My people and I have come to an agreement that satisfies us both. They are to say what they please, and I am to do what I please.

The U.S. presidency is a Tudor monarchy plus telephones.

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

The spirit of liberty is the spirit which is not too sure it is right.

All the ills of democracy can be cured by more democracy.

Natural rights is simple nonsense: natural and imprescriptible rights, rhetorical nonsense—nonsense upon stilts.

Treaties, you see, are like girls and roses: they last while they last.

What, to the American slave, is your Fourth of July? I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him your celebration is a sham.

Politics is the art of the possible.

A riot is at bottom the language of the unheard.

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

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

The Revolution is made by man, but man must forge his revolutionary spirit from day to day.