Richard M. Nixon Quotes

We do not learn by inference and deduction and the application of mathematics to philosophy, but by direct intercourse and sympathy.

It is necessary for me to establish a winner image. Therefore, I have to beat somebody.

Government can provide opportunity. But opportunity means nothing unless people are prepared to seize it.

I have impeached myself by resigning.

When I retire I’m going to spend my evenings by the fireplace going through those boxes. There are things in there that ought to be burned.

My concern today is not with the length of a person’s hair but with his conduct.

Watergate had become the center of the media’s universe, and during the remaining year of my presidency the media tried to force everything else to revolve around it.

I’ve analyzed the best I can… and I have not found an impeachable offense, and therefore resignation is not an acceptable course.

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.

Black Americans, no more than white Americans, they do not want more government programs which perpetuate dependency. They don’t want to be a colony in a nation.

It I talked about Watergate, I was described as struggling to free myself from the morass. If I did not talk about Watergate, I was accused of being out of touch with reality.

My strong point, if I have a strong point, is performance. I always do more than I say. I always produce more than I promise.

Our chief justices have probably had more profound and lasting influence on their times and on the direction of the nation than most presidents.

If I were to make public these tapes, containing blunt and candid remarks on many different subjects, the confidentiality of the office of the president would always be suspect.

I believe in the battle-whether it’s the battle of a campaign or the battle of this office, which is a continuing battle.

I am not a crook.

Let us begin by committing ourselves to the truth to see it like it is, and tell it like it is, to find the truth, to speak the truth, and to live the truth.

I’m glad I’m not Brezhnev. Being the Russian leader in the Kremlin. You never know if someone’s tape recording what you say.

I brought myself down. I impeached myself by resigning.

As this long and difficult war ends, I would like to address a few special words to the American people: Your steadfastness in supporting our insistence on peace with honor has made peace with honor possible.

Castro couldn’t even go to the bathroom unless the Soviet Union put the nickel in the toilet.

My own view is that taping of conversations for historical purposes was a bad decision on the part of all the presidents. I don’t think Kennedy should have done it. I don’t think Johnson should have done it, and I don’t think we should have done it.

I’ve never canceled a subscription to a newspaper because of bad cartoons or editorials. If that were the case, I wouldn’t have any newspapers or magazines to read.

If you think the United States has stood still, who built the largest shopping center in the world?

The mark of a true politician is that he is never at a loss for words because he is always half-expecting to be asked to make a speech.

Americans admire a people who can scratch a desert and produce a garden. The Israelis have shown qualities that Americans identify with: guts, patriotism, idealism, a passion for freedom. I have seen it. I know. I believe that.

Any lady who is first lady likes being first lady. I don’t care what they say, they like it.

I don’t think that a leader can control, to any great extent, his destiny. Very seldom can he step in and change the situation if the forces of history are running in another direction.

I wish I could give you a lot of advice, based on my experience of winning political debates. But I don’t have that experience. My only experience is at losing them.

Tonight – to you, the great silent majority of my fellow Americans – I ask for your support.

A man is not finished when he is defeated. He is finished when he quits.

It’s a piece of cake until you get to the top. You find you can’t stop playing the game the way you’ve always played it.

Scrubbing floors and emptying bedpans has as much dignity as the Presidency.

Unless a president can protect the privacy of the advice he gets, he cannot get the advice he needs.

The American people are entitled to see the president and to hear his views directly, and not to see him only through the press.

The memory of that scene for me is like a frame of film forever frozen at that moment: the red carpet, the green lawn, the white house, the leaden sky. The new president and his first lady.

There are some people, you know, they think the way to be a big man is to shout and stomp and raise hell-and then nothing ever really happens. I’m not like that I never shoot blanks.

A public man must never forget that he loses his usefulness when he as an individual, rather than his policy, becomes the issue.

By the time you get dressed, drive out there, play 18 holes and come home, you’ve blown seven hours. There are better things you can do with your time.

The Cold War isn’t thawing; it is burning with a deadly heat. Communism isn’t sleeping; it is, as always, plotting, scheming, working, fighting.

If you take no risks, you will suffer no defeats. But if you take no risks, you win no victories.

Only if you have been in the deepest valley, can you ever know how magnificent it is to be on the highest mountain.

I can see clearly now… that I was wrong in not acting more decisively and more forthrightly in dealing with Watergate.

The finest steel has to go through the hottest fire.

Those who hate you don’t win unless you hate them, and then you destroy yourself.

When the President does it, that means that it’s not illegal.

Defeat doesn’t finish a man, quit does. A man is not finished when he’s defeated. He’s finished when he quits.

If you want to make beautiful music, you must play the black and the white notes together.

The more you stay in this kind of job, the more you realize that a public figure, a major public figure, is a lonely man.

No event in American history is more misunderstood than the Vietnam War. It was misreported then, and it is misremembered now.

I can take it. The tougher it gets, the cooler I get.

Never let your head hang down. Never give up and sit down and grieve. Find another way. And don’t pray when it rains if you don’t pray when the sun shines.

The greatest honor history can bestow is that of peacemaker.

We cannot learn from one another until we stop shouting at one another – until we speak quietly enough so that our words can be heard as well as our voices.

You must never be satisfied with losing. You must get angry, terribly angry, about losing. But the mark of the good loser is that he takes his anger out on himself and not his victorious opponents or on his teammates.

People have got to know whether or not their president is a crook. Well, I’m not a crook. I earned everything I’ve got.

Solutions are not the answer.

The press is the enemy.

I don’t know anything that builds the will to win better than competitive sports.

Remember, always give your best. Never get discouraged. Never be petty. Always remember, others may hate you. But those who hate you don’t win unless you hate them. And then you destroy yourself.