Famous Quotes About Democracy By Reference

(60 Items) A great collection of quotes about Democracy. Quotations are arranged alphabetically and can be sorted by any header. This list of Democracy sayings and quotes includes the sources and authors of the Democracy quotes when possible. We hope you find this list of quotations about the topic Democracy useful as a reference list or informative as you surf the web, and you can find many other lists of quotes about subjects on Ranker. You may want to copy this fact-based list to build your own just like it, re-rank it to fit your views, then publish it to share it on Facebook, Twitter or any other social sites you frequent.

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1

A modern democracy is a tyranny whose borders are undefined; one discovers how far one can go only by traveling in a straight line until one is stopped.

Norman Mailer

Democracy
2

America is the place where you cannot kill your government by killing the men who conduct it.

Woodrow Wilson

Democracy
3

Anyone who knows history, particularly the history of Europe, will, I think, recognize that the domination of education or of government by any one particular religious faith is never a happy arrangement for the people.

Eleanor Roosevelt

Democracy, Education
4

Apparently, a democracy is a place where numerous elections are held at great cost without issues and with interchangeable candidates.

Gore Vidal

Democracy
5

As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy.

Abraham Lincoln

Democracy
6

Chinks in America's egalitarian armor are not hard to find. Democracy is the fig leaf of elitism.

Florence King

Democracy
7

Democracy demands that the religiously motivated translate their concerns into universal, rather than religion-specific, values.

Barack Obama

Democracy, Religion
8

Democracy don't rule the world, you better get that in your head; this world is ruled by violence, but I guess that's better left unsaid.

Bob Dylan

Democracy
9

Democracy give every man the right to be his own oppressor.

James Russell Lowell

Democracy
10

Democracy is a charming form of government, full of variety and disorder, and dispensing a sort of equality to equals and unequal alike.

Plato

Democracy
11

Democracy is a political method, that is to say, a certain type of institutional arrangement for arriving at political -- legislative and administrative -- decisions and hence incapable of being an end in itself.

Joseph Schumpeter

Democracy
12

Democracy is a process by which the people are free to choose the man who will get the blame.

Laurence J. Peter

Democracy
13

Democracy is also a form of religion. It is the worship of jackals by jackasses.

H. L. Mencken

Democracy
14

Democracy is based upon the conviction that there are extraordinary possibilities in ordinary people.

Harry Emerson Fosdick

Democracy
15

Democracy is never a thing done. Democracy is always something that a nation must be doing. What is necessary now is one thing and one thing only that democracy become again democracy in action, not democracy accomplished and piled up in goods and gold.

Archibald MacLeish

Democracy
16

Democracy is not so much a form of government as a set of principles.

Woodrow Wilson

Democracy
17

Democracy is supposed to give you the feeling of choice, like Painkiller X and Painkiller Y. But they're both just aspirin.

Gore Vidal

Democracy
18

Democracy is the menopause of Western society, the Grand Climacteric of the body social. Fascism is its middle-aged lust.

Jean Baudrillard

Democracy
19

Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half of the time.

E. B. White

Democracy
20

Democracy is the theory that the common people know what They want, and deserve to get it good and hard.

H. L. Mencken

Democracy
21

Democracy means government by the uneducated, while aristocracy means government by the badly educated.

G. K. Chesterton

Democracy
22

Democracy means simply the bludgeoning of the people by the people for the people.

Oscar Wilde

Democracy
23

Democracy means the opportunity to be everyone's slave.

Karl Kraus

Democracy
24

Democracy substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few.

George Bernard Shaw

Democracy
25

Democracy with its semi-civilization sincerely cherishes junk. The artist's power should be spiritual. But the power of the majority is material. When these worlds meet occasionally, it is pure coincidence.

Paul Klee

Democracy
26

Democracy! Bah! When I hear that word I reach for my feather Boa!

Allen Ginsberg

Democracy
27

Everything that is right or natural pleads for separation. The blood of the slain, the weeping voice of nature cries, 'Tis time to part.

Thomas Paine

Democracy
28

I am a democrat only on principle, not by instinct -- nobody is that. Doubtless some people say they are, but this world is grievously given to lying.

Mark Twain

Democracy
29

I believe in democracy, because it releases the energies of every human being.

Woodrow Wilson

Democracy
30

I confess I enjoy democracy immensely. It is incomparably idiotic, and hence incomparably amusing.

H. L. Mencken

Democracy
31

I talk democracy to these men and women. I tell them that they have the vote, and that theirs is the kingdom and the power and the glory. I say to them You are supreme: exercise your power. They say, That's right: tell us what to do; and I tell them. I say Exercise our vote intelligently by voting for me. And they do. That's democracy; and a splendid thing it is too for putting the right men in the right place.

George Bernard Shaw

Democracy
32

It has been said that Democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.

Winston Churchill

Democracy
33

It is a strange fact that freedom and equality, the two basic ideas of democracy, are to some extent contradictory. Logically considered, freedom and equality are mutually exclusive, just as society and the individual are mutually exclusive.

Thomas Mann

Democracy
34

It is not enough to merely defend democracy. To defend it may be to lose it; to extend it is to strengthen it. Democracy is not property; it is an idea.

Hubert Humphrey

Democracy
35

It is the American vice, the democratic disease which expresses its tyranny by reducing everything unique to the level of the herd.

Henry Miller

Democracy
36

Let the people think they govern and they will be governed.

William Penn

Democracy
37

Man's capacity for justice makes democracy possible, but man's inclination to injustice makes democracy necessary.

Reinhold Niebuhr

Democracy, Injustice, Justice
38

No man is good enough to govern another man without that other's consent.

Abraham Lincoln

Democracy
39

Nor is the people's judgment always true: the most may err as grossly as the few.

John Dryden

Democracy
40

Nothing can be more abhorrent to democracy than to imprison a person or keep him in prison because he is unpopular. This is really the test of civilization.

Winston Churchill

Democracy
41

Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.

John Adams

Democracy
42

That a peasant may become king does not render the kingdom democratic.

Woodrow Wilson

Democracy
43

The cure for the evils of democracy is more democracy.

H. L. Mencken

Democracy
44

The freeman, casting with unpurchased hand the vote that shakes the turrets of the land.

Democracy
45

The majority is never right. Never, I tell you! That's one of these lies in society that no free and intelligent man can help rebelling against. Who are the people that make up the biggest proportion of the population -- the intelligent ones or the fools? I think we can agree it's the fools, no matter where you go in this world, it's the fools that form the overwhelming majority.

Henrik Ibsen

Democracy
46

The more I see of democracy the more I dislike it. It just brings everything down to the mere vulgar level of wages and prices, electric light and water closets, and nothing else.

D. H. Lawrence

Democracy
47

The ship of Democracy, which has weathered all storms, may sink through the mutiny of those aboard.

Grover Cleveland

Democracy
48

The Silent majority is silent, and that is best for everybody.

Gerhard Kocher

Democracy
49

The tendency of democracies is, in all things, to mediocrity.

James Fenimore Cooper

Democracy
50

The world must be made safe for democracy.

Woodrow Wilson

Democracy
51

The worst thing I can say about democracy is that it has tolerated the Right Honorable Gentleman for four and a half years.

Aneurin Bevan

Democracy
52

There is a limit to the application of democratic methods. You can inquire of all the passengers as to what type of car they like to ride in, but it is impossible to question them as to whether to apply the brakes when the train is at full speed and accident threatens.

Leon Trotsky

Democracy
53

These, then, will be some of the features of democracy... it will be, in all likelihood, an agreeable, lawless, parti-colored commonwealth, dealing with all alike on a footing of equality, whether they be really equal or not.

Plato

Democracy
54

This is one of the paradoxes of the democratic movement -- that it loves a crowd and fears the individuals who compose it -- that the religion of humanity should have no faith in human beings.

Walter Lippmann

Democracy
55

Two cheers for Democracy: one because it admits variety and two because it permits criticism.

E. M. Forster

Democracy
56

Unless democracy is to commit suicide by consenting to its own destruction, it will have to find some formidable answer to those who come to it saying: I demand from you in the name of your principles the rights which I shall deny to you later in the name of my principles.

Walter Lippmann

Democracy
57

What we call a democratic society might be defined for certain purposes as one in which the majority is always prepared to put down a revolutionary minority.

Walter Lippmann

Democracy
58

When people put their ballots in the boxes, they are, by that act, inoculated against the feeling that the government is not theirs. They then accept, in some measure, that its errors are their errors, its aberrations their aberrations, that any revolt will be against them. It's a remarkably shrewd and rather conservative arrangement when one thinks of it.

John Kenneth Galbraith

Democracy
59

You must drop all your democracy. You must not believe in the people. One class is no better than another. It must be a case of Wisdom, or Truth. Let the working classes be working classes. That is the truth. There must be an aristocracy of people who have wisdom, and there must be a Ruler: a Kaiser: no Presidents and democracies.

D. H. Lawrence

Democracy
60

“You are neither Christ nor King nor Lincoln. But what you are is willing, capable, and sincere, there upon a bough of hope and audacity as branded by history as any have ever been.” --from poem There Upon a Bough of Hope & Audacity

Aberjhani

Democracy, Barack Obama, Politics, American History, African American history, Contemporary history More

Showing items 1 - 25 of 60

Famous Quotes About Democracy you can use this list to help make your own ranked list about this topic

A modern democracy is a tyranny whose borders are undefined; one discovers how far one can go only by traveling in a straight line until one is stopped.

America is the place where you cannot kill your government by killing the men who conduct it.

Anyone who knows history, particularly the history of Europe, will, I think, recognize that the domination of education or of government by any one particular religious faith is never a happy arrangement for the people.

Apparently, a democracy is a place where numerous elections are held at great cost without issues and with interchangeable candidates.

As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy.

Chinks in America's egalitarian armor are not hard to find. Democracy is the fig leaf of elitism.

Democracy demands that the religiously motivated translate their concerns into universal, rather than religion-specific, values.

Democracy don't rule the world, you better get that in your head; this world is ruled by violence, but I guess that's better left unsaid.

Democracy give every man the right to be his own oppressor.

Democracy is a charming form of government, full of variety and disorder, and dispensing a sort of equality to equals and unequal alike.

Democracy is a political method, that is to say, a certain type of institutional arrangement for arriving at political -- legislative and administrative -- decisions and hence incapable of being an end in itself.

Democracy is a process by which the people are free to choose the man who will get the blame.

Democracy is also a form of religion. It is the worship of jackals by jackasses.

Democracy is based upon the conviction that there are extraordinary possibilities in ordinary people.

Democracy is never a thing done. Democracy is always something that a nation must be doing. What is necessary now is one thing and one thing only that democracy become again democracy in action, not democracy accomplished and piled up in goods and gold.

Democracy is not so much a form of government as a set of principles.

Democracy is supposed to give you the feeling of choice, like Painkiller X and Painkiller Y. But they're both just aspirin.

Democracy is the menopause of Western society, the Grand Climacteric of the body social. Fascism is its middle-aged lust.

Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half of the time.

Democracy is the theory that the common people know what They want, and deserve to get it good and hard.

Democracy means government by the uneducated, while aristocracy means government by the badly educated.

Democracy means simply the bludgeoning of the people by the people for the people.

Democracy means the opportunity to be everyone's slave.

Democracy substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few.

Democracy with its semi-civilization sincerely cherishes junk. The artist's power should be spiritual. But the power of the majority is material. When these worlds meet occasionally, it is pure coincidence.

Democracy! Bah! When I hear that word I reach for my feather Boa!

Everything that is right or natural pleads for separation. The blood of the slain, the weeping voice of nature cries, 'Tis time to part.

I am a democrat only on principle, not by instinct -- nobody is that. Doubtless some people say they are, but this world is grievously given to lying.

I believe in democracy, because it releases the energies of every human being.

I confess I enjoy democracy immensely. It is incomparably idiotic, and hence incomparably amusing.

It has been said that Democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.

It is a strange fact that freedom and equality, the two basic ideas of democracy, are to some extent contradictory. Logically considered, freedom and equality are mutually exclusive, just as society and the individual are mutually exclusive.

It is not enough to merely defend democracy. To defend it may be to lose it; to extend it is to strengthen it. Democracy is not property; it is an idea.

It is the American vice, the democratic disease which expresses its tyranny by reducing everything unique to the level of the herd.

Let the people think they govern and they will be governed.

Man's capacity for justice makes democracy possible, but man's inclination to injustice makes democracy necessary.

No man is good enough to govern another man without that other's consent.

Nor is the people's judgment always true: the most may err as grossly as the few.

Nothing can be more abhorrent to democracy than to imprison a person or keep him in prison because he is unpopular. This is really the test of civilization.

Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.

That a peasant may become king does not render the kingdom democratic.

The cure for the evils of democracy is more democracy.

The freeman, casting with unpurchased hand the vote that shakes the turrets of the land.

The more I see of democracy the more I dislike it. It just brings everything down to the mere vulgar level of wages and prices, electric light and water closets, and nothing else.

The ship of Democracy, which has weathered all storms, may sink through the mutiny of those aboard.

The Silent majority is silent, and that is best for everybody.

The tendency of democracies is, in all things, to mediocrity.

The world must be made safe for democracy.

The worst thing I can say about democracy is that it has tolerated the Right Honorable Gentleman for four and a half years.

There is a limit to the application of democratic methods. You can inquire of all the passengers as to what type of car they like to ride in, but it is impossible to question them as to whether to apply the brakes when the train is at full speed and accident threatens.

These, then, will be some of the features of democracy... it will be, in all likelihood, an agreeable, lawless, parti-colored commonwealth, dealing with all alike on a footing of equality, whether they be really equal or not.

This is one of the paradoxes of the democratic movement -- that it loves a crowd and fears the individuals who compose it -- that the religion of humanity should have no faith in human beings.

Two cheers for Democracy: one because it admits variety and two because it permits criticism.

Unless democracy is to commit suicide by consenting to its own destruction, it will have to find some formidable answer to those who come to it saying: I demand from you in the name of your principles the rights which I shall deny to you later in the name of my principles.

What we call a democratic society might be defined for certain purposes as one in which the majority is always prepared to put down a revolutionary minority.

“You are neither Christ nor King nor Lincoln. But what you are is willing, capable, and sincere, there upon a bough of hope and audacity as branded by history as any have ever been.” --from poem There Upon a Bough of Hope & Audacity