Motivational Quotes

Government

It is easy to rule over the good.

- Plautus, Titus Maccius

Best Quotes about Government

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

Reagan, Ronald

Men are not governed by justice, but by law or persuasion. When they refuse to be governed by law or persuasion, they have to be governed by force or fraud, or both.

Shaw, George Bernard

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

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

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

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

Gardner, John W.

We have the best government that money can buy.

Twain, Mark

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

It is function of government to invent philosophies to explain the demands of its own convenience.

Kempton, Murray

10.

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

Fred Thompson

11.

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

Boytzwnburg, Count

12.

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

13.

Remember that a government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take away everything you have.

Crockett, Davy

14.

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

15.

Society is well governed when its people obey the magistrates, and the magistrates obey the law.

Solon

16.

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

Bunting, Basil

17.

The basis of effective government is public confidence.

Kennedy, John F.

18.

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

Douglas, William O.

19.

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

H. L. Mencken

20.

Beaverbrook is so pleased to be in the government that he is like the town tart who finally married the Mayor.

Baxter, Beverley

21.

A man without a vote is man without protection.

Johnson, Lyndon B.

22.

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

Voltaire

23.

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.

24.

Neither snow, nor rain, nor heat, nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds. [The Motto Of The U.S. Postal Service]

Herodotus

25.

No government is safe unless fortified by goodwill.

Nepos, Cornelius

26.

Bureaucracy is a giant mechanism operated by pygmies.

Balzac, Honore De

27.

Good government is the outcome of private virtue.

Chapman, John Jay

28.

The worst thing in the world next to anarchy, is government.

Beecher, Henry Ward

29.

The Athenians govern the Greeks; I govern the Athenians; you, my wife, govern me; your son governs you.

Themistocles

30.

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

31.

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

Hospers, John

32.

An ambassador is an honest person sent to lie abroad for their country.

Wotton, Sir Henry

33.

Even to observe neutrality you must have a strong government.

Hamilton, Alexander

34.

Government does not solve problems; it subsidizes them.

Reagan, Ronald

35.

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

Reagan, Ronald

36.

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

Welch, Robert

37.

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

Caldwell, John S.

38.

Congress is so strange. A man gets up to speak and says nothing. Nobody listens, then everybody disagrees.

Marshalov, Boris

39.

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

Bonaparte, Napoleon

40.

Thou camest out of thy mother's belly without government, thou hast liv'd hitherto without government, and thou mayst be carried to thy long home without government, when it shall please the Lord. How many people in this world live without government, yet do well enough, and are well look'd upon?

Cervantes, Miguel De

41.

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

Reston, James

42.

All good government must begin at home.

Haweis, H. R.

43.

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

Bob Wells

44.

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

Murray, Bill

45.

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

Burns, George

46.

Of all tasks of government the most basic is to protect its citizens against violence.

Dulles, John Foster

47.

Whenever the people are well informed, they can be trusted with their own government; that whenever things get so far wrong as to attract their notice, they may be relied on to set them to rights.

Jefferson, Thomas

48.

A government, for protecting business only, is but a carcass, and soon falls by its own corruption and decay.

Alcott, Amos Bronson

49.

Believe me - the Government will help you anytime it needs you.

Kocher, Gerhard

50.

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

Jefferson, Thomas