The Presidents
In the beginning there was a general by the name of Washington. The media criticized him so harshly while he was president that he came treacherously close to removing that freedom loaned to the press. Instead, he went home.
Robert E. Lee said later that all the best generals worked for some newspaper. But, let's get back to the quotes of our first president.
Be courteous to all, but intimate with few: and let those few be well tried before you give them your confidence. ~ George Washington.
It is better to be alone than in bad company. George Washington.
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Blood running in the streets, Credit ruined, credit related strikes, unemployment, shortages of food, the wheels of government clogged, and we are descending into a valley of confusion and darkness.
George Washington.
Truth will ultimately prevail where there is pains taken to bring it to light. ~ George Washington
The preservation of the sacred fire of liberty, and the destiny of the republican model of government, are justly considered deeply, perhaps as finally, staked on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people. George Washington
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It is well, I die hard, but I am not afraid to go. George Washington
And next we listen to a few platitudes given us by John Adams
Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other. ~ John Adams
The essence of a free government consists in an effectual control of rivalries. ~ John Adams
The happiness of society is the end of government. ~ John Adams
All the perplexities, confusion and distress in America arise, not from defects in their Constitution or Confederation, not from want of honor or virtue, so much as from the downright ignorance of the nature of coin, credit and circulation. ~ John Adams
Democracy... while it lasts is more bloody than either aristocracy or monarchy. ~ John Adams
Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There is never a democracy that did not commit suicide. ~ John Adams
The Hebrews have done more to civilize men than any other nation. If I were an atheist, and believed blind eternal fate, I should still believe that fate had ordained the Jews to be the most essential instrument for civilizing the nations. ~ John Adams
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Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence. ~ John Adams
Fear is the foundation of most governments. ~ John Adams
Great is the guilt of an unnecessary war. ~ John Adams
I always consider the settlement of America with reverence and wonder, as the opening of a grand scene and design in providence, for the illumination of the ignorant and the emancipation of the slavish part of mankind all over the earth. ~ John Adams
I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. ~ John Adams
Liberty cannot be preserved without general knowledge among the people. ~ John Adams
The right of a nation to kill a tyrant in case of necessity can no more be doubted than to hang a robber, or kill a flea. ~ John Adams
When people talk of the freedom of writing, speaking or thinking I cannot choose but laugh. No such thing ever existed. No such thing now exists; but I hope it will exist. ~ John Adams
As the happiness of the people is the sole end of government, so the consent of the people is the only foundation of it, in reason, morality, and the natural fitness of things. Thomas Jefferson
Were we to be directed from Washington when to sow and when to reap, we should soon want bread. -- Thomas Jefferson
The man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them, inasmuch as he who knows nothing is nearer to the truth that he whose mind is filled with falsehoods and errors. Thomas Jefferson
The happiest moments of my life have been the few which I have passed at home in the bosom of my family. Thomas Jefferson.
I, however, place economy among the first and most important republican virtues, and public debt as the greatest of the dangers to be feared. Thomas Jefferson
All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent. Thomas Jefferson
When a man assumes a public trust, he should consider himself as public property. Thomas Jefferson.
To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical. -- Thomas Jefferson
It is our duty still to endeavor to avoid war; but if it shall actually take place, no matter by whom brought on, we must defend ourselves. If our house be on fire, without inquiring whether it was fired from within or without, we must try to extinguish it. -- Thomas Jefferson
Laws that forbid the carrying of arms...disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes ... Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man. -- Thomas Jefferson
James Madison wrote, "Measures are too often decided, not according to the rules of justice and the rights of the minor party, but by the superior force of an interested and overbearing majority."
If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader. John Quincy Adams
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The brave man inattentive to his duty, is worth little more to his country than the coward who deserts her in the hour of danger. Andrew Jackson
I am not a politician, but if I were, I should be a New York politician. ~ Andrew Jackson
Heaven will be no heaven to me if I do not meet my wife there. Andrew Jackson
When Andrew Jackson, Old Hickory, died, someone asked, Will he go to Heaven? and the answer was, He will if he wants to.
I will not shoot a simple-minded soldier boy who deserts, and refuse to touch a wily agitator who induces him to commit the crime.
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Success does not so much depend on external help as on self-reliance. Abraham Lincoln
Children can keep out of an idle habit before they are in it easier than they can get out after they are in. A. Lincoln
The ballot is stronger than the bullet. Abraham Lincoln
I believe that this government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free. Abraham Lincoln
Books serve to show a man that those original thoughts of his aren't very new at all. ~ Abraham Lincoln
hustle. Abraham Lincoln.
No man is good enough to govern another man without that other's consent. -- Abraham Lincoln
With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow and for his orphans, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations. Abraham Lincoln
I believe, if we take habitual drunkards as a class, their heads and their hearts will bear an advantageous comparison with those of any other class. There seems ever to have been a proneness in the brilliant and warm-blooded to fall into this vice.
My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it; and if I could do it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that. Abraham Lincoln
This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing Government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it. -- Abraham Lincoln.
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In this they merely asserted the right which the Declaration of Independence of 1776 defined to be inalienable. Of the time and occasion of this exercise they as sovereigns were the final judges, each for himself. The impartial, enlightened verdict of mankind will vindicate the rectitude of our conduct; and He who knows the hearts of men will judge of the sincerity with which we labored to preserve the government of our fathers in its spirit.
The right solemnly proclaimed at the birth of the States, and which has been affirmed and reaffirmed in the bills of rights of the States subsequently admitted into the Union of 1789, undeniably recognizes in the people the power to resume the authority delegated for the purposes of government. Thus the sovereign States here represented proceeded to form this Confederacy; and it is by the abuse of language that their act has been denominated revolution.
They formed a new alliance, but within each State its government has remained. The rights of person and property have not been disturbed. The agent through whom they communicated with foreign nations is changed, but this does not necessarily interrupt their international relations. Sustained by the consciousness that the transition from the former Union to the present Confederacy has not proceeded from a disregard on our part of our just obligations or any failure to perform every constitutional duty, moved by no interest or passion to invade the rights of others, anxious to cultivate peace and commerce with all nations, if we may not hope to avoid war, we may at least expect that posterity will acquit us of having needlessly engaged in it. Doubly justified by the absence of wrong on our part, and by wanton aggression on the part of others, there can be no use to doubt the courage and patriotism of the people of the Confederate States will be found equal to any measure of defense which soon their security may require.
An agricultural people, whose chief interest is the export of a commodity required in every manufacturing country, our true policy is peace and the freest trade which our necessities will permit. It is alike our interest and that of all those to whom we would sell and from whom we would buy, that there should be the fewest practicable restrictions upon the interchange of commodities. There can be but little rivalry between ours and any manufacturing or navigating community, such as the northeastern States of the American Union. It must follow, therefore, that mutual interest would invite good-will and kind offices. If, however, passion or lust of dominion should cloud the judgment or inflame the ambition of those States, we must prepare to meet the emergency, and maintain by the final arbitrament of the sword the position which we have assumed among the nations of the earth.
We have entered upon a career of independence, and it must be inflexibly pursued through many years of controversy with our late associates of the Northern States. We have vainly endeavored to secure tranquility and obtain respect for the rights to which we were entitled. As a necessity, not a choice, we have resorted to the remedy of separation, and henceforth our energies must be directed to the conduct of our own affairs, and the perpetuity of the Confederacy which we have formed.
If a just perception of mutual interest shall permit us peaceably to pursue our separate political career, my most earnest desire will have been fulfilled. But if this be denied us, and the integrity of our territory and jurisdiction be assailed, it will but remain for us with firm resolve to appeal to arms and invoke the blessing of Providence on a just cause....
Actuated solely by a desire to preserve our own rights, and to promote our own welfare, the separation of the Confederate States has been marked by no aggression upon others, and followed by no domestic convulsion. Our industrial pursuits have received no check, the cultivation of our fields progresses as heretofore, and even should we be involved in war, there would be no considerable diminution in the production of the staples which have constitute our exports, in which the commercial world has an interest scarcely less than our own.
This common interest of producer and consumer can only be intercepted by an exterior force which should obstruct its transmission to foreign markets, a course of conduct which would be detrimental to manufacturing and commercial interests abroad.
Should reason guide the action of the government from which we have separated, a policy so detrimental to the civilized world, the Northern States included, could not be dictated by even a stronger desire to inflict injury upon us; but if it be otherwise, a terrible responsibility will rest upon it, and the suffering of millions will bear testimony to the folly and wickedness of our aggressors. In the meantime there will remain to us, besides the ordinary remedies before suggested, the well-known resources for retaliation upon the commerce of an enemy.... We have changed the constituent parts but not the system of our government.
The Constitution formed by our fathers is that of these Confederate States. In their exposition of it, and in the judicial construction it has received, we have a light which reveals its true meaning. Thus instructed as to the just interpretation of that instrument, and ever remembering that all offices are but trusts held for the people, and that delegated powers are to be strictly construed, I will hope by due diligence in the performance of my duties, though I may disappoint your expectation, yet to retain, when retiring, something of the goodwill and confidence which will welcome my entrance into office.
It is joyous in the midst of perilous times to look around upon a people united in heart, when one purpose of high resolve animates and actuates the whole, where the sacrifices to be made are not, weighed in the balance, against honor, right, liberty, and equality. Obstacles may retard, but they cannot long prevent, the progress of a movement sanctioned by its justice and sustained by a virtuous people.
Reverently let us invoke the God of our fathers to guide and protect us in our efforts to perpetuate the principles which by his blessing they were able to vindicate, establish, and transmit to their posterity; and with a continuance of his favor, ever gratefully acknowledged, we may hopefully look forward to success, to peace, to prosperity.
Jefferson Davis, delivered at his inauguration
HOW TO VOTE
If you believe politicians would never sell your money to their friends, vote Republican.
If you believe politicians would never give your money away so they can feel generous, vote Democrat.
If you believe that half the people earning more than you do deserves more of your money than you do, vote socialist.
If you believe citizens must turn their back to the smiter before giving up their money and property, vote communist. If you believe saving money on public works is more important than public works, vote libertarian.
If you believe the Constitution should have new false teeth installed, vote Conservative.
If you believe the Constitution should have its legs cut off to the politically correct level, vote liberal.
No other terms than unconditional and immediate surrender. I propose to move immediately upon your works. ~ Ulysses S. Grant
I cannot afford to quarrel with a man whom I have to command. ~ Ulysses S. Grant
Leave the matter of religion to the family altar, the church, and the private school, supported entirely by private contributions. Keep the church and state forever separate. ~ Ulysses S. Grant
I know only two tunes: One of them is 'Yankee Doodle' and the other isn't. ~ Ulysses S. Grant
I have made it a rule of my life to trust a man long after other people gave him up, but I don't see how I can ever trust any human being again. ~ Ulysses S. Grant
Hold fast to the Bible. . . . To the influence of this Book we are indebted for all the progress made in true civilization and to this we must look as our guide in the future. ~ Ulysses S. Grant
Nations, like individuals, are punished for their transgressions. ~ Ulysses S. Grant
I know no method to secure the repeal of bad or obnoxious laws so effective as their stringent execution. ~ Ulysses S. Grant
I never heard him (President Lincoln) abuse an enemy. Some of the cruel things said about President Lincoln, particularly in the North, used to pierce him to the heart; but never in my presence did he evince a revengeful disposition. ~ Ulysses S. Grant
As time passes, people, even of the South, will begin to wonder how it was possible that their ancestors ever fought for or justified institutions which acknowledged the right of property in man. ~ Ulysses S. Grant
I am not aware of ever having used a profane expletive in my life ~ Ulysses S. Grant
While a battle is raging one can see his enemy mowed down by the thousand, or the ten thousand, with great composure; but after the battle these scenes are distressing, and one is naturally disposed to do as much to alleviate the suffering of an enemy as a friend. ~ Ulysses S. Grant
Experience proves that the man who obstructs a war in which his nation is engaged, no matter whether right or wrong, occupied no enviable place in life or history. Better for him, individually, to advocate 'war, pestilence, and famine,' than to act as obstructionist to a war already begun. ~ Ulysses S. Grant
As soon as slavery fired upon the flag it was felt, we all felt, even those who did not object to slaves, that slavery must be destroyed. We felt that it was a stain to the Union that men should be bought and sold like cattle. ~ Ulysses S. Grant
Queen Isabella was so disappointed in the financial returns of her investment that she came quite close to having Columbus beheaded.
One can almost hear her screaming down the halls of history.. “Just look at how much the shipping costs me on every a pot of gold you haul in!”
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The lessons of paternalism ought to be unlearned and the better lesson taught that while people should patriotically and cheerfully support their Government, its functions do not include support of the people. Grover Cleveland
“A truly American sentiment recognizes the dignity of labor & the fact that honor lies in honest toil.” - Grover Cleveland
Grover Cleveland remains the only President elected twice.. 4 years apart Grover Cleveland, our 22nd and 24th President, he appeared on the one-thousand dollar bill, which is no longer in circulation.
Millard Fillmore was the first president to have running water in the White House.
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William McKinley, our 25th President, appeared on the five-hundred dollar bill, which is no longer in circulation. He was also the 1st president to ride in an automobile (a steam-powered Locomobile) and to campaign for office by telephone.
William McKinley wanted America to return to the gold standard; He was assassinated. Waiting to die he was the first President to be Xrayed, and also the first President to have air conditioning in the White House.
It is better to be faithful than famous. -- Theodore Roosevelt
Patriotism means to stand by the country. It does not mean to stand by the president or any other public official save exactly to the degree in which he himself stands by the country. It is patriotic to support him insofar as he recently serves the country. It is unpatriotic not to oppose him to the exact extent that by inefficiency or otherwise he fails in his duty to stand by the country.
My men (The Rough Riders) were children of the dragon's blood, and if they had no outland foe to fight and no outlet for their vigorous and daring energy, there was always the chance of their fighting one another: but the great majority, if given the chance to do hard or dangerous work, availed themselves of it with the utmost eagerness! Theodore Roosevelt
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It is unpatriotic not to tell the truth whether about the president or anyone else -- save in the rare cases where this would make known to the enemy information of military value which would otherwise be unknown to him.
I saw more than one, both among the officers and privates, burst into tears when he found he could not go (into battle). No outsider can appreciate the bitterness of the disappointment. Of course, really, those that stayed were entitled to precisely as much honor as those that went. Each man was doing his duty, and much the hardest and most disagreeable duty was to stay. Credit should go with the performance of duty, and not with what is very often the accident of glory. Theodore Roosevelt
Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat. Theodore Roosevelt.
Speak Softly, and carry a big stick; you will go far. Theodore Roosevelt
We demand that big business give the people a square deal; in return we must insist that when anyone engaged in big business honestly endeavors to do right he shall himself be given a square deal. Theodore Roosevelt
The men with the muck-rake are often indispensable to the well-being of society; but only if they know when to stop raking the muck. Theodore Roosevelt
I took the Canal Zone and let Congress debate, and while the debate goes on the canal does also. Theodore Roosevelt Editor's note.. the Canal was an inspiration of Abraham Lincoln
Socialism proposes no adequate substitute for the motive of enlightened selfishness that to-day is at the basis of all human labor and effort, enterprise and new activity.
The welfare of the farmer is vital to that of the whole country.
The world is not going to be saved by legislation.
I do not believe in the divinity of Christ, and there are many other of the postulates of the orthodox creed to which I cannot subscribe.
And, finally, Politics makes me sick.
Is it not true that almost everyone elected to Washington has been trained to defend any side of an argument so well they believe it to be true? No wonder then that half of them become rich so fast it looks like an accident.