Quotes about government (7014 quotes, page 57)

“Welfarism and excessive spending and deficits and socialism divide us, because everybody has to go to Washington. Those who have the biggest clout, whose who are the best lobbyists, those who go and they grab. And whether it's the medical industrial complex, or the banking industry, or the military industrial complex, that's who ends up controlling our government… For so long, conservatives and constitutionalists have lost the argument, they lost the moral highground. Because those who want to give things away, not talking about where they steal it from, but they want to give things and take care of people, they get the moral highground and they come by as being compassionate. And we who believe in liberty, we lack compassion. But the truth is, there's only one compassionate system known to man, and that is freedom and personal responsibility, then there's enough wealth, and then we will all have personal responsibility to use this compassion that we have, first to take care of our families and friends and neighbors, and there would be so much wealth that we could spread this wealth around the world.”

Ron Paul (1935) American politician and physician

New Hampshire Homeschool Meet and Greet, September 30, 2007 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WA0-OIdm6Z8
2000s, 2006-2009

People , Truth , World , Family

“Economists tell us that the 'price' of an object and its 'value' have very little or nothing to do with one another. 'Value' is entirely subjective — economic value, anyway — while 'price' reflects whatever a buyer is willing to give up to get the object in question, and whatever the seller is willing to accept to give it up. Both are governed by the Law of Marginal Utility, which is actually a law of psychology, rather than economics. For government to attempt to dictate a 'fair price' betrays complete misunderstanding of the entire process.”

L. Neil Smith (1946) American writer

Ceres, Chapter Eighteen http://www.bigheadpress.com/lneilsmith/?page_id=235, 2009.

Law , Question

“In conformity with the recommendation of Congress, a proposition was early made to the British Government to abolish the mixed courts created under the treaty of April 7, 1862, for the suppression of the slave trade. The subject is still under negotiation.”

Ulysses S. Grant (1822–1885) 18th President of the United States

1860s, First State of the Union Address (1869)

“The ancient Greeks knew the laws that govern the propagation of light in a uniform medium and upon its reflection. However, the law governing the refraction of light as it passes from one transparent medium to another was unknown until the last century. Snell discovered it, Descartes tried to explain it and Fermat criticized his explanation. Since then, many great geometers have researched the problem, although no one has yet found a way of harmonizing the law of refraction with more fundamental laws that Nature must obey.”

Pierre Louis Maupertuis (1698–1759) French mathematician, philosopher and man of letters

Accord de différentes loix de la nature qui avoient jusqu’ici paru incompatibles (1744)

Law , Way , Nature , Problem

“Politics in this country are dominated by debates about our relationship with Europe and the Eurocentralism that goes with that. I am firmly an internationalist, so I am not necessarily opposed to Europe. However, I am opposed to a fortress Europe that basically creates wealth for itself at the expense of the world, creates an undemocratic control of government for the whole of Europe, and, in truth, works only for the good of multinational corporations and banking systems. It will cause further imbalances in world poverty and world trade arrangements. I view the free market of 1992 not as an opportunity, but as a disaster for very many people throughout the world. I believe that Europe will contribute to the economic problems of the world. I do not agree with the sort of racist nonsense that has been published in the Sun and other newspapers during the past few weeks. It is a disgusting way to report matters. However, I believe that the drive towards a market economy in Europe will create poverty on the rims of Europe and an inner-colonialism in which western Europe will act as a sort of colonial master for eastern Europe and much of the rest of the world. It is about time that we began to take an international and global view rather than shut ourselves into a Europe that does not act in a socially just and reasonable manner. I hope that the debate will now begin to turn on those matters.”

Jeremy Corbyn (1949) British Labour Party politician

Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1990/nov/07/first-day in the House of Commons (7 November 1990).
1990s

People , Truth , World , Hope

“The "Cabinet meeting" of the Chinese government is really quick in yielding. Even the fart of foreigners can be taken as "fragrance." The Cabinet meeting lifts the cotton export ban because foreigners want cotton; it orders "all provinces to stop collecting the cigarette tax" because foreigners want to import cigarettes. Let the 400 million compatriots again think it over: Isn't it correct to say that the Chinese government is the bookkeeper of foreigners?”

Mao Zedong (1893–1976) Chairman of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China

"Cigarette Tax," Hsiang-Tao Chou-Pao, no. 38, August 29, 1923, in Collected Works of Mao Tse-Tung (1917-1949) http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/works/collected-works-pdf/index.htm, vol. 1 (United States Joint Publications Research Service, 1978), 48.
Original: (zh-CN) 中国政府的“阁议”，真是又敏捷又爽快，洋大人打一个屁都是好的“香气”，洋大人要拿棉花去，阁议就把禁棉出口令取消；洋大人要送纸烟来，阁议就“电令各该省停止征收纸烟税”。再请四万万同胞想一想，中国政府是洋大人的账房这句话到底对不对？

Thinking

“Modern liberalism suffers unresolved contradictions. It exalts individualism and freedom and, on its radical wing, condemns social orders as oppressive. On the other hand, it expects governments to provide materially for all, a feat manageable only by an expansion of authority and a swollen bureaucracy. In other words, liberalism defines government as tyrant father but demands it behave as nurturant mother. Feminism has inherited these contradictions.”

Camille Paglia (1947) American writer

Source: Sexual Personae: Art and Decadence from Nefertiti to Emily Dickinson (1990), p. 3

Freedom , Suffering

“There was a plea from honourable Members relating to the need for formal Gross National Product figures. Such figures are very inexact even in the most sophisticated countries I think they do not have a great deal of meaning, even as a basis of comparison between economies. That other countries make use of them is not, I think, necessarily a good reason to suppose that we need them. But, although I am not entirely clear what practical purpose they would serve in Hong Kong, I am sure they would be of interest. I suspect myself, however, that the need arises in other countries because high taxation and more or less detailed Government intervention in the economy have made it essential to be able to judge (or to hope to be able to judge) the effect of policies, and of changes in policies, on the economy. One of the honourable Members who spoke on this subject, said outright, as a confirmed planner, that he thought that they were desirable for the planning of our future economic policy. But we are in the happy position, happier at least for the Financial Secretary where the leverage exercised by Government on the economy is so small that it is not necessary, nor even of any particular value, to have these figures available for the formulation of policy. We might indeed be right to be apprehensive lest the availability of such figures might lead, by a reversal of cause and effect, to policies designed to have a direct effect on the economy. I would myself deplore this.”

John James Cowperthwaite (1915–2006) British colonial administrator

March 25, 1970, page 495.
Official Report of Proceedings of the Hong Kong Legislative Council

Hope , Exercises , Thinking , Change

“Some people think that being in government for a long time is a bad thing. But the more you stay, the more you learn. I am now an expert in governance.”

Yoweri Museveni (1944) President of Uganda

As quoted in "Pressure builds for change" https://web.archive.org/web/201204251111/http://www.global-briefing.org/2012/04/pressure-builds-for-change/ (April 2012), by Benon Herbert Oluka, Global: The International Briefing
2010s

People , Thinking , Learning , Time

“This Government believes that it would be economically advantageous for Scotland to be an independent country. Other parties disagree. But as we continue that debate, let us at least agree that this country - our country - has the capacity to become one of the most successful economies on the planet.”

Alex Salmond (1954) Scottish National Party politician and former First Minister of Scotland

Strategic objectives of new Government (May 23, 2007)

Success , Country

“Today he (Lukashenka) won by the hands of "gorillas" in black masks. Already it is clear that there will be no Parliament in Belarus, no democratic election. The remains of a free press will disappear. A presidential Junta will govern the country… Well, we can congratulate Belarusians on the previous elections. Worse cannot be done. For ourselves, for society and for future generations.”

Vasil Bykaŭ (1924–2003) Belarusian writer

about results of Belarusian presidential election, 1994
“Ён Прыехаў, Сам Памёр, Усё Спакойна…” Апошнія Тыдні Васіля Быкава https://www.svaboda.org/amp/24853764.html // svaboda.org
(in Belarusian)

Future , Country

“Europeans are not having children for lots of reasons. A static and fossilized economy without much growth gives little hope to a 20-something European that he or she can get a good job, buy a home, have three children, and provide for those offspring lives with unlimited choices. Instead, the young European bides his time, satisfying his appetites, as a perpetual adolescent who lives in his parents’ flat, seeks to milk the system, and waits for someone to die at the tribal government bureau. After a lost decade, one hopes to hook up with some like soul in her or his late thirties.”

Victor Davis Hanson (1953) American military historian, essayist, university professor

2010s, Europe at the Edge of the Abyss (2016)

Children , Hope , Home , Soul

“Now, I agree with Mill in holding that the scientific study of the structures and functions of the different governments that have actually existed in human societies cannot well be pursued in complete separation from the scientific study of other important elements of the societies in question : whether the aim of the student is to ascertain the causes of the differences in such governments or to examine their effects. But I do not think that there is any fundamental difference, in this respect, between the study of political relations and the study of economic relations, or, again, of religion, of art, of science and philosophy, as factors of social life. In each of these eases the student concentrates his attention on one element of human history which can only be partially separated from other components of the whole complex fact of social development. Experience seems to show that this kind of concentration, and consequent partial separation of historical and sociological study into special branches, is unavoidable in the division of intellectual labour which the growth of our knowledge renders necessary in a continually increasing degree.”

Henry Sidgwick (1838–1900) English philosopher

Elements of Politics (3rd ed., 1908), Ch. 1: Scope and Method of Politics

Life , Religion , Art , History

“In the following work, I have endeavoured to exhibit the full extent of the Military and Naval Forces which the government of Great Britain can bring into the field, or launch upon the ocean. I have likewise described the connection of these forces with the government of the country, and also the discipline usually exercised in order to produce a hardihood in battle, invulnerable to fear and unassailable by cowardice. My observations on these subjects were derived from a residence of five years in England; during which time I was constantly employed in visiting and viewing every object and institution worthy of notice relative to the British Army and Navy.”

Charles Dupin (1784–1873) French mathematician

Source: A Tour Through the Naval and Military Establishments of Great Britain, 1822, p. iii; Introduction, lead paragraph

Fear , Exercises , Time , Country

“Unless the power of the corporation can be organized on an accepted principle of legitimacy, it will… be taken over by a Central government…”

Peter F. Drucker (1909–2005) American business consultant

Source: 1930s- 1950s, The Future of Industrial Man (1942), p. 96

“It is obvious that no difficulty in the way of world government can match the danger of a world without it.”

Carl Van Doren (1885–1950) American biographer

Preface
The Great Rehearsal (1948)

World , Way

“The art of government has grown from its seeds in the tiny city-states of Greece to become the political mode of half the world. So let us dream of a world in which all states, great and small, work together for the peaceful flowering of the republic of man.”

Adlai Stevenson (1900–1965) mid-20th-century Governor of Illinois and Ambassador to the UN

As quoted in Seeds of Peace : A Catalogue of Quotations (1986) by Jeanne Larson and Madge Micheels, p. 265

World , Peace , Dreams , Art

“Simon, a man of the sect of the Essens, desired leave to speak his mind freely, and said that the vision denoted a change in the affairs of Archelaus, and that not for the better; that oxen, because that animal takes uneasy pains in his labors, denoted afflictions, and indeed denoted, further, a change of affairs, because that land which is ploughed by oxen cannot remain in its former state; and that the ears of corn being ten, determined the like number of years, because an ear of corn grows in one year; and that the time of Archelaus's government was over. And thus did this man expound the dream. Now on the fifth day after this dream came first to Archelaus, the other Archelaus, that was sent to Judea by Caesar to call him away, came hither also.”

Josephus on the Essenes

AJ 17.13.3
Antiquities of the Jews

Pain , Dreams , Affliction , Change

“It is said by parrot-minded critics that Owen was "a man of one idea," whereas he was a man of more ideas than any public man England knew in his day. He shared and befriended every new conception of moment and promise, in science, in education, and government. His mind was hospitable to all projects of progress; and he himself contributed more original ideas for the conduct of public affairs than any other thinker of his generation…. Because some of his projects were so far reaching that they required a century to mature them, onlookers who expected them to be perfected at once, say he "failed in whatever he proposed." While the truth is he succeeded in more things than any public man ever undertook. If he made more promises than he fulfilled, he fulfilled more than any other public man ever made. Thus, he was not a man of "one idea" but of many. Nor did his projects fail. The only social Community for which he was responsible was that of New Harmony, in Indiana; which broke up through his too great trust in uneducated humanity — a fault which only the generous commit. The communities of Motherwell and Orbiston, of Manea, Fen, and Queenwood in Hampshire were all undertaken without his authority, and despite his warning of the adequacy of the means for success. They failed, as he predicted they would. Critics, skilled in coming to conclusions without knowing the facts, impute these failures to him.”

George Holyoake (1817–1906) British secularist, co-operator, and newspaper editor

Memorial dedication (1902)

Truth , Education , Communication , Idea

“It will be enough to define the technocracy as that society in which those who govern justify themselves by appeal to technical experts who, in turn, justify themselves by appeal to scientific forms of knowledge. And beyond the authority of science, there is no appeal.”

Theodore Roszak (1933–2011) American social historian, social critic, writer

Knowledge , Science

“Indeed, our society, which has seemed so freedom-giving and passive in its attitudes toward the artist really makes extraordinary demands upon him: on the one side, to be free in some vague spiritual sense, free to act only as an artist, and yet on the other side to be rigorously tested as to whether the freedom he has achieved is great enough to be more solidly dependable than a government's financial structure... No wonder that modern painters, in view of these curious relations to society, have taken art matters into their own hands, decides for themselves what art is, what its subjects are to be, and how they are to be treated. Art like love is an active process of growth and development.”

Robert Motherwell (1915–1991) American artist

Source: 1950s, The painter and the audience' (1954), p. 108

Love , Art , Sense , Freedom

“Yet those who govern us as if were infants expect us to be grateful that at least we live in 'a family'; a family, moreover, patterned on the ideal by the example of the Windsors. A beaming gran, a dutiful mum, a stern and disciplined father, and children who are … well, all analogies based upon family break down somewhere. The analogy between family and society, as it happens, breaks down as soon as it is applied. The 'United Kingdom' is not a family and never was one. (Not even Orwell, with his image of poor relations, rich relations and 'the wrong members in control', could make it stick.) It is is a painfully evolved society, at once highly stratified and uniform and very fluid and diverse, which is the site of a multitude of competing interests.”

Christopher Hitchens (1949–2011) British American author and journalist

1990s, The Monarchy: A Critique of Britain's Favourite Fetish

Children , Family

“The notion that business and government are and should be partners is ubiquitous, unremarkable, and repeated like a mantra by leaders in both domains. It seems a compelling and innocuous idea - until you think about what it really means.”

Joel Bakan (1959) Canadian writer, musician, filmmaker and legal scholar

Source: The Corporation: The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power (2004), Chapter 4, Democracy Ltd., p. 108

Idea , Business , Thinking

“A fight back against this Government's policies will inevitably take place outside rather than inside Parliament. When I talk about 'extra-parliamentary action' there is a great outcry in the press and from leading Tories about my refusal to accept the democratic will of the people. I am not prepared to accept policies elected by a minority of the British electorate. I am not prepared quietly to accept the destruction of the coal industry, nor am I willing to see our social services decimated. This totally undemocratic Government can now easily push through whatever laws it chooses. Faced with possible parliamentary destruction of all that is good and compassionate in our society, extra-parliamentary action will be the only course open to the working class and the Labour movement.”

Arthur Scargill (1938) British trade unionist

Speech in Perth (4 July 1983), quoted in Paul Routledge, "Pit leaders seek backing for big pay increases", The Times (5 July 1983), p. 1

People , Law , Fight

“I say to my students, I say to my own children, I say to myself, uh the most abject form of slavery there is, is slavery to one's own feelings or passions or desires. The goal, the project of living a human life, a truly human life, is all about self-mastering. Now, if people live in a culture that encourages them to be masters of themselves and if they become masters of themselves, if they're able to control their own passions, no one's going to be perfect, we're not going to eliminate sin from the world or from the human heart, but if we're able to be masters of ourselves, masters of our own passions, then we will be able as a people to govern ourselves, we can genuinely make the republican experiment in ordered liberty work. But if we, if we lose it at the personal level, there's no way it's going to work at the societal level.”

Robert P. George (1955) American legal scholar

2016, Interview with Bill Kristol (2016)

Life , Children , People , World

“In the program of the Turkish government, nothing is said of a Turkification of the Arabs. I have never intended anything like that nor even thought of it. Our sole purpose is to strengthen the feeling of fraternity between the Ottoman-Turkish and the Ottoman-Arab elements and to make the latter understand that the national interests of the Arabs are identical to those of the Turks and that any harm to one of them necessarily means harm to the other. The Ottoman-Turkish and the Ottoman-Arab elements have to rally to the caliphate without afterthoughts if they want to survive.”

Ahmed Djemal (1872–1922) Ottoman general

Quoted in "The Syrian Land: Processes of Integration and Fragmentation" – by Thomas Philipp, Birgit Schäbler – 1998 – Page 321.
Quotess

Feeling , Understanding

“The enforcement of a rigid system of discipline in the government of works of great magnitude is indispensable to success. All subordinates should be accountable to and be directed by their immediate superiors only; as obedience cannot be enforced where the foreman in immediate charge is interfered with by a superior officer giving orders directly to his subordinates.”

Daniel McCallum (1815–1878) Canadian engineer and early organizational theorist

Chandler commented: To illustrate more clearly these lines of authority, McCallum drew up a detailed chart-certainly one of the earliest organization charts in an American business enterprise. (p. 103)
Source: Report of the Superintendent of the New York and Erie Railroad to the Stockholders (1856), p. 40. Partly cited in: Chandler (1977, p. 102)

Success

“We have here no traditions and ancient venerable institutions; here, there are no aristocratic elements hallowed by time or bright deeds; here, every man is the first settler of the land, or removed from the settler one or two generations at the furthest; here, we have no architectural monuments calling up old associations; here, we have none of these old popular legends and stories which, in other countries, have exercised a powerful share in the government; here every man is the son of his own works.”

Thomas D'Arcy McGee (1825–1868) Canadian politician

Hear, hear.
Legislative Assembly, February 9, 1865

Exercises , Time , Country

“This age of globalisation is marked by the adoption of universal principles governing such matters as democracy, human rights, trade and development. Today, I reaffirm here that Fiji accepts these precepts. But we also say that countries like ours should not be held to unrealistic standards, we need time to evolve to adapt and to adhere. Do not judge us by what might be inappropriate at our stage of development.”

Laisenia Qarase (1941) Prime Minister of Fiji

Address to the United Nations General Assembly, 17 September 2005 (excerpts)

Age , Democracy , Universe , Time

“We have an opportunity here to make the courts, as these cases wind their way up, understand privacy issues, emerging tech issues, against the backdrop of civil rights and through the prism of free information… DDoS is absolutely speech, it should absolutely be recognized as such, protected as such, and the law should be changed… The government and people who write about tech tend to call it a "DDoS attack" but in certain circumstances it's not a DDoS attack, but a DDoS protest. So the law should be narrowly drawn and what needs to be excised from that are the legitimate protests. It's really easy to tell legitimate protests, I think, and we should be broadly defining legitimate protests… I don't have to like or agree with the people that I represent to represent them. I have represented neo-Nazis and I'm Jewish… Everyone is entitled to a defense and the more reprehensible they are and maybe the more guilty they seem at the beginning of the case makes them more entitled to a vigorous and hard-hitting defense. So I don't necessarily know that there's someone I wouldn't represent based upon what they did or based upon their politics… People who cooperate, throw someone else into harm's way so they can soften the blow on themselves, I tend not to represent.”

Jay Leiderman (1971) lawyer

As mentioned in the Atlantic interview http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/10/hacktivists-advocate-meet-the-lawyer-who-defends-anonymous/263202/

People , Law , Way , Understanding

“Unfortunately, there are no memorials erected anywhere in Kodungallur, or Trichur, or Alwaye to honour Dharma Raja who gave shelter in his state to thousands of Hindus escaping from the Islamic brutalities of the fanatic Tipu Sultan; or Ayyappan Marthanda Pillai who was the architect of the historic Nedumkotta; or Raja Keshavadas under whose direct command a comparatively small army humbled and defeated the invading army of Tipu Sultan; or scores of valiant Hindu soldiers who laid down their lives to protect their country and faith. The most despicable and shameful act of the anti-Hindu secularist government of Kerala since Independence was that instead of honouring the legendary heroes of the land, a memorial in the form of a flagstaff was erected near the historic Trichur Palace to perpetuate the memory of the Islamic bigot Tipu Sultan who was instrumental in the forcible mass circumcision and killing of Hindus, destruction of Hindu temples, and devastation of the Malabar, Trichur, Alwaye and Kodungallur regions.”

Sita Ram Goel (1921–2003) Indian activist

Tipu Sultan - Villain or Hero (1993)

Faith , Memory , Country

“We have brought three words—freedom, choice, opportunity—into the centre of the political debate. And we have exposed the language of Socialism, the gloss they put on words to conceal their true meaning. For instance, Socialists say “publicly owned”. What they mean is “State controlled”. Socialists say “Government aid”. What they mean is “taxpayers' aid”. Socialists say “social justice”. What they mean is “selective justice”. Socialists say “equality.” What they mean is “levelling down”. Why do they twist the truth like this? Because they dare not spell out the Socialist reality. One way to destroy capitalism, said Lenin, was to devalue its currency. Another way is to debase its language. Whenever we can, let us, like Luther, nail the truth to the door—and let us do it in unambiguous English. These are the opening rounds in the battle of ideas. It is a battle that we are winning.”

Margaret Thatcher (1925–2013) British stateswoman and politician

Speech to Conservative Central Council ("The Historic Choice") (20 March 1976) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/102990
Leader of the Opposition

Truth , Justice , Way , Idea

“We really don’t get all the government we pay for, and thank goodness. Lord protect us on the day that we do.”

Jeffrey Tucker (1963) American writer

“We are most of us governed by epistemologies that we know to be wrong”

Gregory Bateson book Steps to an Ecology of Mind

Source: Steps to an Ecology of Mind (1972), p. 461

“Is there anything more powerful than Google? And our government is in bed with them, as we will show you tomorrow, in unbelievable ways. Unbelievable ways. We have, um, and have had for a while, people inside of Google who have alerted this program to things. There are people inside of Google who are terrified of some of the things that Google is doing and is involved in.”

Glenn Beck (1964) U.S. talk radio and television host

The Glenn Beck Program
Premiere Radio Networks
2011-02-15
Beck: "We Have … People Inside Of Google That Have Alerted This Program To Things" And Are "Terrified" Of Things Google Does
Media Matters for America
2011-02-15
http://mediamatters.org/mmtv/201102150016
2011-02-15
2010s, 2011

People , Way

“Government is too big and important to be left to the politicians.”

Chester Bowles (1901–1986) American politician

Quoted in in Forbes Magazine, vol. 68, 1951.

“I largely agree with those that hold that Government should not in general interfere with the course of the economy merely on the strength of its own commercial judgment. If we cannot rely on the judgment of individual businessmen, taking their own risks, we have no future anyway.”

John James Cowperthwaite (1915–2006) British colonial administrator

March 24, 1966, page 215.
Official Report of Proceedings of the Hong Kong Legislative Council

Future

“In this connection I take this occasion to state, that I was not without grave and serious apprehensions, that if the worst came to the worst, and cutting loose from the old government should be the only remedy for our safety and security, it would be attended with much more serious ills than it has been as yet. Thus far we have seen none of those incidents which usually attend revolutions. No such material as such convulsions usually throw up has been seen. Wisdom, prudence, and patriotism, have marked every step of our progress thus far. This augurs well for the future, and it is a matter of sincere gratification to me, that I am enabled to make the declaration. Of the men I met in the Congress at Montgomery, I may be pardoned for saying this, an abler, wiser, a more conservative, deliberate, determined, resolute, and patriotic body of men, I never met in my life. Their works speak for them; the provisional government speaks for them; the constitution of the permanent government will be a lasting monument of their worth, merit, and statesmanship.”

Alexander H. Stephens (1812–1883) Vice President of the Confederate States (in office from 1861 to 1865)

The Cornerstone Speech (1861)

Life , Wisdom , Men , Future

“A third-party candidate is never treated equally. They look at you as a novelty, as cannon fodder. "This is entertaining," they think, "but we'll go back to the Democrats and Republicans, because only they can run our government."”

Jesse Ventura (1951) American politician and former professional wrestler

Which is baloney.
Harvard interview (February 2004)

Thinking

“Power of auto-suggestion known in the Middle Ages. The power of thought, of idea, is incommensurable, is immeasurable. The world is dominated by thought. The human being individually is also entirely governed by his own thoughts, good or bad. The powerful action of the mind over the body, which explains the effects of suggestion, was well known to the great thinkers of the Middle Ages, whose vigorous intelligence embraced the sum of human knowledge.”

Emile Coué (1857–1926) French psychologist and pharmacist

Source: Autosuggestion : My method (2014), Chapter I. The reality of auto-suggestion.

Age , World , Intelligence , Idea

“Ladies and gentlemen, this is a difficult moment for America. I, unfortunately, will be going back to Washington after my remarks. Secretary Rod Paige and the Lt. Governor will take the podium and discuss education. I do want to thank the folks here at Booker Elementary School for their hospitality. Today we've had a national tragedy. Two airplanes have crashed into the World Trade Center in an apparent terrorist attack on our country. I have spoken to the Vice President, to the Governor of New York, to the Director of the FBI, and have ordered that the full resources of the federal government go to help the victims and their families, and to conduct a full-scale investigation to hunt down and to find those folks who committed this act. Terrorism against our nation will not stand. And now if you would join me in a moment of silence. May God bless the victims, their families, and America. Thank you very much.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

Remarks on After Two Planes Crash Into World Trade Center https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Remarks_After_Two_Planes_Crash_Into_World_Trade_Center (11 September 2001)
2000s, 2001

God , World , Education , School

“Constitutional statutes … which embody the settled public opinion of the people who enacted them and whom they are to govern — can always be enforced. But if they embody only the sentiments of a bare majority, pronounced under the influence of a temporary excitement, they will, if strenuously opposed, always fail of their object; nay, they are likely to injure the cause they are framed to advance.”

Rutherford B. Hayes (1822–1893) American politician, 19th President of the United States (in office from 1877 to 1881)

Diary (17 February 1882)
Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1922 - 1926)

People

“"Another situation generally exposed to ressentiment danger is the older generation's relation with the younger. The process of aging can only be fruitful and satisfactory if the important transitions are accompanied by free resignation, by the renunciation of the values proper to the preceding stage of life. Those spiritual and intellectual values which remain untouched by the process of aging, together with the values of the next stage of life, must compensate for what has been lost. Only if this happens can we cheerfully relive the values of our past in memory, without envy for the young to whom they are still accessible. If we cannot compensate, we avoid and flee the “tormenting” recollection of youth, thus blocking our possibilities of understanding younger people. At the same time we tend to negate the specific values of earlier stages. No wonder that youth always has a hard fight to sustain against the ressentiment of the older generation. Yet this source of ressentiment is also subject to an important historical variation. In the earliest stages of civilization, old age as such is so highly honored and respected for its experience that ressentiment has hardly any chance to develop. But education spreads through printing and other modern media and increasingly replaces the advantage of experience. Younger people displace the old from their positions and professions and push them into the defensive. As the pace of “progress” increases in all fields, and as the changes of fashion tend to affect even the higher domains (such as art and science), the old can no longer keep up with their juniors. “Novelty‟ becomes an ever greater value. This is doubly true when the generation as such is seized by an intense lust for life, and when the generations compete with each other instead of cooperating for the creation of works which outlast them. “Every cathedral,” Werner Sombart writes, “every monastery, every town hall, every castle of the Middle Ages bears testimony to the transcendence of the individual's span of life: its completion spans generations which thought that they lived for ever. Only when the individual cut himself loose from the community which outlasted him, did the duration of his personal life become his standard of happiness.” Therefore buildings are constructed ever more hastily—Sombart cites a number of examples. A corresponding phenomenon is the ever more rapid alternation of political regimes which goes hand in hand with the progression of the democratic movement. But every change of government, every parliamentary change of party domination leaves a remnant of absolute opposition against the values of the new ruling group. This opposition is spent in ressentiment the more the losing group feels unable to return to power. The “retired official” with his followers is a typical ressentiment figure. Even a man like Bismarck did not entirely escape from this danger."”

Max Scheler (1874–1928) German philosopher

Das Ressentiment im Aufbau der Moralen (1912)

Life , People , Youth , Age

“If there is any law governing the distribution of income between classes, it still remains to be discovered.”

Joan Robinson book An Essay on Marxian Economics

Source: An Essay on Marxian Economics (Second Edition) (1966), Chapter IV, The Long-Period Theory Of Employment, p. 34

Law

“Administration is the most obvious part of government; it is government in action; it is the executive, the operative, the most visible side of government, and is of course as old as government itself.”

Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924) American politician, 28th president of the United States (in office from 1913 to 1921)

1880s, "The Study of Administration," 1887

Parting

“And hereby it comes to passe, that Intemperance, is naturally punished with Diseases; Rashness, with Mischance; Injustice; with Violence of Enemies; Pride, with Ruine; Cowardice, with Oppression; Negligent government of Princes, with Rebellion; and Rebellion with Slaughter.”

Thomas Hobbes book Leviathan

The Second Part, Chapter 31, p. 194
Leviathan (1651)

Disease , Nature

“Hillary wants to surrender America to globalism. She wants a country without borders. She wants trade deals written for the benefit of foreign corporations. She wants a government that ignores the will of the people. She wants to sell out American security to the Clinton Foundation for a pile of cash. It is hard to tell where the Clinton Foundation ends and the State Department begins. … Hillary Clinton has betrayed her duty to the people.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

2010s, 2016, August, Speech in Jackson, Mississippi (August 24, 2016)

People , Country

“Timothy looked at the deep ocean sky, trying to see Earth and the war and the ruined cities and the men killing each other since the day he was born. But he saw nothing. The war was as removed and far off as two flies battling to the death in the arch of a great high and silent cathedral. And just as senseless…
“What are you looking at so hard, Dad?”
“I was looking for Earthian logic, common sense, good government, peace, and responsibility.”
“All that up there?”
“No. I didn’t find it. It’s not there any more. Maybe it’ll never be there again. Maybe we fooled ourselves that it was ever there.””

Ray Bradbury book The Martian Chronicles

The Million-Year Picnic (1946)
The Martian Chronicles (1950)

Death , Men , War , Peace

“A Government with Heart to protect victims of corruption, crime, and abuse.”

Francis Escudero (1969) Filipino politician

2015, Speech: Declaration as Vice Presidential Candidate

Heart

“I've seen a lot of patriots and they all died just like anybody else if it hurt bad enough and once they were dead their patriotism was only good for legends; it was bad for their prose and made them write bad poetry. If you are going to be a great patriot, i. e., loyal to any existing order of government (not one who wishes to destroy the existing for something better), you want to be killed early if your life and works won't stink.”

Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961) American author and journalist

Letter (12 January 1936); published in Ernest Hemingway: Selected Letters 1917–1961 (1981) edited by Carlos Baker

Life , Hurt , Dead

“Abolitionism proposes to destroy the right and extinguish the principle of self-government for which our forefathers waged a seven years' bloody war, and upon which our system of free government is founded.”

Stephen A. Douglas (1813–1861) American politician

Speech in the Senate (3 March 1854)
1850s

War

“Now, three years later, at the request of the regularly uncooperative Mexican government, your department has decided to use taxpayer resources to send marshals to Hawaii for Dog Chapman? This Administration routinely tells Congress that they cannot secure our borders and immigration system due to a lack of resources. We are told that the U. S. Attorneys offices in Border States are simply overwhelmed with cases and cannot prosecute all the violations even some of the serious ones. Yet somehow they have plenty of time to track down a Mexican drug smuggler and give him immunity so he can testify against our Border Patrol agents.”

Tom Tancredo (1945) American politician

Tom Tancredo to Attorney General Gonzales http://tancredo.house.gov/Media/File/Tancredo_DOJ_Chapman.pdf (September 15, 2006).

Dogs , Time

“"Any Bill is drafted without consulting any party or stakeholders is because it contains what the Government wants to be included in the Bill." (20 May 2005, explaining why he had not consulted the Great Council of Chiefs on the legislation).”

Laisenia Qarase (1941) Prime Minister of Fiji

Additional remarks about the proposed Reconciliation and Unity Commission

“I am obliged to confess I should sooner live in a society governed by the first two thousand names in the Boston telephone directory than in a society governed by the two thousand faculty members of Harvard University.”

William F. Buckley Jr. (1925–2008) American conservative author and commentator

Listen the to actual quoted words: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2nf_bu-kBr4
1963 statement, as quoted in The Quote Verifier : Who Said What, Where, and When (2006) by Ralph Keyes, p. 82
Meet the Press (1965), as quoted in The Quote Verifier : Who Said What, Where, and When (2006) by Ralph Keyes, p. 82
The numbers cited in paraphrases of this quote often vary from 100 to 2000.
Unsourced variant: I would rather be governed by the first 2000 names in the Boston phone book than by the 2000 members of the faculty of Harvard University.
Variant: I would rather be governed by the first two thousand people in the Boston telephone directory than by the two thousand people on the faculty of Harvard University.

Universe

“Fundamental to everything the [ancient] Greeks achieved was their conviction that good for humanity was possible only if men were free, body, mind, and spirit, and if each man limited his own freedom. A good state or work of art or piece of thinking was possible only through the self-mastery of the free individual, self-government.”

Edith Hamilton (1867–1963) American teacher and writer

Introduction
The Echo of Greece (1957)

Men , Art , Thinking , Freedom

“If a tax cut increases government revenues, you haven't cut taxes enough.”

Milton Friedman (1912–2006) American economist, statistician, and writer

As quoted in "Milton Friedman's Last Lunch" at Forbes.com (11 December 2006)

“We may observe, that, notwithstanding the dogmatical, imperious style of all superstition, the conviction of the religionists, in all ages, is more affected than real, and scarcely ever approaches, in any degree, to that solid belief and persuasion, which governs us in the common affairs of life. Men dare not avow, even to their own hearts, the doubts which they entertain on such subjects: They make a merit of implicit faith; and disguise to themselves their real infidelity, by the strongest asseverations and most positive bigotry. But nature is too hard for all their endeavours, and suffers not the obscure, glimmering light, afforded in those shadowy regions, to equal the strong impressions, made by common sense and by experience. The usual course of men's conduct belies their words, and shows, that their assent in these matters is some unaccountable operation of the mind between disbelief and conviction, but approaching much nearer to the former than to the latter.”

David Hume The Natural History of Religion

Part XII - With regard to doubt or conviction
The Natural History of Religion (1757)

Life , Men , Age , Faith

“Civil government does by its nature include much that is mechanical, and must be treated accordingly. We term it indeed, in ordinary language, the Machine of Society, and talk of it as the grand working wheel from which all private machines must derive, or to which they must adapt, their movements.”

Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) Scottish philosopher, satirical writer, essayist, historian and teacher

1820s, Signs of the Times (1829)

Nature

“My concern with democracy is highly specific. It begins in observing the remarkable fact that, while democracy means a government accountable to the electorate, our rulers now make us accountable to them. Most Western governments hate me smoking, or eating the wrong kind of food, or hunting foxes, or drinking too much, and these are merely the surface disapprovals, the ones that provoke legislation or public campaigns. We also borrow too much money for our personal pleasures, and many of us are very bad parents. Ministers of state have been known to instruct us in elementary matters, such as the importance of reading stories to our children. Again, many of us have unsound views about people of other races, cultures, or religions, and the distribution of our friends does not always correspond, as governments think that it ought, to the cultural diversity of our society. We must face up to the grim fact that the rulers we elect are losing patience with us.”

Kenneth Minogue (1930–2013) Australian political theorist

Introduction, p. 2 ; quoted in: " Professor Kenneth Minogue http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/10155678/Professor-Kenneth-Minogue.html" in telegraph.co.uk, 2 July 2013.
The Servile Mind: How Democracy Erodes the Moral Life

Money , Hate , Children , People

“The Web is the ultimate marketplace of ideas, governed by the laws of big numbers.”

Chris Anderson book The Long Tail

Source: The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More (2006), Ch. 5, p. 70

Law , Idea

“You can't have a government like this without an income tax, but we don't want a government like this. This is not the type of government that was designed by the founders of the country. This is not what was written in the Constitution. We've only had an income tax since 1913. But if you want a welfare state, and if you want to police the world and pay for the defense of Japan and Germany, give foreign aid to the Soviet Union. You not only need the income tax you need the Federal Reserve to print up the money when the deficit is accumulated. So we think that government should be smaller. If government is small, then you don't need the income tax.”

Ron Paul (1935) American politician and physician

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anmlPvmd1Ew
1980s

Money , World , Thinking , Country

“To achieve victory at the cost of eroding civil liberties would not really be a victory. We cannot change the core identity of our Nation and claim success. And our identity has never been in doubt — we are a free people, dedicated to liberty for the popular and the unpopular, committed to the ideal that the People govern themselves, and determined to have a government that cannot extinguish or suppress the rights that make us Americans.”

Alberto Gonzales (1955) 80th United States Attorney General

Speech regarding Civil Liberties and the War on Terrorism (November 20, 2006)

People , Change , Success , Victory

“[S]egments of the Right, who denounced phrases like “economic patriotism” when it passed Barack Obama’s lips but nod and cheer when similar phrases come out of the mouths of “nationalists.” They see the state as the key to fostering a new social solidarity because it alone speaks for their new idol — or “strong god” — of the Nation. Passionate nationalists, like passionate socialists, ultimately believe that the State can love you, and if the right people take it over, the divisions that are inevitable in a free society will be knitted together by some government initiative. But that is not love, it is lust. It is a lust for power and victory for your vision over all others.”

Jonah Goldberg (1969) American political writer and pundit

2010s, 2018, The Government Can’t Love You (2018)

Love , God , People , Strong

“The war has revealed an overpowering national instinct. The conflicting theories of the exact nature and limitations of our government had blinded the shrewdest minds to the fact that we were a nation, with all the feelings and instincts of a nation, and that our quarrels must be settled inside and not outside of the Union.”

George William Curtis (1824–1892) American writer

1860s, The Good Fight (1865)

War , Feeling , Nature

“All the wars and strifes between tribes, races, nations, from the beginning until now, have been the result of man's effort to govern himself and the world, rather than to submit to the government of God.”

David Lipscomb (1831–1917) Leader, American Restoration Movement

Source: Civil Government : Its Origin, Mission, and Destiny (1889), p. 10

God , War , World , Effort

“They first sallied forth in a body of about 500 persons to attack the market place of the village known as Poorwa, where they slaughtered a cow. With the blood of the animal they defiled a Hindu temple. Then they hung up the four quarters (of the cow) in the different parts of the market place. They maltreated and wounded an unfortunate Brahmin and threatened to make him a Muslim… The village of Laoghatty in the Nadia district was their next object attack. Here they commenced operations by the repetition of the same outrage to the religious feelings of the Hindus which they had committed at Poorwa, viz, the slaughter of a cow in that part of the village exclusively occupied by Hindu residents. But being opposed by Hardeb Ray, a principal inhabitant of the village, and a Brahmin, at the head of a party of villagers, an affray ensued in which one Debnath Ray was killed and Hardeb Ray and a number of villagers were severely wounded… Titu’s party went on increasing and with growing confidence they went on killing cows in different places, making raids on the neighbouring villages, forcing from the raiyats agreements to furnish grain, compelling many of them to profess conformity to the tenets of their sect… They openly proclaimed themselves masters of the country, asserting that the Mussalmans from whom the English usurped it, were the rightful owners of the empire… The rebels issued parwanas to the principal zamindars of the district. Their tenor was as follows: “This country is now given to our Deen Mohammed. You must, therefore, immediately send grain to the army.’ In a written report the magistrate of Nadia states that a paper written in Bengali and signed in Arabic characters, was put into his hand, purporting to be an order of Allah to the Pal Chowdhuries of Ranaghat to supply russud (rations) to the army of fakirs who were about to fight with the government.”

Titumir

About the exploits of Titumir. Narahari Kaviraj, Wahabi And Faraizi Rebels of Bengal, New Delhi, 1982, Pp. 37-38, 43-44, 50-51. Quoted in Goel, Sita Ram (1995). Muslim separatism: Causes and consequences. ISBN 9788185990262

Feeling , Confidence , Animals , Fight

“Beware: the Government Is Armed and Dangerous.”

John Hospers (1918–2011) American philosopher and politician

Source: The Libertarian Alternative, (1977), p. 12

“[On the Tea Party:] I like it because their view of government is essentially the same as mine, and I like it because they're regular people who, but for the shock of Obama's radicalism, probably would not have gotten active in politics.”

John R. Bolton (1948) American lawyer and diplomat

"The Man with the Mustache"

People , Tea

“I think myself that we have more machinery of government than is necessary, too many parasites living on the labor of the industrious.”

Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) 3rd President of the United States of America

Letter to William Ludlow (6 September 1824)
1820s

Thinking

“Everything is governed by one law. A human being is a microcosmos, i. e. the laws prevailing in the cosmos also operate in the minutest space of the human being.”

Viktor Schauberger (1885–1958) austrian philosopher and inventor

Implosion Magazine, No. 8, p. 6 (Callum Coats: Energy Evolution (2000))
Implosion Magazine

Law

“Every person, whether in wartime or not, should keep a pistol and rifle in his house at all times. If a person is not going to protect himself, and wishes the government to do it for him, how can he complain when the government decides to protect itself against him, and executes him?”

William Powell (author) book The Anarchist Cookbook

Source: The Anarchist Cookbook (1971), Chapter Three: "Natural, Nonlethal, and Lethal Weapons", p. 93.

Time , Housing , Personality

“…there is a strong case to be made for getting someone senior, with a title to match, who can knock heads together about e-government and how it is done properly…”

Bill Thompson (1960) English technology writer, born 1960

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/2940019.stm E-government begins with you, April, 11, 2003.

Strong

“I want, if I may, to address a few words to the Opposition [Labour Party]… Whatever may be said of this Parliament in years to come and whatever may be said of the right hon. Gentleman's party, I believe that full tribute will be given to him and to his friends. As I and those on these benches who take part in the daily work of the House so well know, the Labour party as a whole have helped to keep the flag of Parliamentary government flying in the world through the difficult periods through which we have passed. They were nearly wiped out at the polls. Coming back with 50 Members, with hardly a man among them with experience of government, many would have thrown their hands in. But from the first day the right hon. Gentleman led his party in this House, they have taken their part as His Majesty's Opposition—and none but those who have been through the mill in opposition know what the day-to-day work is—with no Civil Service behind them, they have equipped themselves for debate after debate and held their own and put their case. I want to say that partly because I think it is due, and partly because I know that they, as I do, stand in their heart of hearts for our Constitution and for our free Parliament, and that has been preserved in the world against all difficulties and against all dangers.”

Stanley Baldwin (1867–1947) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1935/may/22/defence-policy in the House of Commons (22 May 1935). This speech reduced the Labour leader George Lansbury to tears (Thomas Jones, A Diary with Letters. 1931-1950 (London: Oxford University Press, 1954), p. 149.)
1935

World , Thinking , Help , Heart

“Corruption is government intrusion into market efficiencies in the form of regulations.”

Milton Friedman (1912–2006) American economist, statistician, and writer

Frequently misattributed to Milton Friedman based on a monologue from the 2005 movie Syriana
Misattributed

“The Court's statement that it is 'tempting' to acknowledge the authoritativeness of tradition in order to 'curb the discretion of federal judges' is, of course, rhetoric rather than reality; no government official is 'tempted' to place restraints upon his own freedom of action, which is why Lord Acton did not say 'Power tends to purify.' The Court's temptation is in the quite opposite and more natural direction -- towards systematically eliminating checks upon its own power; and it succumbs.”

Antonin Scalia (1936–2016) former Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States

Planned Parenthood v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833 http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&navby=case&vol=505&invol=833&friend=oyez (1992) (dissenting).
1990s

Nature , Reality , Freedom

“But secession struck to an even deeper level, to the very roots of popular government. The seceding states made their bolt for the door not in response to invasion or military occupation or internal taxation, but because their favored candidates did not win a presidential election. The genius of popular government was wound around the twin propositions that majorities have the privilege of winning, and that minorities have the obligation to be cooperative losers. Secession was a declaration of non-cooperation with a national vote, and since the United States in 1860 was virtually the only large-scale example of a successful popular democracy, the threat that the American republic would fracture over a lost election seemed to call into question the entire workability of popular government.”

Allen C. Guelzo (1953) American historian

2000s, States' Rights and Wrongs (2008)

Democracy , Question , Success

“This was an age-old conflict. At its foundation lies the question of how can the Government govern and the people be free? How can organized society make and enforce laws and the individual remain independent? There is no short sighted answer to these inquiries. Whatever may have been the ambiguity in the Federal Constitution, of course the Union had to be supreme within its sphere or cease to be a Union. It was also certain and obvious that each State had to be sovereign within its sphere or cease to be a State.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, Freedom and its Obligations (1924)

People , Age , Law , Question

“I’ve been in some horrific situations where women have been raped repeatedly in. In Afghanistan I was talking to Afghan elders who were world weary of a lack of sustained attention from their own Government and from the international community to stop problems early. That’s the thing that all of that experience gave me - if you ignore a problem it gets worse.”

Jo Cox (1974–2016) UK politician

‘I’ve been in some horrific situations’ - MP http://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/i-ve-been-in-some-horrific-situations-mp-1-7642788, ' (26 December 2015)

Women , World , Communication , Problem

“The United States hastens the delivery of arms to the puppet governments they see as being increasingly threatened; it makes them sign pacts of dependence to legally facilitate the shipment of instruments of repression and death and of troops to use them.”

Ernesto Che Guevara (1928–1967) Argentine Marxist revolutionary

Cuba as Vanguard (1961)

Death , Dependency

“A power has risen up in the government greater than the people themselves, consisting of many and various and powerful interests, combined into one mass, and held together by the cohesive power of the vast surplus in the banks.”

John C. Calhoun (1782–1850) 7th Vice President of the United States

Speech (27 May 1836); this is the source of the phrase, "Cohesive power of public plunder"
1830s

People

“It is not reasonable for each government to come with a new plan every five years, and disregard previous programmes, particularly as no government will ever have the time, during a single mandate, to fully implement its project.”

Mohammed VI of Morocco (1963) King of Morocco

Original French: En effet, il n'est pas raisonnable que tous les cinq ans, chaque nouveau gouvernement arrive avec un nouveau plan, faisant l'impasse sur les plans antérieurs, alors qu'il ne pourra pas exécuter le sien intégralement, au vu de la courte durée de son mandat.
Televised Speech 20 August 2013 http://www.maroc.ma/en/royal-speeches/speech-his-majesty-king-nation-occasion-60th-anniversary-revolution-king-and-people

Time

“Government jobs are not an addition to the country's payroll; they are an increase in the nation's payload.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

“Obama to G-20: Print More Money, Don’t Make It,” http://www.ilanamercer.com/phprunner/public_article_list_view.php?editid1=556 WorldNetDaily.com, June 25, 2010.
2010s, 2010

Country

“The Federal commissioners sat down across the mahogany table from their Southern hosts. After a couple of minutes of chitchat meant to be polite- but during which the three Confederates managed to avoid speaking directly to Butler- Seward said, "Gentlemen, shall we attempt to repair the unpleasantness that lies between our two governments?" "Had you acknowledged from the outset that this land contained to governments, sir, all the unpleasantness, as you call it, would have been avoided," Alexander Stephens pointed out. Like his body, his voice was light and thin. "That may be true, but it's moot now," Stanton said. "Let's deal with the situation as we have it, shall we? Otherwise useless recriminations will take up all our time and lead us nowhere. It was, if I may say so, useless recriminations on both sides that led to the breach between North and South."”

Harry Turtledove book The Guns of the South

Source: The Guns of the South (1992), p. 226

Light , Time

“Since the conception of human rights transcends local legislation and the citizenship of the person affected, it is not surprising that support for human rights can also come from anyone—whether or not she is a citizen of the same country as the person whose rights are threatened. A foreigner does not need the permission of a repressive government to try to help a person whose liberties are being violated. Indeed, in so far as human rights are seen as rights that any person has as a human being and not as a citizen of any particular country, the reach of the corresponding duties can also include any human being, irrespective of citizenship.”

Amartya Sen (1933) Indian economist

Amartya Sen, "Human Rights and Asian Values" Sixteenth Annual Morgenthau Memorial Lecture on Ethics and Foreign Policy, May 25, 1997; Republished in: Tibor R. Machan (2013), Business Ethics in the Global Market. p. 69
1990s

Support , Help , Personality , Country

“Mr. Grey said, that he was prepared to defend the country, not only against an invasion of a foreign enemy, wishing to inculcate their own dangerous principles, which were clearly most subversive of civil society, but he would defend it, at the risk of his life, against the subjects of any government, if it was the best that human wisdom could devise; he did not however think it was candid, or by any means conciliatory, in the right hon. gentleman, on every occasion that presented itself to introduce the words "just and necessary" war. He declared he was much obliged to an hon. gentleman who had done him the honour to remember his words. He had declared, and he would declare again, that he would rather live under the most despotic monarchy, nay, even under that of the king of Prussia, or the empress of Russia, than under the present government of France. He wished the chancellor of the exchequer had descended a little from his high and haughty tone of prerogative, and had informed the House, in plain, simple, intelligible language his real opinion of the legality of the measure which ministers had thought to pursue with respect to voluntary subscriptions. As for himself, he would insist, that to raise money without the authority of parliament, for any public purpose whatsoever, was illegal; and if right hon. gentleman should insist on contrary, it would give a deeper wound the constitution than any that it had received even from that right hon. gentleman.”

Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey (1764–1845) Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland

Speech in the House of Commons (26 March 1794), reported in The Parliamentary History of England, from the Earliest Period to the Year 1803. Vol. XXXI (London: 1818), pp. 94-95.
1790s

Life , Wisdom , Money , War

“There are correspondences in the principles which govern the behavior of entities that are intrinsically widely different. These correspondences are due to the fact that they all can be considered, in certain aspects, "systems," that is, complexes of elements standing in interaction. [It seems] that a general theory of systems would be a useful tool providing, on the one hand, models that can be used in, and transferred to, different fields, and safeguarding, on the other hand, from vague analogies which often have marred the progress in these fields.”

Ludwig von Bertalanffy (1901–1972) austrian biologist and philosopher

1950s, "General systems theory," 1956

Behavior

“Real national unity sprang from the things which we had in common; the greater that common interest, the stronger the nation in peace as well as in war. It is because in this country we all enjoyed freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the right to choose and change our Governments that we were united. The continent of Europe had fallen before Hitler because of its disunity. By playing on the rivalries and jealousies of the nations he had divided them and devoured them in detail. There was not enough realization of the common interest of all in our civilization to overcome sectional ambitions and fears. Had Europe been united in spirit the Nazi monster would have been strangled at birth.”

Clement Attlee (1883–1967) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Speech in Chesterfield (13 June 1941), quoted in The Times (14 June 1941), p. 2.
1940s

War , Fear , Jealousy , Peace

“Big business in America today and for some years has been openly at war with competition and, thus, at war with laissez-faire capitalism. … The left's attack on corporate capitalism is, when examined, an attack on economic forms possible only in collusion between authoritarian government and bureaucratized, nonentrepreneurial business. It is unfortunate that many New Leftists are so uncritical as to accept this premise as indicating that all forms of capitalism are bad…”

Karl Hess (1923–1994) American journalist

"The Death of Politics", Playboy magazine (March 1969)

War , Business

“There is a danger and a most serious one in corrupt morals. A people without good morals is incapable of self-government. At the basis of the proper exercise of the suffrage lie unselfishness and the spirit of sacrifice. A corrupt man is selfish; an appeal to duty finds no response in his conscience; he is incapable of the high- mindedness and generous acts which are the elements of patriotism; he is ready to sell the country for pelf or pleasure. Patriotism takes alarm at the spread of intemperance, lasciviousness, dishonesty, perjury; for country’s sake it should arm against those dire evils all the country’s forces, its legislatures, its courts, and, above all else, public opinion. Materialism and the denial of a living, supreme God annihilate conscience, and break down the barriers to sensuality; they sow broadcast the seeds of moral death : they are fatal to liberty and social order. A people without a belief in God and a future life of the soul will not remain a free people. The age of the democracy must, for its own protection, be an age of religion.”

John Ireland (bishop) (1838–1918) Catholic bishop

1894 speech on patriotism to Union veterans of the Civil War, [McClarey, Donald R, Father John Ireland and the Fifth Minnesota, The American Catholic, 2012-08-23, https://the-american-catholic.com/2012/08/23/father-john-ireland-and-the-fifth-minnesota/, 2018-02-04]

Life , Death , God , People

“There is no higher honor than to serve free men and women, no greater privilege than to labor in government beneath the Great Seal of the United States and the American flag.”

George H. W. Bush (1924–2018) American politician, 41st President of the United States

George Bush: "Remarks to Members of the Senior Executive Service," January 26, 1989. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=16628&st
Address to the Senior Executive Service (1989)

Women , Men

“Great ideas do not burst upon the world unannounced. They are reached by a gradual development over a length of time usually proportionate to their importance. This is especially true of the principles laid down in the Declaration of Independence. Three very definite propositions were set out in its preamble regarding the nature of mankind and therefore of government. These were the doctrine that all men are created equal, that they are endowed with certain inalienable rights, and that therefore the source of the just powers of government must be derived from the consent of the governed. If no one is to be accounted as born into a superior station, if there is to be no ruling class, and if all possess rights which can neither be bartered away nor taken from them by any earthly power, it follows as a matter of course that the practical authority of the Government has to rest on the consent of the governed. While these principles were not altogether new in political action, and were very far from new in political speculation, they had never been assembled before and declared in such a combination.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, Speech on the Anniversary of the Declaration of Independence (1926)

Men , World , Idea , Nature

“This is indeed a maxim of general application…Nations cannot be governed by the obligations of friendship which prevail among individuals in private life…There can be, in the eyes of a philosophical statesman neither national enmities, nor national friendships.”

Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey (1764–1845) Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland

Letter to Lord Palmerston (9 October 1833), quoted in E. A. Smith, Lord Grey. 1764-1845 (Alan Sutton, 1996), p. 284.
1830s

Life , Friendship

“I present, for what it is worth, and may prove to be worth, the following bill of axioms or aphorisms on public administration, as fitting this important occasion.
# The continuous and fairly efficient discharge of certain functions by government, central and local, is a necessary condition for the existence of any great society.
# As a society becomes more complicated, as its division of labor ramifies more widely, as its commerce extends, as technology takes the place of handicrafts and local self-sufficiency, the functions of government increase in number and in their vital relationships to the fortunes of society and individuals.
# Any government in such a complicated society, consequently any such society itself, is strong in proportion to its capacity to administer the functions that are brought into being.
# Legislation respecting these functions, difficult as it is, is relatively easy as compared with the enforcement of legislation, that is, the effective discharge of these functions in their most minute ramifications and for the public welfare.
# When a form of government, such as ours, provides for legal changes, by the process of discussion and open decision, to fit social changes, then effective and wise administration becomes the central prerequisite for the perdurance of government and society — to use a metaphor, becomes a foundation of government as a going concern.
# Unless the members of an administrative system are drawn from various classes and regions, unless careers are open in it to talents, unless the way is prepared by an appropriate scheme of general education, unless public officials are subjected to internal and external criticism of a constructive nature, then the public personnel will become a bureaucracy dangerous to society and to popular government.
# Unless, as David Lilienthal has recently pointed out in an address on the Tennessee Valley Authority, an administrative system is so constructed and operated as to keep alive local and individual responsibilities, it is likely to destroy the basic well-springs of activity, hope, and enthusiasm necessary to popular government and to the following of a democratic civilization.”

Charles A. Beard (1874–1948) American historian

Administration, A Foundation of Government (1940)

Education , Hope , Way , Spring

“I happen to think that the world kind of looks down on Republicans for their social conservative views which include religion in government. I think that that should not play a role in any of this.”

Gary Johnson (1953) American politician, businessman, and 29th Governor of New Mexico

Statement made to representatives of the Pagan Newswire Collective (PNC)
2011-10-16
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/paganswithdisabilities/2011/10/full-transcript-of-qa-with-presidential-candidate-gary-johnson/
2012-02-24
2011

World , Religion , Thinking