Top 70 Eugene V. Debs Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “I have no country to fight for; my country is the earth, and I am a citizen of the world.”

— Eugene V. Debs

2. “While there is a lower class, I am in it, while there is a criminal element, I am of it, and while there is a soul in prison, I am not free.”

— Eugene V. Debs

3. “I’d rather vote for something I want and not get it than vote for something I don’t want, and get it.”

— Eugene V. Debs

4. “I am opposing a social order in which it is possible for one man who does absolutely nothing that is useful to amass a fortune of hundreds of millions of dollars, while millions of men and women who work all the days of their lives secure barely enough for a wretched existence.”

— Eugene V. Debs

5. “The most heroic word in all languages is revolution.”

— Eugene V. Debs

6. “If it had not been for the discontent of a few fellows who had not been satisfied with their conditions, you would still be living in caves. Intelligent discontent is the mainspring of civilization. Progress is born of agitation. It is agitation or stagnation.”

— Eugene V. Debs

7. “Too long have the workers of the world waited for some Moses to lead them out of bondage. I would not lead you out if I could; for if you could be led out, you could be led back again. I would have you make up your minds there is nothing that you cannot do for yourselves.”

— Eugene V. Debs

8. “The master class has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles. The master class had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject class has had nothing to gain and all to lose – especially their lives.”

— Eugene V. Debs

9. “I would rather be arrested as a traitor than fight a war for Wall Street.”

— Eugene V. Debs

10. “When I rise it will be with the ranks and not from the ranks.”

— Eugene V. Debs

11. “Progress is born of agitation. It is agitation or stagnation.”

— Eugene V. Debs

12. “You have got to unite in the same labor union and in the same political party and strike and vote together, and the hour you do that, the world is yours.”

— Eugene V. Debs

13. “Wherever capitalism appears, in pursuit of its mission of exploitation, there will Socialism, fertilized by misery, watered by tears, and vitalized by agitation be also found, unfurling its class-struggle banner and proclaiming its mission of emancipation.”

— Eugene V. Debs

14. “The workers are the saviors of society, the redeemers of the race.”

— Eugene V. Debs

15. “The issue is Socialism versus Capitalism. I am for Socialism because I am for humanity. We have been cursed with the reign of gold long enough. Money constitutes no proper basis of civilization. The time has come to regenerate society – we are on the eve of universal change.”

— Eugene V. Debs

16. “Those who produce should have, but we know that those who produce the most – that is, those who work hardest, and at the most difficult and most menial tasks, have the least.”

— Eugene V. Debs

17. “Anybody can be nobody, but it takes a man to be somebody.”

— Eugene V. Debs

18. “Labor is today the most vital and potential power this planet has ever known, and its historic mission is as certain of ultimate realization as is the setting of the sun.”

— Eugene V. Debs

19. “We want a system in which the worker shall get what he produces and the capitalist shall produce what he gets.”

— Eugene V. Debs

20. “Be true to yourself and you cannot be a traitor to any good cause on earth.”

— Eugene V. Debs

21. “I would no more teach children military training than teach them arson, robbery, or assassination.”

— Eugene V. Debs

22. “The class which has the power to rob upon a large scale has also the power to control the government and legalize their robbery.”

— Eugene V. Debs

23. “The protection the government owes you and fails to provide, you are morally bound to provide for yourselves...”

— Eugene V. Debs

24. “The rights of one are as sacred as the rights of a million.”

— Eugene V. Debs

25. “The truth has always been dangerous to the rule of the rogue, the exploiter, the robber. So the truth must be ruthlessly supressed.”

— Eugene V. Debs

26. “I don’t want you to follow me or anyone else. If you are looking for a Moses to lead you out of the capitalist wilderness, you will stay right where you are. I would not lead you into this promised land if I could because if I could lead you in, someone else could lead you out.”

— Eugene V. Debs

27. “The prison, above all others, should be the most human of institutions.”

— Eugene V. Debs

28. “The American people can have anything they want; the trouble is, they don’t know what they want.”

— Eugene V. Debs

29. “I am for Socialism because I am for humanity.”

— Eugene V. Debs

30. “I am guilty of believing that the human race can be humanized and enriched in every spiritual inference through the saner and more beneficent processes of peaceful persuasion applied to material problems rather than through wars, riots and bloodshed.”

— Eugene V. Debs

31. “Riches are the savings of many in the hands of one.”

— Eugene V. Debs

32. “Capitalism needs and must have the prison to protect itself from the criminals it has created.”

— Eugene V. Debs

33. “I would rather a thousand times be a free soul in jail than to be a sycophant and coward in the streets.”

— Eugene V. Debs

34. “Intelligent discontent is the mainspring of civilization.”

— Eugene V. Debs

35. “What can Labor do for itself? The answer is not difficult. Labor can organize, it can unify; it can consolidate its forces. This done, it can demand and command.”

— Eugene V. Debs

36. “The Republican and Democratic parties, or, to be more exact, the Republican-Democratic party, represent the capitalist class in the class struggle. They are the political wings of the capitalist system and such differences as arise between them relate to spoils and not to principles.”

— Eugene V. Debs

37. “Chicago is the product of modern capitalism, and, like other great commercial centers, is unfit for human habitation.”

— Eugene V. Debs

38. “It is when you have done your work honestly, when you have contributed your share to the common fund that you begin to live.”

— Eugene V. Debs

39. “The master class has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles.”

— Eugene V. Debs

40. “Intelligent discontent is the mainspring of civilization. Progress is born of agitation. It is agitation or stagnation.”

— Eugene V. Debs

41. “I would not be a Moses to lead you into the Promised Land, because if I could lead you into it, someone else could lead you out of it.”

— Eugene V. Debs

42. “No war by any nation in any age has ever been declared by the people.”

— Eugene V. Debs

43. “I may not be able to say all I think, but I am not going to say anything I do not think.”

— Eugene V. Debs

44. “Some go to prison for stealing, and others for believing that a better system can be provided and maintained than one that makes it necessary for a man to steal in order to live.”

— Eugene V. Debs

45. “As long as he owns your tools he owns your job, and if he owns your job he is the master of your fate. You are in no sense a free man. You are subject to his interest and to his will. He decides whether you shall work or not. Therefore, he decides whether you shall live or die. And in that humiliating position any one who tries to persuade you that you are a free man is guilty of insulting your intelligence.”

— Eugene V. Debs

46. “Do not worry over the charge of treason to your masters, but be concerned about the treason that involves yourselves. Be true to yourself and you cannot be a traitor to any good cause on Earth.”

— Eugene V. Debs

47. “You need at this time especially to know that you are fit for something better than slavery and cannon fodder.”

— Eugene V. Debs

48. “If I were hungry and friendless today, I would rather take my chances with a saloon-keeper than with the average preacher.”

— Eugene V. Debs

49. “In the very progress of society, the prison has in the very nature of things undergone some improvement, but there are vast stretches yet to be covered before the prison becomes, if it ever does, an institution for the reclamation and rehabilitation of erring and unfortunate men and women.”

— Eugene V. Debs

50. “To stir the masses, to appeal to their higher, better selves, to set them thinking for themselves, and to hold ever before them the ideal of mutual kindness and good will, based upon mutual interests, is to render real service to the cause of humanity.”

— Eugene V. Debs