“I do not say that democracy has been more pernicious on the whole, and in the long run, than monarchy or aristocracy. Democracy has never been and never can be so durable as aristocracy or monarchy; but while it lasts, it is more bloody than either.”

—  John Adams

XVIII, p. 483. Usually misquoted as "Democracy…while it lasts is more bloody than either aristocracy or monarchy".
1810s, Letters to John Taylor (1814)

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John Adams 202
2nd President of the United States 1735–1826

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