GOVERNMENT QUOTES VI

quotations about government

The proper function of a government is to make it easy for people to do good and difficult for them to do evil.

JIMMY CARTER

Why Not the Best?

Tags: Jimmy Carter


The government's monopoly is what has allowed it to produce so bad a product for so long.

DAVID R. HENDERSON

The Joy of Freedom


In early times the quantity of government is much more important than its quality. What you want is a comprehensive rule binding men together, making them do much the same things, telling them what to expect of each other--fashioning them alike, and keeping them so. What this rule is does not matter so much. A good rule is better than a bad one, but any rule is better than none; while, for reasons which a jurist will appreciate, none can be very good. But to gain that rule, what may be called the impressive elements of a polity are incomparably more important than its useful elements. How to get the obedience of men is the hard problem; what you do with that obedience is less critical.

WALTER BAGEHOT

Physics and Politics

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As soon as we abandon our own reason, and are content to rely upon authority, there is no end to our troubles.

BERTRAND RUSSELL

An Outline of Intellectual Rubbish

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If you have a government of good laws and bad men, you will have a bad government. For bad men will not be bound by good laws.

ROBERT LEFEVRE

"Unlimited Government", Colorado Springs Gazette-Telegraph, Dec. 29, 1961


If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, it expects what never was and never will be.

THOMAS JEFFERSON

letter to Colonel Charles Yancey, January 6, 1816

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Government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force; like fire, a troublesome servant and a fearful master. Never for a moment should it be left to irresponsible action.

GEORGE WASHINGTON

attributed

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All government is cruel; for nothing is so cruel as impunity.

GEORGE BERNARD SHAW

On the Rocks

Tags: George Bernard Shaw


A wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned -- this is the sum of good government.

THOMAS JEFFERSON

Inaugural Address, Mar. 4, 1801

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A government is the complexion of the people--healthy as they are healthy, diseased as they are diseased.

AUSTIN O'MALLEY

Keystones of Thought

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When a country is well governed, poverty and a mean condition are something to be ashamed of. When a country is ill governed, riches and honors are something to be ashamed of.

CONFUCIUS

The Wisdom of Confucius

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That government is best which governs the least, because its people discipline themselves.

THOMAS JEFFERSON

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Most traditional governments divide people, setting them against each other to weaken the society and make it governable.

BRIAN HERBERT & KEVIN J. ANDERSON

The Butlerian Jihad

Tags: Brian Herbert


Governments are nothing more or less than gigantic criminal conspiracies, overgrown street gangs with no claims whatsoever to legitimacy. They are funded by theft and the basis of all their operations is aggression. They're no more entitled to keep their activities secret than any other gaggle of murderers, rapists and thieves.

TOMAS L. KNAPP

"At war with the concept of secrecy itself", August 25, 2013


A scientific body to which had been confided the government of society would soon end by devoting itself no longer to science at all, but to quite another affair; and that affair, as in the case of all established powers, would be its own eternal perpetuation by rendering the society confided to its care ever more stupid and consequently more in need of its government and direction.

MIKHAIL BAKUNIN

God and the State

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For, as far as this life of mortals is concerned, which is spent and ended in a few days, what does it matter under whose government a dying man lives, if they who govern do not force him to impiety and iniquity?

ST. AUGUSTINE

The City of God

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Where the people fear the government you have tyranny. Where the government fears the people you have liberty.

JOHN BASIL BARNHILL

"Indictment of Socialism No. 3", Barnhill-Tichenor Debate on Socialism


Man, born in a family, is compelled to maintain society. Remove justice, and what are kingdoms but gangs of criminals on a large scale?

ST. AUGUSTINE

City of God

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Let our recent mistakes bring a resurgent commitment to the basic principles of our Nation, for we know that if we despise our own government, we have no future. We recall in special times when we have stood briefly, but magnificently, united. In those times no prize was beyond our grasp.

JIMMY CARTER

Inaugural Address, January 20, 1977

Tags: Jimmy Carter


All free governments are managed by the combined wisdom and folly of the people.

JAMES A. GARFIELD

letter to B. A. Hinsdale, April 21, 1880