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Quotes about government

575 quotes from 235 people

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Government has no right to hurt the hair of an Atheist for his Opinions. Let him have a care of his Practices.
John Adams1735–1826Letter to John Quincy Adams (16 June 1816)
- Atheism
Congress in session is Congress on public exhibition, whilst Congress in its committee-rooms is Congress at work.
Woodrow Wilson1856–1924Congressional Government, A Study in American Politics (1885; republished 1981), chapter 2, p. 69 (1981)
And having looked to Government for bread, on the very first scarcity they will turn and bite the hand that fed them.
Edmund Burke1729–1797Thoughts and Details on Scarcity (1795)
The world must be made safe for democracy. Its peace must be planted upon the tested foundations of political liberty.
Woodrow Wilson1856–1924Wilson’s War Message to Congress (1917)
- Democracy
- Liberty
What the government is good at is collecting taxes, taking away your freedoms and killing people. It’s not good at much else.
Tom Clancy1947–2013Kudlow & Cramer interview (2003)
The United States Constitution has proven itself the most marvelously elastic compilation of rules of government ever written.
Franklin D. Roosevelt1882–1945Radio address (2 March 1930), in Public Papers of Governor Roosevelt (1930), p. 710
- America
The class which has the power to rob upon a large scale has also the power to control the government and legalize their robbery.
Eugene V. Debs1855–1926in Debs (1971), p. 75
- Power
I suspect that there are just two sorts of lawyers: those who spend their efforts making life easy for other people⁠—and parasites.
Robert A. Heinlein1907–1988Friday (1982), Chapter 24 (p. 257)
- Clever Jabs
- Laws
In a free society the state does not administer the affairs of men. It administers justice among men who conduct their own affairs.
Walter Lippmann1889–1974The Good Society (1937), Ch. XII: “The Political Principles of Liberalism”, §6, p. 267
- Freedom
- Justice
All government — indeed, every human benefit and enjoyment, every virtue and every prudent act — is founded on compromise and barter.
Edmund Burke1729–1797Second Speech on Conciliation with America (1775)
Apparently, a democracy is a place where numerous elections are held at great cost without issues and with interchangeable candidates.
Gore Vidal1925–2012“Gods and Greens” (1989)
- Democracy
- Voting
I think myself that we have more machinery of government than is necessary, too many parasites living on the labor of the industrious.
Thomas Jefferson1743–1826Letter to William Ludlow (6 September 1824)
The law is simply and solely made for the exploitation of those who do not understand it or of those who, for naked need, cannot obey it.
Bertolt Brecht1898–1956The Threepenny Opera (1928), Act 3, scene 1 (Peachum)
- Justice
- Laws
Anarchism is founded on the observation that since few men are wise enough to rule themselves, even fewer are wise enough to rule others.
Edward Abbey1927–1989A Voice Crying in the Wilderness (Vox Clamantis in Deserto) (1990)
- Wisdom
Lord, the money we do spend on Government and it’s not one bit better than the government we got for one-third the money twenty years ago.
Will Rogers1879–1935The Will Rogers Book (1972)
- Money