| Quote 22 | For in reason, all government without the consent of the governed is the very definition of slavery. |
| Quote 44 | Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master. |
| Quote 50 | Democracy gives every man the right to be his own oppressor. |
| Quote 152 | If men were angels, no government would be necessary. |
| Quote 182 | It is error alone which needs the support of government. Truth can stand by itself. |
| Quote 214 | In the absence of justice, what is sovereignty but organized robbery? |
| Quote 378 | Democracy is the only system that persists in asking the powers that be whether they are the powers that ought to be. |
| Quote 382 | Democracy is the art and science of running the circus from the monkey cage. |
| Quote 399 | Every government is a parliament of whores. The trouble is, in a democracy, the whores are us. |
| Quote 443 | If human beings are fundamentally good, no government is necessary; if they are fundamentally bad, any government, being composed of human b... |
| Quote 658 | Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one. |
| Quote 757 | Here is my first principle of foreign policy: good government at home. |
| Quote 1019 | That government is best which governs least.
- Thomas Paine |
| Quote 1169 | Economics is extremely useful as a form of employment for economists. |
| Quote 1188 | Democracy is an abuse of statistics.
- Jorge Luis Borges |
| Quote 1202 | Ancient Rome declined because it had a Senate, now what's going to happen to us with both a House and a Senate? |
| Quote 2011 | Government is an unnecessary evil. Human beings, when accustomed to taking responsibility for their own behavior, can cooperate on a basis o... |
| Quote 2052 | It's not the voting that's democracy; it's the counting. |
| Quote 2721 | The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter. |
| Quote 2744 | We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give. |
| Quote 3533 | The best minds are not in government. If any were, business would steal them away. |
| Quote 3543 | If 'pro' is the opposite of 'con' what is the opposite of 'progress'? |
| Quote 3873 | Laws too gentle are seldom obeyed; too severe, seldom executed. |
| Quote 4396 | Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys. |
| Quote 4747 | I'm tired of hearing it said that democracy doesn't work. Of course it doesn't work. We are supposed to work it. |
| Quote 7809 | To rule is easy, to govern difficult.
- Johann Goethe |
| Quote 7889 | Washington is a place where politicians don't know which way is up and taxes don't know which way is down. |
| Quote 7893 | Our government... teaches the whole people by its example. If the government becomes the lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites ... |
| Quote 8049 | This country has come to feel the same when Congress is in session as when the baby gets hold of a hammer. |
| Quote 8094 | There are three species of government: republican, monarchical, and despotic. |
| Quote 8254 | Laws are like sausages, it is better not to see them being made. |
| Quote 8335 | It is hard to feel individually responsible with respect to the invisible processes of a huge and distant government. |
| Quote 8458 | Ohio claims they are due a president as they haven't had one since Taft. Look at the United States, they have not had one since Lincoln... |
| Quote 8631 | The genius of our ruling class is that it has kept a majority of the people from ever questioning the inequity of a system where most people... |
| Quote 9412 | Talk is cheap - except when Congress does it. |
| Quote 9635 | Government is a trust, and the officers of the government are trustees. And both the trust and the trustees are created for the benefit of t... |
| Quote 10015 | It is to be regretted that the rich and powerful too often bend the acts of government to their own selfish purposes. |
| Quote 10224 | The oppressed are allowed once every few years to decide which particular representatives of the oppressing class are to represent and repre... |
| Quote 10296 | People try to live within their income so they can afford to pay taxes to a government that can't live within its income. |
| Quote 10325 | Let the people think they govern and they will be governed. |
| Quote 10385 | The mistakes made by Congress wouldn't be so bad if the next Congress didn't keep trying to correct them. |
| Quote 10482 | The government solution to a problem is usually as bad as the problem. |
| Quote 10581 | Government alone cannot solve the problems we deal with in our correctional facilities, treatment centers, homeless shelters and crisis cent... |
| Quote 10588 | Whenever the people are well-informed, they can be trusted with their own government. |
| Quote 10651 | What I worry about would be that you essentially have two chambers, the House and the Senate, but you have simply, majoritarian, absolute po... |
| Quote 10750 | The government, which was designed for the people, has got into the hands of the bosses and their employers, the special interests. An invis... |
| Quote 11255 | Knowledge will forever govern ignorance; and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge ... |
| Quote 11660 | The essence of good government is trust.
- Kathleen Sebelius |
| Quote 11782 | The worst thing in this world, next to anarchy, is government. |
| Quote 11925 | Feeling good about government is like looking on the bright side of any catastrophe. When you quit looking on the bright side, the catastrop... |
| Quote 11981 | Ninety eight percent of the adults in this country are decent, hardworking, honest Americans. It's the other lousy two percent that get... |
| Quote 12037 | Our nation is built on the bedrock principle that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. |
| Quote 12151 | So that the record of history is absolutely crystal clear. That there is no alternative way, so far discovered, of improving the lot of the ... |
| Quote 12183 | The instant formal government is abolished, society begins to act. A general association takes place, and common interest produces common se... |
| Quote 12233 | The fact that political ideologies are tangible realities is not a proof of their vitally necessary character. The bubonic plague was an ext... |
| Quote 12277 | No man is good enough to govern another man without that other's consent. |
| Quote 12388 | Government "help" to business is just as disastrous as government persecution... the only way a government can be of service to na... |
| Quote 12548 | To hear some men talk of the government, you would suppose that Congress was the law of gravitation, and kept the planets in their places. |
| Quote 12780 | Americans no longer look to government for economic security; rather, they look to their portfolios. |
| Quote 12984 | But let us remember, at the same time, government is sacred, and not to be trifled with. |
| Quote 13099 | You don't pay taxes - they take taxes.
- Chris Rock |
| Quote 13116 | Bureaucracy gives birth to itself and then expects maternity benefits. |
| Quote 13160 | Majority rule only works if you're also considering individual rights. Because you can't have five wolves and one sheep voting on ... |
| Quote 13284 | I have long believed taxpayers make better use of their money than the government ever could. |
| Quote 13756 | As a governor, I am naturally inclined to focus on the domestic side of protecting the United States. |
| Quote 13844 | The way people in democracies think of the government as something different from themselves is a real handicap. And, of course, sometimes t... |
| Quote 13982 | Man will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest. |
| Quote 13990 | The people are the government, administering it by their agents; they are the government, the sovereign power. |