Government Quotes

"Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is in prison."
-Henry David Thoreau

"But government in which the majority rule in all cases can not be based on justice, even as far as men understand it."
-Henry David Thoreau

"In general, the art of government consists in taking as much money as possible from one part of the citizens to give to the other."
-Voltaire

"It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong."
-Voltaire

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

"The less government we have the better."
-Ralph Waldo Emerson

"Democracy becomes a government of bullies tempered by editors. "
-Ralph Waldo Emerson

"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have ... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."
-Thomas Jefferson

"No government ought to be without censors & where the press is free, no one ever will."
-Thomas Jefferson

"The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions that I wish it to be always kept alive."
-Thomas Jefferson

"If people let government decide what foods they eat and what medicines they take, their bodies will soon be in as sorry a state as are the souls of those who live under tyranny."
-Thomas Jefferson

"The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg."
-Thomas Jefferson

"The government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion."
-George Washington

"This is a celebration of individual freedom, not of homosexuality. No government has the right to tell its citizens when or whom to love. The only queer people are those who don't love anybody."
-Rita Mae Brown

"Ours is a government of checks and balances. The Mafia and crooked businessmen make out checks, and the politicians and other compromised officials improve their bank balances."
-Steve Allen

"Sure there are dishonest men in local government. But there are dishonest men in national government too."
-Richard M. Nixon

"The impersonal hand of government can never replace the helping hand of a neighbor. "
-Hubert H. Humphrey

"All free governments are managed by the combined wisdom and folly of the people."
-James A. Garfield

"Governments exist to protect the rights of minorities. The loved and the rich need no protection: they have many friends and few enemies."
-Wendell Phillips

"Good government is good politics."
-Richard J. Daley

"If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in 5 years there'd be a shortage of sand."
-Milton Friedman

"It is to be regretted that the rich and powerful too often bend the acts of government to their own selfish purposes."
-Andrew Jackson

"When it comes to federal spending, George W. Bush is the boy who can't say no. In each of his three years at the helm, the president has warned Congress to restrain its spending appetites, but so far nobody has pushed away from the table mainly because the president doesn't seem to mean what he says."
-Tony Snow

"There is no nonsense so arrant that it cannot be made the creed of the vast majority by adequate governmental action."
-Bertrand Russell

"For every action there is an equal and opposite government program."
-Bob Wells

"A wise government knows how to enforce with temper, or to conciliate with dignity."
-George Grenville

"One does not fight corruption by fighting corruption."
-Daniel Kaufmann

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