Governments exist to protect the rights of minorities. The loved and the rich need no protection: they have many friends and few enemies. — Wendell Phillips
The one pervading evil of democracy is the tyranny of the majority. — Lord Acton
The one pervading evil of democracy is the tyranny of the majority, or rather of that party, not always the majority, that succeeds, by force or fraud, in carrying elections. — Lord Acton
It is unnatural for a majority to rule, for a majority can seldom be organized and united for specific action, and a minority can. — Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Individual rights are not subject to a public vote; a majority has no right to vote away the rights of a minority. — Ayn Rand
Historically, the judicial branch has often been the sole protector of the rights of minority groups against the will of the popular majority. — Diane Watson
The majority is always wrong; the minority is rarely right. — Henrik Ibsen
Short Democracy Minority Quotes
It is bad to be oppressed by a minority, but it is worse to be oppressed by a majority. — Lord Acton
A minority is always compelled to think. That is the blessing of being in the minority. — Leo Baeck
A silent majority and government by the people is incompatible. — Tom Hayden
Democracy must be something more than two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner. — James Bovard
Democracy is four wolves and a sheep voting on dinner. — Robert A. Heinlein
Democracies die behind closed doors. — Damon Keith
The political machine triumphs because it is a united minority acting against a divided majority. — Will Durant
Democracy passes into despotism. — Plato
Democracy is not freedom. Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to eat for lunch. — Unknown Author
Democracy Minority Image Quotes
The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.
Democracy Minority Rights Quotes
Measures are too often decided, not according to the rules of justice and the rights of the minor party, but by the superior force of an interested and overbearing majority. — James Madison
Democracy is an experiment, and the right of the majority to rule is no more inherent than the right of the minority to rule; and unless the majority represents sane, righteous, unselfish public sentiment, it has no inherent right. — William Allen White
Of course, the aim of a constitutional democracy is to safeguard the rights of the minority and avoid the tyranny of the majority. (p. 102) — Cornel West
We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a drop in the ocean, but the ocean would be less because that missing drop.
Since the birth of our Nation, no other right has been more important than having the ability to vote. Unfortunately, as history has shown, the denial of this right to minorities is a scar on our system of democracy. — Jan Schakowsky
Democracy is based on the majority principle. This is especially true in a country such as ours where the vast majority have been systematically denied their rights. At the same time, democracy also requires that the rights of political and other minorities be safeguarded. — Nelson Mandela
And that is my definition of democracy, the right to be in a minority and not be suppressed. — Lee Harvey Oswald
Most people fail in life because they major in minor things.
One of the benefits of a properly functioning democracy is minority rights and majority rule. — Noam Chomsky
The people in Arab countries are now speaking out and asking many questions about human rights, minorities, religion, democracy, "the other," and so on. — Hassan Blasim
The right of a minority is so important in a democracy. — Robert Caro
You have fewer rights because you are a minority. Absolutely, that’s how democracy works. — Jacob Zuma
Minority Government Quotes
But if the laws are to be so trampled upon with impunity, and a minority is to dictate to the majority, there is an end put at one stroke to republican government, and nothing but anarchy and confusion is to be expected thereafter. — George Washington
Extreme taxation, excessive controls, oppressive government competition with business, frustrated minorities and forgotten Americans are not the products of free enterprise. They are the residue of centralized bureaucracy, of government by a self-anointed elite. — Ronald Reagan
In every State, the government is nothing but a permanent conspiracy on the part of the minority against the majority, which it enslaves and fleeces. — Mikhail Bakunin
Anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.
A minority government can't govern without support from other parties. — Nicola Sturgeon
Always remember that the minority dictates the prices, and the majority governs the value. — Naved Abdali
Even before winning its majority, Harper's Republican-styl e Conservative party - well to the right Canada's traditional Progressive Conservative Party - managed to win minority governments with less than 40 per cent of the popular vote. — Linda McQuaig
The smallest minority on earth in the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities.
War is the health of the State. It automatically sets in motion throughout society these irresistible forces for uniformity, for passionate cooperation with the government in coercing into obedience the minority groups and individuals which lack the larger herd sense. — Randolph Bourne
Though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will, to be rightful, must be reasonable. — Thomas Jefferson
One of the really positive things about minority government is that there is the necessity to broker policy positions. What happens is you get a hybrid of what a single party might do. And I don't think that is a bad thing. — Kathleen Wynne
Fifty-one percent of a nation can establish a totalitarian regime, suppress minorities and still remain democratic. — Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn
That the desires of the majority of the people are often for injustice and inhumanity against the minority, is demonstrated by every page of the history of the world. — John Adams
A democracy is a state which recognizes the subjection of the minority to the majority, that is, an organization for the systematic use of violence by one class against the other, by one part of the population against another. — Vladimir Lenin
Democracy has turned out to be not majority rule but rule by well-organized and well-connected minority groups who steal from the majority. — Llewellyn Rockwell
[N]o one's ever been able to show me any difference between democracy and brute force. It's just a majority ganging up on a minority with the minority giving in to avoid getting massacred. — L. Neil Smith
By a faction, I understand a number of citizens, whether amounting to a majority or a minority of the whole, who are united and actuated by some common impulse of passion, or of interest... The latent causes of faction are sown in the nature of man. — James Madison
Parliamentary government is simply a mild and disguised form of compulsion. We agree to try strength by counting heads instead of breaking heads, but the principle is exactly the same... The minority gives way not because it is convinced that it is wrong, but because it is convinced that it is a minority. — James Fitzjames Stephen
The Greeks... labored under the delusion that their democracy was a guarantee of peace and plenty, not realizing that unrestrained majority rule always destroys freedom, puts the minority at the mercy of the mob, and works at cross-purposes to the effective use of human energy and individual initiative. — Henry Grady Weaver
Democracy cannot survive without the guidance of a creative minority. — Harlan Stone
Democracy is for infidels. A real Muslim is not a democrat because he doesn't care about the opinions of majorities and minorities don't interest him. He is only interested in what Islam says. — Abdul Sattar Abu Risha
I call government that works the best for people open society, which is basically just another more general term for a democracy that is - you call it maybe a liberal democracy. It's not only majority rule but also respect for minorities and minority opinions and the rule of law. So it's really a sort of institutional democracy. — George Soros
I guess 35 years ago, I thought we had more of a democracy than we actually do. Majority support doesn't help unless the majority is active and votes - but the opposition minority votes a much greater proportion, so we often lose by a narrow margin. — Gloria Steinem
For a privileged minority, Western democracy provides the leisure, the facilities, and the training to seek the truth lying hidden behind the veil of distortion and misrepresentation, ideology and class interest, through which the events of current history are presented to us. — Noam Chomsky
Violent resistance against the power of the state is the last resort of the minority in its effort to break loose from the oppression of the majority. ... The citizen must not be so narrowly circumscribed in his activities that, if he thinks differently from those in power, his only choice is either to perish or to destroy the machinery of state. — Ludwig von Mises
If the measures which have been pursued are approved by the majority, it is the duty of the minority to acquiesce and conform. — Thomas Jefferson
And where else will [Hume,] this degenerate son of science, this traitor to his fellow men, find the origin of just powers, if not in the majority of the society? Will it be in the minority? Or in an individual of that minority? — Thomas Jefferson
A fatal defect in majority rule is that by its very nature it abolishes itself. Majority rule must inevitably become minority rule: the majority is too big to handle itself; it organizes itself into committees ... which in their turn resolve themselves into a committee of one. — Mary Parker Follett
Disagreement produces debate but dissent produces dissension. Dissent (which come from the Latin, dis and sentire) means originally to feel apart from others. People who disagree have an argument, but people who dissent have a quarrel. People may disagree and both may count themselves in the majority. But a person who dissents is by definition in a minority. A liberal society thrives on disagreement but is killed by dissension. Disagreement is the life blood of democracy, dissension is its cancer. — Daniel J. Boorstin
Outside of America, there are many people, myself included, who champion values that, in some senses, could be thought of as traditionally American - the idea that everybody's equal, that the rights of women and men should be the same, that there should be no discrimination on religious or sexual orientation, that democracy and rule of law and due process are the ways in which society should govern themselves and minorities should be cared for. — Mohsin Hamid
In the South, prior to the Civil Rights movement and the 1964 Civil Rights Act, democracy was the rule. The majority of people were white, and the white majority had little or no respect for any rights which the black minority had relative to property, or even to their own lives. The majority - the mob and occasionally the lynch mob - ruled. — Neal Boortz
In a democracy the majority of citizens is capable of exercising the most cruel oppressions upon the minority...and that oppression of the majority will extend to far great number, and will be carried on with much greater fury, than can almost ever be apprehended from the dominion of a single sceptre. Under a cruel prince they have the plaudits of the people to animate their generous constancy under their sufferings; but those who are subjected to wrong under multitudes are deprived of all external consolation: they seem deserted by mankind, overpowered by a conspiracy of their whole species. — Edmund Burke
Vladimir Putin is doubtlessly trying to drive a wedge into the Western alliance. When it comes to the Russian minorities in the Baltics, Putin will surely know that his chances there are slim to none. They are quite comfortable in those countries. But at the moment, there are at least three EU member-states where it is questionable whether they still belong among Western democracies: Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria. — Heinrich August Winkler
If you look at Indian society, it's a society made up of minorities. There's nobody who's not a minority, whether it's ethnicity, caste or religion. But the whole effort now is to confect a political constituency - an ethnic or a religious constituency that can coalesce into a political majority in order to deal with this model of representative democracy. That process has been a hundred years in the making in this part of the world. — Arundhati Roy
Let's pretend six people live in your house. And you propose that only four people get to eat every day, and you put it to a vote. If four people vote that only four people get to eat, two people don't, that prevails. That's what a democracy is. It's strictly majority-minority rule. — Rush Limbaugh
Democracy appears to me potentially a higher form of political organization than any kind of dictatorship. But if it turns out that in America, which could afford a decent living for everyone, the comfortable majority is willing to condone the misery and abuse of a minority for an indefinite period, the exploitation by the majority becomes as repugnant as exploitation by an oligarchy, and democracy loses half its supposed superiority. — Benjamin Spock
The fact that the majority wants something good does not give them the right to use force on the minority that don't want to pay for it. If you have to use a gun, it's not really a very good idea. Democracy without respect for individual rights sucks. It's just ganging up on the weird kid, and I'm always the weird kid. — Penn Jillette
After all, the practical reason why, when the power is once in the hands of the people, a majority are permitted, and for a long period continue, to rule is not because they are most likely to be in the right, nor because this seems fairest to the minority, but because they are physically the strongest. But a government in which the majority rule in all cases cannot be based on justice, even as far as men understand it. — Henry David Thoreau
The most important element of democracy, I believe, is the protection of minorities. — Shahin Najafi
With growing and intermixed minority populations, our democracy can not work optimally unless all people are integrated as full and equal members, and I think our collective freedom requires that. — Richard Benjamin
In this world which is losing faith in so called representative democracy, there are new developments in participatory democracy. These are very interesting developments, reflecting the revitalization of community power with a more and more active presence of minorities in political life, including the presence of women who are of course by no means a minority. — Eduardo Galeano
Democracy's real test lies in its respect for minority opinion. — Ellery Sedgwick
In Conclusion
Which quotation resonated with you best? Did you enjoy our collection of democracy minority quotes? Or may be you have a slogan about democracy minority to suggest. Let us know using our contact form.
Citation
Feel free to cite and use any of the quotes in this collection of democracy minority quotations. For popular citation styles(APA, Chicago, MLA), please use this citation page.
