Out of the crooked timber of humanity no straight thing was ever made.

It is impossible to tell which of the two dispositions we find in men is more harmful in a republic, that which seeks to maintain an established position or that which has none but seeks to acquire it.

An appeal to the reason of the people has never been known to fail in the long run.

You have all the characteristics of a popular politician: a horrible voice, bad breeding, and a vulgar manner.

The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.

What experience and history teach is this—that nations and governments have never learned anything from history or acted upon any lessons they might have drawn from it.

On the loftiest throne in the world, we still sit only on our own rump.

Sic semper tyrannis! The South is avenged.

I am invariably of the politics of the people at whose table I sit, or beneath whose roof I sleep.

The vice presidency isn’t worth a pitcher of warm piss.

Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half of the time.

A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always count on the support of Paul.

In politics, what begins in fear usually ends in folly.