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Government

The way people in democracies think of the government as something different from themselves is a real handicap. And, of course, sometimes the government confirms their opinion. – Lewis Mumford, in Anne Chisholm, Philosophers of the Earth: Conversations with E

It might be more worthwhile if we stopped wringing our hands and started ringing our congressmen. – Author Unknown

We are imperfect. We cannot expect perfect government. – William Howard Taft

Democracy substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few. – George Bernard Shaw, Man and Superman, “Maxims: Education,” 1905

In the absence of justice, what is sovereignty but organized robbery? – St.Augustine

Under capitalism man exploits man; under socialism the reverse is true. – Polish Proverb

Governments should not possess instruments of coercion and violence denied to their citizens. – Edgar A. Suter

Our government… teaches the whole people by its example. If the government becomes the lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy. – Louis Brandeis

A government that is big enough to give you all you want is big enough to take it all away. – Barry Goldwater

Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except all those others that have been tried from time to time. – Winston Churchill

Democracy is two wolves and a lamb deciding what to have for dinner. Liberty is a well-armed lamb. – Author unknown, commonly misattributed to Benjamin Franklin (Thanks, Art)

Christmas is the time when kids tell Santa what they want and adults pay for it. Deficits are when adults tell government what they want and their kids pay for it. – Richard Lamm

This country has come to feel the same when Congress is in session as when the baby gets hold of a hammer. – Will Rogers

Congress is so strange. A man gets up to speak and says nothing. Nobody listens — and then everybody disagrees. – Boris Marshalov

The worst thing in this world, next to anarchy, is government. – Henry Ward Beecher, Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit, 1887

Talk is cheap — except when Congress does it. – Cullen Hightower

How can one conceive of a one-party system in a country that has over two hundred varieties of cheese? – Charles de Gaulle, about France

Relying on the government to protect your privacy is like asking a peeping tom to install your window blinds. – John Perry Barlow, 1992

Treaties are like roses and young girls — they last while they last. – Charles de Gaulle

The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and undernourishment. – Robert M. Hutchins, Great Books, 1954