The Quotes canon
Sourced and curated.
Every quote has been curated by hand and carefully authenticated.
Browse all 10,075 quotes or apply filters in different categories to narrow your search.
Browse all 10,075 quotes or apply filters in different categories to narrow your search.
Political literature84 quotes
From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs! — Karl Marx · 1883No tyrant need fear till men begin to feel confident in each other. — Aristotle · 350 BCAmbition must be made to counteract ambition. — James Madison · 1788Enlightened statesmen will not always be at the helm. — James Madison · 1787Where-ever Law ends, Tyranny begins. — John Locke · 1690The happiness of society is the end of government. — John Adams · 1776All 84 quotes →Political speech54 quotes
Every Communist must grasp the truth: "Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun." — Mao Zedong · 1938In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem. — Ronald Reagan · 1981There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured by what is right with America. — Bill Clinton · 1993Whatever America hopes to bring to pass in the world must first come to pass in the heart of America. — Dwight D. Eisenhower · 1953A free society is a society where it is safe to be unpopular. — Adlai Stevenson · 1952The ballot is stronger than the bullet. — Abraham Lincoln · 1856All 54 quotes →Philosophical literature26 quotes
Democracy passes into despotism. — Socrates · 375 BCNo tyrant need fear till men begin to feel confident in each other. — Aristotle · 350 BCWhat I say is that "just" or "right" means nothing but what is to the interest of the stronger party. — Thrasymachus · 375 BCThe State is not "abolished", it withers away. — Friedrich Engels · 1878Whoever desires to found a state and give it laws, must start with assuming that all men are bad and ever ready to display their vicious nature, whenever they may find occasions for it. — Niccolo Machiavelli · 1531The best political community is formed by citizens of the middle class. — Aristotle · 350 BCAll 26 quotes →Economic literature12 quotes
From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs! — Karl Marx · 1883In proportion as the antagonism between classes within the nation vanishes, the hostility of one nation to another will come to an end. — Karl Marx · 1848The theory of the Communists may be summed up in the single sentence: Abolition of private property. — Karl Marx · 1848All systems, either of preference or of restraint, therefore, being thus completely taken away, the obvious and simple system of natural liberty establishes itself of its own accord. Every man, as long as he does not violate the laws of justice, is left perfectly free to pursue his own interest his own way, and to bring both his industry and capital into competition with those of any other man, or order of men. — Adam Smith · 1776History suggests only that capitalism is a necessary condition for political freedom. Clearly it is not a sufficient condition. — Milton Friedman · 1962I believe that in many cases the ideal size for the unit of control and organisation lies somewhere between the individual and the modern State. I suggest, therefore, that progress lies in the growth and the recognition of semi-autonomous bodies within the State. — John Maynard Keynes · 1926All 12 quotes →Legal writing4 quotes
Of that freedom one may say that it is the matrix, the indispensable condition, of nearly every other form of freedom. — Benjamin Cardozo · 1937It is one of the happy incidents of the federal system that a single courageous State may, if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory; and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country. — Louis Brandeis · 1932Right conclusions are more likely to be gathered out of a multitude of tongues, than through any kind of authoritative selection. To many this is, and will always be, folly; but we have staked upon it our all. — Learned Hand · 1943In all tyrannical governments, the supreme magistracy, or the right both of making and of enforcing the laws, is vested in one and the same man, or one and the same body of men; and wherever these two powers are united together, there can be no public liberty. — William Blackstone · 1769Autobiography and memoir3 quotes
Politics, as a practice, whatever its professions, had always been the systematic organization of hatreds. — Henry Adams · 1907Modern politics is, at bottom, a struggle not of men but of forces. — Henry Adams · 1907Knowledge of human nature is the beginning and end of political education. — Henry Adams · 1907Historical literature3 quotes
You know as well as we do that right, as the word goes, is only in question between equals in power, while the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must. — Thucydides · 404 BCThe death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and undernourishment. — Robert Maynard Hutchins · 1954Bureaucracy is not an obstacle to democracy but an inevitable complement to it. — Joseph Schumpeter · 1942Satire2 quotes
Nor is the people's judgment always true:
The most may err as grossly as the few. — John Dryden · 1681Anyone who campaigns for public office becomes disqualified for holding any office at all. — Thomas More · 1516Animation1 quote
Jessie's right! Authority should derive from the consent of the governed, not from threat of force! — Barbie · 2010Animation (film)1 quote
Jessie's right! Authority should derive from the consent of the governed, not from threat of force! — Barbie · 2010Comedy1 quote
Listen, strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony. — Dennis · 1975Comedy (film)1 quote
Listen, strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony. — Dennis · 1975Commencement address1 quote
It's worth remembering this: freedom of expression sustains all the other freedoms we enjoy. — Ian McEwan · 2015Dissenting opinion1 quote
It is one of the happy incidents of the federal system that a single courageous State may, if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory; and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country. — Louis Brandeis · 1932Documentary (film)1 quote
Honestly, I think we should just trust our president in every decision that he makes and we should just support that. — Britney Spears · 2004Dystopian fiction1 quote
There are only four ways in which a ruling class can fall from power. Either it is conquered from without, or it governs so inefficiently that the masses are stirred to revolt, or it allows a strong and discontented Middle group to come into being, or it loses its own self-confidence and willingness to govern. These causes do not operate singly, and as a rule all four of them are present in some degree. A ruling class which could guard against all of them would remain in power permanently. Ultimately the determining factor is the mental attitude of the ruling class itself. — George Orwell · 1949Epic poem1 quote
A multitude of rulers is not a good thing. Let there be one ruler, one king. — Homer · 700 BCFeminist literature1 quote
The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by an endless series of hobgoblins, most of them imaginary. — H.L. Mencken · 1918Political writing1 quote
Some men look at constitutions with sanctimonious reverence, and deem them like the ark of the covenant, too sacred to be touched... Laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind... We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy, as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors. — Thomas Jefferson · 1816Sociology1 quote
Private beneficence is totally inadequate to deal with the vast numbers of the city's disinherited. — Jane Addams · 1910