In the Laws it is maintained that the best constitution is made up of democracy and tyranny, which are either not constitutions at all, or are the worst of all. But they are nearer the truth who combine many forms; for the constitution is better which is made up of more numerous elements. The constitution proposed in the Laws has no element of monarchy at all; it is nothing but oligarchy and democracy, leaning rather to oligarchy.
A writer is like a gypsy. He owes no allegiance to any government. If he is a good writer he will never like any government he lives under. His hand should be against it and its hand will always be against him.
The fortunes amassed through corporate organization are now so large, and vest such power in those that wield them, as to make it a matter of necessity to give to the sovereign - that is, to the Government, which represents the people as a whole - some effective power of supervision over their corporate use. In order to insure a healthy social and industrial life, every big corporation should be held responsible by, and be accountable to, some sovereign strong enough to control its conduct.
We're paying maybe 25 percent of the income tax, but the payroll tax is over a third of the receipts of the federal government. And they don't take that from me on capital gains. They don't take that from me on dividends.
It is a travesty, in my mind, for the state and local governments on the one hand to expect the Federal government to reimburse them for costs attributable to illegal immigrants, when on the other hand the State and local governments prohibit their own law enforcement and other officials from cooperating with the Immigration and Naturalization Service to locate or apprehend or expel illegal aliens.
If ever this free people, if this Government itself is ever utterly demoralized, it will come from this incessant human wriggle and struggle for office, which is but a way to live without work.
There is some who say that perhaps freedom is not universal. Maybe it's only Western people that can self-govern. Maybe it's only, you know, white-guy Methodists who are capable of self-government. I reject that notion.
The new naval treaty permits the United States to spend a billion dollars on warships-a sum greater than has been accumulated by all our endowed institutions of learning in their entire history. Unintelligence could go no further! ... In Great Britain, the situation is similar. ... Until the figures are reversed, ... nations deceive themselves as to what they care about most.
No matter what the cause was and wherever it was, Indian governments must never requisition the services of British soldiers to deal with civil disturbances.
WASHINGTONIAN, n. A Potomac tribesman who exchanged the privilege of governing himself for the advantage of good government. In justice to him it should be said that he did not want to.
By adoption of these principles, the long-felt want for a uniform medium will be satisfied. The taxpayers will be saved immense sums of interest, discounts, and exchanges. The financing of all public enterprises, the maintenance of stable government and ordered progress, and the conduct of the Treasury will become matters of practical administration. The people can and will be furnished with a currency as safe as their own government.
The goodness or badness, justice or injustice, of laws varies of necessity with the constitution of states. This, however, is clear, that the laws must be adapted to the constitutions. But if so, true forms of government will of necessity have just laws, and perverted forms of government will have unjust laws.
There is some who say that perhaps freedom is not universal. Maybe it's only Western people that can self-govern. Maybe it's only, you know, white-guy Methodists who are capable of self-government. I reject that notion.
The oil companies are really making a very lucrative amount of profit from the high price of oil. I don't that they're very keen to reduce the price of oil. The consumers are those who are the victims so I think that the producers, the governments, some of them, they're enjoying the high revenue that they get.
For my part, I am very much more afraid of the man who does a bad thing and does not know it is bad than of the man who does a bad thing and knows it is bad; because I think that in public affairs stupidity is more dangerous than knavery, because harder to fight and dislodge.
Where it is a general rule that it is wrong to gratify lovers, this can be attributed to the defects of those who make that rule: the government's lust for rule and the subjects' cowardice.