Republic Quotes

• Republics are created by the virtue, public spirit, and intelligence of the citizens. They fall, when the wise are banished from the public councils, because they dare to be honest, and the profligate are rewarded, because they flatter the people, in order to betray them.

  Joseph Story

  Wise, Fall, Order

  Joseph Story (1834). “The Constitutional Class Book: Being a Brief Exposition of the Constitution of the United States: Designed for the Use of the Higher Classes in Common Schools”, p.154

  60 Copy quote

  Show source

• The difference between what we do and what we are capable of doing would suffice to solve most of the world's problems.

  Mahatma Gandhi

  Inspirational, Motivational, Positive

  65 Copy quote

• The Republican form of government is the highest form of government: but because of this it requires the highest type of human nature, a type nowhere at present existing.

  Herbert Spencer

  Nature, Thinking, Government

  'Essays' (1891) vol. 3 'The Americans'

  5 Copy quote

  Show source

• I feel that the constitution is workable, it is flexible and it is strong enough to hold the country together both in peacetime and in wartime. Indeed, if I may say so, if things go wrong under the new Constitution, the reason will not be that we had a bad Constitution. What we will have to say is that Man was vile.

  B. R. Ambedkar

  Country, Strong, Men

  13 Copy quote

• I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country... corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed.

  Abraham Lincoln

  Country, Money, Hands

  549 Copy quote

• This republic was not established by cowards; and cowards will not preserve it.

  Elmer Davis

  Coward, India, Preserves

  12 Copy quote

• Between a balanced republic and a democracy, the difference is like that between order and chaos.

  John Marshall

  Differences, Democracies Have, Order

  John Marshall (1836). “The life of George Washington: commander in chief of the American forces, during the war which established the independence of his country, and first president of the United States”, p.447

  57 Copy quote

  Show source

• When once a Republic is corrupted, there is no possibility of remedying any of the growing evils but by removing the corruption and restoring its lost principles; every other correction is either useless or a new evil.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Evil, Voting, Principles

  136 Copy quote

• Until philosophers are kings, or the kings and princes of this world have the spirit and power of philosophy, and political greatness and wisdom meet in one, and those commoner natures who pursue either to the exclusion of the other are compelled to stand aside, cities will never have rest from their evils - no, nor the human race, as I believe - and then only will this our State have a possibility of life and behold the light of day.

  Plato

  Kings, Plato, Philosophy

  Plato (2015). “The Republic”, p.206, First Avenue Editions

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• Republicanism is not the phantom of a deluded imagination. On the contrary, laws, under no form of government, are better supported, liberty and property better secured, or happiness more effectually dispensed to mankind.

  George Washington

  Happiness, Government, Law

  George Washington (1855). “Maxims of Washington: Political, Social, Moral, and Religious”, p.20

  3 Copy quote

  Show source

• Our great Republic is a government of laws and not of men. Here, the people rule.

  Gerald R. Ford

  Work, Men, Law

  Remarks upon taking oath of office, 9 Aug. 1974

  3 Copy quote

  Show source

• Society is a republic. When an individual tries to lift themselves above others, they are dragged down by the mass, either by ridicule or slander.

  Victor Hugo

  Society, Trying, Individual

  8 Copy quote

• Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters.

  Benjamin Franklin

  Years, People, Needs

  Letter to the Abbés Chalut and Arnaud, April 17, 1787.

  10 Copy quote

  Show source

• The first requisite of a good citizen in this republic of ours is that he shall be able and willing to pull his own weight.

  Theodore Roosevelt

  Military, Citizens, Weight

  Speech, New York, N.Y., 11 Nov. 1902

  10 Copy quote

  Show source

• The new republic should be based on diversity, respect and equal rights for all.

  Evo Morales

  Rights, Diversity, Should

  3 Copy quote

• A Republic without parties is a complete anomaly. The histories of all popular governments show absurd is the idea of their attempting to exist without parties.

  Franklin Pierce

  Party, Patriotic, Government

  61 Copy quote

• The state is nothing but an instrument of opression of one class by another - no less so in a democratic republic than in a monarchy.

  Friedrich Engels

  Class, States, Instruments

  102 Copy quote

• The little words in the Republic of Letters, like the little folks in a nation, are the most useful and significant.

  Samuel Richardson

  Letters, Littles, Significant

  Samuel Richardson (1751). “Clarissa; Or, The History of a Young Lady: Comprehending the Most Important Concerns of Private Life”, p.415

  3 Copy quote

  Show source

• Grant me thirty years of equal division of inheritances and a free press, and I will provide you with a republic.

  Alexis de Tocqueville

  Years, India, Division

  9 Copy quote

• The same fact that Boccaccio offers in support of religion might be adduced in behalf of a republic: "It exists in spite of its ministers.

  Heinrich Heine

  Hypocrisy, Support, Might

  3 Copy quote

• Behold a republic standing erect while empires all around are bowed beneath the weight of their own armaments - a republic whose flag is loved while other flags are only feared.

  William Jennings Bryan

  Flags, Weight, Empires

  Imperialism (Flag of an Empire), delivered 8 August 1900, Indianapolis, IN

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• The safety of the republic being the supreme law, and Texas having offered us the key to the safety of our country from all foreign intrigues and diplomacy, I say accept the key and bolt the door at once.

  Andrew Jackson

  Country, Keys, Texas

  "Personal Quotes/ Biography". www.imdb.com.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Republics end through luxury; monarchies through poverty.

  Baron de Montesquieu

  Tyrants, Luxury, Poverty

  "The Spirit of the Laws" by Charles de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu, Book VII: Consequences of the Different Principles of the Three Governments with Respect to Sumptuary Laws, Luxury and the Condition of Women, Ch. 4: Of Sumptuary Laws in a Monarchy, 1748.

  5 Copy quote

  Show source

• At twenty every one is republican.

  Alphonse de Lamartine

  Twenties, Republican

  3 Copy quote

• A government of laws, and not of men.

  John Adams

  Men, Law, Presidential

  "Novanglus Papers" no. 7 (1774). Almost certainly derived from James Harrington, but Adams's use of the phrase gave it wide circulation in the United States. He also used "government of laws, and not of men" in the Declaration of Rights drafted for the Massachusetts Constitution in 1780. See Cox 1; Gerald Ford 3; James Harrington 1

  78 Copy quote

  Show source