Quotes about independent (1886 quotes, page 19)

“What set him apart from almost all the freedom fighters who held high offices in independent India was his complete freedom from material desire. He had no source of income and would not accept money from his children or from well-wishers. He had to be forced to sign an application for the freedom fighters pension of Rs 500 per month.”

Gulzarilal Nanda (1898–1998) Prime Minister of India

Rediff.com, in "Former PM Gulzarilal Nanda dead".

Money , Children , Freedom

“Modern Hypnotism owes it name and its appearance in the realm of science to the investigations made by Braid…He is its true creator; he made it what it is; and above all, he gave emphasis to the experimental truth by means of which he proved that, when hypnotic phenomena are called into play, they are wholly independent of any supposed influence of the hypnotist upon the hypnotised, and that the hypnotised person simply reacts upon himself by reason of latent capacities in him which are artificially developed…Braid demonstrated that … hypnotism, acting upon a human subject as upon a fallow field, merely set in motion a string of silent faculties which only needed its assistance to reach their development.”

James Braid (1795–1860) Scottish surgeon, hypnotist, and hypnotherapist

Jules Bernard Luys, in Pamphlets on hypnotism (1892) http://books.google.co.in/books?ei=-2xvU7rZLIXc8AW9i4CwAQ, pp.898-99.

Truth , Science , Appearance , Personality

“He had access to Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, C. Rajagopalachari and all the post-Independence greats, such as K. Kamaraj, Jayaprakash Narayan and Indira Gandhi, none of whom hesitated to exploit his grit and ingenuity.”

Ramnath Goenka (1904–1991) Indian politician

Ramnath Goenka — Media Baron, 1904-1991

“Our goals are the same, to have a just system of economics and politics, to let the people of the world share in growth, in peace, in personal freedom, and in the benefits to be derived from the proper utilization of natural resources. We believe in enhancing human rights. We believe that we should enhance, as independent nations, the freedom of our own people.”

Nicolae Ceaușescu (1918–1989) General Secretary of the Romanian Communist Party

Jimmy Carter welcoming Ceaușescu (April 1978). [Muravchik, Joshua, Our Worst Ex-President, Commentary magazine., February 2007, http://www.commentarymagazine.com/cm/main/viewArticle.aip?id=10824&page=2]
About Ceaușescu

Peace , Freedom , Personality , People

“Convictions following the admission into evidence of confessions which are involuntary, i. e., the product of coercion, either physical or psychological, cannot stand. This is so not because such confessions are unlikely to be true but because the methods used to extract them offend an underlying principle in the enforcement of our criminal law: that ours is an accusatorial and not an inquisitorial system — a system in which the State must establish guilt by evidence independently and freely secured and may not by coercion prove its charges against an accused out of his own mouth.”

Felix Frankfurter (1882–1965) American judge

Rogers v. Richmond, 365 U.S. 534, 540-41 (1961).
Judicial opinions

Law

“Thomas Eakins was a man of great character. He was a man of iron will and his will to paint and to carry out his life as he thought it should go. This he did. It cost him heavily but in his works we have the precious result of his independence, his generous heart and his big mind. Eakins was a deep student of life, and with a great love he studied humanity frankly. He was not afraid of what his study revealed to him.”

Thomas Eakins (1844–1916) American painter

Robert Henri, open letter to the Art Students League, (1917-10-29).

Study , Painting , Heart , Love

“What constitutes an American? Not color nor race nor religion. Not the pedigree of his family nor the place of his birth. Not the coincidence of his citizenship. Not his social status nor his bank account. Not his trade nor his profession. An American is one who loves justice and believes in the dignity of man. An American is one who will fight for his freedom and that of his neighbor. An American is one who will sacrifice… An American is one in whose heart is engraved the immortal second sentence of the Declaration of Independence.”

Harold L. Ickes (1874–1952) American politician

Americans have always known how to fight for their rights and their way of life. Americans are not afraid to fight. They fight joyously in a just cause.
"What Is An American?" http://www.historyplace.com/speeches/ickes.htm (18 May 1941)

Family , Religion , Justice , Freedom

“As we devote ourselves to the higher calling of serving our country as president and vice-president, this is the reason we will choose to remain independent, or without party. We believe that whoever runs and serves as president or vice-president should not be member of a single party (LP, NPC, NUP, NP, UNA or others). Our party should be the Filipino people. And we should be loyal not only to liberals, nationalists, or other party members, but to every Filipino.”

Francis Escudero (1969) Filipino politician

2015, Speech: Declaration as Vice Presidential Candidate

People , Country

“Whereas slavery, throughout its entire existence in the United States, is none other than the most barbarous, unprovoked and unjustifiable war of one portion of its citizens against another portion, the only conditions of which are perpetual imprisonment and hopeless servitude, or absolute extermination, in utter disregard and violation of those eternal and self-evident truths set forth in our Declaration of Independence.”

John Brown (abolitionist) (1800–1859) American abolitionist

Therefore, we, citizens of the United States, and the oppressed people who, by a recent decision of the Supreme' Court, are declared to have no rights which the white man is bound to respect, together with all other people degraded by the laws thereof, do, for the time being, ordain and establish for ourselves the following Provisional Constitution and Ordinances, the better to protect our persons, property, lives, and liberties, and to govern our actions.
Preamble.
Provisional Constitution and Ordinances (1858)

Truth , War , Self-confidence

“Józef Piłsudski will remain in the memory of our nation as the founder of independence and as the victorious leader who fended off a foreign assault that threatened the whole of Europe and its civilization. Józef Piłsudski served his country well, and has entered our history forever.”

Józef Piłsudski (1867–1935) Polish politician and Prime Minister

Declaration of the Sejm (Lower House) of the Polish Parliament, May 12, 1995, the 60th anniversary of Piłsudski's death. Józef Piłsudski http://members.lycos.co.uk/jozefpilsudski/index2.html
About him

Victory , Memory , History , Country

“Being an incomplete female, the male spends his life attempting to complete himself, become female. He attempts to do this by constantly seeking out, fraternizing with and trying to live through and fuse with the female and by claiming as his own all female characteristics - emotional strength and independence, forcefulness, dynamism, decisiveness, coolness, objectivity, assertiveness, courage, integrity, vitality, intensity, depth of character, grooviness, etc.”

Valerie Solanas book SCUM Manifesto

and projecting onto women all male traits - vanity, frivolity, triviality, weakness, etc. It should be said, though, that the male has one glaring area of superiority over the female - public relations. He has done a brilliant job of convincing millions of women that men are women and women are men.
Source: SCUM MANIFESTO (1967), p. 2 (hyphens (not en- or em-dashes) so in original).

Courage , Life , Decision

“Life is harsh and people competitive. We naturally must look after our own interests. We also want to feel that we are independent, doing our own bidding. That is why when others try to persuade or change us, we become defensive and resistant. To give in challenges our need to feel autonomous. That is why to get people to move from their defensive positions you must always make it seem like what they are doing is of their own free will. Creating a feeling of mutual warmth helps soften people’s resistance and makes them want to help. Never attack people for their beliefs or make them feel insecure about their intelligence or goodness—that will only strengthen their defensiveness and make your task impossible. Make them feel that by doing what you want they are being noble and altruistic—the ultimate lure. Learn to tame your own stubborn nature and free your mind from its defensive and closed positions, unleashing your creative powers.”

Robert Greene (1959) American author

Chap. 7 : Soften People’s Resistance by Confirming Their Self-opinion
The Laws of Human Nature (2018)

Intelligence , Help , People , Nature

“We have a side to our character that we are generally unaware of—our social personality, the different person we become when we operate in groups of people. In the group setting, we unconsciously imitate what others are saying and doing. We think differently, more concerned with fitting in and believing what others believe. We feel different emotions, infected by the group mood. We are more prone to taking risks, to acting irrationally, because everyone else is. This social personality can come to dominate who we are. Listening so much to others and conforming our behavior to them, we slowly lose a sense of our uniqueness and the ability to think for ourselves. The only solution is to develop self-awareness and a superior understanding of the changes that occur in us in groups. With such intelligence, we can become superior social actors, able to outwardly fit in and cooperate with others on a high level, while retaining our independence and rationality.”

Robert Greene (1959) American author

Chap. 14 : Resist the Downward Pull of the Group
The Laws of Human Nature (2018)

Understanding , Personality , Intelligence , People

“The Federal government of the United States today is guilty of exactly every sort of infringement, abuse, and denial stated as intolerable by the Declaration of Independence. I cannot, in conscience, sanction that government by the payment of taxes.”

Karl Hess (1923–1994) American journalist

Karl Hess, “Letter from Washington: My Taxes,” Libertarian, May 1, 1969, p. 3

“Simply put, anger feels better than powerlessness. That is why it benefits people to get angry. And independence feels better than powerless victimhood. That is why it benefits people to get independent. But if our progression stops there, we will never achieve true happiness and our civilization will never achieve true alignment.”

Teal Swan (1984) American spiritual teacher

Anger , Happiness , People , Feeling

“For doing my job –– for interviewing government officials, protesters at los guarimbas, average Venezuelans and peaceful marchers –– I am called a spy who should be killed by the same people called ‘peaceful freedom fighters’ by Western press...These unsuccessful attempts to intimidate us reveals how much they really fear accurate reporting that might undermine their narrative... The show [The Empire Files] is totally independent of TeleSUR...We merely sell them the content; they have zero control over anything we do.”

Abby Martin (1984) American journalist

Quoted in Venezuelan Opposition Spreads Lies About U.S. Journalists, Inciting Violence, Death Threats, by Ben Norton, AlterNet https://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/venezuela-abby-martin-mike-prysner-lies-death-threats (3 June 2017)

Peace , Fear , People , Freedom

“I only said that independence was one theoretical option for Hong Kong if the party collapses, alongside a federal state or an EU-style confederation.”

Benny Tai (1964) Hong Kong activist and writer

April 23, 2018 Free speech fears as Beijing attacks Hong Kong professor https://www.ft.com/content/02439b1e-3efb-11e8-b7e0-52972418fec4

“Man is the greatest being endowed with independence, creativity and consciousness and, at the same time, a beautiful creature who champions justice. Man, by nature, aspires to virtue and ennobling qualities and detests all that is evil and dirty. These unique features constitute his human traits.”

Kim Il-sung (1912–1994) President of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea

With the century, vol. 4

Time , Justice , Beauty , Nature

“To look for a continuation of harmony between a number of independent, unconnected sovereignties in the same neighborhood, would be to disregard the uniform course of human events, and to set at defiance the accumulated experience of ages.”

Alexander Hamilton Federalist Papers

No. 6
The Federalist Papers (1787–1788)

Age

“The truth is plain to see — if you want freedom, take pride in your country; if you want democracy, hold onto your sovereignty, and if you want peace, love your nation. Wise leaders always put the good of their own people and their own country first. The future does not belong to globalists. The future belongs to patriots. The future belongs to sovereign and independent nations who protect their citizens, respect their neighbours, and honor the differences that make each country special and unique.”

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

Address to United Nations General Assembly, quoted in * 2019-09-24
Trump UN speech knocks globalism: The future belongs to nationalism
Tim Pearce
Washington Examiner
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/trump-un-speech-knocks-globalism-the-future-belongs-to-nationalism
2010s, 2019, September

Democracy , Peace , Freedom , Country

“If communication takes place between the artwork and the public, it is on the level of sensibility, through the emotions and their immanent modifications. It does not have anything to do with words, with collective, ideological or scientific representations, or with their critical, intellectual or literary formulations, in short, anything that is called culture. It is totally independent from that type of culture. This is why it is addressed to the group of people who ‘lack culture’. It is popular in the sense that it leads to what is most essential in each human being: one’s capacity to feel, to suffer and to love.”

Michel Henry (1922–2002) French writer

Michel Henry, Seeing the invisible: On Kandinsky, Continuum, 2009, p. 73
Books on Culture and Barbarism, Seeing the Invisible: On Kandinsky (1988)

People , Suffering , Communication , Sense

“The people demand of you that you be equal to these great historical times, that you sacrifice all other considerations, that you offer your utmost abilities, that you act at this time as men who are independent, who have no personal ties and obligations, men of supreme moral and national consciousness.”

Jaroslav Kvapil book Manifesto of Czech writers

The Bohemian Review, Volume 1, p.5
Address of Bohemian Authors to the Parliamentary Representatives of the Bohemian People (Manifesto of Czech writers)

Personality , Time , People , Men

“Sooner or later, if human society is to evolve—indeed, if it is to survive—we must match our lives to our new knowledge. For too long, the Two Cultures—the esthetic, feeling humanities and cool, analytical science—have functioned independently, like the right and left hemispheres of a split-brain patient. We have been the victims of our collective divided consciousness.”

Marilyn Ferguson (1938–2008) American writer

The Aquarian Conspiracy (1980), Chapter Six, Liberating Knowledge: News from the Frontiers of Science

Knowledge , Science , Feeling

“Hardly anyone expected the American uprising to succeed. Thousands of colonists emigrated to Canada or hid in the woods, certain that the king's armies would tear the colonial regiments to shreds. Nor did a majority of the people support the struggle for independence, even in theory. Historians estimate that one-third favored independence, one-third favored retaining British ties, and one-third were indifferent.”

Marilyn Ferguson (1938–2008) American writer

The Aquarian Conspiracy (1980), Chapter Five, The American Matrix for Transformation

Indifference , Support , People , Tear

“I preside over a government that is made up of three independent parties who have built consensus around the issues we will collectively pursue. The fact that we will work together collaboratively does not diminish the identities of those parties. There are a number of reasons why confidence and supply is a form of arrangement that will suit the needs of particular parties and why others will prefer coalition. I have no trouble, and I do not question my role or authority simply by allowing a party to speak to that issue themselves.”

Jacinda Ardern (1980) Prime Minister of New Zealand

On why the Greens are outside of cabinet.
Interview with Lisa Owen at Newshub Nation, 21 October 2017

Self-confidence , Confidence , Question

“You would think that the obvious irreligious objection would come to almost anyone’s mind when reading a religious tome or holy book. What if you don’t believe the holy book’s presuppositions and narrative claims and simply ask for independent argument or evidence for God’s existence? What if you’re not persuaded by the argument that God exists because His assertion that He exists and discussion of His various exploits appear in this book about Him that believers say He inspired?”

John Allen Paulos (1945) American mathematician

Part 2 “Four Subjective Arguments”, Chapter 2 “The Argument from Prophecy (and the Bible Codes)” (p. 63)
Irreligion: A Mathematician Explains Why the Arguments for God Just Don’t Add Up (2008)

God , Reading , Thinking , Books

“...I can savor a work, but it is difficult for me to judge it independently from the author, and I would gladly say, as is the tree, so is the fruit.”

Charles Augustin Sainte-Beuve (1804–1869) French literary critic

Original: (fr) ...je puis goûter une œuvre, mais il m'est difficile de la juger indépendamment de la connaissance de l'homme même, et je dirais volontiers: tel arbre, tel fruit.

Tree

“If the discount parameter, w, is sufficiently high, there is no best strategy independent of the strategy used by the other player.”

Robert Axelrod The evolution of cooperation

Chap. 1 : The Problem of Cooperation
Proposition 1.
The Evolution of Cooperation (1984; 2006)

“Washington knows no heresy in the Third World but independence. In the case of Salvador Allende independence came clothed in an especially provocative costume—a Marxist constitutionally elected who continued to honor the constitution. This would not do. It shook the very foundation stones upon which the anti-communist tower is built: the doctrine, painstakingly cultivated for decades, that "communists" can take power only through force and deception, that they can retain that power only through terrorizing and brainwashing the population. There could be only one thing worse than a Marxist in power—an elected Marxist in power.”

William Blum (1933–2018) American author and historian

Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II, Chapter 34. Chile 1964-1973: A hammer and sickle stamped on your child's forehead

World , Clothes

“It is not true, that the granting of the independence of America was “an advantage to England.””

William Cobbett (1763–1835) English pamphleteer, farmer and journalist

It was, on the contrary, the greatest evil that and ever befell her. It was the primary cause of the present war, and of all the calamities which it has brought upon England and upon Europe. If England and the American States had continued united, they would have prevented France from disturbing the peace of the world. That fatal measure, though it has not curtailed our commerce, has created a power who will be capable of assisting France in any of her future projects against us, and whose neutrality, when France recovers her marine, must be purchased by us at the expense, first of commercial concessions, and, finally, by much more important sacrifices. In short, it laid the foundation of the ruin of the British empire, which can be prevented by nothing but a wisdom, and an energy, which have never yet marked the councils of our Government, in its transactions with the American States.

‘A Summary View of the Politics of the United States from the close of the War to the year 1794’, Porcupine's Works; containing various writings and selections, exhibiting a faithful picture of the United States of America, Volume I (1801), pp. 47–8
1790s

“[T]he existence of the mind-independent environment beyond one's world-simulation is a theoretical inference, not an empirical observation.”

David Pearce (philosopher) (1959) British transhumanist

Postscript to review https://www.hedweb.com/lockwood.htm of Michael Lockwood's Mind, Brain and the Quantum, BLTC Research, Dec. 2016

World

“Mass education was designed to turn independent farmers into docile, passive tools of production. That was its primary purpose. And don't think people didn't know it. They knew it and they fought against it. There was a lot of resistance to mass education for exactly that reason. It was also understood by the elites. Emerson once said something about how we're educating them to keep them from our throats. If you don't educate them, what we call "education," they're going to take control -- "they" being what Alexander Hamilton called the "great beast," namely the people. The anti-democratic thrust of opinion in what are called democratic societies is really ferocious. And for good reason. Because the freer the society gets, the more dangerous the great beast becomes and the more you have to be careful to cage it somehow.”

Noam Chomsky book Class Warfare

Quotes 1990s, 1995–1999, Class Warfare, 1995

Education , Thinking , People

“[I]f suffering is bad for animals when we cause it, it is also bad for them when other animals cause it. That suffering is bad for those who experience it is not a human prejudice; nor is an effort to prevent wild animals from suffering a moralistic attempt to police the behavior of other animals. Even if we are not morally required to prevent suffering among animals in the wild for which we are not responsible, we do have a moral reason to prevent it, just as we have a general moral reason to prevent suffering among human beings that is independent both of the cause of the suffering and of our relation to the victims. The main constraint on the permissibility of acting on our reason to prevent suffering is that our action should not cause bad effects that would be worse than those we could prevent.”

Jeff McMahan (philosopher) (1954) American philosopher

" The Meat Eaters http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/19/the-meat-eaters/", The New York Times, 19 Sept. 2010

Bad luck , Suffering , Animals , Relation ships

“Not only boxing, but wrestling, quarter-staff, single-stick, bull-baiting, every exercise of the common people, that supposes the possible risk of life or limb, and, of course, that tends to prepare them for deeds of bravery of a higher order, and, by the means of those deeds and of the character and consequence naturally growing out of them, to preserve the independence and the liberties of their country; every such exercise seems to be doomed to extirpation. ... Every thing calculated to keep alive the admiration, and even the idea, of hardihood, seems to have become offensive and odious in the sight of but too many of those, whose duty it is to endeavour to arrest, and not to accelerate, the fatal progress of effeminacy. ... That cuttings and stabbings are more fatal than boxing, to say nothing of the disgrace, every one must agree; and, it cannot be denied, that the former have increased in proportion as the latter has been driven from amongst the people.”

William Cobbett (1763–1835) English pamphleteer, farmer and journalist

‘Boxing’, Political Register (10 August 1805), p. 200
1800s

Country , Box , People , Nature

“We must not pursue science for ends independent of science. It must be pursued for its own sake, and must lead to its own results.”

John Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton (1834–1902) British politician and historian

Private journal (1858), quoted in Gertrude Himmelfarb, Lord Acton: A Study in Conscience and Politics (1952), p. 40

Science

“My people hunger for independence and will have it. And are you forgetting some recent examples of what ragged bands can do against modern troops? Have you already forgotten the heroism of the Yugoslav partisans against the Germans? The spirit of man is more powerful than his own machines.”

Ho Chi Minh (1890–1969) Vietnamese communist leader and first president of Vietnam

1950's, On Revolutionary Morality (1958)
Source: David Schoenbrun, As France Goes (page 234), Harper, 1957.

Hunger , People , Forgetting

“I was only a working-class boy from a Nationalist ghetto, but it is repression that creates the revolutionary spirit of freedom. I shall not settle until I achieve liberation of my country, until Ireland becomes a sovereign, independent socialist republic.”

Bobby Sands (1954–1981) Irish volunteer of the Provisional Irish Republican Army

Republican News http://larkspirit.com/hungerstrikes/bios/sands.html, (16 December 1978)
Other writings

Country , Boy , Freedom

“If the Bank of England is “independent” who took the decision to steal Venezuela’s gold?”

George Galloway (1954) British politician, broadcaster, and writer

Twitter https://twitter.com/georgegalloway/status/1090754716227768321 (30 January 2019)

Decision

“The infinite vibratory levels,
The dimensions of interconnectedness
Are without end.
There is nothing independent.
All beings and things are residents”

Alex Grey (1953) American artist

Art Psalms (2008), The Vast Expanse

“I’m for an independent, strong Israel that is not a client state and not a reliant state.”

Rand Paul (1963) American politician, ophthalmologist, and United States Senator from Kentucky

2013
Source: 18 January 2013 https://www.timesofisrael.com/paul-cuts-to-israel-aid-would-not-be-immediate-dramatic/

Strong

“This so-called bipartisan system prevailing in America and Britain has been one of the most powerful means of preventing the rise of an independent working-class, i.e., genuinely socialist, party.”

Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924) Russian politician, led the October Revolution

The Results and Significance of the U.S. Presidential Elections https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1912/nov/09.htm (November 1912)
1910s

“...the [Whig] party, which has thought proper to proscribe me on account of a book [the Reflections] which I published on the Idea, that the principles of a new, republican, frenchified Whiggism was gaining ground in this Country. ... The party with which I acted had, by the malevolent and unthinking been reproached, and by the wise and good always esteemd and confided in—as an aristocratick Party. Such I always understood it to be in the true Sense of the word. I understood it to be a Party, in its composition and in its principles, connected with the solid, permanent long possessed property of the Country; a party, which, by a Temper derived from that Species of Property, and affording a security to it, was attached to the antient tried usages of the Kingdom, a party therefore essentially constructed upon a Ground plot of stability and independence; a party therefore equally removed from servile court compliances, and from popular levity, presumption, and precipitation.”

Edmund Burke (1729–1797) Anglo-Irish statesman

Letter to William Weddell (31 January 1792), quoted in P. J. Marshall and John A. Woods (eds.), The Correspondence of Edmund Burke, Volume VII: January 1792–August 1794 (1968), pp. 52-53
1790s

Confidence , Country , Self-confidence , Books

“If we assume the viewpoint claimed as his own by Lenin and we fear the influence of intellectuals in the proletarian movement, we can conceive of no greater danger to the Russian party than Lenin's plan of organization. Nothing will more surely enslave a young labor movement to an intellectual elite hungry for power than this bureaucratic straightjacket, which will immobilize the movement and turn it into an automaton manipulated by a Central Committee. On the other hand there is no more effective guarantee against opportunist intrigue and personal ambition than the independent revolutionary action of the proletariat, as a result of which the workers acquire the sense of political responsibility and self-reliance.”

Rosa Luxemburg (1871–1919) Polish Marxist theorist, socialist philosopher, and revolutionary

Leninism or Marxism? (1904)

Sense , Self-confidence , Fear , Personality

“The American Revolution of 1776 was a great liberal revolution. The Declaration of Independence and the American Constitution, more than any documents on earth, embody the fundamentals of liberalism. These documents assert the essential equality of human beings. This does not mean, and never did, that one man is as talented, or wise, or good as another, or that each person is entitled to the same rewards. It does mean that every human being has a right to his own life; that no man may be forced to labor against his will, or to assert beliefs contrary to his conscience, or be relegated to one class of society.”

Dorothy Thompson (1893–1961) American journalist and radio broadcaster

Dorothy Thompson’s Political Guide: A Study of American Liberalism and its Relationship to Modern Totalitarian States (1938)
Source: A Study of American Liberalism and its Relationship to Modern Totalitarian States (1938)
pp. 64-65

Personality , Life

“If you intrust independent executive and legislative power to the Government of Ireland, can you say it will never be hostile? On the contrary...you know that a very considerable proportion of the population of Ireland is unfortunately at this time, and has been for generations past, animated with the most bitter sentiments against England. Well, is there any impediment to prevent them in case of some European war, where you might be fighting for your existence, is there anything to prevent the Government of an independent Ireland...from placing those splendid harbours which lie opposite you at the disposal of a foreign fleet?”

Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury (1830–1903) British politician

Source: Speech in Bristol (22 April 1889), quoted in The Times (24 April 1889), p. 6

Time , Hostility , War , Past

“Even the victor in a just cause is susceptible to the passions which war arouses. Every inhuman feeling is at once exacerbated. Truth, decency, morality, justice are the first casualties in any war. The accumulated effect makes a just settlement impossible. ... The pacifist treasures justice, liberty; but he believes that they can only be lastingly secured by peaceable means and that the use of force will only contaminate them. ... Armaments themselves provide an independent cause of war owing to the suspicion and fear which they breed. ... Unilateral disarmament offers the only way to escape once the policy of collateral disarmament has failed.”

Michael Foot (1913–2010) British politician

Source: Article in Young Oxford and War (1934), quoted in Mervyn Jones, Michael Foot (1994), p. 30

Justice , War , Truth , Passion

“Antifa is a phantom movement by design. It is leaderless and structured to be functional through small, independent organizations, known as affinity groups, and individuals. Only the ideology needs to be propagated for lone wolves or groups to be inspired. Part of that ideology involves extensive training on ‘digital security,’ that is, using encrypted tools, apps, and web browsers to completely evade detection by authorities and others. It is no surprise that scant evidence materialized in the early days of the investigation into accused rioters. Antifa are trained to hide their political affiliations.”

Andy Ngo (1986) American conservative journalist and social‐media personality

Source: Unmasked: Inside Antifa’s Radical Plan to Destroy Democracy (2021), p. 18

Training , Parting

“The ultimate goal of our endeavor is to lead the congolese populations in prosperity and peace on the road to independence without delay but also without rash haste.”

Baudouin of Belgium (1930–1993) King of Belgians

Peace

“Where the self is conceived as prior to its ends, independent of the roles it may occupy at any given time, reputation cannot be a matter of honor in the traditional sense. For the unencumbered self, not honor but dignity is the basis of respect―the dignity that consists in the capacity of persons as autonomous agents to choose their ends for themselves. Unlike honor, which ties respect for persons to the roles they inhabit, dignity resides in a self antecedent to social institutions, and so is invulnerable to injury by insult alone. For selves such as these, reputation matters, not intrinsically, as a matter of honor, but only instrumentally, as a business asset for example.”

Michael J. Sandel (1953) American political philosopher

Chap. 3. Religious Liberty and Freedom of Speech
Democracy's Discontent (1996)

Personality , Business , Sense , Time

“I leave to the oppressors of humanity a terrible testament, which I proclaim with the independence befitting one whose career is so nearly ended; it is the awful truth: “Thou shalt die!””

Maximilien Robespierre (1758–1794) French revolutionary lawyer and politician

Last Speech to the National Convention (26 July 1794)

Truth

“The Catholic Church in Greece must play the game of the European Union, pushing for a secular, free, independent and modern state.”

Yannis Spiteris (1947) Roman Catholic archbishop

Why the Greek Orthodox Oppose Papal Visit https://zenit.org/2001/04/30/why-the-greek-orthodox-oppose-papal-visit/ (April 30, 2001)

Game

“We as a society have become very independent, and we have become proficient in so many things, I think some of us feel we don't have that reliance on God as much as it was once felt. But the fact is we need (God) more than ever.”

Anthony F. Tonnos (1935) Canadian Catholic bishop

Bishop Tonnos retires after almost three decades of service https://www.thespec.com/news/hamilton-region/2010/11/08/bishop-tonnos-retires-after-almost-three-decades-of-service.html (November 8, 2010)

God , Feeling , Thinking

“Our party’s experiences and our revolutionary realities have demonstrated that whenever we firmly maintain a spirit of independence and self-reliance we are able to be creative in our development of policies and directions, and we achieve success.”

Lê Duẩn (1907–1986) former General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam

Speech at 12th Plenum of the Party Central Committee (1 December 1965)

Success , Reality

“Personally, I am against deeper integration with Russia because Belarus is a sovereign nation. We want to be independent. We want to find friends and not enemies among other countries.”

Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya (1982) Belarusian politician and educator

"«Нельзя так со своим народом»Главная соперница Лукашенко — о том, почему у белорусов кончилось терпение и нужна ли им Россия" https://lenta.ru/articles/2020/07/30/tihanovskaya/ (30 July 2020)

Personality , Country

“Moreover, nobody gave us independence. We tried, we fought, and we achieved. We achieved it not only at the cost of our will and devotion but also at the expense of the lives of many of our compatriots.”

Armen Sarkissian (1953) 4th President of Armenia, Member of the Global Leadership Foundation, one of the directors of Eurasia House, phy…

"Address on Armenia's Independence Day" https://www.president.am/en/statements-and-messages/item/2021/09/21/President-Armen-Sarkissians-congratulatory-message-on-the-occasion-of-Armenias-Independence-Day-/ (21 September 2021)

“Natural selection has designed all parts of our bodies to last just long enough to see our children into independence, no more.”

Matt Ridley book Genome

Source: Genome (1999), Chapter 14 “Immortality” (p. 202)

Children , Nature , Parting

“I just told my parents I was going alone. I’ve always felt like there was less creative space on sets with guardians. I just felt independent at a young age.”

Timothée Chalamet (1995) French-American Actor (1995)

Source: "Timothée Chalamet is Hollywood’s next big thing with ‘Call Me by Your Name’ and ‘Lady Bird’" in Los Angeles Times https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:cjt5QVEK718J:https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-ca-mn-timothee-chalamet-call-me-by-your-name-20171116-story.html+&cd=55&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us (17 November 2017)

Parent , Age

“If I do not promise Belgium a splendid government like that which founded its independence, nor a great King like him whom we mourn, then at least i believe to be a Belgian King in heart and soul, whose whole life belongs to the country.”

Leopold II of Belgium (1835–1909) King of the Belgians

Source: Bulletin Officiel de Congo Belge - Années 1908 et 1909, page 174. https://archive.org/details/bulletin-officiel-de-congo-belge-annees-1908-et-1909/page/n373/mode/2up King Leopold II in a speech on 17 december 1865.

Soul , Country , Heart , Life

“I was once dead but I live again, I think independence is epic fortnite win.”

Olof Palme (1927–1986) Swedish 20th century prime minister

Thinking , Dead

“The secret which will solve this impasse is that true independence and individuality can only successfully exist in group form!”

Vera Stanley Alder (1898–1984) British artist

Source: Humanity Comes of Age, A study of Individual and World Fulfillment (1950), Introduction p. I - XII

Secret

“When independent-thinking people (and here I do not include the corporate media) begin to rally under flags, when writers, painters, musicians, film makers suspend their judgment and blindly yoke their art to the service of the “Nation,” it’s time for all of us to sit up and worry.”

Arundhati Roy (1961) Indian novelist, essayist

Source: Articles, Come September (29 Sep 2002)

People , Time , Art , Thinking

“We need to respect the independent choices of model of technology management and of public policies made by countries, and their right to participating in the global technological governance system as equals.”

Wang Qishan (1948) Chinese politician

Source: "China’s Vice President Decries Technological Hegemony" in The Wall Street Journal https://www.wsj.com/articles/china-vice-president-urges-governments-to-address-their-domestic-problems-11548258999 (23 January 2019)

Country

“I speak in general. I think that Putin does not understand that criticizing power can help this power. How do we fight corruption in the United States? There are two forces - independent media and powerful opposition party.”

Michael McFaul (1963) American academic and diplomat

"Izvestia Interview with Michael McFaul" in Carnegie Endowment for World Peace https://carnegieendowment.org/2002/05/15/izvestia-interview-with-michael-mcfaul-pub-984 (15 May 2002)

Understanding , Help , Thinking , Fight

“We must search for ways ... so that Crimea may have the maximum degree of independence possible ... but be part of Ukraine.”

Viktor Yanukovych (1950) Ukrainian politician who was the President of Ukraine

Source: "AP Interview: Yanukovych admits mistakes on Crimea" in Associated Press https://apnews.com/article/8b795952e78a47a3beff026800eb508a (2 April 2014)

Search , Way , Parting

“Running counter to the fundamental interests of the Chinese nation and Taiwan compatriots, Taiwan separatists’ attempts to seek ‘Taiwan independence’ are doomed to fail.”

Zhu Fenglian (1977)

Source: "Mainland Condemns ‘Taiwan Independence’ Separatist Schemes" in China Today http://www.chinatoday.com.cn/ctenglish/2018/zdtj/202006/t20200612_800209787.html (12 June 2020)

“Businesses and financial sponsors associated with supporters of Taiwan independence will be penalized according to law.”

Zhu Fenglian (1977)

Source: "China Targets Corporate Backers of Taiwan’s Ruling Party" in Bloomberg https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-11-22/china-sets-sights-on-corporate-backers-of-taiwan-s-independence (22 November 2021)

Law , Business , Support

“And, after all, the humane spirit, which is the motive power of all true schemes of reform, is, by its very essence, independent of belief in what is commonly called "success."”

Henry Stephens Salt (1851–1939) British activist

Source: " The Poet of Pessimism https://www.henrysalt.co.uk/library/essay/the-poet-of-pessimism/", Vegetarian Review, August 1896
Context: We work for an ideal, not because we believe the ideal is destined to be triumphant, but because we are impelled so to work, and cannot, without violence to our best instincts, act otherwise. We protest against cruelty and injustice for the same reason, not merely because we feel that the dawn of a better day is at hand, but because such a protest has to be made, and we know intuitively that we must help to make it. Of the event we can have no absolute assurance—it rests for other minds and other hands than our—but we can at least be assured that we have done what was natural and inevitable to us, and that, whether successful or unsuccessful, there was no other course for a thoughtful man to take.

Success , Motivation

“Above all, maintain the line of demarcation between parties; for it is only by maintaining the independence of party that you can maintain the integrity of public men, and the power and influence of Parliament itself.”

Benjamin Disraeli (1804–1881) British Conservative politician, writer, aristocrat and Prime Minister

Source: Speech in the House of Commons (22 January 1846), quoted in Selected Speeches of the Late Right Honourable the Earl of Beaconsfield, Volume I, ed. T. E. Kebbel (1882), p. 110

Men

“If you have hurt even a single innocent person, even if you remain independent, that struggle for independence will never be considered a victory.”

Mustafa Dzhemilev (1943) Leader of the Crimean Tatar National Movement

Source: Dünya Demokrasi Hareketi şeref belgesi töreni http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7414118294379483231 (5 April 2006)

Hurt , Personality , Victory

“School trains children to be employees and consumers; teach your own to be leaders and adventurers. School trains children to obey reflexively; teach your own to think critically and independently.”

John Taylor Gatto (1935–2018) American teacher, book author

Weapons of Mass Instruction: A Schoolteacher's Journey Through the Dark World of Compulsory Schooling (2008)
Source: Weapons of Mass Instruction: A Schoolteacher's Journey Through the Dark World of Compulsory Schooling, New Society Publishers (2013) p. xxii

School , Children , Thinking , Training

“I feel ashamed that so many of us cannot imagine a better way to do things than locking children up all day in cells instead of letting them grow up knowing their families, mingling with the world, assuming real obligations, striving to be independent and self-reliant and free.”

John Taylor Gatto (1935–2018) American teacher, book author

Source: A Different Kind of Teacher: Solving the Crisis of American Schooling, Berkeley Hills Books (2000) p. 97

Imagination , Children , World , Family

“The spirit of our age is Democracy. All for the people, and all by the people. Nothing about the people without the people… My nation will rise, called to resurrection by the eternal principles of the law of nature and of nature’s God. It will not lie in the grave longer than the holy number three, and will require your magnanimity by becoming the corner-stone of national independence on the European Continent.”

Lajos Kossuth (1802–1894) Hungarian politician

Source: In front of Ohio's legislators on 7 february, 1852.

Democracy , God , People , Lie

“Human rights and democracy cannot be protected when independent media are routinely intimidated.”

Marco Respinti (1964)

Source: "Pakistan’s Independent Journalists Killed, Wounded, Tortured" https://bitterwinter.org/pakistans-independent-journalists-killed-wounded-tortured/

Democracy

“The independence of our nation is inseparable from our interdependence as a people.”

John Avlon (1973) American journalist

Source: [Avlon, John, Washington's Farewell, Simon and Schuster, Hardcover, January 2017, New York, 284, English, 978-1-4767-4646-3]

People

“"You must tell them that there must be a new union or there will be chaos," he [Shevardnadze] implored me. That evening, when I hosted republic leaders for dinner — a mixed group of presidents, prime ministers, and foreign ministers — I saw around the table and in the conversation a microcosm of the post-coup Soviet Union’s potential — and its problems. Whatever euphoria that they felt with their post-putsch independence declarations had given way to a marked degree of realism. "Independence sounds nice, but we have to live, and we have to be practical," observed the Prime Minister of Moldova, Valeriu Muravsky. That was the persistent theme that I heard from every one of the republic leaders, with the sole exception of the Georgian Prime Minister, Vissarion Gugushvili, though even he spoke of the need for economic cooperation once Georgian independence was recognized internationally.”

James Baker (1930) Former U.S. Secretary of State

The Politics of Diplomacy: Revolution, War and Peace 1989-1992 (1995) by James Addison Baker, p. 531
1990s

Problem , Way

“China makes its observation and conclusion based independently- based on the merits of the matter itself.”

Qin Gang (1966) politician

"Transcript: Chinese Ambassador to the U.S. Qin Gang on Face the Nation" in CBS https://www.cbsnews.com/news/qin-gang-chinese-ambassador-face-the-nation-03-20-2022/ (20 March 2022)

“It is clear that the popular revolution must combine three demands: a life of stability for the people, national independence, and world peace. These demands must be realised through international solidarity.”

Kyūichi Tokuda (1894–1953) Japanese politician

New Situation and the Policy of the Communist Party of Japan (1950)

People , World , Peace , Life

“I must pronounce my firm belief that Tibet will soon regain her independence and that His Holiness the Dalai Lama will return to the Golden Throne. Long live His Holiness the Dalai Lama.”

Choekyi Gyaltsen (1938–1989) 10th Panchen Lama of the Gelug School of Tibetan Buddhism

As quoted in 1964, "Death of the Tenth Panchen Lama" https://www.shambhala.com/snowlion_articles/panchen-lama-death/

“If we strive only for national reconstruction but neglect to struggle for sovereignty and territorial integrity, national independence will certainly not be recognized and our country will be reduced to an autonomous state.”

Trường Chinh (1907–1988) former General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam (1907-1988)

Source: The August Revolution (1946) (excerpts), p.68

Country

“The August Revolution was a revolution of national liberation. It aimed at liberating the Vietnamese people from the colonial yoke and making Vietnam an independent nation.”

Trường Chinh (1907–1988) former General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam (1907-1988)

Source: The August Revolution (1946) (excerpts), p.42

People

“To require that all of these must be reducible to a single version is to make the mistake of supposing that 'Which are the real objects?' is a question that makes sense independently of our choice of concepts.”

Hilary Putnam (1926–2016) American philosopher

Lecture I: Is There Still Anything to Say about Reality and Truth?
The Many Faces of Realism (1987)

Question , Sense

“Ukraine wants to be independent, and we will celebrate our national day with our partners and friends.”

Sergiy Kyslytsya (1969) Ukrainian diplomat

"Ukrainas FN-ambassadør til VG: Vil ikke være over med en fredsavtale" https://www.vg.no/nyheter/utenriks/i/V93WK6/ukrainas-fn-ambassadoer-til-vg-vil-ikke-vaere-over-med-en-fredsavtale (In Norwegian), VG, 31 March 2022