Best individual & government Quotes | Short & Famous Sayings Page 2

“I still believe that, in the long run, the aggregate of the decisions of individual businessmen, exercising individual judgment in a free economy, even if often mistaken, is likely to do less harm than the centralized decisions of a Government; and certainly the harm is likely to be counteracted faster. As I said earlier in this debate, our economic medicine may be painful but it is fast and powerful because it can act freely.”

“In a free society, the “vision thing” is left to private individuals; civil servants are kept on a tight leash, because free people understand that a “visionary” bureaucrat is a voracious one and that the grander the government [...] the poorer and less free the people.”

People Government Individual Left Vision Servant Visionaries Free Society Bureaucrats Leashes Civil Servants

Author:Ilana Mercer

“If the Bill of Rights was intended to place strict limits on federal power and protect individual and locality from the national government the 14th Amendment effectively defeated that purpose by placing the power to enforce the Bill of Rights in federal hands, where it was never intended to be.”

Ifs Hands Government Purpose Individual Rights Protect Limits Bills Amendments Defeated Strict Bill Of Rights Locality 14th Amendment

Author:Ilana Mercer

“I am a Republican because I believe in the constitution, strength in national defense, limited government, individual freedom, and personal responsibility as the concrete foundation for American government. They reinforce the resolve that the United States is the greatest country in the world and we can all be eternally grateful to our founding fathers for the beautiful legacy they left us today.”

“I have a long-standing interest in what I like to think of as "forbidden knowledge": methods of unarmed killing, lock picking, breaking and entry, spy stuff, and other things that the government wants only a few select individuals to know.”

Thinking Knows Want Long Government Individual Stuff Interest Standing Method Killing Locks Forbidden Spy Select Entry Unarmed

Author:Barry Eisler

“Education, and the life of the mind generally, is a matter in which individual initiative is the chief thing needed; the function of the state should begin and end with insistence on some kind of education, and, if possible, a kind which promotes mental individualism, not a kind which happens to conform to the prejudices of government officials.”

Source: Pacifism and Revolution, 1916-18

“In proportion as the people are accustomed to manage their affairs by their own active intervention, instead of leaving them to the government, their desires will turn to repelling tyranny, rather than to tyrannizing: while in proportion as all ready initiative and direction resides in the government, and individuals habitually feel and act as under its perpetual tutelage, popular institutions develop in them not the desire of freedom, but an unmeasured appetite for place and power.”

“Democracy has two excesses to avoid: the spirit of inequality, which leads to an aristocracy, or to the government of a single individual; and the spirit of extreme equality, which conducts it to despotism, as the despotism of a single individual finishes by conquest.”

Two Wisdom Government Spirit Politics Individual Economy Democracy Extremes Inequality Liberalism Excess Conquest Aristocracy Despotism Democracies Have

Author:Baron de Montesquieu

“Our Founding Fathers well understood that concentrated power is the enemy of liberty and the rights of man. They knew that the American experiment in individual liberty, free enterprise and republican self-government could succeed only if power were widely distributed. And since in any society social and political power flow from economic power, they saw that wealth and property would have to be widely distributed among the people of the country. The truth of this insight is immediately apparent.”

“It goes beyond mere 'acknowledgment' of religion because its sole purpose is to encourage all citizens to engage in prayer, an inherently religious exercise that serves no secular function in this context. In this instance, the government has taken sides on a matter that must be left to individual conscience.”

Matter Government Purpose Individual Left Sides Religious Prayer Taken Atheism Citizens Exercise Conscience Function Mere Positive Atheism Instance Sole Secular Acknowledgment

Author:Barbara Brandriff Crabb

“In fact, it is because the nature of prayer is so personal and can have such a powerful effect on a community that the government may not use its authority to try to influence an individual's decision on whether and when to pray.”

Trying May Facts Use Government Individual Community Prayer Decision Powerful Atheism Influence Effects Praying Authority Positive Atheism

Author:Barbara Brandriff Crabb

“Obey; this may be right; but beware of reverence.... Government is nothing but regulated force; force is its appropriate claim upon your attention. It is the business of individuals to persuade; the tendency of concentrated strength, is only to give consistency and permanence to an influence more compendious than persuasion.”

Giving May Government Individual Force Attention Atheism Influence Claims Positive Atheism Tendencies Appropriate Reverence Consistency Persuasion Permanence

Book:Enquiry Concerning Political Justice and Its Influence on Morals and Happiness

Source: Enquiry Concerning Political Justice and Its Influence on Morals and Happiness

“I think it is wrong for the federal government to force Christian individuals, businesses, pastors, churches to participate in wedding ceremonies that violate our sincerely held religious beliefs. We have to stand up and fight for religious liberty. That's where this fight is going.”

Thinking Government Christian Fighting Individual Belief Force Church Religious Liberty Pastor Federal Government Ceremony Sincerely Religious Belief Religious Liberty Wedding Ceremony

Author:Bobby Jindal

“Fights between individuals, as well as governments and nations, invariably result from misunderstandings in the broadest interpretation of this term.”

Wells Government Fighting Individual Nations Term Results Interpretation Misunderstanding

Book:The Nikola Tesla Treasury

Source: The Nikola Tesla Treasury

“The ultimate solution is not in the hands of the government. The solution falls on each and every individual, with guidance from family, friends and community. The #1 responsibility for each of us is to change ourselves with hope that others will follow. This is of greater importance than working on changing the government; that is secondary to promoting a virtuous society. If we can achieve this, then the government will change.”

Ifs Hands Government Fall Individual Community Responsibility Greater Achieve Solutions Ultimate Importance Guidance Virtuous Promoting Family Friends

Author:Ron Paul

“The State has no more existence than gods and devils have. They are equally the reflex and creation of man, for man, the individual, is the only reality. The State is but the shadow of man, the shadow of his opaqueness, of his ignorance and fear.”

Men States Reality Government Individual Existence Creation Ignorance Devil Shadow Reflexes Ignorance And Fear Creation Of Man

Book:Red Emma Speaks: An Emma Goldman Reader

Source: Red Emma Speaks: An Emma Goldman Reader

“Censorship' is a term pertaining only to governmental action. No private action is censorship. No private individual or agency can silence a man or suppress a publication; only the government can do so. The freedom of speech of private individuals includes the right not to agree, not to listen and not to finance one's own antagonists.”

Men Government Action Individual Term Can Do Silence Speech Agree Finance Agency Censorship Freedom Of Speech Publication Antagonist

Book:The Ayn Rand Lexicon: Objectivism from A to Z

Source: The Ayn Rand Lexicon: Objectivism from A to Z

“The government does not need to know more about what we are doing. We need to know more about what the government is doing. We should be thankful for individuals like Edward Snowden and Glenn Greenwald who see injustice being carried out by their own government and speak out, despite the risk. They have done a great service to the American people by exposing the truth about what our government is doing in secret.”

People Knows Needs Should Doe Done Government Individual Speak Secret Risk Injustice Despite Being Thankful Speaks Out Nsa Exposing Great Service Snowden

Author:Ron Paul

“If any individual who objects to government policy can take it in their own hands to publicly disclose classified information, then we will never be able to keep our people safe or conduct foreign policy.”

People Ifs Hands Government Able Individual Information Policy Objects Safe Foreign Policy Nsa Government Policy Classified Information

Author:Barack Obama

“I'm a committed Republican. I believe very strongly in individual liberty. I tend not to think much in terms of group politics. I really am a kind of small government person and I'm most certainly a fiscal conservative and strong on national defense.”

“Let America symbolize humanity's struggle to conquer nature and master technology. The time has now come for our Government to facilitate the individual's control over his or her future - and of the future of America.”

Government America Humanity Individual Technology Struggle Masters Conquer Facilitate Future Of America

Author:Gerald R. Ford

“The real transgression occurs when religion wants government to tell citizens how to live uniquely personal parts of their lives. The failure of Prohibition proves the futility of such an attempt when a majority or even a substantial minority happens to disagree. Some questions may be inherently individual ones, or people may be sharply divided about whether they are. In such cases, like Prohibition and abortion, the proper role of religion is to appeal to the conscience of the individual, not the coercive power of the state.”

People Want May Real States Government Happens Individual Roles Cases Citizens Prove Conscience Majority Appeals Abortion Minorities Divided Disagree Prohibition Futility Transgression

Author:Edward Kennedy

“I represent what I think is a traditional Republican... a limited government, fiscal responsibility, strong national defense, individual freedom and liberty.”

Thinking Government Individual Strong Responsibility Liberty Republican Defense Traditional Freedom And Liberty Limited Government Individual Freedom National Defense Fiscal Responsibility

Author:Olympia Snowe

“It's government's job to respect and protect the rights of the individual. That vision is centrally important to the principle put forth by the Founding Fathers. If you don't believe that, you shouldn't be in Congress.”

Ifs Believe Important Government Jobs Father Individual Vision Principles Rights Protect Don't Believe Congress Founding

Author:Bill Sali

“I really didn't know much about the Libertarians. I knew they were for less government and more individual freedom. I liked that.”

Knows Government Individual Libertarian Individual Freedom

Author:Howard Stern

“The proof that the state is a creation of nature and prior to the individual is that the individual, when isolated, is not self-sufficing.”

Self States Government Individual Creation Proof Isolated

Book:Politics

Source: Politics

“That the equalization of property exercises an influence on political society was clearly understood even by some of the old legislators. Laws were made by Solon and others prohibiting an individual from possessing as much land as he pleased.”

Made Government Law Political Individual Influence Land Exercise Understood Property Possessing Legislators

Book:Politics

Source: Politics

“A nation's exchange rate is the single most important price in its economy; it will influence the entire range of individual prices, imports and exports, and even the level of economic activity. So it is hard for any government to ignore large swings in its exchange rate.”

Important Hard Government Individual Nations Levels Economy Influence Economic Activity Rate Investing Range Swings Imports

Book:Changing fortunes: the world's money and the threat to American leadership

Source: Changing fortunes: the world's money and the threat to American leadership

“The mischievous idea that all public needs should be satisfied by compulsory organization and that all the means that individuals are willing to devote to pubic purposes should be under the control of government, is wholly alien to the basic principles of a free society.”

Needs Should Mean Ideas Government Purpose Individual Principles Willing Economics Organization Satisfied Aliens Free Society Basic Principles Compulsory Mischievous

Author:Friedrich August von Hayek

“It [appears] that however certain forms of government are better calculated than others to protect individuals in the free exercise of their natural rights, and are at the same time themselves better guarded against degeneracy, yet experience [has] shown that, even under the best forms, those entrusted with power have, in time and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny.”

Government Form Certain Individual Natural Rights Exercise Protect Tyranny Operations Forms Of Government Guarded Natural Rights

Book:Thomas Jefferson: selections from his writings edited, with an introduction

Source: Thomas Jefferson: selections from his writings edited, with an introduction

“By deriving it's just powers from the governed, government becomes primarily a mechanism for defense against bodily harm, theft, and involuntary servitude. It cannot claim the power to redistribute money or property nor to force reluctant citizens to perform acts of charity against their will. Government is created by the people. No individual possesses the power to take another's wealth or to force others to do good, so no government has the the right to do such things either. The creature cannot exceed the creator.”

Source: The Constitution: A Heavenly Banner

“I know of no existing nation that deserves to live, and I know of very few individuals.”

Knows Government Individual Nations Deserve

Author:H. L. Mencken

“The only thing I believe is individual responsibility doesn't mean the government is the answer to ever fear and every problem every individual has. We are the masters of our own destiny.”

Believe Mean Problem Government Individual I Believe Answers Responsibility Destiny Masters Individual Responsibility

Author:Sean Hannity

“And there was a deeper, less visible effect of the Truman loyalty program. Seeing its consequences for certain individuals and fearing its intrusion on their own lives, many in the government sought protection by strongly asserting their anti-Communism. In the public action that ensued, policy was based not on reality but, instinctively or deliberately, on personal caution...Those who urged a militant and sometimes military anti-Communism were considered sound, trustworthy and personally safe; those who questioned such a course were politically unsafe, possible even slightly disloyal.”

“[M]y conception of liberty does not permit an individual citizen or a group of citizens to commit acts of depredation against nature in such a way as to harm their neighbors and especially to harm the future generations of Americans. If many years ago we had had the necessary knowledge, and especially the necessary willingness on the part of the Federal Government, we would have saved a sum, a sum of money which has cost the taxpayers of America two billion dollars.”

“The good of the people must be the great purpose of government. By the laws of nature and of reason, the governors are invested with power to that end. And the greatest good of the people is liberty. It is to the state what health is to the individual.”

People Ends States Reason Government Law Purpose Individual Liberty Atheism Positive Atheism Governors Laws Of Nature Purpose Of Government

Author:Denis Diderot

“I love to tell how I'm suffering because one percent we're paying 25 percent of the total. We're not paying 25 percent of the total taxes on individuals. We're paying maybe 25 percent of the income tax, but the payroll tax is over a third of the receipts of the federal government. And they don't take that from me on capital gains. They don't take that from me on dividends. They take from the woman who comes in and takes the wastebaskets out.”

Government Suffering Individual Taxes Percent Gains Thirds Income Federal Government Income Tax Dividends Payroll Receipts Capital Gains Payroll Tax

Author:Howard Warren Buffett

“... while one-half of the people of the United States are robbed of their inherent right of personal representation in this freestcountry on the face of the globe, it is idle for us to expect that the men who thus rob women will not rob each other as individuals, corporations and Government.”

People Men States Government Faces Individual United Half United States Crime He Man Injustice Corporations Inherent Globes Representation Idle Suffrage One Half Woman Suffrage

Author:Susan B. Anthony

“A State, in idea, is the opposite of a Church. A State regards classes, and not individuals; and it estimates classes, not by internal merit, but external accidents, as property, birth, etc. But a church does the reverse of this, and disregards all external accidents, and looks at men as individual persons, allowing no gradations of ranks, but such as greater or less wisdom, learning, and holiness ought to confer. A Church is, therefore, in idea, the only pure democracy.”

Source: Golden Hours with Samuel Taylor Coleridge

“The American people owe it to themselves, and to the cause of free Government, to prove by their establishments for the advancement and diffusion of knowledge, that their political Institutionsare as favorable to the intellectual and moral improvement of Man as they are conformable to his individual and social rights.”

People Men Government Political Individual Social Causes Education Moral Rights Prove Intellectual Improvement Establishment Advancement Free Government Diffusion

Book:Selected Writings of James Madison

Source: Selected Writings of James Madison

“A nation's domestic and foreign policies and actions should be derived from the same standards of ethics, honesty and morality which are characteristic of the individual citizens of the nation.”

Should Government Action Individual Nations Honesty Policy Citizens Morality Standards Ethics Characteristics Foreign Policy

Author:Jimmy Carter

“A people may prefer a free government, but if by momentary discouragement or temporary panic, or a fit of enthusiasm for an individual, they can be induced to lay their liberties at the feet of even a great man, or trust him with powers to subvert their institutions, in all these cases they are unfit for liberty.”

Source: On Liberty, Utilitarianism and Other Essays

“The strongest reason why we ask for woman a voice in the government under which she lives; in the religion she is asked to believe; equality in social life, where she is the chief factor; a place in the trades and professions, where she may earn her bread, is because of her birthright to self-sovereignty; because, as an individual, she must rely on herself.”

Believe May Self Reason Government Asks Individual Social Voice Trade Profession Bread Factors Chiefs Reason Why Rely Strongest Individualism Sovereignty Social Life Birthright

Author:Elizabeth Cady Stanton

“We must introduce a new balance in the relationship between the individual and the government--a balance that favors greater individual freedom and self-reliance.”

Self Government Individual Freedom Greater Balance Favors Introducing Self Reliance Reliance Individual Freedom

Book:Gerald R. Ford: containing the public messages, speeches, and statements of the President

Source: Gerald R. Ford: containing the public messages, speeches, and statements of the President

“The Declaration [of Independence] was not a protest against government, but against the excess of government. It prescribed the proper role of government, to secure the rights of individuals and to effect their safety and happiness. In modern society, no individual can do this alone. So government is not a necessary evil but a necessary good.”

Government Evil Individual Can Do Roles Rights Modern Effects Safety Independence Secure Protest Excess Declaration Declaration Of Independence Modern Society Necessary Evil Role Of Government

Author:Gerald R. Ford

“Under the Obama regime, the president and his allies are intentional in pursuing these conflicts from the perspective that you must sacrifice your most sacred beliefs to government the instant you start a business. You have the protection of the First Amendment as an individual, you see – but the instant you start a business, you lose those protections.”

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Individual Quotes