Government Quotes - Page 6

• The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern: every class is unfit to govern.

  Lord Acton

  Rights, Class, Political

  "Letters of Lord Acton to Mary Gladstone". Book by John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton, 1913.

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• We have the best government that money can buy.

  Mark Twain

  Funny, Sarcastic, Money

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• A government big enough to give you everything you want is a government big enough to take from you everything you have.

  Gerald R. Ford

  Inspirational, Success, Peace

  "If Elected, I Promise: 1001 Jokes, Toasts, Stories, and Gems of Wisdom by and about Politicians". Book by John Francis Parker, 1960.

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• The essence of Government is power; and power, lodged as it must be in human hands, will ever be liable to abuse.

  James Madison

  Power, Hands, Essence

  James Madison, Ralph Ketcham “Selected Writings of James Madison”, Hackett Publishing

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• Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive.

  C. S. Lewis

  Peace, War, Security And Freedom

  C. S. Lewis (2003). “A Mind Awake: An Anthology of C. S. Lewis”, p.45, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• It's amazing to me how many people think that voting to have the government give poor people money is compassion. Helping poor and suffering people yourself is compassion. Voting for our government to use guns to give money to help poor and suffering people is immoral, self-righteous, bullying laziness.

  Penn Jillette

  Bullying, Gun, Thinking

  Penn Jillette (2012). “God, No!: Signs You May Already Be an Atheist and Other Magical Tales”, p.151, Simon and Schuster

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• Governments never learn. Only people learn.

  Milton Friedman

  Philosophy, People, Political

  "The Cynic's Lexicon: A Dictionary Of Amoral Advice‎". Book by Jonathon Green, 1984.

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• Democracy means government by the uneducated, while aristocracy means government by the badly educated.

  Gilbert K. Chesterton

  Mean, Political, Cynical

  New York Times 1 Feb. 1931, pt. 5, p. 1

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• The government deficit is the difference between the amount of money the government spends and the amount it has the nerve to collect.

  Sam Ewing

  Differences, Nerves, Deficit

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• The government is us; WE are the government, you and I."- Theodore Roosevelt

  Theodore Roosevelt

  Theodore

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• The dominant purpose of the First Amendment was to prohibit the widespread practice of government suppression of embarrassing information.

  William O. Douglas

  Practice, Freedom Of Speech, Purpose

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• The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Gun, Southern, Liberty

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• To do that they, the NSA specifically, targets the communications of everyone. It ingests them by default. It collects them in its system and it filters them and it analyses them and it measures them and it stores them for periods of time simply because that's the easiest, most efficient, and most valuable way to achieve these ends. So while they may be intending to target someone associated with a foreign government or someone they suspect of terrorism, they're collecting you're communications to do so.

  Edward Snowden

  Communication, Nsa, Filters

  "• Edward Snowden Interview Transcript FULL TEXT: Read the Guardian's Entire Interview With the Man Who Leaked PRISM" by Gabriel Rodriguez, mic.com. June 10, 2013.

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• What country can preserve its liberties if its rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Country, Freedom, Gun

  Letter toWilliam Stephens Smith, 13 Nov. 1787

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• 

  I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Money, Believe, Army

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• Government is a trust, and the officers of the government are trustees. And both the trust and the trustees are created for the benefit of the people.

  Henry Clay

  Trust, People, Political

  Henry Clay (2015). “The Papers of Henry Clay: Candidate, Compromiser, Whig, March 5, 1829-December 31, 1836”, p.42, University Press of Kentucky

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• No free government, or the blessings of liberty, can be preserved to any people, but by a firm adherence to justice, moderation, temperance, frugality, and virtue.

  George Mason

  Freedom, Blessing, Tyrants

  Virginia Declaration of Rights (Article 15), June 12, 1776.

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• We're not a democracy. It's a terrible misunderstandin g and a slander to the idea of democracy to call us that. In reality, we're a plutocracy: a government by the wealthy.

  Ramsey Clark

  Reality, Ideas, America

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• I repeat... that all power is a trust; that we are accountable for its exercise; that from the people and for the people all springs, and all must exist.

  Benjamin Disraeli

  Trust, Spring, Exercise

  'Vivian Grey' (1826) bk. 6, ch. 7

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• Laws too gentle are seldom obeyed; too severe, seldom executed.

  Benjamin Franklin

  Forgiveness, Law, Gentle

  Poor Richard's Almanack, May 1756

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• In order to rally people, governments need enemies... if they do not have a real enemy, they will invent one in order to mobilize us.

  Nhat Hanh

  Peace, Real, War

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• Freedom is hammered out on the anvil of discussion, dissent, and debate.

  Hubert H. Humphrey

  President, Anvils, Debate

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• Dependence begets subservience and venality, suffocates the germ of virtue, and prepares fit tools for the designs of ambition.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Ambition, Design, Liberty

  Thomas Jefferson, Jerry Holmes (2002). “Thomas Jefferson: A Chronology of His Thoughts”, p.43, Rowman & Littlefield

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• Governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.

  Cory Doctorow

  Happiness, Men, Power

  Cory Doctorow (2010). “Little Brother”, p.235, Tor Teen

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• Christmas is the time when kids tell Santa what they want and adults pay for it. Deficits are when adults tell government what they want and their kids pay for it.

  Richard Lamm

  Funny, Christmas, Xmas

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