Quotes on Democracy

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Sydney J. Harris

“Democracy is the only system that persists in asking the powers that be whether they are the powers that ought to be.”

(American Journalist and Author, He wrote a syndicated column, Strictly Personal, from 1944-86. 1917-1986)

Agnes Repplier:

Democracy forever teases us with the contrast between its ideals and its realities, between its heroic possibilities and its sorry achievements.

Alex Carey:

... the 20th century has been characterized by three developments of great political importance: The growth of democracy, the growth of corporate power, and the growth of corporate propaganda as a means of protecting corporate power against democracy.

Australian social scientist, quoted by Noam Chomsky in World Orders Old and New

Alexis de Tocqueville:

The surface of American society is covered with a layer of democratic paint, but from time to time one can see the old aristocratic colours breaking through.

Aristotle:

If liberty and equality, as is thought by some, are chiefly to be found in democracy, they will be best attained when all persons alike share in the government to the utmost.

Edward Dowling:

The two greatest obstacles to democracy in the United States are, first, the widespread delusion among the poor that we have a democracy, and second, the chronic terror among the rich, lest we get it. <1941>

Eleanor Holmes Norton:

The only way to make sure people you agree with can speak is to support the rights of people you don't agree with.

Eugene McCarthy:

As long as the differences and diversities of mankind exist, democracy must allow for compromise, for accommodation, and for the recognition of differences.

Eugene V. Debs:

When great changes occur in history, when great principles are involved, as a rule the majority are wrong. The minority are right.

George Bernard Shaw:

Democracy is a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve.

George Orwell:

In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act.

George Washington:

As Mankind becomes more liberal, they will be more apt to allow that all those who conduct themselves as worthy members of the community are equally entitled to the protections of civil government. I hope ever to see America among the foremost nations of justice and liberality.

H. L. Mencken:

Democracy is only a dream: it should be put in the same category as Arcadia, Santa Claus, and Heaven.

H. L. Mencken:

As democracy is perfected, the office represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. We move toward a lofty ideal. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their hearts desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.

The Baltimore Evening Sun, July 26, 1920

Hermann Goering:

Naturally the common people don't want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country. quote verified at snopes.com

Howard Winters:

Civilization is the process in which one gradually increases the number of people included in the term 'we' or 'us' and at the same time decreases those labeled 'you' or 'them' until that category has no one left in it.

J. William Fulbright:

In a democracy, dissent is an act of faith.

John F. Kennedy:

We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people.

John Gardner:

The citizen can bring our political and governmental institutions back to life, make them responsive and accountable, and keep them honest. No one else can.

John Simon:

Democracy encourages the majority to decide things about which the majority is ignorant.

Laurence J. Peter:

Democracy is a process by which the people are free to choose the man who will get the blame.

Mark Twain:

We adore titles and heredities in our hearts and ridicule them with our mouths. This is our democratic privilege.

Meg Greenfield:

Everybody's for democracy in principle. It's only in practice that the thing gives rise to stiff objections.

Mohandas K. Gandhi:

In true democracy every man and women is taught to think for himself or herself.

Mohandas K. Gandhi:

The spirit of democracy cannot be established in the midst of terrorism, whether governmental or popular.

Molly Ivins:

The thing about democracy, beloveds, is that it is not neat, orderly, or quiet. It requires a certain relish for confusion.

Noam Chomsky:

The most effective way to restrict democracy is to transfer decision-making from the public arena to unaccountable institutions: kings and princes, priestly castes, military juntas, party dictatorships, or modern corporations.

Noam Chomsky:

There are no magic answers, no miraculous methods to overcome the problems we face, just the familiar ones: honest search for understanding, education, organization, action that raises the cost of state violence for its perpetrators or that lays the basis for institutional change -- and the kind of commitment that will persist despite the temptations of disillusionment, despite many failures and only limited successes, inspired by the hope of a brighter future."

Noam Chomsky:

In this possibly terminal phase of human existence, democracy and freedom are more than just ideals to be valued - they may be essential to survival.

Paulo Freire:

Education either functions as an instrument which is used to facilitate integration of the younger generation into the logic of the present system and bring about conformity or it becomes the practice of freedom, the means by which men and women deal critically and creatively with reality and discover how to participate in the transformation of their world.

Plato:

An imbalance between rich and poor is the oldest and most fatal ailment of all republics.

Robert M. Hutchins:

The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and undernourishment.

Stuart Chase:

Democracy, as has been said of Christianity, has never really been tried.

Theodore Parker:

Democracy means not "I am as good as you are" but "You are as good as I am."

Thomas Jefferson:

I know of no safe repository of the ultimate power of society but people. And if we think them not enlightened enough, the remedy is not to take the power from them, but to inform them by education.

Thomas Jefferson:

A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine.

Thomas Jefferson:

Whenever the people are well-informed, they can be trusted with their own government.

Thomas Jefferson:

I have no fear that the result of our experiment will be that men may be trusted to govern themselves without a master.

Thomas Jefferson:

The care of human life and happiness, and not their destruction, is the first and only object of good government.

Voltaire:

So long as the people do not care to exercise their freedom, those who wish to tyrannize will do so; for tyrants are active and ardent, and will devote themselves in the name of any number of gods, religious and otherwise, to put shackles upon sleeping men.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

1. Good ones! K&R and one more from Mencken

It is the fundamental theory of all the more recent American law...that the average citizen is half-witted, and hence not to be trusted to either his own devices or his own thoughts.

Democracy, too, is a religion. It is the worship of jackals by jackasses.

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2. indeed

:toast:

H. L. Mencken:

As democracy is perfected, the office represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. We move toward a lofty ideal. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their hearts desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.




Reagan, the original downright moron....