Quotes & Sayings About Conservative Values

Making the case (for same-sex marriage) from a conservative values perspective is an imperative, not an option. — Ken Mehlman

We have to wonder what this might suggest about the relationship between the public realm and private lives in our settlement.
Some have proposed that we need to do more in encouraging individual interests and pursuits, even if they don't appear terribly useful or practical, to bolster and deepen those inner reserves that "make" a person into who she is, and how, by extension, she identifies and values herself. Other, more conservative, voices balk at this, countering that we need, in fact, to strengthen the bonds of the commune, so that to end one's own life would be tantamount to a grievous assault on us all ... But if we calm ourselves and open our eyes and step back far enough, we have to admit that our society, if not fundamentally unwell, has been profoundly wounded. — Chang-rae Lee

As one of the most conservative members of Congress and a staunch supporter of the 2nd Amendment, I am constantly under attack for my values and beliefs. — Paul Broun

Many millennials...feel "unsafe" if someone they disagree with speaks at an event they don't have to attend on their campus....they're trying to figure out what gender they are and which bathroom they should be using. It's not an improvement....Snowflakes may melt when the going gets tough, but kids who are taught good, conservative values will stand tall even when it's not easy. — John Hawkins

What used to be considered conservative values ... are increasingly becoming more mainstream values. — Preston Manning

After a few Republicans on the Houston city council supported the Democratic majority's proposal that stalled cars be towed immediately off the city's notoriously clotted freeways, local Republican officials promised retribution. 'We're not looking for council members who are going to go along and get along,' said Jared Woodfill, chairman of the Harris County Republican Party. 'We're looking for council members who are going to stand up for conservative values.' Surely, political ideology has teetered over some high cliff when towing can be described as a 'value.' What's next, a doctrine of potholes, the water pressure credo? — Bill Bishop

Corporatist attitudes against capitalism came to the fore in the 1920s. Corporatists, with their conservative values, hated the invasion of towns and regions by new businesses, upsetting traditional ways, wealth and status. — Edmund Phelps

On issue after issue, the counterpoints to the conservative principle of the free market are the progressive principles of human dignity and the common good. We are interested in a market that serves human values, not humans who serve a market. Take — George Lakoff

On issue after issue, the polls - and these are not snapshot polls; these are polls over a consistent period of time - show that most Americans share what one could call core liberal or progressive values: investment in health care and education over tax cuts; fair trade over free trade; corporate accountability over deregulation; environmental protection over laissez-faire policies; defending Social Security and Medicare over privatizing them; raising the minimum wage over eliminating it. The country prefers progressive alternatives to the failed policies of the conservative right. — Katrina Vanden Heuvel

When I say that Latinos share conservative values, when Ronald Reagan said that, we mean the love of family, the love of country, a commitment to personal responsibility, to hard work. — Lionel Sosa

I've been a Republican all my life because I embrace the conservative values of hard work, personal freedom, less government and fewer taxes. But I also believe in compassion, inclusion, and helping those who want to help themselves. — Lionel Sosa

I want to lead the Progressive Conservative Party, a party that will promote true conservative values and principles. I can tell you right now, I am not the merger candidate. I am not interested in institutional marriages with other parties. — Peter MacKay

The Obama administration has a nasty habit of equating basic conservative values with terrorism. — Tom Fitton

Scranton describing Sen. Robert A. Taft's conservatism as compared to Goldwater's said Taft was a conservative in the truest sense of the word. He sought to conserve all the human values that have been carried down to us on a long stream of American history. He saw history as the foundation on which a better future might be built, not a Technicolor fantasy behind which the problems of the present might be concealed. — Rick Perlstein

Conservative principles place growth and opportunity at the forefront, and I look forward to the RNC continuing to promote those values in communities across the nation as we grow the party. — Tim Scott

I'll tell you, in my life I've never once have seen a Hispanic panhandler, because in our community, it would be viewed as shameful to be out on the street begging. Those are all conservative values - faith, family, hard work, responsibility. — Ted Cruz

And Republican women have always been the backbone of our party. We do the work, we are strong believers in conservative values. Having more of those voices in place at a state level is going to be a great improvement for us as a party. — Kerry Healey

My mother's side of the family is Methodist, which is how I was raised. It was conservative in that I had strong values - sitting down and eating with the family every day, listening to authority and going to church every week and having perfect attendance at Sunday school. — Jonathan Groff

I hear very little from evangelicals about the impact of gun proliferation on violent crime, much less an issue like nuclear disarmament. I hear almost nothing about health care for the poor and protecting widows and orphans, both biblical mandates, and scant mention of the thirteen million children who die worldwide from malnutrition in a year. I hear scornful dismissal of concerns about global warming, an issue viewed seriously by the vast majority of scientists. I hear talk about family values, but when an administration proposed legislation to allow mothers to take unpaid leave after childbirth, conservative religious groups opposed it. — Philip Yancey

As we pointed out, the common principles of conservative thought make up a list crying out for an explanation of how they fit together: smaller government; strong defense; lower taxes; traditional family values; personal responsibility; and free markets. As we have seen, these all flow from a strict father morality. Finally, — George Lakoff

Whatever the self-righteous excesses of the environmentalist left, it is impossible to be true to traditional conservative values (to say nothing of the Christian faith conservatives like me profess) and hold laissez faire attitudes about the use and abuse of the natural world. — Rod Dreher

Are public school textbooks biased? Are they censored? The answer to both is yes. And the nature of the bias is clear: Religion, traditional family values, and conservative political and economic positions have been reliably excluded from children's textbooks. — Paul Vitz

Our shared conservative values, our belief in the individual is the great hope of our nation. — Rick Perry

I think I'm the best candidate not just to beat President Obama, but to do what is necessary to get this country going, a conviction conservative who can rally the American public around a common set of values. — Rick Santorum

Hispanic values are conservative values. Hispanics are highly religious, they're very strongly pro-traditional family ... not only pro-family, but also pro-life. They are highly patriotic. — Rafael Cruz

Joel Kotkin, a professor of urban development, argued in the daily beast that the power of the single voter is destined to fade, since single people "Have no heirs," while their religious, conservative, counterparts will repopulate the nation with children who will replicate their parents politics, ensuring that "conservative, more familial-oriented values inevitably prevail." Kotkin's error, of course, is both in assuming that unmarried people do not reproduce
in fact, they are doing so in ever greater numbers
but also in failing to consider whence the gravitation away from married norms derived. A move toward independent life did not simply emerge from the clamshell: it was born of generations of dissatisfaction with the inequalities of religious, conservative, social practice. — Rebecca Traister

For me, I think being a conservative means you are focused on all four key principles: strong defense, lower taxes, less spending, and defending traditional American values. — Jim Jordan

One good way to understand what conservatism is really about is to use the acronym FLINT to remember five core concepts: Free enterprise, Limited government, Individual liberty, National defense, and Traditional values. These five principles are a good summary of conservative thought in America today. — William J. Bennett

Even what may have seemed, in retrospect, like minor quibbles - over the particular wording of sharia clauses, for example - reflected fundamental divides over the boundaries, limits, and purpose of the nation-state. For liberals, certain rights and freedoms are, by definition, nonnegotiable. They envision the state as a neutral arbiter. Meanwhile, even those Islamists who have little interest in legislating morality see the state as a promoter of a certain set of religious and moral values, through the soft power of the state machinery, the educational system, and the media. For them, these conservative values are not ideologically driven but represent a self-evident popular consensus around the role of religion in public life. The will of the people, particularly when it coincides with the will of God, takes precedence over any presumed international human rights norms. — Shadi Hamid

We have successful, strong-willed, independent women who stand up for conservative, traditional values. Women are leading this movement because they've been raised to be unafraid....I didn't grow up feeling oppressed. I didn't grow up feeling like a victim. — S. E. Cupp

Our only hope for America is that every conservative takes upon him or herself the project of learning what American and conservative values are, coming to understand what leftism stands for, and learning how to make the case for those values to women, young people, blacks and Hispanics. — Dennis Prager

Her philosophy, Objectivism, advocates reason, individualism, and personal happiness. Conservatives are more likely to favor faith, tradition, and duty as core values. Politically, Objectivism is classically liberal or libertarian. It expresses a worldview associated with the Enlightenment. Ayn Rand fundamentally rejected the conservative-liberal distinction in culture. — David Kelley

Patriotism is about improving the lives of one's fellow citizens and improving one's country's contribution to the world. In the conservative moral hierarchy, our country is taken as simply better than other countries. This is jingoism, not true patriotism, which rests on progressive values. — George Lakoff

When I hear Governor Mitt Romney in his speech talk about how the Republican Party must stand for legitimate conservative values. They don't. — Rush Limbaugh

Schooling, by definition, must be conservative. It is naturally dependent on an older generation's level of knowledge and sense of values. — Leon Botstein

Progressives need a collection of proactive policies and communication techniques to get our own values out on our own terms. "War rooms" and "truth squads" must change frames, not reinforce conservative frames. — George Lakoff

For all our alarm, it is clear that the religious right is responding to a real hunger in our society ... a deep-seated yearning for stable values ... When conservative Christian groups talk of failures in our educational system, the erosion of our moral standards, and the waste of young lives, they are addressing real and legitimate concerns ... Among secularists, the aversion toward discussion of moral values, let alone religion, can reach absurd extremes. — Norman Lear

I like to do movies that provoke rather than reinforce conservative values. — Steve Coogan

The typical, well-meaning liberal approach to solving social tensions is to treat every value as equal, and then try to force a leveling or redistribution of resources (money, rights, goods, land) while leaving the values untouched. The typical conservative approach is take its particular values and try to foist them on everybody else. The developmental approach is to realize that there are many different values and worldviews; that some are more complex than others; that many of the problems at one stage of development can only be defused by evolving to a higher level; and that only by recognizing and facilitating this evolution can social justice be finally served. — Ken Wilber

I think the thing that I admire about Rick Santorum is that he hasn't backed down or apologized one bit for his personal religious views, for standing up for social conservative values. — Michelle Malkin

Look, I think Hispanic community - the values that resonate in our community are fundamentally conservative. They are faith, family and patriotism. — Ted Cruz

Harris Very interesting. So when we talk about a phenomenon like honor killing, we're not just worried about Islamists; we're worried about how the average conservative Muslim man will treat his wife or daughter in light of his religious beliefs and cultural values. And yet many of these conservatives may be opponents of Islamism. Nawaz Yes. Conservative Muslims can be very useful as allies against Islamism and jihadism, but they may oppose you on gender rights and equality and, in some cases, honor killings. — Sam Harris

That the religious right completely took over the word Christian is a given. At one time, phrases such as Christian charity and Christian tolerance were used to denote kindness and compassion. To perform a "Christian" act meant an act of giving, of acceptance, of toleration. Now, Christian is invariably linked to right-wing conservative political thought
Christian nation, Christian morality, Christian values, Christian family. — Peter McWilliams

The [nonprofit] sector is the natural home of nonmajoritarian impulses, movements and values. It comfortably harbors innovators, maverick movements, groups which feel they must fight for their place in the sun, and critics of both liberal conservative persuasion. — John W. Gardner

Those who consider themselves 'Conservative' frequently identify with family values, so they should consider carefully the fact that in 1960, only 18% of women with children were in the workforce. Currently that number is 71.3%. Granted, some of this represents 'career women' who do so by choice, but one need only look at their own friends and neighbors to realize that the vast majority work because they must. — Joseph Befumo

The values to which the conservative appeals are inevitably caricatured by the individuals designated to put them into practice. — Harold Rosenberg

We've got the wind at our back right now. Americans are waking up to the realities of their previous choices. We must keep America moving back to preeminence because our values and conservative ideas are the world's greatest hope. — Rick Perry

The privatization of education means that conservatives can set up their own schools in which their children will not have to learn about anything that might be inconsistent with conservative morality and politics. It would also mean a move away from the integration of schools, which means that the children of conservatives would not have to encounter students from different subcultures with different values. School vouchers would make privatization that much easier. In — George Lakoff

My hypothesis is that conservative Republicans have very clear values, and when you have that, you're simply more relaxed. — Helen Fisher

I think the Hispanic community, the values that resonate in our community, are fundamentally conservative. They are faith, family, patriotism. — Ted Cruz

A person of faith who shares conservative values and who says very clearly that climate change is real - and here's why we have to care about it - I think that we "unicorns" do pose a threat to people who want to muddy the waters and keep others in the dark. — Katharine Hayhoe

We must put behind us the tribalism and divisions seen in the referendum between Leave and Remain and focus on defining our place in the world, healing our wonderful nation and putting core Conservative principles and values into action. — Priti Patel

I believe that we are missing a great opportunity. We as Republicans are not really emphasizing what brings us together, and that's conservative values: love of the country. Love of family. Personal responsibility. Hard work. Optimism. Those are the things that we should be communicating to Latinos, and we're doing that very poorly. — Lionel Sosa

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to represent you in the United States House of Representatives. Together, we will continue fighting to protect our Texas conservative values and the preservation of the America we know and love for future generations to come. — Mike Conaway

I like the Growth and Opportunity Project. These are good conservative values, proving the core of the GOP is just that: conservative. — L. Brent Bozell Jr.

Planned Parenthood, we're going to get rid of that. — Mitt Romney

I went into the ministry to use the church to elicit political change according to a soft Marxist vision of wealth distribution and proletarian empowerment. Edrita [his wife] could sense that I was on a long and uncertain path. She was always more conservative than I, but she did share my basic social values and was willing at least to let me test my political follies ... Whenever I read the New Testament after 1950, I was trying to read it entirely without its crucial premises of incarnation and resurrection. That required a lot of circular reasoning for me to establish what the text said. I habitually assumed that truth in religion was finally reducible to economics (with Marx) or psychosexual motives (with Freud) or self assertive power (with Nietzsche). It was truly a self-deceptive time for me, but I had no inkling of its insidious dangers. — Thomas C. Oden

For conservatives, the issue is that for generations now, they have failed to make the case for their values. They haven't even conveyed conservative values to many of their children. And when they have, the university has often succeeded in undoing them. — Dennis Prager

To all of you who are Republicans of long standing, I hope you appreciate that I always tried to stand for conservative values. — Richard Mourdock

To many of my liberal and atheist friends and colleagues, an explanation for religious beliefs such as what I have presented in this book is tantamount to discounting both its internal validity and its external reality. Many of my conservative and theist friends and colleagues take it this way as well and therefore bristle at the thought that explaining a belief explains it away. This is not necessarily so. Explaining why someone believes in democracy does not explain away democracy; explaining why someone who holds liberal or conservative values within a democracy does not explain away those values. — Michael Shermer

The last generation's Religious Right activism was, to the contrary, the exact opposite, affirming and reaffirming that they were not a theological movement but a political one. The tent was broad enough to include evangelical Protestants, Roman Catholics, Latter-day Saints, Orthodox Jews, and even socially conservative agnostics and atheists.7 The rhetoric was focused much less on the kingdom of God or on the gospel of Christ than on "traditional family values" or "our Judeo-Christian heritage. — Russell D. Moore

If you're a person of faith that is conservative, that's pro-life, as I am, that believes strongly in traditional family values, as I do ... then how we talk about them matters. — Kevin Cramer

Let Detroit go bankrupt. — Mitt Romney

The right-wing Tories and the conservative Whigs fought Napoleon as the Usurper and the Enemy of the Established Order; the liberal Tories and the radical Whigs fought him as the Betrayer of the Revolution and the Enslaver of Europe; they were all agreed in fighting him, and his notion that their disagreement signified national disunion was mere wishful thinking. All dictators since his time have fallen into the same trap: themselves blind to the values of liberty, they cannot conceive that people who disagree on its meaning can nevertheless unite in upholding their freedoms against patent despotism. — J. Christopher Herold

I am like all other atheists only in that I do not believe there are any gods. Beyond that, I may differ dramatically in my values and beliefs from any other atheist. On both sides of the political spectrum, one can find the neo-conservative Objectivists and the ultra-liberal Communists, both of whom hate each other. These two factions take up nearly opposite sets of values, yet both are comprised of unabashed atheists. — Richard Carrier

Am I conservative? Yes, I am. I would have thought conservative is very much middle of the road, representative of the aspirational values of the Australian people. The extreme right has connotations with it that I would never seek to identify with. — Eric Abetz

Part of the reason I am so evangelical in our campaigning work is that I had an unshakeable faith in Labour values, but we needed a machine worthy of the message. I grew up with a peerless Conservative machine, with vastly superior resources. — Douglas Alexander

I was speaking on the radio in South Texas [in 2016], and I was speaking to Hispanics, and I said 'You know, you probably vote Democrat because your parents always voted Democrat, and your grandparents always voted Democrat, but let me tell you something. Thirty years ago in Texas, there were two parties - liberal Democrats and conservative Democrats. Looking at your principles, your values as Hispanics, in all probability your parents were conservative Democrats. The conservative Democrats of 30 years ago are Republicans today!' — Rafael Cruz

There are conservative values where certain lifestyles are imposed and everybody should have 2.4 children and a dog and a cat and a house and you should feel like God and you should believe in God and you should be a capitalist. I don't buy any of that. — Steve Coogan

There are three principal conservative descriptions of conservatism. 1. Conservatism is against big government. 2. Conservatism is for traditional values. 3. Conservatism is just what the Bible tells us. We — George Lakoff

I think Hispanic community - the values that resonate in our community are fundamentally conservative. They are faith, family and patriotism. Do you know the rate of military enlistment among Hispanics is higher than any demographic in this country? And they are also hard work and responsibility. — Ted Cruz

This has led evangelicals to ethnocentrism, to asserting their historically contingent cultural values as "biblical truth." In the conservative direction, this has closed off productive dialogue between evangelicals and mainline Christians on gay marriage - because if the Bible has an obvious stance on the matter, as most evangelicals believe, the other side must be intentionally denying the truth. In the liberal direction, this has led green evangelicals to ignore the role contemporary experiences and theology have played in their reinterpretation of the Bible on environmental matters. — Jonathan Dudley

We conservatives bemoan the decline in values that has besieged our society. Why then should we not abhor the lack of morality involved in discharging untested chemicals into the air, ground, and water to alter and harm, to whatever degree, human life and wildlife? As a conservative, I do abhor it. — Wendell Berry

There's a natural tendency for children to, in some sense, inherit the cultural values of their parents. I'm not against that, that's fine, that's wonderful. What I am against is labelling. Nobody ever labels a child a cricketer because his father is a cricketer, but they do label a child a Catholic because his parents are Catholic. I think it's more or less unique. Nobody ever labels a child a socialist or a conservative or a liberal because that's what their parents are. — Richard Dawkins

We must not allow the liberals to move us away from the conservative values of the American past which sustain our present and shall secure our future. As for me and my family, we will serve God, we will serve this constitutional republic, we will serve America. — Allen West

Let's stand up. Let's speak with pride about our morals and our values and redouble our effort to elect more conservative Republicans. — Rick Perry

When we talk about values, I think of rationality in solving problems. That's something I value. [Values are things like] Fairness, kindness, generosity, tolerance. When they [Conservative right wing Republicans] talk about values, they're talking about things like going to church, voting for Bush, being loyal to Jesus, praying. These are not values. — Bill Maher

We need a strong, bold constitutional conservative who won't back down and who will fight for the values we believe in. That's what we need for our nominee, whether it is me or whether it is someone else. — Michele Bachmann

I want you to answer this question: Why should you settle for anything less than an authentic conservative who will fight for your views and values without an apology? Think about that. — Rick Perry

Conservative values aren't really reflected in the radical values of the NRA. And the other idea was that the NRA is not what you think it is: It's an evolving, ever-changing organization, and it has not always been this radical, right-wing arm of the Republican Party, and that the history of the NRA is in fact really interesting. — Abigail Disney

Conservatives like to talk about 'the strivers' who share what they like to think of as Conservative values. But as I found in my Blue Collar Tories research in 2012, such people no longer see the party as their natural ally. — Michael Ashcroft

I've got to put forward a very strong conservative voice, advocate for conservative values and advocate for principle in politics to restore faith in politics. — Cory Bernardi