Top 10 Quotes & Sayings by James L. Petigru

Explore popular quotes and sayings by an American public servant James L. Petigru.

Last updated on April 15, 2025.

James Louis Petigru was an American lawyer, politician, and jurist in South Carolina. He is best known for his service as the Attorney General of South Carolina, his judicial work that played a key role in the recodification of the state's law code. He was also known for opposing nullification and, in 1860, state secession.

American - Public Servant | May 10, 1789 - March 9, 1863

Source: Wikipedia

The allegiance of the citizen, in the only sense in which the word can be tolerated in a republic, is due to the law. What idea other men may have of a law higher than the supreme law, I know not. Like the notion of the Stoics concerning Fate, it is perfectly incomprehensible.

James L. Petigru

Growing richer every day, for as rich and poor are relative terms, when the rich are growing poor, it is pretty much the same as if the poor were growing rich. Nobody is poor when the distinction between rich and poor is destroyed.

James L. Petigru

If one has not influence to stem the torrent of popular delusion he is reduced to the melancholy part of a spectator in the midst of the ruin.

James L. Petigru

It does not, surely, require such torrents of blood to satisfy any reasonable man that nothing can be a more impious presumption than for either side to think themselves entitled to count the Almighty as an ally in such a pitiful display of human passion.

James L. Petigru

South Carolina is too small for a republic and too large for an insane asylum.

James L. Petigru

The pulse of the People is still so high as to call for more bleeding, before quinine can be administered with any hope of benefit.

James L. Petigru

The war begins to make itself felt very near to us.

James L. Petigru

No one supposes that the government of the United States is supreme, beyond the sphere plainly defined by the constitution: Neither does any one deny that the State is supreme within its proper sphere of action.

James L. Petigru

To speak against religion (the Christian) is breaking down the bond of good government.

James L. Petigru

The political power of the Country must fall eventually into the hands of certain great families as it always has done in other republics.

James L. Petigru