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

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.

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

Television has made dictatorship impossible, but democracy unbearable.

There is no method by which men can be both free and equal.

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.

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

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

No free man shall be taken or imprisoned or dispossessed or outlawed or exiled, or in any way destroyed, nor will we go upon him, nor will we send against him except by the lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land.

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.

The affairs of the world are no more than so much trickery, and a man who toils for money or honor or whatever else in deference to the wishes of others, rather than because his own desire or needs lead him to do so, will always be a fool.

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

Sic semper tyrannis! The South is avenged.