Government quotes
11.3K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
"Government is not a solution to our problem, government is the problem. ... Government does not solve problems; it subsidizes them. Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. If it stops moving, subsidize it. ... The problem is not that people are taxed too little, the problem is that government spends too much."
"War is when the government tells you who the bad guy is. Revolution is when you decide that for yourself."
"If you do not take an interest in the affairs of your government, then you are doomed to live under the rule of fools."
"If voting made any difference they wouldn't let us do it."
"If the ANC does to you what the apartheid government did to you, then you must do to the ANC what you did to the apartheid government."
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Browse quotes that often appear alongside government — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.
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"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together."
"There is nothing government can give you that it hasn't taken from you in the first place."
"If more government is the answer, then it was a really stupid question."
"The end of democracy and the defeat of the American Revolution will occur when government falls into the hands of lending institutions and moneyed incorporations."
"He is a weak ruler who needs religion to uphold his government; it is as if he would catch his people in a trap."
"It’s ridiculous to talk about freedom in a society dominated by huge corporations. What kind of freedom is there inside a corporation? They’re totalitarian institutions - you take orders from above and maybe give them to people below you. There’s about as much freedom as under Stalinism."
"A government which does not trust its citizens to be armed is not itself to be trusted."
"If all that Americans want is security, they can go to prison. They'll have enough to eat, a bed and a roof over their heads. But if an American wants to preserve his dignity and his equality as a human being, he must not bow his neck to any dictatorial government."
"No responsibility of government is more fundamental than the responsibility of maintaining the highest standard of ethical behavior for those who conduct the public business."
"It's hard, when you're up to your armpits in alligators, to remember you came here to drain the swamp."
"When there is no middle class, and the poor greatly exceed in number, troubles arise, and the state soon comes to an end."
"One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors."
"There is nothing I dread so much as the division of the republic into two great parties, each arranged under its leader, and concerting measures in opposition to each other. This, in my humble apprehension, is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our constitution."
"The government you elect is the government you deserve."
"In free governments the rulers are the servants, and the people their superiors and sovereigns."
"The art of government is to make two-thirds of a nation pay all it possibly can pay for the benefit of the other third."
"Up to this moment I have been pleased to entrust the government of my affairs to the late Cardinal. It is now time that I govern them myself. You [secretaries and ministers of state] will assist me with your counsels when I ask for them. I request and order you to seal no orders except by my command, . . . I order you not to sign anything, not even a passport . . . without my command; to render account to me personally each day and to favor no one."
"To those who cite the first amendment as reason for excluding God from more and more of our institutions and everyday life, may I just say: The first amendment of the Constitution was not written to protect the people of this country from religious values; it was written to protect religious values from government tyranny."
"Extreme taxation, excessive controls, oppressive government competition with business, frustrated minorities and forgotten Americans are not the products of free enterprise. They are the residue of centralized bureaucracy, of government by a self-anointed elite."
"But if the laws are to be so trampled upon with impunity, and a minority is to dictate to the majority, there is an end put at one stroke to republican government, and nothing but anarchy and confusion is to be expected thereafter."
