, 1690, ch. 7, sect. 87.

Current Citation

Locke, John. Second Treatise of Civil Government, edited by C. B. Macpherson. Hackett Publishing Company, 1980, ch. 7, sect. 87.

No man made the land. It is the original inheritance of the whole species. Its appropriation is wholly a question of general expediency. When private property in land is not expedient, it is unjust.

John Stuart Mill

More information about this quote

Topic

Property rights Redistribution of resources Political theory Politics

Author

John Stuart Mill

Source

Principles of Political Economy

Genre

Economic literature Political literature

Language

English

Time

1848 1840s 19th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Mill, John Stuart. Principles of Political Economy. London: John W. Parker, 1848, bk. 2, ch. 1, sect. 6.

Current Citation

Mill, John Stuart. "Principles of Political Economy." Principles of Political Economy with Chapters on Socialism, edited by Jonathan Riley. Oxford University Press, 2008, bk. 2, ch. 1, sect. 6.

The system of private property is the most important guaranty of freedom, not only for those who own property, but scarcely less for those who do not.

Friedrich Hayek

The Road to Serfdom

More information about this quote

Topic

Property rights Freedom

Author

Friedrich Hayek

Source

The Road to Serfdom

Genre

Political literature Economic literature

Language

English

Time

1944 1940s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Von Hayek, Friedrich August. The Road to Serfdom [Der Weg zur Knechtschaft]. Routledge Press/University of Chicago Press, 1944, ch. 8.

Private property is a necessary institution, at least in a fallen world; men work more and dispute less when goods are private than when they are common. But it is to be tolerated as a concession to human frailty, not applauded as desirable in itself.

R.H. Tawney

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Topic

Property rights

Author

R.H. Tawney

Source

Religion and the Rise of Capitalism

Genre

Religious literature Economic literature

Language

English

Time

1926 1920s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Tawney, Richard Henry. Religion and the Rise of Capitalism. Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1926, ch. 1.

Current Citation

Tawney, Richard Henry. Religion and the Rise of Capitalism. Angelico Press, 2021, ch. 1.