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Election Quotes

Browse 2542 quotes about Election.

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Election Quotes

“The problem with elections is that anybody who wants an office badly enough to run for it probably shouldn’t have it. And anybody who does not want an office badly enough to run for it probably shouldn’t have it, either. Government office should be received like a child’s Christmas present, with surprise and delight. Instead it is usually received like a diploma, an anticlimax that never seems worth the struggle to earn it.”

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Book:Empire
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“I have an idea about voting, how about on every ballot we include "None of the above". People may laugh at that, but what that is, it is a vote of no confidence in your government and I'm willing to bet that in some elections, 'None of the Above' would win. Imagine if you won the election but lost to 'None of the Above'. Wouldn't that make you re-think your positions?”

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Author:Jesse Ventura
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“Famines are easy to prevent if there is a serious effort to do so, and a democratic government, facing elections and criticisms from opposition parties and independent newspapers, cannot help but make such an effort. Not surprisingly, while India continued to have famines under British rule right up to independence... they disappeared suddenly with the establishment of a multiparty democracy and... a free press and an active political opposition constitute the best early-warning system a country threaten by famines can have.”

IfsCountryHelpingGovernmentPoliticalEasyPartyEffortDemocracySeriousCriticismIndiaIndependentElectionIndependencePressesDemocraticBritishActiveNewspapersOppositionWarningEstablishmentFamineFree PressDemocratic GovernmentOpposition PartiesBritish Rule
Author:Amartya Sen
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“To straddle the middle ground and win elections, we have to be in charge of the political agenda. This can only be done by not being beaten in the argument with our critics. They complain that I come down too hard on their arguments. But wrong ideas have to be challenged before they influence public opinion and make for problems. Those who try to be clever at the expense of the government should not complain if my replies are as sharp as their criticisms.”

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Author:Lee Kuan Yew
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“[E]very Man who comes among us, and takes up a piece of Land, becomes a Citizen, and by our Constitution has a Voice in Elections, and a share in the Government of the Country.”

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Book:The Works of Benjamin Franklin; Containing Several Political and Historical Tracts Not Included in Any Former Edition, and Many Letters, Official and Private, Not Hitherto Published; with Notes and a Life of the Author
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“The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.”

HumorGovernmentFunnyPoliticalPoliticsFreedomLibertyDemocracyFiveCrazyMinutesTrustCitizensConversationHumorousArgumentVoteElectionDemocraticAverageWittyLibertarianSillySocialismVotingVotersFive MinutesGoverningForms Of GovernmentLimited GovernmentDemocracies HaveBig GovernmentPolitical HumorElitistElection DayLimiting GovernmentLimited FreedomPolitical WillFounding Fathers DemocracyVoting And DemocracyFunny PoliticalLimiting FreedomPoliticians And PoliticsDemocratic CountryElections And VotingTyranny Of The MajorityGovernment And PoliticsGovernment PoliticsPolitics FunnyPower GovernmentPolitical JokesPolitical WisdomVoting DayVoter TurnoutEnglish GovernmentVoter Id
Book:Churchill By Himself
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“The government consists of a gang of men exactly like you and me. They have, taking one with another, no special talent for the business of government; they have only a talent for getting and holding office. Their principal device to that end is to search out groups who pant and pine for something they can't get and to promise to give it to them. Nine times out of ten that promise is worth nothing. The tenth time is made good by looting A to satisfy B. In other words, government is a broker in pillage, and every election is sort of an advance auction sale of stolen goods.”

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Author:H. L. Mencken
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“In the election campaign of 1930, Hitler seldom spoke explicitly of Jews. The crude tirades of the early 1920s were missing altogether. 'Living-space' figured more prominently, posed against the alternative international competition for markets ... The key theme now was the collapse of Germany under parliamentary democracy and party government into a divided people with separate and conflicting interests, which only the NSDAP could overcome by creating a new unity of the nation, transcending class, estate and profession.”

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Author:Ian Kershaw
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“The right of voting for representatives is the primary right by which other rights are protected. To take away this right is to reduce a man to slavery, for slavery consists in being subject to the will of another, and he that has not a vote in the election of representatives is in this case.”

MenGovernmentPainCasesRightsSubjectsVoteElectionSlaveryPrimariesVotingProtectedRepresentatives
Book:THOMAS PAINE Ultimate Collection: Political Works, Philosophical Writings, Speeches, Letters & Biography (Including Common Sense, The Rights of Man & The Age of Reason): The American Crisis, The Constitution of 1795, Declaration of Rights, Agrarian Justice, The Republican Proclamation, Anti-Monarchal Essay, Letters to Thomas Jefferson and George Washington…
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“If the citizens neglect their duty and place unprincipled men in office, the government will soon be corrupted . . . . If a republican government fails to secure public prosperity and happiness, it must be because the citizens neglect the Divine commands, and elect bad men to make and administer the laws.”

IfsMenGovernmentHappinessLawReligionPrinciplesDemocracyFailingDivineDutyFailureCitizensMoralityRepublicanOfficeElectionProsperityCommandSecureAdministrationVotingNeglectOur Founding FathersUs Founding FathersBad ManFounding Fathers Of AmericaFounding AmericaMorality And ReligionRepublican GovernmentAmerican CharacterCorrupt SocietyVoting Founding Fathers
Book:Instructive and Entertaining Lessons for Youth: With Rules for Reading with Propriety, Illustrated by Examples: Designed for Use in Schools and Families
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“Nothing can be more evident, than that an exclusive power of regulating elections for the National Government, in the hands of the State Legislatures, would leave the existence of the Union entirely at their mercy . . . . It is to little purpose to say that a neglect or omission of this kind [not letting the feds have elections], would be unlikely to take place. The constitutional possibility of the thing, without an equivalent for the risk, is an unanswerable objection.”

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Author:Alexander Hamilton
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“Frequent elections are unquestionably the only policy by which this dependence and sympathy can be effectually secured. But what particular degree of frequency may be absolutely necessary for the purpose, does not appear to be susceptible of any precise calculation; and must depend on a variety of circumstances with which it may be connected. Let us consult experience, the guide that ought always to be followed, whenever it can be found.”

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Book:The Federalist Papers: A Collection of Essays Written in Favour of the New Constitution
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“The regular distribution of power into distinct departments; the introduction of legislative balances and checks; the institution of courts composed of judges holding their offices during good behavior; the representation of the people in the legislature by deputies of their own election . . . They are means, and powerful means, by which the excellences of republican government may be retained and its imperfections lessened or avoided.”

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Book:The Essential Federalist: A New Reading of the Federalist Papers
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“I bring quadruple diversity to the Senate: I'm a woman; I'll be the first Asian woman ever to be elected to the U.S. Senate; I am an immigrant; I am a Buddhist. When I said this at one of my gatherings, they said, 'Yes, but are you gay?' and I said, 'Nobody's perfect.'”

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Author:Mazie Hirono
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“I declare that this government is no longer a constitutional and moral form of government. I will deal with it, and I will obey its laws, and I will support it when it is defending our country from foreign and domestic enemies. I will vote in its elections and participate in its political debates. But I will never accept it. I aim at a restoration of constitutional and moral order.”

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Author:Lawrence Auster
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“The true principle of a republic is that the people should choose whom they please to govern them. Representation is imperfect, in proportion as the current of popular favor is checked. The great source of free government, popular election, should be perfectly pure, and the most unbounded liberty allowed.”

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Book:The works of Alexander Hamilton: comprising his correspondence, and his political and official writings, exclusive of the Federalist, civil and military. Published from the original manuscripts deposited in the Department of State, by order of the Joint Library Committee of Congress
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“That instability is inherent in the nature of popular governments, I think very disputable … A representative democracy, where the right of election is well secured and regulated & the exercise of the legislature, executive, and judiciary authorities, is vested in select persons, chosen really and not nominally by the people, will in my opinion be most likely to be happy, regular and durable.”

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Author:Alexander Hamilton
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