American Values Quotes

• I like to call the ethos I grew up with 'Oklahoma values.' But you'd be just as accurate if you said 'American values.' Except for our lack of a seacoast, Oklahoma has a little bit of just about everything that's American.

  J. C. Watts

  Oklahoma, Ethos, Littles

  "What Color Is a Conservative?". abcnews.go.com.

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• We shall listen, not lecture; learn, not threaten. We will enhance our safety by earning the respect of others and showing respect for them. In short, our foreign policy will rest on the traditional American values of restraint and empathy, not on military might.

  Theodore C. Sorensen

  Respect, Military, Safety

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• Our American values are not luxuries but necessities, not the salt in our bread, but the bread itself. Our common vision of a free and just society is our greatest source of cohesion at home and strength abroad, greater than the bounty of our material blessings.

  Jimmy Carter

  Home, Patriotic, Blessing

  Jimmy Carter's Farewell Address, January 14, 1981.

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• A nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people.

  John F. Kennedy

  Christian, Peace, War

  Kennedy, John F. (1963). “Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: John F. Kennedy, 1962”, p.163, Best Books on

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• On the road to equality there is no better place for blacks to detour around American values than in forgoing its example in the treatment of its women and the organization of its family.

  Eleanor Holmes Norton

  Equality, Organization, Example

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• We need to teach our youth American values, kindness, honesty,respect.

  Donald Trump

  Honesty, Kindness, Youth

  Source: www.msnbc.com

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• I am an undiluted admirer of American values and the American dream and I believe they will continue to inspire not just the people of the United States but millions across the face of the globe.

  Margaret Thatcher

  Dream, Believe, People

  Margaret Thatcher (1997). “The collected speeches of Margaret Thatcher”, HarperCollins

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• That's what American values and ideals are all about: We can come here and be different and celebrate different faiths and be OK with that.

  Marty Walsh

  Different, Celebrate, Ideals

  Source: www.mtv.com

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• My mother told me if I work hard and I really believed in American principles and I believed in God, anything is possible. That's why I'm not anxious to give away American values and principles for the sake of political correctness.

  Benjamin Carson

  Mother, Hard Work, Giving

  Source: cnnpressroom.blogs.cnn.com

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• Our American government has strayed too far from American values. It is time to move forward. The country we carry in our hearts is waiting.

  Bruce Springsteen

  Country, Moving, Heart

  "Chords for Change". www.nytimes.com. August 5, 2004.

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• We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values.

  John F. Kennedy

  Peace, Truth, Philosophy

  Kennedy, John F. (1963). “Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: John F. Kennedy, 1962”, p.163, Best Books on

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• Our government leaders... have made many mistakes in the past when they have lost sight of the sacred American values rooted in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. We are at the brink of even graver mistakes and assaults on these values.

  Samuel Dash

  Mistake, Past, Government

  Samuel Dash (2004). “The Intruders: Unreasonable Searches and Seizures from King John to John Ashcroft”, p.152, Rutgers University Press

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• Every age has found some alternative to American values appealing. The number of Western intellectuals enamored of fascism and all the various expressions of Marxism was legion.

  Dennis Prager

  Expression, Numbers, Age

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• We need to end permanently the tax that punishes American values of savings and investment and of building small businesses and family farms and ranches.

  Christopher Bond

  Needs, Saving, Investment

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• The country we carry in our hearts is waiting.

  Bruce Springsteen

  Country, Heart, Waiting

  "Chords for Change". www.nytimes.com. August 5, 2004.

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• Those aren't the kinds of folks who represent our core American values.

  Barack Obama

  Kind, Folks, Core

  "Transcript of President Barack Obama with Univision". Interview with Eddie "Piolin" Sotelo, latimesblogs.latimes.com. October 25, 2010.

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• We live in a time of transition, an uneasy era which is likely to endure for the rest of this century... During this period we may be tempted to abandon some of the time-honored principles and commitments which have been proven during the difficult times of past generations. We must never yield to this temptation. Our American values are not luxuries but necessities - not the salt in our bread but the bread itself.

  Jimmy Carter

  Patriotic, Commitment, Past

  Jimmy Carter's Farewell Address, www.jimmycarterlibrary.gov. January 14, 1981.

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• President George W. Bush is endangering the United States and the world's safety while undermining American values.

  George Soros

  Hurt, Safety, President

  "Why America Must Not Re-elect President Bush". Column at Project Syndicate, www.project-syndicate.org. October 17, 2004.

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• The lack of money is the root of all evil.

  Mark Twain

  Funny, Bible, Sarcastic

  Mark Twain, John Sutton Tuckey (1980). “The Devil's Race-track: Mark Twain's Great Dark Writings : the Best from Which was the Dream? and Fables of Man”, p.337, Univ of California Press

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• America's exceptionalism, American leadership, the American model, the American values are not [first with Donald Trump] - they're something that end at the border.

  Mark Shields

  America, Borders, Firsts

  Source: www.pbs.org

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• Watching President Obama apologize last week for America's arrogance - before a French audience that owes its freedom to the sacrifices of Americans - helped convince me that he has a deep-seated antipathy toward American values and traditions.

  Rick Santorum

  Apology, Sacrifice, America

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• I love the idea of a beautiful neighborhood that represents the very best of American values, but also as a fun backdrop to some darker, deliciously sneaky things going on in people's lives.

  Marc Cherry

  Beautiful, Fun, Ideas

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• America, the great liberator, is in desperate need of being liberated from itself - from its own excesses and arrogance. And the world needs to be liberated from American values and culture, spreading across the planet as if by divine providence.

  Kalle Lasn

  America, Arrogance, Needs

  "Culture Jam: How To Reverse America's Suicidal Consumer Binge - And Why We Must". Book by Kalle Lasn, 1999.

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• America will nurture a new Muslim - one who can believe in Muhammad and the Quran but who abandons belief in a Shariah-based state and affirms the primary American value of individual liberty, which has not been a normative Islamic value.

  Dennis Prager

  Believe, Islamic, America

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• An idea is growing in foreign policy circles in Washington ... that there is no turning back. We are stuck in Iraq and Afghanistan for 25 to 40 years, we are embedded in our prideful unilateralism, and nothing can return us to more traditional American values and principles of action. The hubristic creators of this "inevitability" planned it this way. ... Their failures in Iraq have not stopped the fanatic, power-hungry neoconservatives. ... The hard-liners who dominate this administration ... have led us to eternal conflict with Muslims.

  Georgie Anne Geyer

  War, Power, Years

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