Top 100 Government Quotes (2024 Update)

1. “My fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.”

— John F. Kennedy

Also featured in: Commitment Quotes, Greatness Quotes, Sacrifice Quotes

2. “It is much safer for the prince to be feared than loved, but he ought to avoid making himself hated.”

— Niccolò Machiavelli

3. “Yes We Can!”

— Barack Obama

Also featured in: Change Quotes, Opportunity Quotes, Winning Quotes, Effort Quotes, Quotes About Believing

4. “The rising tide lifts all the boats.”

— John F. Kennedy

5. “He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past.”

— George Orwell

Also featured in: Thought Provoking Quotes, Past Quotes

6. “Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind. ”

— George Orwell

7. “War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.”

— George Orwell

Also featured in: Sarcastic Quotes, Freedom Quotes, Quotes About War

8. “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

— Thomas Jefferson

Also featured in: Opportunity Quotes, Freedom Quotes, Powerful Quotes, Important Quotes

9. “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same.”

— Ronald Reagan

Also featured in: Fighting Quotes, Freedom Quotes

10. “A government is the most dangerous threat to man's rights: it holds a legal monopoly on the use of physical force against legally disarmed victims.”

— Ayn Rand

Also featured in: Freedom Quotes, Rights Quotes

11. “The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.”

— Franklin D. Roosevelt

Also featured in: Quotes About Humanity, Caring Quotes, Progress Quotes, Justice Quotes

12. “Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.”

— George Orwell

Also featured in: Quotes About Thinking, Truth Quotes, Freedom Quotes, Quotes About Ideas

13. “One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors.”

— Plato

14. “All tyrannies rule through fraud and force, but once the fraud is exposed they must rely exclusively on force.”

— George Orwell

15. “We know that no one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it.”

— George Orwell

16. “The past was erased, the erasure was forgotten, the lie became the truth.”

— George Orwell

Also featured in: Truth Quotes

17. “Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.”

— Ronald Reagan

Also featured in: Sarcastic Quotes

18. “Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others.”

— Winston Churchill

19. “The Constitution is the guide which I never will abandon.”

— George Washington

Also featured in: Quotes on Liberty, 4th Of July Quotes

20. “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.”

— Benjamin Franklin

Also featured in: Giving Up Quotes, Peace Quotes, Freedom Quotes, History Quotes

21. “Democracy is “government of, by and for the people”.”

— Abraham Lincoln

22. “First of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself – nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.”

— Franklin D. Roosevelt

Also featured in: Challenges Quotes, History Quotes, Patriotic Quotes

23. “A society becomes totalitarian when its structure becomes flagrantly artificial: that is, when its ruling class has lost its function but succeeds in clinging to power by force or fraud.”

— George Orwell

24. “Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.”

— Abraham Lincoln

Also featured in: History Quotes

25. “A politician needs the ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month, and next year. And to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn’t happen.”

— Winston Churchill

26. “If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.”

— Thomas Jefferson

27. “If the people cannot trust their government to do the job for which it exists – to protect them and to promote their common welfare – all else is lost.”

— Barack Obama

28. “The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”

— George Orwell

29. “Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority: still more when you superadd the tendency or the certainty of corruption by authority.”

— Lord Acton

Also featured in: Exercise Quotes

30. “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction.”

— Ronald Reagan

Also featured in: Freedom Quotes

31. “My first rule: I don’t believe anything the government tells me.”

— George Carlin

Also featured in: Hilarious Quotes, Firsts Quotes, Doubt Quotes

32. “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”

— Thomas Jefferson

Also featured in: Wisdom Quotes, Fighting Quotes, Veteran's Day Quotes

33. “It is better to be feared than loved, if you cannot be both.”

— Niccolò Machiavelli

Also featured in: Powerful Quotes, Fear Quotes, Witty Quotes

34. “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”

— Margaret Thatcher

Also featured in: Quotes About Money, Smart Quotes

35. “Being powerful is like being a lady. If you have to tell people you are, you aren't.”

— Margaret Thatcher

36. “It is not enough that we do our best; sometimes we must do what is required.”

— Winston Churchill

Also featured in: Commitment Quotes, History Quotes

37. “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

— Lord Acton

38. “People’s participation is the essence of good governance.”

— Narendra Modi

39. “Politics have no relation to morals.”

— Niccolò Machiavelli

40. “The smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities.”

— Ayn Rand

Also featured in: Focus Quotes, Freedom Quotes, Ego Quotes

41. “All of us do not have equal talent, but all of us should have an equal opportunity to develop our talent.”

— John F. Kennedy

Also featured in: Opportunity Quotes, Helping Quotes

42. “Funded by the government just means funded by the people. Government, by the way, has no money. It only takes money from the people. Sometimes people forget that that’s really what occurs.”

— Elon Musk

43. “Even if you’re not doing anything wrong, you are being watched and recorded.”

— Edward Snowden

Also featured in: Intelligence Quotes

44. “Democracy cannot succeed unless those who express their choice are prepared to choose wisely. The real safeguard of democracy, therefore, is education.”

— Franklin D. Roosevelt

45. “Man is by nature a political animal.”

— Aristotle

46. “Yes, we can. Yes, we can change. Yes, we can.”

— Barack Obama

Also featured in: Change Quotes, Quotes About Hope, Vision Quotes

47. “Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate.”

— John F. Kennedy

Also featured in: Fear Quotes

48. “Nothing can stand in the way of the power of millions of voices calling for change.”

— Barack Obama

Also featured in: Justice Quotes

49. “The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men.”

— Plato

50. “If you want a vision of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face – forever.”

— George Orwell

Also featured in: Freedom Quotes, Imagination Quotes