Quotes About Politics

There is no country in the world in which everything can be provided for by laws, or in which political institutions can prove a substitute for common sense and public morality.

All those who seek to destroy the liberties of a democratic nation ought to know that war is the surest and shortest means to accomplish it.

patriotism and religion are the only two motives in the world which can permanently direct the whole of a body politic to one end.

This demonstrated to me that those who regard universal suffrage as a guarantee for good choices are under a complete illusion. Universal suffrage has other advantages, but not that one.

No protracted war can fail to endanger the freedom of a democratic country

the advantage of democracy is not, as has been sometimes asserted, that it protects the interests of the whole community, but simply that it protects those of the majority.

Democratic institutions strongly tend to promote the feeling of envy.

One has to understand that equality ends up by infiltrating the world of politics as it does everywhere else. It would be impossible to imagine men forever unequal in one respect, yet equal in others; they must, in the end, come to be equal in all. Now, I am aware of only two means of establishing equality in the world of politics: rights have to be granted to every citizen or to none.

I have heard of patriotism in the United States, and it is a virtue which may be found among the people, but never among the leaders of the people.

The tyranny of the executive power will come in its turn, but at a more distant period.

Despotism may govern without faith, but liberty cannot.

It is, indeed, difficult to conceive how men who have entirely given up the habit of self-government should succeed in making a proper choice of those by whom they are to be governed; and no one will ever believe that a liberal, wise, and energetic government can spring from the suffrages of a subservient people.

The American learns about the law by participating in the making of it. He teaches himself about the forms of government by governing. He watches the great work of society being done every day before his eyes and, in a sense, by his hand. In the United States, all of education is directed toward politics. In Europe, its principal purpose is to prepare people for private life. Citizens take part in public affairs too seldom to prepare them for it in advance.

The deeper we penetrate into the working of these parties, the more do we perceive that the object of the one is to limit, and that of the other to extend, the popular authority.

Ainsi donc, en s'alliant à un pouvoir politique, la religion augmente sa puissance sur quelques-uns, et perd l'espérance de régner sur tous.

The two chief weapons which parties use in order to ensure success are the public press and the formation of associations.

Os costumes, cuja excelência torna o governo quase inútil e cuja corrupção o torna quase impossível.

A long war almost always places nations in the wretched alternative of being abandoned to ruin by defeat or to despotism by success.

No sooner does a government attempt to go beyond its political sphere and to enter upon this new track, than it exercises, even unintentionally, an insupportable tyranny; for a government can only dictate strict rules, the opinions which it favors are rigidly enforced, and it is never easy to discriminate between its advice and its commands.

Nowhere do citizens seem more insignificant than in a democratic nation.

Democratic nations often hate those in whose hands the central power is vested; but they always love that power itself.

The two chief weapons which parties use in order to obtain success are the newspapers and public associations.

While the natural instincts of democracy persuade the people to remove distinguished men from power, the latter are guided by no less an instinct to distance themselves from a political career, where it is so difficult for them to retain their complete autonomy or to make any progress without cheapening themselves.

Le suffrage universel ne me fait pas peur, les gens voteront comme on leur dira