Every communist must grasp the truth: “Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.”

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.

Written laws are like spiderwebs: they will catch, it is true, the weak and poor but would be torn in pieces by the rich and powerful.

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.

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

Do that which consists in taking no action, and order will prevail.

I say violence is necessary. It is as American as cherry pie.

A riot is at bottom the language of the unheard.

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

Every country has the government it deserves.

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

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

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