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state quotes

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“It is our belief that the state is the servant of the citizen and not his master.” John F. Kennedy, State of the Union Address
“As soon as any man says of the affairs of the State 'What does it matter to me?' the State may be given up for lost.”
“There will never be a really free and enlightened State until the State comes to recognize the individual as a higher and independent power, from which all its own power and authority are derived, and treats him accordingly.” Henry David Thoreau, Civil Disobedience
“The chief foundations of all states, new as well as old or composite, are good laws and good arms; and as there cannot be good laws where the state is not well armed, it follows that where they are well armed they have good laws.” Niccolò Machiavelli, The Prince
“Every tax ought to be so contrived, as both to take out and to keep out of the pockets of the people as little as possible, over and above what it brings into the public treasury of the state.” Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
“A State for one man is no State at all.” Sophocles, Antigone
“It runs as follows: The State is made for man, not man for the State.” Albert Einstein, The world as I see it
“A constitution is the arrangement of magistracies in a state, especially of the highest of all. The government is everywhere sovereign in the state, and the constitution is in fact the government.” Aristotle, Politics
“A state half slave and half free cannot exist.” Ulysses S. Grant, Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant
“The art of war is of vital importance to the State.” Sun Tzu, The Art of War
“The State is the altar of political freedom and, like the religious altar, it is maintained for the purpose of human sacrifice.” Emma Goldman, Anarchism and Other Essays
“The economy is in a depression, and the United States has become a fascist state where the government uses TV and giant screens in the neighborhoods to distract people from the fact that nobody has a job.” Arnold Schwarzenegger, Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story
“the States are as the men are; they grow out of human characters.” Plato, The Republic
“The excess of liberty, whether in States or individuals, seems only to pass into excess of slavery.” Plato, The Republic
“AMNESTY, n. The state's magnanimity to those offenders whom it would be too expensive to punish.” Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary
“The really valuable thing in the pageant of human life seems to me not the State but the creative, sentient individual, the personality; it alone creates the noble and the sublime, while the herd as such remains dull in thought and dull in feeling.” Albert Einstein, The world as I see it
“A State, I said, arises, as I conceive, out of the needs of mankind; no one is self-sufficing, but all of us have many wants.” Plato, The Republic
“The State in particular is turned into a quasi-animate personality from whom everything is expected. In reality it is only a camouflage for those individuals who know how to manipulate it.” Carl Jung, The Undiscovered Self
“The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works — whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified.” Barack Obama, Inaugural Address
“What is prudence in the conduct of every private family, can scarce be folly in that of a great kingdom.” Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
“If the Sovereign desires to govern, or the magistrate to give laws, or if the subjects refuse to obey, disorder takes the place of regularity, force and will no longer act together, and the State is dissolved and falls into despotism or anarchy.” Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract
“if the earlier forms of society are natural, so is the state, for it is the end of them, and the nature of a thing is its end.” Aristotle, Politics
“Fundamentally, there are only two ways of co-ordinating the economic activities of millions. One is central direction involving the use of coercion—the technique of the army and of the modern totalitarian state. The other is voluntary...” Milton Friedman, Capitalism and Freedom
“The word finance is a slavish word, unknown in the city-state.” Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract
“In every ordered State, wealth is a sacred thing: in democracies it is the only sacred thing.” Anatole France, Penguin Island
“We have not successfully rolled back the frontiers of the state in Britain only to see them reimposed at a European level, with a European super-state exercising a new dominance from Brussels.” Margaret Thatcher, The Downing Street Years
“We have no intention of imposing our culture. But America will always stand firm for the non-negotiable demands of human dignity: the rule of law; limits on the power of the state; respect for women; private property; free speech; equal justice;...” George W. Bush, State of the Union Address

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law cooperation freedom government democracy liberty slavery tyranny individualism anarchy service power individuality equality nature man welfare citizenship men war

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Jean-Jacques Rousseau (3)
Plato (3)
Aristotle (2)
Albert Einstein (2)
Adam Smith (2)
John F. Kennedy (1)
Milton Friedman (1)
Henry David Thoreau (1)
Ambrose Bierce (1)
Sun Tzu (1)
Sophocles (1)
Anatole France (1)
Emma Goldman (1)
Margaret Thatcher (1)
Carl Jung (1)
Ulysses S. Grant (1)
Barack Obama (1)
Arnold Schwarzenegger (1)
George W. Bush (1)
Niccolò Machiavelli (1)

Related sources

The Republic (3)
The Social Contract (3)
Politics (2)
State of the Union Address (2)
The world as I see it (2)
The Wealth of Nations (2)
Civil Disobedience (1)
Capitalism and Freedom (1)
The Art of War (1)
Inaugural Address (1)
The Prince (1)
Anarchism and Other Essays (1)
Antigone (1)
Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant (1)
The Undiscovered Self (1)
Penguin Island (1)
The Downing Street Years (1)
Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story (1)
The Devil's Dictionary (1)