John Adams [1798]: “The declaration that our People are hostile to a government made by themselves, for themselves, and conducted by themselves, is an insult.”
Grover Cleveland [[1894]: “The Ship of Democracy, which has weathered all storms, may sink through the mutiny of those on board.”
Henry S. Commager [1954]: “If our democracy is to flourish, it must have criticism; if our government is to function it must have dissent.”
Calvin Coolidge [1924]: ‘The governments of the past could fairly be characterized as devices for maintaining in perpetuity the place and position of certain privileged classes, without any ultimate protection for the rights of the people. The Government of the United States is a device for maintaining in perpetuity the rights of the people, with the ultimate extinction of all privileged classes.”
James F. Cooper [1838]: “The American doctrinaire is the converse of the American demagogue, and, in his way, is scarcely less injurious to the public. The first deals in poetry, the last in cant.”
Helen G. Douglas [1946]: “A vigorous democracy – a democracy in which there are freedom from want, freedom from fear, freedom of religion, and freedom of speech – would never succumb to communism or any other ism.”
Alexander Hamilton [1787-88]: “It is of great importance in a republic not only to guard against the oppression of its rulers, but to guard one part of society against the injustice of the other part.”
Robert M. Hutchins [1954]: “The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and undernourishment.”
Otto Kahn [1918]: “The deadliest foe of democracy is not autocracy but liberty frenzied.”
George F. Kennan [195l]: “And so the chauvinists of all times and places go their appointed way; plucking the easy fruits, reaping the little triumphs of the day at the expense of someone else tomorrow, deluging in noise and filth anyone who gets in their way, dancing their reckless dance on the prospects for human progress, drawing the shadow of a great doubt over the validity of democratic institutions. And until the peoples learn to spot the fanning of mass emotions and the sowing of bitterness, suspicion, and intolerance as crimes themselves – as perhaps the greatest disservice that can be done to the cause of popular government – this sort of thing will continue to occur.”
Sinclair Lewis[1935]: “Cure the evils of Democracy by the evils of Fascism! Funny therapeutics! I’ve heard of their curing syphilis by giving the patient malaria, but I’ve never heard of their curing malaria by giving the patient syphilis.”
H>L>Mencken [1920]: “The most popular man under a democracy is not the most democratic man, but the most despotic man. The common folk delight in the exactions of such a man. They like him to boss them. Their natural gait is the goosestep.”
Franklin D. Roosevelt [1940]: “Democracy can thrive only when it enlists the devotion of those whom Lincoln called the common people. Democracy can hold that devotion only when it adequately respects their dignity by so ordering society as to assure to the masses of men and women reasonable security and hope for themselves and for their children.”
Benjamin Spock [1968]: “Democracy appears to me potentially a higher form of political organization than any kind of dictatorship. But if it turns out that America, which could afford a decent living for everyone, the comfortable majority is willing to condone the misery and abuse of a minority for an indefinite period, the exploitation by the majority becomes as repugnant as exploitation by an oligarchy, and democracy loses half its supposed superiority.”
Henry D Thoreau [1849]: “There will never be a free and enlightened State until the State comes to recognize the individual as a higher and independent power, from which all its own power and authority are derived, and treats him accordingly.”
Virginia Declaration of Rights, June 12, 1776; Section 13: “That a well-regulated militia , composed of the body of the people, trained to arms, is the proper, natural, and safe defense of a free state; that standing armies, in time of peace, should be avoided as dangerous to liberty…”
Section 16: “That religion, or the duty which we owe to our Creator, and the manner of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and conviction, not by force or violence; and therefore all men are equally entitled to the free exercise of religion, according to the dictates of conscience; and that it is the mutual duty of all to practice Christian forbearance, love, and charity toward each other.”
***note: the above quotes have been supplied by The Harper Book of American Quotations, by G.Carruth and E. Ehrlich
Those of us now privileged to be living in the United States in January, 2021 – might be well advised to reconsider what we think our “rights” are. And perhaps to reflect on what our “responsibilities” are instead.
With Justice For All 