We find ourselves under the government of a system of political institutions, conducing more essentially to the ends of civil and religious liberty, than any of which the history of former times tells us.

It is not my nature, when I see a people borne down by the weight of their shackles – the oppression of tyranny – to make their life more bitter by heaping upon them greater burdens; but rather would I do all in my power to raise the yoke than to add anything that would tend to crush them.

Atlas was permitted the opinion that he was at liberty, if he wished, to drop the Earth and creep away; but this opinion was all that he was permitted.

Study the past, if you would divine the future.

Men are never really willing to die except for the sake of freedom: therefore they do not believe in dying completely.

We will not be intimidated or pushed off the world stage by people who do not like what we stand for, and that is, freedom, democracy and the fight against disease, poverty and terrorism.

I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past.

Our country was founded by geniuses, but it’s being run by idiots.

Many Communist government officials have a rigid, dictatorial power, but they live in constant suspicion and fear of anything that might undermine the power they have.

The world at large is less inequitable today than at any time in history. Number of people in abject poverty, as a percentage, is at all-time low.

In history people dressed much better than we do today.

Seeking means: to have a goal; but finding means: to be free, to be receptive, to have no goal.

We must always remember that the Chinese revolution was not a peasant’s revolution, but one of the extreme Right.

The age of chivalry is past. Bores have succeeded to dragons.

Dogmas are collective conceptual prisons. And the strange thing is that people love their prison cells because they give them a sense of security and a false sense of ‚I know.‘ Nothing has inflicted more suffering on humanity than its dogmas.

While discipline and freedom seem like they sit on opposite sides of the spectrum, they are actually very connected.

I can do whatever I want.

For Africa to me… is more than a glamorous fact. It is a historical truth. No man can know where he is going unless he knows exactly where he has been and exactly how he arrived at his present place.

Up until the 1920s, everyone thought the universe was essentially static and unchanging in time.

Well, I have great respect for Senator Hirono.

The only sure bulwark of continuing liberty is a government strong enough to protect the interests of the people, and a people strong enough and well enough informed to maintain its sovereign control over the goverment.

I found this national debt, doubled, wrapped in a big bow waiting for me as I stepped into the Oval Office.

I think members of the legislature, people who have to run for office, know the connection between money and influence on what laws get passed.

In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free – honorable alike in that we give and what we preserve. We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth.

We are not to expect to be translated from despotism to liberty in a featherbed.

I thought how unpleasant it is to be locked out; and I thought how it is worse, perhaps, to be locked in.

All of us are in the same place, each with our own rooms, and we were allowed to do whatever we wanted. Which is totally different than college, where they manage your schedule for you. In the NBA, you’re on your own.

The government of Israel doesn’t like the kinds of things I say, which puts them into the same category as every other government in the world.

Liberty is the right to do what I like; license, the right to do what you like.

Germany has reduced savagery to a science, and this great war for the victorious peace of justice must go on until the German cancer is cut clean out of the world body.

The more you practice, the better you get, the more freedom you have to create.

The history of all previous societies has been the history of class struggles.

Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves; and under the rule of a just God, cannot long retain it.

In the 1960s, there was a point, 1968, ’69, when there was a very strong antiwar movement against the war in Vietnam. But it’s worth remembering that the war in Vietnam started – an outright war started in 1962.

World War II broke out in 1939, and many people credit that war with saving the economy.

Let us never forget that government is ourselves and not an alien power over us. The ultimate rulers of our democracy are not a President and senators and congressmen and government officials, but the voters of this country.

Within the soul of America is freedom of mind and spirit in man. Here alone are the open windows through which pours the sunlight of the human spirit. Here alone is human dignity not a dream but an accomplishment. Perhaps it is not perfect, but it is more full in realization here than any other place in the world.

The people made worse off by slavery were those who were enslaved. Their descendants would have been worse off today if born in Africa instead of America. Put differently, the terrible fate of their ancestors benefitted them.

Oh, yes; you Virginians shed barrels of perspiration while standing off at a distance and superintending the work your slaves do for you. It is different with us. Here it is every fellow for himself, or he doesn’t get there.

A bureaucrat is a Democrat who holds some office that a Republican wants.

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.

They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.

I wish I could say to all those people who consider themselves anarchists or radicals: Please join the nonviolent movement. This is how Gandhi freed India. If Gandhi freed India, we can certainly free the United States from our racism, misogyny, and bigotry.

The essence of Government is power; and power, lodged as it must be in human hands, will ever be liable to abuse.

A popular government without popular information or the means of acquiring it, is but a prologue to a farce, or a tragedy, or perhaps both.

We’ve persevered because of a belief we share with the Iraqi people – a belief that out of the ashes of war, a new beginning could be born in this cradle of civilization. Through this remarkable chapter in the history of the United States and Iraq, we have met our responsibility. Now, it’s time to turn the page.

Only free men can negotiate. A prisoner cannot enter into contracts.

If people lose faith in their government, the result is the same whether or not the loss of confidence is justified.

If physical death is the price that I must pay to free my white brothers and sisters from a permanent death of the spirit, then nothing can be more redemptive.

I like policy. It’s why I decided to enter government. The other thing I like about government – you have good days, you have bad days, but you never have a boring day, and that’s important to me.

Treachery has existed as long as there’s been warfare, and there’s always been a few people that you couldn’t trust.

Anyone who knows anything of history knows that great social changes are impossible without feminine upheaval. Social progress can be measured exactly by the social position of the fair sex, the ugly ones included.

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.

The Holocaust was an obscene period in our nation’s history. I mean in this century’s history. But we all lived in this century. I didn’t live in this century.

Freedom makes a huge requirement of every human being. With freedom comes responsibility. For the person who is unwilling to grow up, the person who does not want to carry his own weight, this is a frightening prospect.

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

Shall I tell you what the real evil is? To cringe to the things that are called evils, to surrender to them our freedom, in defiance of which we ought to face any suffering.

The people are the only legitimate fountain of power, and it is from them that the constitutional charter, under which the several branches of government hold their power, is derived.

John F. Kennedy was the victim of the hate that was a part of our country. It is a disease that occupies the minds of the few but brings danger to the many.

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

Even in high school I was very interested in history – why people do the things they do. As a kid I spent a lot of time trying to relate the past to the present.