I do think that Magna Carta and international law are worth paying some attention to.

President Obama seems completely unaware of how many of the policies he is trying to impose have been tried before, in many times and places around the world, and have failed time and again.

In the 21st century, the countries that thrive will be the ones where citizens know their voices will be heard because the institutions are transparent.

Slavery is a weed that grows on every soil.

Democracy is a daring concept – a hope that we’ll be best governed if all of us participate in the act of government. It is meant to be a conversation, a place where the intelligence and local knowledge of the electorate sums together to arrive at actions that reflect the participation of the largest possible number of people.

Humanitarianism consists in never sacrificing a human being to a purpose.

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.

No one doubts that innocent men, women and children have been the victims of chemical weapons attacks in Syria. And there’s no doubt who is responsible for this heinous use of chemical weapons in Syria: the Syrian regime.

So what we’re talking about here is human rights. The right to live like a human. The right to live, period. And what we’re facing in Africa is an unprecedented threat to human dignity and equality.

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

I was arrested three times and tortured once.

The good of the people is the greatest law.

In a republic this rule ought to be observed: that the majority should not have the predominant power.

On account of being a democracy and run by the people, we are the only nation in the world that has to keep a government four years, no matter what it does.

I think governments can’t do much.

To deny people their human rights is to challenge their very humanity.

Man is not free unless government is limited.

For any young democracy, the most difficult but important step is burying the legacy of tyranny and establishing an economy and a government and institutions that abide by the rule of law. Every country faces challenges to the rule of law, including my own.

Govern a great nation as you would cook a small fish. Do not overdo it.

It is difficult to make our material condition better by the best law, but it is easy enough to ruin it by bad laws.

Men are more easily governed through their vices than through their virtues.

I am opposed to the accumulation of executive power anywhere.

In order to govern, the question is not to follow out a more or less valid theory but to build with whatever materials are at hand. The inevitable must be accepted and turned to advantage.

Knowledge will forever govern ignorance; and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.

Men and women may form associations for and among themselves and be governed by stipulations that are mutually acceptable.

If I were a Negro, I’d be fighting, as Martin Luther King fought, for human recognition and justice. I’d rather go down with my flag flying. If you’re weak or crippled, or you can’t speak out or fight back in some way, then people don’t hesitate to treat you badly.

I think all Americans believe in human rights. And health is an often overlooked aspect of basic human rights. And it’s one that’s easily corrected. The reason I say that is that many of the diseases that we treat around the world, I knew when I was a child. My mother was a registered nurse. And they no longer exist in our country.

For this generation, ours, life is nuclear survival, liberty is human rights, the pursuit of happiness is a planet whose resources are devoted to the physical and spiritual nourishment of its inhabitants.

The example that America knows how to govern itself is one of the compelling aspects of our national security.

Slavery takes hold of few, but many take hold of slavery.

Government’s first duty is to protect the people, not run their lives.

Governance should be designed as an equalizer. Democrats are more inclined towards working families and those who are struggling for a better life.

The world is governed by very different personages from what is imagined by those who are not behind the scenes.

Nineteen sixty-eight was one exciting moment in a much larger movement. It spawned a whole range of movements. There wouldn’t have been an international global solidarity movement, for instance, without the events of 1968. It was enormous, in terms of human rights, ethnic rights, a concern for the environment, too.

To deprive a man of his natural liberty and to deny to him the ordinary amenities of life is worse then starving the body; it is starvation of the soul, the dweller in the body.

Rendition is just sending people abroad to be tortured.

Things in our country run in spite of government, not by aid of it.

In a country well governed, poverty is something to be ashamed of. In a country badly governed, wealth is something to be ashamed of.

The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all.

When you have an efficient government, you have a dictatorship.

Public opinion is the thermometer a monarch should constantly consult.

He who would be no slave must consent to have no slave. Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves and, under a just God, cannot long retain it.

If you must break the law, do it to seize power: in all other cases observe it.

What do I care about Jupiter? Justice is a human issue, and I do not need a god to teach it to me.

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

Tyrants have always some slight shade of virtue; they support the laws before destroying them.

Today we are engaged in a deadly global struggle for those who would intimidate, torture, and murder people for exercising the most basic freedoms. If we are to win this struggle and spread those freedoms, we must keep our own moral compass pointed in a true direction.

The sacred rights of mankind are not to be rummaged for among old parchments or musty records. They are written, as with a sunbeam, in the whole volume of human nature, by the hand of the divinity itself; and can never be erased or obscured by mortal power.

In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place, oblige it to control itself.

Mankind, when left to themselves, are unfit for their own government.

No man is good enough to govern another man without the other’s consent.

Judge Afiuni has suffered enough. She has been subject to acts of violence and humiliations to undermine her human dignity. I am convinced that she must be set free.

I played by the rules of politics as I found them.

The most perfect political community is one in which the middle class is in control, and outnumbers both of the other classes.

In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.

And every human being is precious.

I think what’s going on in Guantanamo Bay and other places is a disgrace to the U.S.A. I wouldn’t say it’s the cause of terrorism, but it has given impetus and excuses to potential terrorists to lash out at our country and justify their despicable acts.

Finality is not the language of politics.

Peace and justice are two sides of the same coin.

Pre-emptive war might fall within the framework of international law.

The equal right of all citizens to health, education, work, food, security, culture, science, and wellbeing – that is, the same rights we proclaimed when we began our struggle, in addition to those which emerge from our dreams of justice and equality for all inhabitants of our world – is what I wish for all.