#government

There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty. ↗

— John Adams

#endanger #free #free government #government #liberty

Human nature turns out to be more complicated than the idea that people will get along if only the rules are clear enough. Uncertainty, the ultimate evil that modern law seeks to eradicate, generally fosters cooperation, not the opposite. ↗

— Philip K. Howard

#government #law #rules #uncertainty #death

I have an idea about voting, how about on every ballot we include "None of the above". People may laugh at that, but what that is, it is a vote of no confidence in your government and I'm willing to bet that in some elections, 'None of the Above' would win. Imagine if you won the election but lost to 'None of the Above'. Wouldn't that make you re-think your positions? ↗

— Jesse Ventura

#voting #imagination

I apprehend no danger to our country from a foreign foe . . . Our destruction, should it come at all, will be from another quarter. From the inattention of the people to the concerns of their government, from their carelessness and negligence, I must confess that I do apprehend some danger. I fear that they may place too implicit a confidence in their public servants, and fail properly to scrutinize their conduct; that in this way they may be made the dupes of designing men, and become the instruments of their own undoing. Make them intelligent, and they will be vigilant; give them the means of detecting the wrong, and they will apply the remedy. ↗

— Daniel Webster

#government #design

A good leader leads the people from above them. A great leader leads the people from within them. ↗

— M.D. Arnold

#leadership #leadership

When occasions present themselves in which the interests of the people are at variance with their inclinations, it is the duty of the persons whom they have appointed to be the guardians of those interests to withstand the temporary delusion in order to give them time and opportunity for more cool and sedate reflection. Instances might be cited in which a conduct of this kind has saved the people from very fatal consequences of their own mistakes, and has procured lasting monuments of their gratitude to the men who had courage and magnanimity enough to serve them at the peril of their displeasure. ↗

— Alexander Hamilton

#government-leadership #courage

Any government has as much of a duty to avoid war as a ship's captain has to avoid a shipwreck." [On Water] ↗

— Guy de Maupassant

#government #leadership #peace #responsibility #shipwreck

Diplomats and bureaucrats may function differently, but they achieve exactly the same results. ↗

— Spock

#government-corruption #organizational-leadership #leadership

The challenge has always been that "good people" don't know how to win elections ↗

— Fela Durotoye

#government #leadership #politics #leadership

In a well-functioning democracy, the state constitution is considered more important than God's holy book, whichever holy book that may be, and God matters only in your private life. ↗

— Ayaan Hirsi Ali

#god #government #holy-book #islam #muslim