Politics can be relatively fair in the breathing spaces of history; at its critical turning points there is no other rule possible than the old one, that the end justifies the means. — Arthur Koestler
Politics is pervasive. Everything is political and the choice to be "apolitical" is usually just an endorsement of the status quo and the unexamined life. — Rebecca Solnit
Politics is for the present, but an equation is for eternity. — Albert Einstein
Political science without biography is a form of taxidermy. — Harold Lasswell
History is not happenstance: it is conspiratorial. Carefully planned and executed by people in power. — George Carlin
Today's political climate does not allow the luxury of apathy. — Trent Reznor
Historical analogy is the last refuge of people who can't grasp the current situation. — Kim Stanley
All political lives, unless they are cut off in midstream at a happy juncture, end in failure, because that is the nature of politics and of human affairs. — Enoch Powell
Politics is a pendulum whose swings between anarchy and tyranny are fueled by perennially rejuvenated illusions. — Albert Einstein
Politics are usually the executive expression of human immaturity. — Vera Brittain
More history is made by secret handshakes than by battles, bills and proclamations. — John Barth
The writing of history reflects the interests, predilections, and even prejudices of a given generation. — John Hope Franklin
Politics, it seems to me, for years, or all too long, has been concerned with right or left instead of right or wrong. — Richard Armour
An honest public servant can't become rich in politics. He can only attain greatness and satisfaction by service. — Harry S. Truman
It is impossible for one who has studied at all the services of the Hebrew people to avoid the faith that they will one day be restored to their historic national home and there enter on a new and yet greater phase of their contribution to the advance of humanity. — Warren G. Harding
I would support a Presidential candidate who pledged to take the following steps: ... At the end of the war in the Persian Gulf, press for a comprehensive Middle East settlement and for a 'new world order' based not on Pax Americana but on peace through law with a stronger U.N. and World Court. — George McGovern
When words are both true and kind they can change the world.
I will totally accept the results of this great and historic presidential election if I win. I would also reserve my right to contest or file a legal challenge in the case of a questionable result. — Donald Trump
Since the foundation of the State of Israel, the United States has stood by her and helped her to pursue security, peace, and economic growth. Our friendship is based on historic moral and strategic ties, as well as our shared dedication to democracy. — Ronald Reagan
President Obama's Justice Department won less than half of its total cases before the Supreme Court, which is the lowest presidential win rate since Harry Truman. Average historically for the last 50 years is about 70 percent. — Ted Cruz
Be gentle with yourself, you're doing the best you can.
In America, one of our challenges, historically, is that we have very low voting rates, even during presidential elections. — Barack Obama
For the people of Israel and America are historic partners in the global quest for human dignity and freedom. We will always remain at each other's side. — Ronald Reagan
Political History Quotes
Ideas are more powerful than guns. We would not let our enemies have guns, why should we let them have ideas. — Joseph Stalin
The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders...tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. — Hermann Goring
Why waste your money looking up your family tree? Just go into politics and your opponent will do it for you. — Mark Twain
Be the person your dog thinks you are.
Here is your country. Cherish these natural wonders, cherish the natural resources, cherish the history and romance as a sacred heritage, for your children and your children's children. Do not let selfish men or greedy interests skin your country of its beauty, its riches or its romance. — Theodore Roosevelt
It is the intense spirituality of India, and not any great political structure or social organisation that it has developed, that has enabled it to resist the ravages of time and the accidents of history. — Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan
History fails to record a single precedent in which nations subject to moral decay have not passed into political and economic decline. There has been either a spiritual awakening to overcome the moral lapse or a progressive deterioration leading to ultimate national disaster. — Douglas MacArthur
There is no such thing as public opinion. There is only published opinion.
The issue today is the same as it has been throughout all history, whether man shall be allowed to govern himself or be ruled by a small elite. — Thomas Jefferson
Of the people, by the people, for the people. — Sun Yat-sen
All the ills of mankind, all the tragic misfortunes that fill the history books, all the political blunders, all the failures of the great leaders have arisen merely from a lack of skill at dancing. — Moliere
The word 'Italy' is a geographical expression, a description which is useful shorthand, but has none of the political significance the efforts of the revolutionary ideologues try to put on it, and which is full of dangers for the very existence of the states which make up the peninsula. — Klemens Von Metternich
Great Political Quotes
There is nothing I dread so much as the division of the republic into two great parties, each arranged under its leader, and concerting measures in opposition to each other. This, in my humble apprehension, is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our constitution. — John Adams
All rising to great places is by a winding stair. — Buddha
That these united colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British crown; and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved. — Richard Henry Lee
Treat everyone with politeness and kindness, not because they are nice, but because you are.
From where many of us in the U.K. sit, American politics is hopelessly polarized. All kinds of issues get bundled up into two great heaps. The rest of the world, today and across the centuries, simply doesn't see things in this horribly oversimplified way. — N. T. Wright
We find two great gangs of political speculators, who alternately take possession of the state power and exploit it by the most corrupt ends -- the nation is powerless against these two great cartels of politicians who are ostensibly its servants, but in reality dominate and plunder it. — Friedrich Engels
A great civilization is not conquered from without, until it has destroyed itself from within. The essential causes of Rome's decline lay in her people, her morals, her class struggle, her failing trade, her bureaucratic despotism, her stifling taxes, her consuming wars. — Will Durant
The stronger you become, the gentler you will be.
The great issues facing us today are not Republican issues or Democratic issues. The political parties can debate the means, but both parties must embrace the end objective, which is to make America great again. — Lee Iacocca
The only thing we have to fear is fear itself-and possibly teh bogey man. — Pat Paulsen
All the great things have been denied and we live in an intricacy of new and local mythologies, political, economic, poetic, which are asserted with an ever-enlarging incoherence. — Wallace Stevens
To get your name well enough known that you can run for a public office, some people do it by being great lawyers or philanthropists or business people or work their way up the political ladder. I happened to become known from a different route. — John Glenn
Historical Events Quotes
Covering a historic event is perfectly legitimate. It's not sneaking into somebody's boudoir... These people belong to history, and not to record that if you have the opportunity would be wrong. — Elliott Erwitt
When the venture has been made of dealing with historical events and characters, it always seems fair towards the reader to avow what liberties have been taken, and how much of the sketch is founded on history. — Charlotte Mary Yonge
The Renaissance is studded by the names of the artists and architects, with their creations recorded as great historical events. — Arthur Erickson
Being polite is so rare these days, thats its often confused with flirting.
When I was at Stratford, the very first thing that I was commissioned to work on was trying to make a musical out of the documentary material about the General Strike, which was the next big historical event in England, after the First World War. — Trevor Nunn
Historical novels are, without question, the best way of teaching history, for they offer the human stories behind the events and leave the reader with a desire to know more. — Louis L'Amour
I believe that historians and analysts of historical events need the authority of facts supplied by living witnesses to the events, which they make their subject. — Ibrahim Babangida
Treat everyone with politeness, even those who are rude to you - not because they are nice, ut because you are.
History is opaque. You see what comes out, not the script that produces events, [...] The generator of historical events is different from the events themselves, much as the minds of the gods cannot be read just by witnessing their deeds. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb
I accept the resurrection of Easter Sunday not as an invention of the community of disciples, but as a historical event. — Pinchas Lapide
A complex is a cluster of energy in the unconscious, charged by historic events, reinforced through repitition, embodying a fragment of our personality, and generating a programmed response and an implicit set of expectations. — Carl Jung
History - an account, mostly false, of events, mostly unimportant — John Barth
Historical Military Quotes
If we fight a war and win it with H-bombs, what history will remember is not the ideals we were fighting for, but the methods we used to accomplish them. These methods will be compared to the warfare of Genghis Khan who ruthlessly killed every last inhabitant of Persia. — Hans Bethe
It is God's job to forgive Osama Bin Laden. It is our job to arrange a face to face meeting. — Norman Schwarzkopf
Sure, we want to go home. We want this war over with. The quickest way to get it over with is to go get the bastards who started it. — George S. Patton
Kindness and politeness are not overrated at all. They're underused.
I am the very model of a modern Major-General, I've information vegetable, animal, and mineral, I know the kings of England, and I quote the fights historical, From Marathon to Waterloo, in order categorical. — W. S. Gilbert
The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena..who errs, who comes short again and again; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who spends himself in a worthy cause. — Theodore Roosevelt
Show me a man that gets rich by being a politician and I'll show you a crook.
The military mind tends to be conservative, realistic and historical. The civilian mind tends to be liberal, idealistic and Utopian. Journalists, obviously, are civilians, and they tend to distrust, and to suspect, the military's motives. — Mark Riebling
The information technologies which were historically born from military research are, today, on the verge of developing an offensive capability of destruction, which could tomorrow, if we're not careful, completely destroy world peace. — Guy-Philippe Goldstein
And while national military forces have historically resisted the full participation of women soldiers, female talent has found plenty of scope in revolutionary and terrorist groups around the planet. — Katherine Dunn
South America has virtually broken away in the last decade. That's an event of historic significance. South America just doesn't follow US orders. In fact there isn't a single US military base left there. — Noam Chomsky
Great Historical Quotes
A revolution that is based on the people exercising their creativity in the midst of devastation is one of the great historical contributions of humankind. — Grace Lee Boggs
On the eve of this great adventure I send my best wishes to every soldier in the Allied team.
To us is given the honour of striking a blow for freedom which will live in history; and in the better days that lie ahead men will speak with pride of our doings. — Bernard Law Montgomery
Another important historical factor is the fact that this already very simple religion was further simplified and purified by the early philosophers of ancient China. Our first great philosopher was a founder of naturalism; and our second great philosopher was an agnostic. — Hu Shih
Politeness and courteousness are a small price to pay for the goodwill of others.
I think one of the great historical contributions of science is to weaken the hold of religion. That's a good thing. — Steven Weinberg
I think the whole, like, cultural diversity and the arty side of London is really, really great. And how it's so historic as well. — Lily Allen
[A] great embarrassing fact… haunts all attempts to represent the market as the highest form of human freedom: that historically, impersonal, commercial markets originate in theft. — David Graeber
History is the only laboratory we have in which to test the consequences of thought. — Etienne Gilson
Quite apart from any conscious program, the great cultural historians have always been historical morphologists: seekers after theforms of life, thought, custom, knowledge, art. — Johan Huizinga
We consider Christmas as the encounter, the great encounter, the historical encounter, the decisive encounter, between God and mankind. He who has faith knows this truly; let him rejoice. — Pope Paul VI
You have to know the past to understand the present. — Carl Sagan
For complicated historical and political reasons, we associate 'poor' in our public consciousness with 'black.' Terms such as 'welfare queen' and 'culture of poverty' became associated uniquely with the social maladies of African Americans in urban ghettos, despite the fact that poor whites outnumbered poor blacks. — James David Vance
When one group rules another, the relationship between the two is political. When such an arrangement is carried out over a long period of time it develops an ideology (feudalism, racism, etc.). All historical civilizations are patriarchies: their ideology is male supremacy. — Kate Millett
Let us put the normal divisions of politics aside. Let us come together as one country; let us seize this historic moment to shift the balance of power from the corridors of Westminster to the streets and communities of Scotland. — Nicola Sturgeon
Sooner I'd try to change history than turn political, than try convincing others to write letters or to vote or to march or to do something they didn't already feel like doing. — Richard Bach
Today the path of total dictatorship in the United States can be laid by strictly legal means, unseen and unheard by the Congress, the President, or the people. Outwardly we have a Constitutional government. We have operating within our government and political system, another body representing another form of government - a bureaucratic elite. — William E. Jenner
Truth is not to be found either in traditional capitalism or in Marxism. Each represents a partial truth. Historically, capitalism failed to discern the truth in collective enterprise and Marxism failed to see the truth in individual enterprise. — Martin Luther King, Jr.
It's a historical phenomenon that in 250 years, a nation could move from a colony into the most prosperous nation of the world and the leader of the world. It is indeed an achievement, a tribute to the talent of the American nation, the American people and an optimal political and economic system. — Vladimir Putin
You have delivered up our holy German Fatherland to one of the greatest demagogues of all time. I solemnly prophesy that this accursed man will cast our Reich into the abyss and bring our nation to inconceivable misery. Future generations will damn you in your grave for what you have done. — Ian Kershaw
The more subsidized it is, the less free it is. What is known as 'free education' is the least free of all, for it is a state-owned institution; it is socialized education - just like socialized medicine or the socialized post office - and cannot possibly be separated from political control. — Frank Chodorov
Anti-Semitism has no historical, political and certainly no philosophical origins. Anti-Semitism is a disease. — Daniel Barenboim
The idea of the paranoid style as a force in politics would have little contemporary relevance or historical value if it were applied only to men with profoundly disturbed minds. It is the use of paranoid modes of expression by more or less normal people that makes the phenomenon significant. — Richard Hofstadter
Due to the fact that I experienced personally the situation of a political prisoner, I have an historical commitment to all those that were or are prisoners just because they expressed their views, their public opinion, their own opinions. — Dilma Rousseff
People often of masterful intelligence, trained usually in law or economics or perhaps in political science, who have led their governments into disastrous decisions and miscalculations because they have no awareness whatever of the historical background, the cultural universe, of the foreign societies with which they have to deal. — Michael Howard
But we need more than a broader understanding of what is a good society or a moral and political critique of the existing market fundamentalism engulfing American society, we also need to create new forms of solidarity, new and broad based social movements that move beyond the isolated and fractured politics of the current historical moment. — Henry Giroux
I think students should know something about religion as a historical phenomenon, in the same way that they should know something about socialism and humanism and the other great ideas that have shaped political philosophies and therefore the course of human events. — Steven Pinker
America has become amnesiac - a country in which forms of historical, political, and moral forgetting are not only willfully practiced but celebrated. — Henry Giroux
A relatively small and eternally quarrelsome country in Western Europe, fountainhead of rationalist political manias, militarily impotent, historically inglorious during the past century, democratically bankrupt, Communist-infiltrated from top to bottom. — William F. Buckley, Jr.
Democracy, in its best state, is but the politics of Bedlam; while kept chained, its thoughts are frantic, but when it breaks loose, it kills the keeper, fires the building, and perishes. — Fisher Ames
Historically and politically, the petit-bourgeois is the key to the century. The bourgeois and proletariat classes have become abstractions: the petite-bourgeoisie, in contrast, is everywhere, you can see it everywhere, even in the areas of the bourgeois and the proletariat, what's left of them. — Roland Barthes
A Republic, if you can keep it. — Benjamin Franklin
Historically, if you look back at the struggle to end slavery, the struggle to gain womens' right to vote, the labor movement - these were big social transitions in which there was a movement on the ground in which a lot of people died, but it also took an independent political party. — Jill Stein
Abraham Lincoln did not shoot John Wilkes Booth. Titanic did not sink a North Atlantic iceberg. And Fox News is neither fair nor balanced. These are simple historical facts intelligible to all adults, most children, and some of your more discerning domesticated animals. But not... to Bill O — Keith Olbermann
I don’t want to disappoint too many people, but the number of interesting political, historical conversations we had, you could stick in your ear, it wasn't that many. We talked about friends, family and of course girls. — Ben Bradlee
These pictures possibly give rise to questions of political content or historical truth. Neither interests me in this instance. And although even my motivation for painting them is probably of no significance, I am trying to put a name to it here, as an articulation, parallel to the pictures, as it were, of my disquiet and of my opinion. — Gerhard Richter
The erasure itself became the action. It seemed to suggest a moment in terms of how sad or pessimistic you can feel in a political environment or a historical situation. But it felt like a really hopeful gesture in the painting. — Julie Mehretu
This generation, raised on "Eyewitness News," conditioned by the instant replay, and spared the illumination that comes from tedious historical study, tends to be even more ahistorical than most. — Harry S. Truman
There is not a truth to be gathered from history more certain, or more momentous, than this: that civil liberty cannot long be separated from religious liberty without danger, and ultimately without destruction to both. Wherever religious liberty exists, it will, first or last, bring in and establish political liberty. — Joseph Story
The career of politics grants a feeling of power. The knowledge of influencing men, of participating in power over them, and above all, the feeling of holding in one's hands a nerve fiber of historically important events can elevate the professional politician above everyday routine even when he is placed in formally modest positions. — Max Weber
My advice to the 10 year old daughter is: fashion happens in a context. It's societal, it's cultural, it's historic, it's economic, and it's political. So all of her studies, everything that is happening in the world, all needs to be channeled through her in order to be a good designer. — Tim Gunn
Racial discrimination in elections in Texas is no mere historical artifact. To the contrary, Texas has been found in violation of the Voting Rights Act in every redistricting cycle from and after 1970. — Ruth Bader Ginsburg
She has slimmed down since the height of impeachment, her thick blow-dried hair as shiny as Russian sable and her creamy cleavage, as historic in its own way as Mount Rushmore, was quite wonderful to behold. — Monica Lewinsky
In historical fact, all of history's despots, combined, never managed to get things done as well as this rambunctious, self-critical civilization of free and sovereign citizens, who have finally broken free of worshipping a ruling class and begun thinking for themselves. Democracy can seem frustrating and messy at times, but it delivers. — David Brin
The Congress has historically played covert communal politics in order to create what in India we call vote banks where you pit one community against another and so on in order to secure votes. — Arundhati Roy
The Russian drama began at the end of 1991, when the Soviet Union mercifully ended. Russia and 14 other new countries emerged from the ruins of the Soviet Union. Every one of those 15 new states faced a profound historical, economic, financial, social and political challenge. — Jeffrey Sachs
In historical and constitutional terms, the recent political status vote in Puerto Rico was a necessary but obviously not decisive step on the road of self-determination leading to full self-government. — Dick Thornburgh
From a historical viewpoint, religion is just a kind of superstition, and from a political viewpoint it is a tool of social control. — Mario Bunge
I am a political animal, because for God's sakes I think "We The People" is a job. I think experienced self government demands on all levels - intellectual, moral, historical, and spiritual level. We are supposed to be engaged and give directions to our elected employees. — Ted Nugent
Today's Politically Correct "historical Jesuses" are no different, being mere clones of the scholars who design them. — Robert M. Price
How does a country deal with the fact that some of its most revered historical figures had certain moral values and political views virtually identical to Nazis? — Robert Jensen
Density, complexity, and historical-semantic value that is so strong as to make politics possible... Gramsci's insight is to have recognised that subordination, fracturing, diffusion, reproducing, as much as producing, creating, forcing, guiding, are necessary aspects of elaboration. — Edward Said
It was the French Revolution that served as the catalyst of this renovation. Its impact was to make the concept of popular sovereignty the new moral justification for the political system of historical capitalism. — Immanuel Wallerstein
...the crimes of violence committed for selfish, personal motives are historically insignificant compared to those committed ad majorem gloriam Dei, out of a self-sacrificing devotion to the flag, a leader, a religeous faith or political conviction. — Arthur Koestler
In Conclusion
Which quotation resonated with you best? Did you enjoy our collection of historical political quotes? Or may be you have a slogan about historical political to suggest. Let us know using our contact form.
Citation
Feel free to cite and use any of the quotes in this collection of historical political quotations. For popular citation styles(APA, Chicago, MLA), please use this citation page.
