“The fundamental question of politics has always been whether there should be politics.”

— Karl Hess

Foreword (1984) to The Market for Liberty (1970)
Context: The most interesting political questions throughout history have been whether or not humans will be ruled or free, whether they will be responsible for their actions as individuals or left irresponsible as members of society, and whether they can live in peace by volitional agreements alone.The fundamental question of politics has always been whether there should be politics.

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Karl Hess 25

American journalist 1923–1994

Karl Hess (1923–1994) American journalist

Foreword (1984) to The Market for Liberty (1970)

“My work has always been political, because the choice of being an artist is political in China.”

Ai Weiwei (1957) Chinese concept artist

2000-09, Escape from Propaganda, 2009

“Language has always been important in politics, but language is incredibly important to the present political struggle.”

Stephen Colbert (1964) American political satirist, writer, comedian, television host, and actor

New York Magazine interview http://nymag.com/news/politics/22322/ (16 October 2006)
Context: Language has always been important in politics, but language is incredibly important to the present political struggle. Because if you can establish an atmosphere in which information doesn't mean anything, then there is no objective reality. The first show we did, a year ago, was our thesis statement: What you wish to be true is all that matters, regardless of the facts. Of course, at the time, we thought we were being farcical.

“To be sure, Protestant theology presents a different, supposedly unpolitical doctrine, conceiving of God as the "wholly other," just as in political liberalism the state and politics are conceived of as the "wholly other." We have come to recognize that the political is the total, and as a result we know that any decision about whether something is unpolitical is always a political decision, irrespective of who decides and what reasons are advanced. This also holds for the question whether a particular theology is a political or an unpolitical theology.”

Carl Schmitt (1888–1985) German jurist, political theorist and professor of law

Political Theology (1922), Preface to Second Edition (1934)

“It has been frequently remarked that it seems to have been reserved to the people of this country, by their conduct and example, to decide the important question, whether societies of men are really capable or not of establishing good government from reflection and choice, or whether they are forever destined to depend for their political constitutions on accident and force.”

Alexander Hamilton Federalist Papers

No. 1
The Federalist Papers (1787–1788)

“The Imagination has always called for a return to the truest fundamentalism contained in the question "What does it mean to be a human being?" Needless to say, this is a question that deserves the deepest and most patient development. It will have to suffice for the present to say that our reigning social reality forbids— structurally, politically, violently— the broad posing of this question.”

Curtis White (1951) American academic

"The spirit of disobedience: an invitation to resistance"

“Europe is a commercial giant and an economic power of the first rank, but it is a political dwarf. Political cooperation in the Community will grow. The question is whether the supply services will follow.”

Jacques Delors (1925) French economist and politician

Speech to the press (3 December 1980), quoted in The Times (4 December 1980), p. 5
Member of the European Parliament

“The question was whether the Liberal Party was going to be merely a political party which is "the Keeper of the Doctrines."”

David Lloyd George (1863–1945) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Its sole business would be to see that no man should stray. It would become purely a political sect, strictly, sternly, severely, painfully orthodox, and painfully select. If that was to be its rôle it would dwindle from generation to generation and decade to decade, until it would only have representation amongst the more tenacious races, to one of which he belonged.
Speech in Oxford Town Hall (6 August 1924), quoted in The Times (7 August 1924), p. 14
Leader of the National Liberal Party

“There is no race problem before the country, but only a political one, the question whether a Republican has any right to exist south of Mason and Dixon's line.”

Frederick Douglass (1818–1895) American social reformer, orator, writer and statesman

1890s, Speech at Tremont Temple (1890)

“Kumaratunga not only boldly said that the ethnic problem needs a political solution but over the years she has been able to convince the majority of this country that the ethnic question warrants a political solution.”

Chandrika Kumaratunga (1945) President of Sri Lanka

Gunasekara, quoted on BBC News, What is the Kumaratunga Legacy? http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4452714.stm, November 19, 2005.
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“The fundamental question of politics has always been whether there should be politics.”

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