Top 300 Harry S. Truman Quotes (2024 Update)
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101. “When you have an efficient government, you have a dictatorship.”

— Harry S. Truman

102. “A man who is not interested in politics is not doing his patriotic duty toward maintaining the constitution of the United States.”

— Harry S. Truman

103. “A President cannot always be popular.”

— Harry S. Truman

104. “Being too good is apt to be uninteresting.”

— Harry S. Truman

105. “Of course I believe in free enterprise but in my system of free enterprise, the democratic principle is that there never was, never has been, never will be, room for the ruthless exploitation of the many for the benefit of the few.”

— Harry S. Truman

106. “You should never form judgments from front page headlines. As with a contract, the fine print on the inside pages should be carefully studied.”

— Harry S. Truman

107. “Any man who has had the job I’ve had and didn’t have a sense of humor wouldn’t still be here.”

— Harry S. Truman

108. “Art is parasitic on life, just as criticism is parasitic on art.”

— Harry S. Truman

109. “Today, America has become one of the most powerful forces for good on earth. We must keep it so.”

— Harry S. Truman

110. “The Marine Corps is the Navy’s police force and as long as I am President that is what it will remain. They have a propaganda machine that is almost equal to Stalin’s.”

— Harry S. Truman

111. “The atom bomb was no ‘great decision.’ It was merely another powerful weapon in the arsenal of righteousness.”

— Harry S. Truman

112. “The successful man has enthusiasm. Good work is never done in cold blood; heat is needed for forge anything. Every great achievement is the story of a flaming heart.”

— Harry S. Truman

113. “My favorite animal is the mule. He has more horse sense than a horse. He knows when to stop eating – and he knows when to stop working.”

— Harry S. Truman

114. “The fundamental basis of this Nation’s law was given to Moses on the Mount. The fundamental basis of our Bill of Rights comes from the teachings which we get from Exodus and St. Matthew, from Isaiah and St. Paul.”

— Harry S. Truman

115. “It’s a recession when your neighbor loses his job; it’s a depression when you lose your own.”

— Harry S. Truman

116. “Although I hold the highest civil honour in the world, I have always regarded my rank and title as a Past Grand Master of Masons the greatest honour that had ever come to me.”

— Harry S. Truman

117. “The Marshall Plan will go down in history as one of America’s greatest contributions to the peace of the world.”

— Harry S. Truman

118. “Here lies Jack Williams. He done his damndest.”

— Harry S. Truman

119. “Ignorance and its hand-maidens, prejudice, intolerance, suspicion of our fellowman, breed dictators and breed wars.”

— Harry S. Truman

120. “Nixon is one of the few in the history of this country to run for high office talking out of both sides of his mouth at the same time and lying out of both sides.”

— Harry S. Truman

121. “About the meanest thing you can say about a man is that he means well.”

— Harry S. Truman

122. “Such an atmosphere is un-American, the most un-American thing we have to contend with today. It is the climate of a totalitarian country in which scientists are expected to change their theories to match changes in the police state’s propaganda line.”

— Harry S. Truman

123. “If that’s art, I’m a Hottentot!”

— Harry S. Truman

124. “In the simplest of terms, what we are doing in Korea is this: We are trying to prevent a third world war.”

— Harry S. Truman

125. “You can always amend a big plan, but you can never expand a little one. I don’t believe in little plans. I believe in plans big enough to meet a situation which we can’t possibly foresee now.”

— Harry S. Truman

126. “When we refused to be forced out of Berlin, we demonstrated to the people of Europe that with their cooperation we would act, and act resolutely, when their freedom was threatened.”

— Harry S. Truman

127. “I sit here all day trying to persuade people to do the things they ought to have the sense to do without my persuading them. That’s all the powers of the President amount to.”

— Harry S. Truman

128. “As you get older, you get tired of doing the same things over and over again, so you think Christmas has changed. It hasn’t. It’s you who has changed.”

— Harry S. Truman

129. “Men often mistake notoriety for fame, and would rather be noticed for their vices than not be noticed at all.”

— Harry S. Truman

130. “You can never get all the facts from just one newspaper, and unless you have all the facts, you cannot make proper judgements about what is going on.”

— Harry S. Truman

131. “He’ll sit there are he’ll say “Do this! Do that!” and nothing will happen. Poor Ike – it won’t be a bit like the army.”

— Harry S. Truman

132. “The way in which you endure that which you must endure is more important than the crisis itself.”

— Harry S. Truman

133. “The United Nations is designed to make possible lasting freedom and independence for all its members.”

— Harry S. Truman

134. “Some questions cannot be answered, but they can be decided.”

— Harry S. Truman

135. “There is no more fundamental axiom of American freedom than the familiar statement: In a free country we punish men for the crimes they commit but never for the opinions they have.”

— Harry S. Truman

136. “Children and dogs are as necessary to the welfare of the country as Wall Street and the railroads.”

— Harry S. Truman

137. “No one in the world can take the place of your mother. Right or wrong, from her viewpoint you are always right. She may scold you for little things, but never for the big ones.”

— Harry S. Truman

138. “Every segment of our population, and every individual, has a right to expect from his government a fair deal.”

— Harry S. Truman

139. “We believe that all men are created equal because they are created in the image of God.”

— Harry S. Truman

140. “Beware of the guy praying loudest in the amen corner.”

— Harry S. Truman

141. “I have to decide Japanese strategy – shall we invade Japan proper or shall we bomb and blockade? That is my hardest decision to date. But I’ll make it when I have all the facts.”

— Harry S. Truman

142. “A person who is fundamentally honest doesn’t need a code of ethics. The Ten Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount are all the ethical code anybody needs.”

— Harry S. Truman

143. “A leader in the Democratic Party is a boss, in the Republican Party he is a leader.”

— Harry S. Truman

144. “Any story worth telling is worth exaggerating.”

— Harry S. Truman

145. “May the sun never set on American baseball.”

— Harry S. Truman

146. “All my life I have fought against prejudice and intolerance.”

— Harry S. Truman

147. “It’s plain hokum. If you can’t convince ’em, confuse ’em. It’s an old political trick. But this time it won’t work.”

— Harry S. Truman

148. “The most peaceful thing in the world is plowing a field. Chances are you’ll do your best thinking that way.”

— Harry S. Truman

149. “Canada and the United States have reached the point where we no longer think of each other as ‘foreign’ countries. We think of each other as friends, as peaceful and cooperative neighbors on a spacious and fruitful continent.”

— Harry S. Truman

150. “We all have to recognise, no matter how great our strength, that we must deny ourselves the licence to do always as we please.”

— Harry S. Truman