First Inaugural Address (4 March 1829). 
1820s
                                    
“The task will be more fruitfully performed if the citizen, and his agents in public offices, understand the ecology of government.”
Source: Reflections on public administration, 1947, p. 19
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John M. Gaus 7
American political scientist 1894–1969Related quotes
Source: https://www.vanguardngr.com/2021/10/nigeria-61-eie-11-light-hope-power-and-voice-opinion/ Speaking about Nigeria (October 18 2021 )
Letter accepting the nomination for governor of New York (October 1882).
                                        
                                        Statement to a reporter in the Boston Record, 14 April 1903. (quoted in Alpheus Thomas Mason, Brandeis: A Free Man's Life (1946), p. 122.) 
Commonly paraphrased as "The most important office is that of the private citizen" or "The most important political office is that of the private citizen", and sometimes misattributed to his dissenting opinion in Olmstead v. United States. 
Extra-judicial writings
                                    
[harv, Brownlie, Robin, A fatherly eye: Indian agents, government power, and Aboriginal resistance in Ontario, 1918-1939, 2003, 2003, University of Toronto Press, 9780195417845], p. 153
"On Voting Rights for Actors and Jews" (21 December 1789)
                                        
                                        Address to the Los Angeles Junior Chamber of Commerce (10 July 1991) 
Post-presidency (1989–2004) 
Context: Although I held public office for a total of sixteen years, I also thought of myself as a citizen-politician, not a career one. Every now and then when I was in government, I would remind my associates that "When we start thinking of government as 'us' instead of 'them,' we've been here too long." By that I mean that elected officeholders need to retain a certain skepticism about the perfectibility of government.
                                    
2012, Yangon University Speech (November 2012)