Quotes from Hubert Humphrey

The impersonal hand of government can never replace the helping hand of a neighbour.

The right to be heard does not automatically include the right to be taken seriously.

If I believe in something, I will fight for it with all I have. But I do not demand all or nothing. I would rather get something than nothing. Professional liberals want the fiery debate. They glory in defeat. The hardest job for a politician today is to have the courage to be a moderate. It's easy to take an extreme position.

Behind every successful man stands a surprised mother-in-law.

Fortunately, the time has long passed when people liked to regard the United States as some kind of melting pot, taking men and women from every part of the world and converting them into standardized, homogenized Americans. We are, I think, much more mature and wise today. Just as we welcome a world of diversity, so we glory in an America of diversity -- an America all the richer for the many different and distinctive strands of which it is woven.

Men in earnest have no time to waste In patching fig-leaves for the naked truth.

Never answer a question from a farmer.

Never give up on anybody.

People in places many of us never heard of, whose names we can't pronounce or even spell, are speaking up for themselves. They speak in languages we once classified as exotic but whose mastery is now essential for our diplomats and businessmen. But what they say is very much the same the world over. They want a decent standard of living. They want human dignity and a voice in their own futures. They want their children to grow up strong and healthy and free.

The great challenge which faces us is to assure that, in our society of big-ness, we do not strangle the voice of creativity, that the rules of the game do not come to overshadow its purpose, that the grand orchestration of society leaves ample room for the man who marches to the music of another drummer.

The hardest job for a politician today is to have the courage to be a moderate. It's easy to take an extreme position.

The right to be heard does not autmatically include the right to be taken seriously.

There are those who say to you -- we are rushing this issue of civil rights. I say we are 172 years late.

This, then, is the test we must set for ourselves; not to march alone but to march in such a way that others will wish to join us.

To be realistic today is to be visionary. To be realistic is to be starry-eyed.

The test we must set for ourselves is not to march alone but to march in such a way that others will wish to join us.

The moral test of government is how it treats people in the dawn of life, the children, in the twilight of life, the aged, and in the shadows of life, the sick, the needy, and the handicapped

Racism is racism–and there is no room in America for racism of any color. And we must reject calls for racism, whether they come from a throat that is white or one that is black.