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About this quote

What does it mean?
Living people have the right to govern themselves and manage resources without being bound by the laws or decisions of past generations.
In plain terms
The current generation should make decisions for itself, not follow the dead.
What can you take from it?
Each generation must have the freedom to shape its own future.

Where it applies

  • constitutional reform
  • policy updates
  • cultural shifts

Putting it to work

  • review outdated laws
  • update constitutions
  • question inherited traditions

Questions to consider

  • What debts should we inherit from the past?
  • How often should laws be rewritten?

Another view

Some foundational principles may need to persist across generations for stability.

More from Thomas Jefferson

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  3. Still one thing more, fellow citizens - a wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free…

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