Thomas Paine

It is only to the constituting power that this right belongs.

Those officers, by whatever name they are called, have no authority to add to, alter, or abridge the original articles.

Every society and association that is established, first agreed upon a number of original articles, digested into form, which are its constitution.

All the constitutions of America are declared to be established on the authority of the people.

A constitution is the property of a nation, and not of those who exercise the government.

In all those matters the right of judging and acting are in those who pay, and not in those who receive.

It is not for the benefit of those who exercise the powers of government that constitutions, and the governments issuing from them, are established.

Government has no right to make itself a party in any debate respecting the principles or modes of forming, or of changing, constitutions.

It is always the interest of a far greater number of people in a nation to have things right, than to let them remain wrong; and when public matters are open to debate, and the public judgment free, it will not decide wrong, unless it…

For this purpose they did not, like a cabal of courtiers, send for a Dutch Stadtholder, or a German Elector; but they referred the whole matter to the sense and interest of the country.

The defect was not in the principle, but in the distribution of power.

It has of itself no rights; they are altogether duties.