Motivational Quotes

Government

Today, if you invent a better mousetrap, the government comes along with a better mouse.

- Reagan, Ronald

Best Quotes about Government

Public instruction should be the first object of government.

Bonaparte, Napoleon

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

The greater the hold of government upon the life of the individual citizen, the greater the risk of war.

Hospers, John

I don't judge a regime by the damning criticism of the opposition, but by the ingenuous praise of the partisan.

Rostand, Jean

Society is well governed when its people obey the magistrates, and the magistrates obey the law.

Solon

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

Douglas, William O.

It is doubtful that the government knows much more than the public does about how government [Economic] policies will work.

Wallis, W. Allen

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.

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

10.

Well, fancy giving money to the Government! Might as well have put it down the drain.

Herbert, A. P.

11.

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

Einstein, Albert

12.

The government is us; we are the government, you and I.

Roosevelt, Theodore

13.

As long as our government is administered for the good of the people, and is regulated by their will; as long as it secures to us the rights of persons and of property, liberty of conscience and of the press, it will be worth defending.

Jackson, Andrew

14.

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

15.

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

16.

Government is either organized benevolence or organized madness; its peculiar magnitude permits no shading.

Updike, John

17.

Government is an evil; it is only the thoughtlessness and vices of men that make it a necessary evil. When all men are good and wise, government will of itself decay.

Shelley, Percy Bysshe

18.

Bureaucracy is a giant mechanism operated by pygmies.

Balzac, Honore De

19.

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

Lawson, Nigel

20.

Every form of government tends to perish by excess of its basic principles.

Durant, William J.

21.

It would be foolish to suggest that government is a good custodian of aesthetic goals. But, there is no alternative to the state.

Galbraith, John Kenneth

22.

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

Beecher, Henry Ward

23.

Truth is the glue that holds government together.

Ford, Gerald R.

24.

Many people want the government to protect the consumer. A much more urgent problem is to protect the consumer from the government.

Friedman, Milton

25.

All good government must begin at home.

Haweis, H. R.

26.

The government is best which makes itself unnecessary.

Humboldt, Karl Wilhelm Von

27.

Governments tend not to solve problems, only to rearrange them.

Reagan, Ronald

28.

Who so taketh in hand to frame any state or government ought to presuppose that all men are evil, and at occasions will show themselves so to be.

Raleigh, Sir Walter

29.

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

Bismarck, Otto Von

30.

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.

31.

Remember that a government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take away everything you have.

Crockett, Davy

32.

Any government is potentially the worst client in the world you could ever possibly want to have.

Thomas Heatherwick

33.

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

Boytzwnburg, Count

34.

Today, if you invent a better mousetrap, the government comes along with a better mouse.

Reagan, Ronald

35.

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

Caldwell, John S.

36.

The best government is that which teaches us to govern ourselves.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

37.

It is the duty of the President to propose and it is the privilege of the Congress to dispose.

Roosevelt, Franklin D.

38.

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

39.

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

40.

Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except all those others that have been tried from time to time.

Churchill, Winston

41.

It is easy to rule over the good.

Plautus, Titus Maccius

42.

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

Burns, George

43.

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

44.

I believe that all government is evil, and that trying to improve it is largely a waste of time.

H. L. Mencken

45.

I would not give half a guinea to live under one form of government rather than another. It is of no moment to the happiness of an individual.

Johnson, Samuel

46.

A man without a vote is man without protection.

Johnson, Lyndon B.

47.

An educated people can be easily governed.