evidence: No, Thomas Jefferson did not say big government is ‘strong enough to take everything you have’ [...] A Facebook post claims Thomas Jefferson once said or wrote that "a government big enough to give you everything you want, is strong enough to take everything you have." But the quote could not be found in any of Jefferson’s writings and appears to have originated sometime around the 1950s. It has been attributed to Ford, among others, throughout the years as it became a popular saying for politicians starting in the 20th Century.