Government Quotes

  • The philosophy of the schoolroom in one generation will be the philosophy of government in the next. (Abraham Lincoln)
  • Republics decline into democracies and democracies degenerate into despotisms. (Aristotle)
  • Democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts and murders itself. There never was a democracy that did not commit suicide. (John Adams)
  • If judges confined themselves to acting like judges, instead of legislating from the bench, creating new “rights” out of thin air that are nowhere to be found in the Constitution, maybe Senate confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominees would not be such bitter and ideological battles. (Thomas Sowell)
  • In general, people in politics seem to develop their strategies around their personal ambition and then decide on their objectives. For me, the first step is to define the objective and then develop the strategy. (Jared Kushner)
  • When government takes away citizens’ right to bear arms, it becomes citizens’ duty to take away government’s right to govern. (George Washington)
  • Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master. (George Washington)
  • A government big enough to give you everything you need, is a government big enough to take away everything that you have…. (Thomas Jefferson)
  • What is existential to democracy is allowing totalitarian regimes—or any government—full knowledge of everything you do at all times.  Because the tendency is always going to be to want to regulate how you think, how you act, what you do. The problem is that most people don’t think very hard about what that world would look like.  (Robert Spalding)
  • “I have this strange notion. We are a democracy,” Biden sarcastically said, pointing out that “Some of my Republican friends, and some of my Democratic friends occasionally say ‘well if you can’t get the votes, by executive order you’re going to do something’”.“You can’t do it by executive order, unless you’re a dictator,”Biden continued, adding “We’re a democracy, we need consensus.”( Joe Biden at a October 15, 2020 Townhall)
  • How fortunate for governments that the people they administer don’t think (Adolf Hitler)