Democracy Quotes

“'The Sea Wolf' is the story of a man who believes only in brute force. He is so firm in belief in his own ideas that he despises all who disagree with him. He preaches the doctrine of intolerance. He flaunts the notion that democracy is anything but weakness.”

“Democracy, if it meant what our forefathers said, that would be great, but unfortunately it's been corrupted by this funding and funding of campaigns. There's a much better way to do it. There could be a small amount of money given by every taxpayer to be dedicated to candidates.”

“Japan and Australia share the universal values of freedom, democracy, the rule of law, and fundamental human rights.”

“In a democracy there are only two types of power: there's organized people and organized money, and organized money only wins when people aren't organized.”

“Voting is a fundamental right in our democracy.”

“Democracy should not work on the basis of personalities.”

“When the Soviet Union fell, optimistic scholars believed the world had shifted inexorably in the direction of free markets and liberal democracy. Instead, the West gradually embraced bigger government and weaker social bonds, creating a fragmented society in which the only thing we all belong to, as President Barack Obama puts it, is the state.”

“The amount of violations of human rights in a country is always an inverse function of the amount of complaints about human rights violations heard from there. The greater the number of complaints being aired, the better protected are human rights in that country.”

“Democracy could be worthless and counterproductive in the absence of sound moral leadership!”

“In a democracy the poor will have more power than the rich, because there are more of them, and the will of the majority is supreme. &It is also in the interests of a tyrant to keep his people poor, so that they may not be able to afford the cost of protecting themselves by arms and be so occupied with their daily tasks that they have no time for rebellion.”

“If you want to preserve - I'm very serious now - if you want to preserve democracy as we know it, you have to have a free and many times adversarial press. And without it, I am afraid that we would lose so much of our individual liberties over time. That's how dictators get started.”

“Celebrity distorts democracy by giving the rich, beautiful, and famous more authority than they deserve.”

“The international community should pressure Iran to get the Houthis to agree to some peaceful understanding in Yemen. But at the same time, Saudi Arabia also needs to believe truly in democracy for Yemen.”

“Our democracy relies on participation, and we've never done better by excluding folks.”

“I believe that open criticism of any institution is necessary in a democracy, to safeguard the constitutional order.”

“Throughout my life, I have publicly and privately denounced military interventions in domestic politics. In fact, I have been advocating for democracy for decades.”

“Our nation was not founded because we all looked alike, or prayed alike, or descended from the same family tree. But our founders, in their genius, in this, the oldest constitutional democracy, put forth on this earth the idea that all are created equal; that we all have inalienable rights.”

“I don't think we should be undermining our democracy.”

“In a democracy there will always be a tension between security and privacy.”

“If you believe in democracy, than you can't trash it by being cynical about the people who do democracy: the politicians.”