Motivational Quotes

Government

There is something to be said for government by a great aristocracy which has furnished leaders to the nation in peace and war for generations; even a democrat like myself must admit this. But there is absolutely nothing to be said for government by a plutocracy, for government by men very powerful in certain lines and gifted with the money touch, but with ideals which in their essence are merely those of so many glorified pawnbrokers.

- Roosevelt, Theodore

Best Quotes about Government

So they [the Government] go on in strange paradox, decided only to be undecided, resolved to be irresolute, adamant for drift, solid for fluidity, all-powerful to be impotent.

Sir Winston Churchill

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.

We have the best government that money can buy.

Twain, Mark

The body politic, as well as the human body, begins to die as soon as it is born, and carries itself the causes of its destruction.

Rousseau, Jean Jacques

Large legislative bodies resolve themselves into coteries, and coteries into jealousies.

Bonaparte, Napoleon

You will find that the State is the kind of organization which, though it does big things badly, does small things badly, too.

John Kenneth Galbraith

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

Fred Thompson

I love my government not least for the extent to which it leaves me alone.

Updike, John

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.

10.

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

Lawson, Nigel

11.

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

12.

In the councils of a state, the question is not so much, what ought to be done? As, what can be done?

Proverb, French

13.

Fear is the foundation of most government.

Adams, John

14.

I don't judge a regime by the damning criticism of the opposition, but by the ingenuous praise of the partisan.

Rostand, Jean

15.

The constitution is not neutral. It was designed to take the government off the backs of people.

Douglas, William O.

16.

To rule is not so much a question of the heavy hand as the firm seat.

Gasset, Jose Ortega Y

17.

Men are to be guided only by their self-interests. Good government is a good balancing of these; and, except a keen eye and appetite for self-interest, requires no virtue in any quarter. To both parties it is emphatically a machine: to the discontented, a taxing-machine; to the contented, a machine for securing property. Its duties and its faults are not those of a father, but of an active parish-constable.

Carlyle, Thomas

18.

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

19.

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

20.

Being nice to governments doesn't work, they are such lying bastards.

Baluch, Joy

21.

Do not ask what the Government can do for you. Ask why it doesn't.

Kocher, Gerhard

22.

The care of human life and happiness, and not their destruction, is the first and only legitimate object of good government.

Jefferson, Thomas

23.

The whole duty of government is to prevent crime and to preserve contracts.

Melbourne, Lord

24.

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

Bunting, Basil

25.

The government must always be a step ahead of the popular movement.

Boytzwnburg, Count

26.

Truth is the glue that holds government together.

Ford, Gerald R.

27.

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

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

28.

Today, if you invent a better mousetrap, the government comes along with a better mouse.

Reagan, Ronald

29.

The whole country is one vast insane asylum and they're letting the worst patients run the place.

Welch, Robert

30.

Government does not solve problems; it subsidizes them.

Reagan, Ronald

31.

Government is either organized benevolence or organized madness; its peculiar magnitude permits no shading.

Updike, John

32.

Even to observe neutrality you must have a strong government.

Hamilton, Alexander

33.

It is the duty of government to make it difficult for people to do wrong, easy to do right.

Gladstone, William E.

34.

The best government is a benevolent tyranny tempered by an occasional assassination.

Voltaire

35.

The point to remember is what government gives it must first take away

Caldwell, John S.

36.

No more distressing moment can ever face a British government than that which requires it to come to a hard, fast and specific decision.

Tuchman, Barbara

37.

I believe that all government is evil, and that trying to improve it is largely a waste of time.

H. L. Mencken

38.

The government is best which makes itself unnecessary.

Humboldt, Karl Wilhelm Von

39.

You can only govern men by serving them. The rule is without exception.

Cousin, Victor

40.

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

Reston, James

41.

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

Hume, David

42.

When any government, or church for that matter, undertakes to say to it's subjects,this you may not read, this you must not see, this you are forbidden to know the end result is tyranny and oppression, no matter how holy the motive.

Heinlein, Robert

43.

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

Thomas Heatherwick

44.

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

George W. Bush

45.

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

46.

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

Einstein, Albert

47.

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

Burns, George

48.

The greater the hold of government upon the life of the individual citizen, the greater the risk of war.

Hospers, John

49.

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