Active Citizens Quotes & Sayings

Inevitably any series that goes on too long will reach a point where it starts struggling for ideas, so I've always been really aware of getting out while the going's good. — Antony Starr

I confess that when I first read that smog is particularly hazardous to children, senior citizens, and physically active people, for a brief moment I thought, I'm in the clear for at least ten years. — Paula Poundstone

If active or concerned citizens forfeit politics, they thereby abandon their society to its most mediocre and venal public servants — Tony Judt

Government has three primary functions. It should provide for military defense of the nation. It should enforce contracts between individuals. It should protect citizens from crimes against themselves or their property. When government
in pursuit of good intentions tries to rearrange the economy, legislate morality, or help special interests, the cost come in inefficiency, lack of motivation, and loss of freedom. Government should be a referee, not an active player. — Milton Friedman

The thing about insanity is that when you're around it long enough you become part of it. — Marky Ramone

The death-knell of the republic had rung as soon as the active power became lodged in the hands of those who sought, not to do justice to all citizens, rich and poor alike, but to stand for one special class and for its interests as opposed to the interests of others. — Edmund Morris

New possibilities for a more active democracy are beginning to emerge in the information age. Effective citizen action is possible if citizens develop the abilities to gain access to information of all kinds and the skills to put such information to effective use. — Harry Boyte

If nothing were substituted for everything, it would still be too much and too little. — Maurice Blanchot

Using simple equipment and daylight alone is for me a pleasure and a replenishment. — Irving Penn

I don't know how you feel, my brethren and sisters, but I'd rather be dead than to lose my liberty. I have no fear we'll ever lose it because of invasion from the outside. But I do have fear that it may slip away from us because of our own indifference, our own negligence, as citizens of this land. And so I plead with you this morning that you take an active interest in matters pertaining to the future of this country. — Ezra Taft Benson

Sixty years of Western nations excusing and accommodating the lack of freedom in the Middle East did nothing to make us safe because in the long run stability cannot be purchased at the expense of liberty ... The global wave of democracy has barely reached the Arab states. For too long, many people in that region have been victims and subjects. They deserve to be active citizens. — George W. Bush

You can't plan for a seizure of feeling, and for this reason I put everything else aside when I'm inspired. — May Sarton

We do not understand democracy in its bourgeois meaning
of babbling, lack of discipline, anarchy. We understand democracy as the active participation of the citizens in formulating and implementing the Party's policy. — Nicolae Ceausescu

I always see other people as predecessors and admire them. — Judd Apatow

Libraries are more than community centers, just as librarians do more than answer questions you could easily ask Google. From the opening of the BPL, the first public library, to the expansion of public libraries across America through the Carnegie libraries, the library as an institution has been fundamental to the success of our democracy. Libraries provide access to the skills and knowledge necessary to fulfill our role as active citizens. Libraries also function as essential equalizing institutions in our society. For as long as a library exists in most communities, staffed with trained librarians, it remains true that individuals' access to our shared culture is not dictated by however much money they have. — John Palfrey

Frequent worshippers are also significantly more active citizens. They are more likely to belong to community organizations, especially those concerned with young people, health, arts and leisure, neighborhood and civic groups and professional associations. — Jonathan Sacks

Think about it: if you were running a multi-million dollar company, and your database of customer information was stolen, would you want to tell your clients? No. Most companies did not until the laws required them to. It's in the best interest of organisations - when they're attacked and information is stolen - to tell nobody. — Kevin Mitnick

I'm not active in politics. I vote as a citizen, and if somebody cares to know what my opinion is at the time of the election, I might or might not share it publicly. — Colin Powell

There is nothing beyond the reach of ordinary citizens doing the daily work of democracy, and no problem too great to tackle with the power of active citizenship. — Joan Claybrook

For a nation to be truly transformed, there must be movements, civil societies, NGOs that are spread all across the land to educate people on the issues of Personal Responsibility. If a nation or rather active citizens of a nation could successfully launch such campaigns and a good percentage of the populace begin to live by the principles of Personal Responsibility, which is "don't blame others", think of what you can do to fix it. Such a nation would cross the huddle of civilization in a record time. — Sunday Adelaja

In high school, I read 'Silas Marner' and I was very attracted to this character - he was very rundown and he'd just stop, and things would happen around him. — Gus Van Sant

The members of a body-politic call it "the state" when it is passive, "the sovereign" when it is active, and a "power" when they compare it with others of its kind. Collectively they use the title "people," and they refer to one another individually as "citizens" when speaking of their participation in the authority of the sovereign, and as "subjects" when speaking of their subordination to the laws of the state. — Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Therefore, the chief task of the rulers is always to secure the active or resigned acceptance of the majority of the citizens.8, 9 Of course, one method of securing support is through the creation of vested economic interests. — Murray N. Rothbard

A strong defense is the surest way to peace. Strength makes detente attainable. Weakness invites war, as my generationmy generationknows from four very bitter experiences. Just as Americas will for peace is second to none, so will Americas strength be second to none. We cannot rely on the forbearance of others to protect this Nation. The power and diversity of the Armed Forces, active Guard and Reserve, the resolve of our fellow citizens, the flexibility in our command to navigate international waters that remain troubled are all essential to our security. — Gerald R. Ford

This gimmick makes it possible for citizens to raise and decide issues directly. They won't have to wait for the Council to verbalize a measure. Any citizen can transmit his will with one of these, make his needs register on a central control that automatically responds. When a large enough segment of the population wants a certain thing done, these little gadgets set up an active field that touches all the others. An issue won't have to go through a formal Council. The citizens can express their will long before any bunch of gray-haired old men could get around to it. — Anonymous

Most Americans aren't the sort of citizens the Founding Fathers expected; they are contented serfs. Far from being active critics of government, they assume that its might makes it right. — Joseph Sobran

What is this much repeated phrase 'active citizen' supposed to mean? The active citizens are the ones who took the Bastille. — Camille Desmoulins

Clearly, we view Jesus from a considerable historical distance, but, even though Jesus is a historical figure, he is at the same time a timeless figure. He was excruciatingly realistic about human weaknesses, forthright in moral judgment about sin, and active in solving the needs of the poor and hurting. His teachings show how we might be kingdom citizens, and his self-sacrifice shows the extent to which love can go. Indeed, what makes Christian ethics Christian might be summed up in this way: being like the Master and doing as the Master does. — Kent A. Van Til

How could you communicate with the future? It was impossible. Either the future would resemble the present in which case it would not listen to him, or it would be different from it, and his predicament would be meaningless. — George Orwell

As I see it, the aims of education are to enable students to understand the world around them and the talents within them so that they can become fulfilled individuals and active, compassionate citizens. — Ken Robinson

Those who suffer from the abuse of drugs have themselves to blame for it. This does not mean that society is absolved from active concern for their plight. It does mean that their plight is subordinate to the plight of those citizens who do not experiment with drugs but whose life, liberty, and property are substantially affected by the illegalization of the drugs sought after by the minority. — William F. Buckley Jr.

What frightens me about America today is that in the large majority there is no active sense of the value of the individual: few citizens feel that they are the Republic, responsible for what happens. And when the individual in a democracy ceases to feel his importance, then there is grave danger that he will give over his freedom, if not to a Fascist State, then to the advertising men or Publicity Agents or to the newspaper he happens to read. — May Sarton

What motivates me is the desire to bring up a whole new generation of active citizens who believe in peace and social justice and will work for it. — Howard Zinn

Teachers need our active support and encouragement. They are doing one of the most necessary and exacting jobs in the land. They are developing our most precious national resource: our children, our future citizens. — Dwight D. Eisenhower

Our nation will succeed or fail to the degree that all of us - citizens and businesses alike - are active participanats in building strong, sustainable and enriching communities. — Arnold Hiatt

Alexis de Tocqueville warned that as the economy and government of America got bigger, citizens could become smaller: less practiced in the forms of everyday power, more dependent on vast distant social machines, more isolated and atomized--and therefore more susceptible to despotism.

He warned that if the "habits of the heart" fed by civic clubs and active self-government evaporated, citizens would regress to pure egoism. They would stop thinking about things greater than their immediate circle. Public life would disappear. And that would only accelerate their own disempowerment.

This is painfully close to a description of the United States since Trump and Europe since Brexit. And the only way to reverse this vicious cycle of retreat and atrophy is to reverse it: to find a sense of purpose that is greater than the self, and to exercise power with others and for others in democratic life. — Eric Liu

Christians are soldiers of Christ on active duty. As citizens of heaven, they long for their homeland and readily acknowledge their status as pilgrims and sojourners in this present world. One day in the future, Jesus will return to withdraw His troops from this temporary tour of duty called "life." Until that time, the church serves as His outpost on earth. That colony of heaven cannot be defined geographically, but it is no less real. The Lord reigns in the hearts of men and women who have been redeemed by His Son. — Aubrey Johnson

Since predation must be supported out of the surplus of production, it is necessarily true that the class constituting the State - the full-time bureaucracy (and nobility) - must be a rather small minority in the land, although it may, of course, purchase allies among important groups in the population. Therefore, the chief task of the rulers is always to secure the active or resigned acceptance of the majority of the citizens.8, 9 Of — Murray N. Rothbard