An appeal to the reason of the people has never been known to fail in the long run.
—James Russell Lowell, c. 1865Quotes
Let him who desires peace prepare for war.
—Vegetius, c. 385Politics, n. A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles. The conduct of public affairs for private advantage.
—Ambrose Bierce, 1906The vice presidency isn’t worth a pitcher of warm piss.
—John Nance Garner, c. 1967A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always count on the support of Paul.
—George Bernard Shaw, 1944Out of the crooked timber of humanity no straight thing was ever made.
—Immanuel Kant, 1784There is nothing more tyrannical than a strong popular feeling among a democratic people.
—Anthony Trollope, 1862What, 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.
—Frederick Douglass, 1855In politics, what begins in fear usually ends in folly.
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 1830The U.S. presidency is a Tudor monarchy plus telephones.
—Anthony Burgess, 1972It 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.
—Niccolò Machiavelli, c. 1515You should never have your best trousers on when you go out to fight for freedom and truth.
—Henrik Ibsen, 1882I shall be an autocrat: that’s my trade. And the good Lord will forgive me: that’s his.
—Catherine the Great, c. 1796