Motivational Quotes

Government

It would be foolish to suggest that government is a good custodian of aesthetic goals. But, there is no alternative to the state.

- Galbraith, John Kenneth

Best Quotes about Government

Public instruction should be the first object of government.

Bonaparte, Napoleon

The supply of government exceeds demand.

Lapham, Lewis H.

Good government is the outcome of private virtue.

Chapman, John Jay

No man undertakes a trade he has not learned, even the meanest; yet everyone thinks himself sufficiently qualified for the hardest of all trades, that of government.

Socrates

Even to observe neutrality you must have a strong government.

Hamilton, Alexander

Nothing is more surprising than the easiness with which the many are governed by the few.

Hume, David

But their determination to banish fools foundered ultimately in the installation of absolute idiots.

Bunting, Basil

After two years in Washington, I often long for the realism and sincerity of Hollywood.

Fred Thompson

That government is the strongest of which every man feels himself a part.

Jefferson, Thomas

10.

A man without a vote is man without protection.

Johnson, Lyndon B.

11.

I say to myself that I mustn't let myself be cut off in there, and yet the moment I enter my bag is taken out of my hand, I'm pushed in, shepherded, nursed and above all cut off, alone. Whitehall envelops me.

Crossman, Richard

12.

Freedom of men under government is to have a standing rule to live by, common to every one of that society, and made by the legislative power vested in it; a liberty to follow my own will in all things, when the rule prescribes not, and not to be subject to the inconstant, unknown, arbitrary will of another man.

Locke, John

13.

For its part, Government will listen. We will strive to listen in new ways -- to the voices of quiet anguish, to voices that speak without words, the voices of the heart, to the injured voices, and the anxious voices, and the voices that have despaired of being heard.

Nixon, Richard M.

14.

Governing today means giving acceptable signs of credibility. It is like advertising and it is the same effect that is achieved -- commitment to a scenario.

Baudrillard, Jean

15.

The monarchy is a labor intensive industry.

Wilson, Harold

16.

A government is the only vessel that leaks from the top.

Reston, James

17.

Any government is potentially the worst client in the world you could ever possibly want to have.

Thomas Heatherwick

18.

The mechanism that directs government cannot be virtuous, because it is impossible to thwart every crime, to protect oneself from every criminal without being criminal too; that which directs corrupt mankind must be corrupt itself; and it will never be by means of virtue, virtue being inert and passive, that you will maintain control over vice, which is ever active: the governor must be more energetic than the governed.

Sade, Marquis De

19.

The government can destroy wealth but it cannot create wealth, which is the product of labor and management working with creation.

Murray, Bill

20.

The contented and economically comfortable have a very discriminating view of government. Nobody is ever indignant about bailing out failed banks and failed savings and loans associations. But when taxes must be paid for the lower middle class and poor, the government assumes an aspect of wickedness.

Galbraith, John Kenneth

21.

In our consumer confidence surveys, we ask people whether they think government economic policy is good, fair, or poor. Increasingly, the answer we get is just plain laughter.

Schmiedeskamp, Jay

22.

Generosity is a part of my character, and I therefore hasten to assure this Government that I will never make an allegation of dishonesty against it wherever a simple explanation of stupidity will suffice.

Lever, Leslie Baron

23.

Every form of government tends to perish by excess of its basic principles.

Durant, William J.

24.

There is no nonsense so arrant that it cannot be made the creed of the vast majority by adequate government action.

Russell, Bertrand

25.

Nothing is more destructive of respect for the government and the law of the land than passing laws which cannot be enforced.

Einstein, Albert

26.

Governments tend not to solve problems, only to rearrange them.

Reagan, Ronald

27.

The best government is that which teaches us to govern ourselves.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

28.

The auditor is a watchdog and not a bloodhound.

Topes, Lord Justice

29.

What we should be asking is not whether we need a big government or small government, but how we can create a smarter and better government.

President Barack Obama

30.

Of the best rulers, The people only know that they exist; the next best they love and praise the next they fear; and the next they revile. When they do not command the people's faith, some will lose faith in them, and then they resort to oaths! But of the best when their task is accomplished, their work done, the people all remark, We have done it ourselves.

Lao-Tzu

31.

It is perfectly true that that government is best which governs least. It is equally true that that government is best which provides most.

Lippmann, Walter

32.

It is hard to feel individually responsible with respect to the invisible processes of a huge and distant government.

Gardner, John W.

33.

To govern is to choose. To appear to be unable to choose is to appear to be unable to govern.

Lawson, Nigel

34.

In quiet and untroubled times it seems to every administrator that it is only by his efforts that the whole population under his rule is kept going, and in this consciousness of being indispensable every administrator finds the chief reward of his labor and efforts. While the sea of history remains calm the ruler-administrator in his frail bark, holding on with a boat hook to the ship of the people and himself moving, naturally imagines that his efforts move the ship he is holding on to. But as soon as a storm arises and the sea begins to heave and the ship to move, such a delusion is no longer possible. The ship moves independently with its own enormous motion, the boat hook no longer reaches the moving vessel, and suddenly the administrator, instead of appearing a ruler and a source of power, becomes an insignificant, useless, feeble man.

Tolstoy, Count Leo

35.

For every action there is an equal and opposite government program.

Bob Wells

36.

The government is best which makes itself unnecessary.

Humboldt, Karl Wilhelm Von

37.

Government can be bigger than any of the players on the field as a referee, but it has no right to become one of the players.

Igleheart, Austin

38.

Too bad that all the people who know how to run the country are busy driving taxicabs and cutting hair.

Burns, George

39.

Whenever you have an efficient government, you have a dictatorship.

Truman, Harry S

40.

Government is an evil; it is only the thoughtlessness and vices of men that make it a necessary evil. When all men are good and wise, government will of itself decay.

Shelley, Percy Bysshe

41.

It is the duty of the President to propose and it is the privilege of the Congress to dispose.

Roosevelt, Franklin D.

42.

You know what's interesting about Washington? It's the kind of place where second-guessing has become second nature.

George W. Bush

43.

Not wishing to be disturbed over moral issues of the political economy, Americans cling to the notion that the government is a sort of automatic machine, regulated by the balancing of competing interests.

Mills, C. Wright

44.

The government is huge, stupid, greedy and makes nosy, officious and dangerous intrusions into the smallest corners of life -- this much we can stand. But the real problem is that government is boring. We could cure or mitigate the other ills Washington visits on us if we could only bring ourselves to pay attention to Washington itself. But we cannot.

O'Rourke, P. J.

45.

There are no necessary evils in government. Its evils exist only in its abuses.

Jackson, Andrew

46.

Any cook should be able to run the country.

Lenin, Vladimir Ilyich

47.

Truth is the glue that holds government together.

Ford, Gerald R.

48.

Government is not reason and it is not eloquence. It is force! Like fire it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master. Never for a moment should it be left to irresponsible action.

Washington, George

49.

Well, fancy giving money to the Government! Might as well have put it down the drain.

Herbert, A. P.

50.

Office without pay makes thieves.

Proverb, German