Democracy Quotes
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Talent and worth are the only eternal grounds of distinction. To these the Almighty has affixed His everlasting patent of nobility. Knowledge and goodness,--these make degrees in heaven, and they must be the graduating scale of a true democracy.
Catharine Sedgwick -
To include freedom in the very definition of democracy is to define a process not by its actual characteristics as a process but by its hoped for results. This is not only intellectually invalid, it is, in practical terms, blinding oneself in advance to some of the unwanted consequences of the process.
Thomas Sowell
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I think that rather than talking about particular models, of which there could be a huge number, we should talk about basic principles of democracy. After all, even within the West, there is no single standard and single model.
Vladimir Putin -
People cannot be free unless they are willing to sacrifice some of their interests to guarantee the freedom of others. The price of democracy is the ongoing pursuit of the common good by all of the people.
Saul Alinsky -
Students should not only be trained to live in a democracy when they grow up; they should have the chance to live in one today.
Alfie Kohn -
There's great participation, there's great enthusiasm and there's a great calm in the country ... ... It will strengthen our democracy, and that will allow the country to continue forward.
Ernesto Zedillo -
Science and policy-making thrive on challenge and questioning; they are vital to the health of inquiry and democracy.
Nicholas Herbert Stern -
America has no functioning democracy at this moment.
Jimmy Carter
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Few things are more damaging to our democracy than a military officer who doesn't have the moral courage to stand up for what's right or the moral fiber to step aside when circumstances dictate.
Michael Mullen -
The growing tide of anti-Semitism shocks the conscious of everyone who values freedom, and the ugly, hateful acts particularly stain the character of democracies where liberty and religious freedom are supposed to be respected.
Mike Ferguson -
The thing about democracy, beloveds, is that it is not neat, orderly, or quiet. It requires a certain relish for confusion.
Molly Ivins -
Whatever else the religious Right may be, it is a bonanza for its opponents... Reports of the great terror that is upon us are raising millions of dollars in fund appeals by Planned Parenthood, the American Civil Liberties Union, the National Organization for Women, Norman Lear's People for the American Way, and others who claim to believe that the religious Right is the greatest peril to American democracy since Joe McCarthy.
Richard John Neuhaus -
If Despotism failed only for want of a capable benevolent despot, what chance has Democracy, which requires a whole population of capable voters.
George Bernard Shaw -
Philadelphia, the foundation of freedom, liberty and democracy, I still believe in the idea of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Michael Nutter
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The word "democracy" is a Western word obviously. It doesn't exist in Arabic. Democratiya is a loan word. We in the Western world make the great mistake of assuming that ours is the only form of good government; that democracy means what it means in the Anglo-American world and a few other places in the West, but not many others. Muslims have their own tradition on limited government. Now in Islam, there is a very strong political tradition. Because the different circumstances, Islam is political from the very beginning.
Bernard Lewis -
A functioning democracy cannot stand when its people do not trust their leaders to uphold the law.
Raja Krishnamoorthi -
Both thinkers sought ways to restrict what voters could achieve together in a democracy to what the wealthiest among them would agree to.
Nancy MacLean -
Democracy ... is never won but always to be won.
Hallie Flanagan -
There are all kinds of devices invented for the protection and preservation of countries: defensive barriers, forts, trenches, and the like... But prudent minds have as a natural gift one safeguard which is the common possession of all, and this applies especially to the dealings of democracies. What is this safeguard? Skepticism. This you must preserve. This you must retain. If you can keep this, you need fear no harm.
Demosthenes -
Education and justice are democracy's only life insurance.
Nannie Helen Burroughs
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I've never understood multi-party democracy. It's hard enough with two parties.
Hillary Clinton -
Democracy is indispensable to socialism.
Vladimir Lenin -
In some ways, political decency is a sign of a healthy democracy, but in other ways, it is the cause of it.
Raja Krishnamoorthi -
We’re at a point in history that whether the Internet is going to evolve in a way that’s compatible with democracy and human rights is really kind of up in the air.
Rebecca MacKinnon