Economic freedom cannot be sacrificed if political freedom is to be preserved.

If you know how to read, you have a complete education about life, then you know how to vote within a democracy. But if you don’t know how to read, you don’t know how to decide. That’s the great thing about our country – we’re a democracy of readers, and we should keep it that way.

Every election is a sort of advance auction sale of stolen goods.

I believe we are on an irreversible trend toward more freedom and democracy – but that could change.

All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin. And therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words ‚Ich bin ein Berliner!‘

Democracy is when the indigent, and not the men of property, are the rulers.

What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans, and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty or democracy?

Optimism comes less easily today, not because democracy is less vigorous, but because democracy’s enemies have refined their instruments of repression.

Democracy is a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve.

Our defense is in the preservation of the spirit which prizes liberty as a heritage of all men, in all lands, everywhere. Destroy this spirit and you have planted the seeds of despotism around your own doors.

If something inconveniences my children too much or takes me away from them, I won’t do it.

Propaganda is to a democracy what the bludgeon is to a totalitarian state.

When I joined the freedom movement in Mississippi in my early 20s, it was to come to the aid of sharecroppers, like my parents, who had been thrown off the land they’d always known – the plantations – because they attempted to exercise their ‚democratic‘ right to vote.

I hope to play until I’m, like, 38 or something, and that’s a lot of years in the game and a lot of travel and a lot of sacrifice on my family’s part.

Because of my parents‘ love of democracy, we came to America after being driven twice from our home in Czechoslovakia – first by Hitler and then by Stalin.

Over the course of my career in law enforcement, I have witnessed over and over again the selflessness and sacrifice of law enforcement who lay their lives on the line every day to protect people who they will never meet and people who will never know their names.

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.

The U.S. and its allies will do anything they can to prevent authentic democracy in the Arab world.

It is far more difficult to be simple than to be complicated; far more difficult to sacrifice skill and easy execution in the proper place, than to expand both indiscriminately.

It is almost universally felt that when we call a country democratic we are praising it; consequently, the defenders of every kind of regime claim that it is a democracy, and fear that they might have to stop using the word if it were tied down to any one meaning.

I think the self-burning itself on practice of non-violence. These people, you see, they easily use bomb explosive, more casualty people. But they didn’t do that. Only sacrifice their own life. So this also is part of practice of non-violence.

In the flush of love’s light, we dare be brave. And suddenly we see that love costs all we are, and will ever be. Yet it is only love which sets us free.

The ballot is stronger than the bullet.

People sacrifice the present for the future. But life is available only in the present. That is why we should walk in such a way that every step can bring us to the here and the now.

I think our democracy has it exactly right: two terms, eight years. It’s enough. Because it’s important to have one foot in reality when you have access to this kind of power.

The government is us; we are the government, you and I.

El Salvador is a democracy so it’s not surprising that there are many voices to be heard here. Yet in my conversations with Salvadorans… I have heard a single voice.

I’m glad I can’t vote.

To be able to throw one’s self away for the sake of a moment, to be able to sacrifice years for a woman’s smile – that is happiness.

Anything important is never left to the vote of the people. We only get to vote on some man; we never get to vote on what he is to do.

Part of the American dream is to live long and die young. Only those Americans who are willing to die for their country are fit to live.

The basis of our political system is the right of the people to make and to alter their constitutions of government.

Ballots are the rightful and peaceful successors to bullets.

In a democracy, the majority of the citizens is capable of exercising the most cruel oppressions upon the minority.

On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.

Let us all be brave enough to die the death of a martyr, but let no one lust for martyrdom.

If the people of Utah shall peacefully form a State Constitution tolerating polygamy, will the Democracy admit them into the Union?

Everywhere that freedom stirs, let tyrants fear.

The greatest of follies is to sacrifice health for any other kind of happiness.

The quietly pacifist peaceful always die to make room for men who shout.

Power means happiness; power means hard work and sacrifice.

The wise man does not expose himself needlessly to danger, since there are few things for which he cares sufficiently; but he is willing, in great crises, to give even his life – knowing that under certain conditions it is not worthwhile to live.

Fifty years of isolating Cuba had failed to promote democracy, setting us back in Latin America. That’s why we restored diplomatic relations, opened the door to travel and commerce, and positioned ourselves to improve the lives of the Cuban people.

Democracy is also a form of worship. It is the worship of Jackals by Jackasses.

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

If you want to sacrifice the admiration of many men for the criticism of one, go ahead, get married.

Many Tibetans sacrifice their lives.

For the record, our democracy is revered around the world. And free elections are the best way on Earth to choose our leaders. This is how we elected John F. Kennedy; Ronald Reagan; two George Bushes; Bill Clinton; and Barack Obama. It has worked for decades.

I don’t vote. I don’t do no voting.

Women fight for democracy and engage in the world. But they shouldn’t try and be copying men and be masculine; they should anchor on the home and build on those fundamentals.

Better to have beasts that let themselves be killed than men who run away.

Jesus paid a tremendous price for us so we could have abundant life. He willingly took all of our sin on Himself and gave His life on the cross so we could be forgiven and have new life in Him.

In wildness is the preservation of the world.

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

Up until the First World War, when people turned anti-German, Germany had been described by American political scientists as the model of democracy.

There’s no political point worth my son’s life.

I think it’s important to vote.

My mother was a full-time mother. She didn’t have much of her own career, her own life, her own experiences… everything was for her children. I will never be as good a mother as she was. She was just grace incarnate. She was the most generous, loving – she’s better than me.

We here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain – that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom – and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

The martyr sacrifices themselves entirely in vain. Or rather not in vain; for they make the selfish more selfish, the lazy more lazy, the narrow narrower.

The wisest use of American strength is to advance freedom.