Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

It is a certain sign of a wise government and proceeding, when it can hold men’s hearts by hopes, when it cannot by satisfaction.

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

If you must take care that your opinions do not differ in the least from those of the person with whom you are talking, you might just as well be alone.

Politics is the art of the possible.

The more corrupt the republic, the more numerous the laws.

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

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

A real leader is somebody who can help us overcome the limitations of our own individual laziness and selfishness and weakness and fear and get us to do better, harder things than we can get ourselves to do on our own.

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.

You should never have your best trousers on when you go out to fight for freedom and truth.

Why has the government been instituted at all? Because the passions of men will not conform to the dictates of reason and justice without constraint.

Television has made dictatorship impossible, but democracy unbearable.