Motivational Quotes

Government

I say to myself that I mustn't let myself be cut off in there, and yet the moment I enter my bag is taken out of my hand, I'm pushed in, shepherded, nursed and above all cut off, alone. Whitehall envelops me.

- Crossman, Richard

Best Quotes about Government

The government must always be a step ahead of the popular movement.

Boytzwnburg, Count

What we should be asking is not whether we need a big government or small government, but how we can create a smarter and better government.

President Barack Obama

No man undertakes a trade he has not learned, even the meanest; yet everyone thinks himself sufficiently qualified for the hardest of all trades, that of government.

Socrates

Beaverbrook is so pleased to be in the government that he is like the town tart who finally married the Mayor.

Baxter, Beverley

A man without a vote is man without protection.

Johnson, Lyndon B.

Governing today means giving acceptable signs of credibility. It is like advertising and it is the same effect that is achieved -- commitment to a scenario.

Baudrillard, Jean

The worst thing in the world next to anarchy, is government.

Beecher, Henry Ward

No more distressing moment can ever face a British government than that which requires it to come to a hard, fast and specific decision.

Tuchman, Barbara

The government is huge, stupid, greedy and makes nosy, officious and dangerous intrusions into the smallest corners of life -- this much we can stand. But the real problem is that government is boring. We could cure or mitigate the other ills Washington visits on us if we could only bring ourselves to pay attention to Washington itself. But we cannot.

O'Rourke, P. J.

10.

Too bad that all the people who know how to run the country are busy driving taxicabs and cutting hair.

Burns, George

11.

Government is actually the worst failure of civilized man. There has never been a really good one, and even those that are most tolerable are arbitrary, cruel, grasping and unintelligent.

Mencken, H. L.

12.

Nothing is more destructive of respect for the government and the law of the land than passing laws which cannot be enforced.

Einstein, Albert

13.

It is easy to rule over the good.

Plautus, Titus Maccius

14.

You could afford your house without the government if it weren't for the government.

Limbaugh, Rush

15.

The monarchy is a labor intensive industry.

Wilson, Harold

16.

There is no nonsense so arrant that it cannot be made the creed of the vast majority by adequate governmental action.

Bertrand Russell

17.

The Athenians govern the Greeks; I govern the Athenians; you, my wife, govern me; your son governs you.

Themistocles

18.

I love my government not least for the extent to which it leaves me alone.

Updike, John

19.

All good government must begin at home.

Haweis, H. R.

20.

The ship of state is the only known vessel that leaks from the top.

Reston, James

21.

To govern is to choose. To appear to be unable to choose is to appear to be unable to govern.

Lawson, Nigel

22.

It is hard to feel individually responsible with respect to the invisible processes of a huge and distant government.

Gardner, John W.

23.

It is perfectly true that that government is best which governs least. It is equally true that that government is best which provides most.

Lippmann, Walter

24.

That government is the strongest of which every man feels himself a part.

Jefferson, Thomas

25.

There is no nonsense so arrant that it cannot be made the creed of the vast majority by adequate government action.

Russell, Bertrand

26.

We must judge a government by its general tendencies and not by its happy accidents.

Macaulay, Thomas B.

27.

The art of government is the organization of idolatry. The bureaucracy consists of functionaries; the aristocracy, of idols; the democracy, of idolaters. The populace cannot understand the bureaucracy: it can only worship the national idols.

Shaw, George Bernard

28.

There are no necessary evils in government. Its evils exist only in its abuses.

Jackson, Andrew

29.

For its part, Government will listen. We will strive to listen in new ways -- to the voices of quiet anguish, to voices that speak without words, the voices of the heart, to the injured voices, and the anxious voices, and the voices that have despaired of being heard.

Nixon, Richard M.

30.

In a healthy nation there is a kind of dramatic balance between the will of the people and the government, which prevents its degeneration into tyranny.

Einstein, Albert

31.

What is government itself but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary.

Madison, James

32.

The basis of effective government is public confidence.

Kennedy, John F.

33.

Of the best rulers, The people only know that they exist; the next best they love and praise the next they fear; and the next they revile. When they do not command the people's faith, some will lose faith in them, and then they resort to oaths! But of the best when their task is accomplished, their work done, the people all remark, We have done it ourselves.

Lao-Tzu

34.

The best government is a benevolent tyranny tempered by an occasional assassination.

Voltaire

35.

Government is not reason and it is not eloquence. It is force! Like fire it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master. Never for a moment should it be left to irresponsible action.

Washington, George

36.

Nothing is more surprising than the easiness with which the many are governed by the few.

Hume, David

37.

The whole country is one vast insane asylum and they're letting the worst patients run the place.

Welch, Robert

38.

The constitution is not neutral. It was designed to take the government off the backs of people.

Douglas, William O.

39.

Those who govern, having much business on their hands, do not generally like to take the trouble of considering and carrying into execution new projects. The best public measures are therefore seldom adopted from previous wisdom, but forced by the occasion.

Franklin, Benjamin

40.

Of all tasks of government the most basic is to protect its citizens against violence.

Dulles, John Foster

41.

Safety of the state is the highest law.

Justinian

42.

Whenever you have an efficient government you have a dictatorship.

Harry S Truman

43.

In the councils of a state, the question is not so much, what ought to be done? As, what can be done?

Proverb, French

44.

In quiet and untroubled times it seems to every administrator that it is only by his efforts that the whole population under his rule is kept going, and in this consciousness of being indispensable every administrator finds the chief reward of his labor and efforts. While the sea of history remains calm the ruler-administrator in his frail bark, holding on with a boat hook to the ship of the people and himself moving, naturally imagines that his efforts move the ship he is holding on to. But as soon as a storm arises and the sea begins to heave and the ship to move, such a delusion is no longer possible. The ship moves independently with its own enormous motion, the boat hook no longer reaches the moving vessel, and suddenly the administrator, instead of appearing a ruler and a source of power, becomes an insignificant, useless, feeble man.

Tolstoy, Count Leo

45.

The contented and economically comfortable have a very discriminating view of government. Nobody is ever indignant about bailing out failed banks and failed savings and loans associations. But when taxes must be paid for the lower middle class and poor, the government assumes an aspect of wickedness.

Galbraith, John Kenneth

46.

You know what's interesting about Washington? It's the kind of place where second-guessing has become second nature.

George W. Bush

47.

The point to remember is what government gives it must first take away

Caldwell, John S.

48.

Government can be bigger than any of the players on the field as a referee, but it has no right to become one of the players.

Igleheart, Austin

49.

A government must not waiver once it has chosen it's course. It must not look to the left or right but go forward.