Great Presidents Quotes - Page 3

• You can be a great president and be ridden with flaws. Of course we know that.

  Morley Safer

  President, Flaws, Courses

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• One thing that does seem to me to be fairly consistent is that presidents who restrict civil liberties, even in wartime, are usually judged harshly for it. So most people agree that one of the worst stains on the reputation of FDR, who is widely considered a great president, is the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. Likewise, Lincoln is judged harshly for the suspension of habeas corpus.

  David Greenberg

  War, People, President

  "Making Presidential History". The Washington Post Live Q&As, www.slate.com. August 9, 2007.

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• Mr. Lincoln was not only a great President, but a great man - too great to be small in anything. In his company I was never in any way reminded of my humble origin, or of my unpopular color.

  Frederick Douglass

  Humble, Men, Color

  Frederick Douglass (2012). “The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass”, p.318, Courier Corporation

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• Hillary Clinton is probably one of the best prepared people to walk into the Oval Office certainly in a generation, with all the love and respect and admiration that I have for President Obama, and he's been a great president, going in he was nowhere nearly as prepared as Hillary Clinton.

  Nancy Pelosi

  People, Office, President

  Source: www.politico.com

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• There are a lot of women that I think are very powerful and would be great presidents.

  Laura Bush

  Powerful, Thinking, President

  "The First Lady's Quiet Victory". Interview with Cindi Leive, www.glamour.com. January 3, 2008.

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• From Jefferson to Jackson to Lincoln to FDR to Reagan, every great president inspires enormous affection and enormous hostility. We'll all be much saner, I think, if we remember that history is full of surprises and things that seemed absolutely certain one day are often unimaginable the next.

  Jon Meacham

  Thinking, Inspire, One Day

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• I would never say John Kerry would be a great president. I will say that George Bush has divided us; he has filled this country with hatred.

  John Mellencamp

  Country, Hatred, President

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• Nixon was no more a saint than he was a great president.

  Hunter S. Thompson

  President, Saint

  Hunter S. Thompson, Jann Wenner (2011). “Fear and Loathing at Rolling Stone: The Essential Writing of Hunter S. Thompson”, p.429, Simon and Schuster

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• Liberty in the United States will never be reestablished so long as elites and masses alike look to the president to perform supernatural feats and therefore tolerate a virtually unlimited exercise of presidential power. Until we can restore limited, constitutional government in this country, God save us from great presidents.

  Robert Higgs

  Country, Exercise, Government

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• He was a great president in his first term; in his second term, he wasn't the same Grover Cleveland he was to begin with. ...Cleveland reestablished the presidency by being not only a chief executive but a leader.

  Harry S. Truman

  Leader, President, Firsts

  Harry S. Truman (2015). “Where the Buck Stops: The Personal and Private Writings of Harry S. Truman”, p.21, New Word City

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• Truman is now seen as a near-great president because he put in place the containment doctrine boosted by the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan and NATO, which historians now see as having been at the center of American success in the cold war.

  Robert Dallek

  War, President, Doctrine

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• The presidency is a serious job that requires sound judgment and good ideas, and there's no doubt in my mind that Jeb Bush has the experience and the character to be a great president.

  George W. Bush

  Jobs, Character, Ideas

  "George W. Bush Makes Campaign Trail Debut For His Brother". www.npr.org. February 15, 2016.

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• I don't pick my presidents because they were great presidents. I'm not much interested in ranking presidents and who is the best and who is the worst. I am much more inclined to be interested in them if they had an interesting life and if they were a complete person - and by that I mean they also had flaws and failings.

  David McCullough

  Mean, Interesting, President

  Source: belmontvision.com

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• Some of the presidents were great and some of them weren't. I can say that, because I wasn't one of the great presidents, but I had a good time trying to be one, I can tell you that.

  Harry S. Truman

  Time, Trying, President

  Harry S. Truman, Ralph Keyes (1995). “Wit and wisdom of Harry Truman”, Harpercollins

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• Jeb Bush is my friend. I think he'd make a great president. I've nudged him for some time.

  John Boehner

  Leadership, Thinking, President

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• George W. Bush is not only a great president; he was a great candidate.

  Ed Gillespie

  President, Candidates

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• The Presidency is not merely an administrative office. Thats the least of it. It is more than an engineering job, efficient or inefficient. It is pre-eminently a place of moral leadership. All our great Presidents were leaders of thought at times when certain historic ideas in the life of the nation had to be clarified.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Jobs, Engineering, Moral Leadership

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• After all the allowances are made for the necessity of having a few supermen in our midst - explorers, conquerors, great inventors, great presidents, heroes who change the course of history - the happiest man is still the man of the middle class who has earned a slight means of economic independence, who has done a little, but just a little, for mankind and who is slightly distinguished in his community, but not too distinguished.

  Lin Yutang

  Hero, Mean, Men

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• George Herbert Walker Bush. He was a pretty-pretty great President and anything but.

  Mitt Romney

  President, Walkers

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• I admire and respect Bill Clinton. I think he was a great president.

  Jim Clyburn

  Thinking, President, Bills

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• One right decision doth not a great president make.

  Herman Cain

  Decision, President, Right Decision

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• The great presidents never forget the principle of the republic and seek to preserve and enhance them – in the long run– without undermining the needs of the moment. Bad presidents simply do what is expedient, heedless of principles. But the worst presidents are those who adhere to the principles regardless of what the fortunes of the moment demand.

  George Friedman

  Running, Long, President

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• We need a great president.

  Donald Trump

  President, Needs

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• There will be great presidents again but there will never be another Camelot.

  Jackie Kennedy

  President, Camelot

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• We imagine much more appropriately an artisan on his toilet seat or on his wife than a great president, venerable by his demeanorand his ability. It seems to us that they do not stoop from their lofty thrones even to live.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Imagination, Wife, President

  Michel de Montaigne (1958). “Complete Essays”, p.615, Stanford University Press

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