Unless your government is respectable, foreigners will invade your rights; and to maintain tranquillity, it must be respectable – even to observe neutrality, you must have a strong government.

While democracy in the long run is the most stable form of government, in the short run, it is among the most fragile.

Politics is not bean bags. It’s serious, tough stuff.

Our government has kept us in a perpetual state of fear – kept us in a continuous stampede of patriotic fervor – with the cry of grave national emergency.

In many respects, the United States is a great country. Freedom of speech is protected more than in any other country. It is also a very free society.

My job is not to represent Washington to you, but to represent you to Washington.

We, the People, recognize that we have responsibilities as well as rights; that our destinies are bound together; that a freedom which only asks what’s in it for me, a freedom without a commitment to others, a freedom without love or charity or duty or patriotism, is unworthy of our founding ideals, and those who died in their defense.

Personally, I’d like to see more of our leaders take a technocratic approach to solving our biggest problems.

What I worry about would be that you essentially have two chambers, the House and the Senate, but you have simply, majoritarian, absolute power on either side. And that’s just not what the founders intended.

The time has come for us to draw the line. The time has come for the responsible leaders of both political parties to take a stand against overgrown Government and for the American taxpayer.

So confident am I in the intentions, as well as wisdom, of the government, that I shall always be satisfied that what is not done, either cannot, or ought not to be done.

A constitution is the arrangement of magistracies in a state.

The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions that I wish it to be always kept alive.

The best government is that which teaches us to govern ourselves.

The Bill of Rights is not an a la carte menu.

Sure there are dishonest men in local government. But there are dishonest men in national government too.

It is a way to take people’s wealth from them without having to openly raise taxes. Inflation is the most universal tax of all.

A man will fight harder for his interests than for his rights.

The governments of the present day have to deal not merely with other governments, with emperors, kings and ministers, but also with the secret societies which have everywhere their unscrupulous agents, and can at the last moment upset all the governments‘ plans.

Whenever the people are well-informed, they can be trusted with their own government.

I would just like to say something, ladies and gentlemen. Something that I think is very important. It is that, you, we – we own this country. We – we own it. It is not you owning it, and not politicians owning it. Politicians are employees of ours.

Every actual State is corrupt. Good men must not obey laws too well.

No government ought to be without censors; and where the press is free no one ever will.

When I came to Delhi and noticed an insider view, I felt what it was, and I was surprised to see it. It seemed as if dozens of separate governments are running at the same time in one main government. It appeared that everyone has its own fiefdom.

I consider anybody a twerp who hasn’t read ‚Democracy in America‘ by Alexis de Tocqueville. There can never be a better book than that one on the strengths and vulnerabilities inherent in our form of government.

Policy makers who have never served in the military continue to use the military to lead social change in this country.

In general, the art of government consists of taking as much money as possible from one class of citizens to give to another.

Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people.

It’s very difficult for the American people to believe that our government, one of the richest on Earth, is also one of the stingiest on Earth.

The best minds are not in government. If any were, business would steal them away.

The difference between a democracy and a dictatorship is that in a democracy you vote first and take orders later; in a dictatorship you don’t have to waste your time voting.

Democracy means simply the bludgeoning of the people by the people for the people.

But do I think that our actions in anyway violate the War Powers Resolution, the answer is no.

You have to have a certain realism that government is a pretty blunt instrument, and without the constant attention of highly qualified people with the right metrics, it will fall into not doing things very well.

As a tactic, violence is absurd. No one can compete with the Government in violence, and the resort to violence, which will surely fail, will simply frighten and alienate some who can be reached, and will further encourage the ideologists and administrators of forceful repression.

Conquest is not in our principles. It is inconsistent with our government.

Every man, every woman who has to take up the service of government, must ask themselves two questions: ‚Do I love my people in order to serve them better? Am I humble and do I listen to everybody, to diverse opinions in order to choose the best path?‘ If you don’t ask those questions, your governance will not be good.

We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we’ve set. We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded.

I do not believe that government should be in the business of telling women what they should do with their bodies.

We will never have true civilization until we have learned to recognize the rights of others.

I am concerned about the whole man. I am concerned about what the people, using their government as an instrument and a tool, can do toward building the whole man, which will mean a better society and a better world.

When you decide to get involved in a military operation in a place like Syria, you’ve got to be prepared, as we learned from Iraq and Afghanistan, to become the government, and I’m not sure any country, either the United States or I don’t hear of anyone else, who’s willing to take on that responsibility.

The biggest problem that we have is that California is being run now by special interests. All of the politicians are not anymore making the moves for the people, but for special interests and we have to stop that.

I found that the corridors of power in Delhi were littered with lobbies of various kinds.

Nobody wants to put the creditworthiness of the United States in jeopardy. Nobody wants to see the United States default. So we’ve got to seize this moment, and we have to seize it soon.

Our rights are not absolute. Our rights can be curtailed in the interest of public safety.

What men value in this world is not rights but privileges.

The Iranian government is undoubtedly a severe danger to its own population, but not beyond that.

The effort to try to present the Social Security program as if it’s a major problem, that’s just a hidden way of trying to undermine and destroy it.

Nothing is unchangeable but the inherent and unalienable rights of man.

There is too much government today. We’ve got to remember the government should be by the people, of the people, and for the people.

Not only our future economic soundness but the very soundness of our democratic institutions depends on the determination of our government to give employment to idle men.

The philosophy of the school room in one generation will be the philosophy of government in the next.

Politics ought to be the part-time profession of every citizen who would protect the rights and privileges of free people and who would preserve what is good and fruitful in our national heritage.

To suppose that any form of government will secure liberty or happiness without any virtue in the people, is a chimerical idea.

I simply can’t build my hopes on a foundation of confusion, misery and death… I think… peace and tranquillity will return again.

I own that I am not a friend to a very energetic government. It is always oppressive.

There is no more independence in politics than there is in jail.

If you make any money, the government shoves you in the creek once a year with it in your pockets, and all that don’t get wet you can keep.

If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.

The most dangerous man to any government is the man who is able to think things out… without regard to the prevailing superstitions and taboos. Almost inevitably he comes to the conclusion that the government he lives under is dishonest, insane, intolerable.