People revere the Constitution yet know so little about it—and that goes for some of my fellow senators.

Politics is the art of preventing people from taking part in affairs which properly concern them.

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.

I’m president of the United States, and I’m not going to eat any more broccoli!

To be turned from one’s course by men’s opinions, by blame, and by misrepresentation shows a man unfit to hold office.

I am no courtesan, nor moderator, nor tribune, nor defender of the people: I am myself the people.

The most hateful torment for men is to have knowledge of everything but power over nothing.

Let him who desires peace prepare for war.

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

I shall be an autocrat: that’s my trade. And the good Lord will forgive me: that’s his.

Whether for good or evil, it is sadly inevitable that all political leadership requires the artifices of theatrical illusion. In the politics of a democracy, the shortest distance between two points is often a crooked line.

Sic semper tyrannis! The South is avenged.

The best of all rulers is but a shadowy presence to his subjects.