Quotes About Democracy

We know, for instance, that Americans have forcefully resisted extending the right to vote; those in power have disenfranchised blacks, women, and the poor in myriad ways. We know, too, that women historically have had fewer civil protections than corporations. Instead of a thoroughgoing democracy, Americans have settled for democratic stagecraft: high-sounding rhetoric, magnified, and political leaders dressing down at barbecues or heading out to hunt game.

Instead of a thoroughgoing democracy, Americans have settled for democratic stagecraft.

Governor Winthrop despised democracy, which he brusquely labeled "the meanest and worst of all forms of Government." For Puritans, the church and state worked in tandem; the coercive arm of the magistracy was meant to preserve both public order and class distinctions.

When you turn an election into a three-ring circus, there's always a chance that the dancing bear will win.40

Historical mythmaking is made possible only by forgetting. We have to begin, then, with the first refusal to face reality: most colonizing schemes that took root in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century British America were built on privilege and subordination, not any kind of proto-democracy

The real wonder of America's achievement, he professed, was that the "world's largest capitalist country" had "come closest to the ideal of prosperity for all in a classless society." These words strike at the heart of the matter. For Nixon, the United States was more than a land of plenty. Democratic in its collective soul, it had nearly achieved a kind of utopia.

If we do not study ourselves with due attention to disturbing patterns in our history, we will be learning little, and democracy can scarcely claim to be the best form of government.

democracy of manners," which was not the same as real democracy. He meant that voters accepted huge disparities in wealth but at the same time expected their elected leaders to "cultivate the appearance of being no different from the rest of us."68 The

Tugwell had no patience for the illusion of democracy, or the pretense of being a man of the people, or the empty rhetoric of equal opportunity.

In 1949, an Australian observer described this phenomenon best. Americans had a taste for what he called a "democracy of manners," which was not the same as a real democracy. He meant that voters accepted huge disparities in wealth but at the same time expected their elected leaders to "cultivate the appearance of being no different from the rest of us.

Historical mythmaking is made possible only by forgetting. We have to begin, then, with the first refusal to face reality: most colonizing schemes that took root in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century British America were built on privilege and subordination, not any kind of proto-democracy. The generation of 1776 certainly underplayed that fact. And all subsequent generations took their cue from the nation's founders.

even beyond class issues, Jackson's candidacy changed the nature of democratic politics. One political commentator noted that Jackson's reign ushered in the "game of brag.

democracy of manners," which was not the same as real democracy. He meant that voters accepted huge disparities in wealth but at the same time expected their elected leaders to "cultivate the appearance of being no different from the rest of us.

What, after all, was the point of describing a Revolution meant to create a democratic republic of free men that was destroyed by power-hungry men determined to create a new 'aristocracy?

Democracy cannot function or survive without a sufficient medium by which citizens remain informed and engaged in public policy debates.

You actually cannot sell the idea of freedom, democracy, diversity, as if it were a brand attribute and not reality -- not at the same time as you're bombing people, you can't.

Throughout our story, the people involved demanded the right to be heard, insisting that we—the public—had the right to hear both sides and that the media had an obligation to present it. They insisted that this was only fair and democratic. But were they attempting to preserve democracy? No. The issue was not free speech; it was free markets.

A 1994 FOREST report entitled "Through the Smokescreen of Science: The Dangers of Politically Corrupted Science for Democratic Public Policy" claimed much the same thing as Fred Singer had: that science was being rigged to advance a political agenda. Whether or not that was true, this report made clear that the inverse was certainly true: science was being attacked to advance their agenda, the defense of free market capitalism.

Aristocracy is the spirit of the Old Testament, democracy of the New.

A form of government that is not the result of a long sequence of shared experiences, efforts, and endeavors can never take root.

I have no doubt that given a real choice, the vast majority of Muslims and Arabs, like everyone else will choose a free society over a fear society.

By helping readers understand these mechanics, I hope they will appreciate why freedom is for everyone, why it is essential for our security and why the free world plays a critically important role in advancing democracy around the globe.

Only weeks after Oslo began, when nearly all the world and most of Israel was drunk with the idea of peace, I argued that a Palestinian society not constrained by democratic norms would be a fear society that would pose a grave threat to Israel.

My optimism is not based primarily on the successful march of democracy in recent times but rather is based on the experience of having lived in a fear society and studied the mechanics of tyranny that sustain such a society.