Quotes & Sayings About Democratic Principles

When the United States was founded, the very idea of a nation premised on democratic principles of freedom and tolerance was viewed by the vast majority of the world as an experiment doomed to fail. Dictatorships, monarchies, and theocracies had for many centuries ruled the world. — Eliot Spitzer

Companies that are willing to share, to withhold in order to further the growth of the company, willing to try to get a better atmosphere through a demonstration of democratic principles, fairness and cooperation, a better product, those will win in the end. — E. O. Wilson

Many think it not only inevitable but entirely proper that liberty give way to security in times of national crisis
that, at the extremes of military exigency, inter arma silent leges. Whatever the general merits of the view that war silences law or modulates its voice, that view has no place in the interpretation and application of a Constitution designed precisely to confront war and, in a manner that accords with democratic principles, to accommodate it. — Antonin Scalia

Modern political systems are labeled liberal democracies because they unite two disparate principles. Liberalism is based on a rule of law that maintains a level playing field for all citizens, particularly the right to private property, which is critical for economic growth and prosperity. The democratic part, political choice, is the enforcer of communal choices and accountable to the citizenry as a whole. Over the past few years, we've witnessed revolts around the world of the democratic part of this equation against the liberal one. — Francis Fukuyama

Democratic principles are the result of equality of condition. — Mercy Otis Warren

Finally, it was about how people treat one another. It was about human dignity. We forced the employers to treat us as equals, to sit down and talk to us about the work we do, how we do it, and what we get paid for it. And I believe that the principles for which we fought in 1934 are still true and still useful. Whether your job is pushing a four-wheeler, or programming a computer, I don't know of any way for working people to win basic economic justice and dignity except by being organized into a solid, democratic union. — Harry Bridges

International affairs must be completely permeated with scientific methodology and a democratic spirit, with a fearless weighing of all facts, views, and theories, with maximum publicity of ultimate and intermediate goals, and with a consistency of principles. — Andrei Sakharov

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

America now is stumbling through the darkness of hatred and divisiveness. Our values, our principles, and our determination to succeed as a free and democratic people will give us a torch to light the way. And we will survive and become the strongernot only because of a patriotism that stands for love of country, but a patriotism that stands for love of people. — Gerald R. Ford

When the United States aligns with dictatorships and totalitarian regimes, it compromises the basic democratic principles of its foundation - namely, life, liberty and justice for all. — Benazir Bhutto

Alliances are crucial to success in the political sphere. However, if we are to approach other organizations to propose alliances for the public good, we must be prepared to assert a far more important role for the library. We must clearly define what we do and establish and assert the relationship of libraries to basic democratic freedoms, to the fundamental humanistic principles that are central to our very way of life ... — Arthur Curley

The traditional Jeffersonian principle of religious freedom was so broadly democratic that it included the right to have no religion at all - it gave to the individual the right to worship any God he chose or no god. — Franklin D. Roosevelt

Democracy is about the conditions that make it possible for ordinary people to better their lives by becoming political beings and by making power responsive to their hopes and needs. What is at stake in democratic politics is whether ordinary men and women can recognize that their concerns are best protected and cultivated under a regime whose actions are governed by principles of commonality, equality, and fairness, a regime in which taking part in politics becomes a way of staking out and sharing in a common life and its forms of self-fulfillment. Democracy is not about bowling together but about managing together those powers that immediately and significantly affect the lives and circumstances of others and one's self. — Sheldon S. Wolin

I will, based on the existing ROC constitutional system, based on democratic principles, on the basis of the largest public opinion, promote cross-strait policy. — Tsai Ing-wen

In order every one in our homeland learns principles of democracy and the peaceful transition of power, and in order to stabilize and develop multiple choices in democratic practice. — Ali Abdullah Saleh

Bill C-9 was supposed to be a budget bill, but it came with innumerable measures that had little or nothing to do with the nation's finances. It was, as critics put it, the advance of the Harper agenda by stealth, yet another abuse of the democratic process. The bill was a behemoth. It was 904 pages, with 23 separate sections and 2,208 individual clauses ...
As a Reform MP, [Stephen Harper] ... said of one piece of legislation that 'the subject matter of the bill is so diverse that a single vote on the content would put members in conflict with their own principles.' The bill he referred to was 21 page long
or 883 pages shorter than the one he was now putting before Parliament. — Lawrence Martin

I confess that during the citizenship application process the founding principles of this country have grown on me. I have come to believe in the ideal that "We the People" can come together "to form a more perfect Union". The United States represent the most awesome social experiment in the world - a melting pot of cultures, united behind the idea of living free in a democratic Republic. — Gudjon Bergmann

Real democracy is only possible when people truly imbibe democratic principles and respect ethical values above everything else. — Nirmala Srivastava

These core principles - helping patients, preventing medical errors, promoting best practices and improving quality - are the reasons that health IT is featured in both the 2012 Republican platform and 2012 Democratic platform. — Sheldon Whitehouse

The [Oregon] Journal in its head and heart will stand for the people, be truly Democratic and free from political entanglements and machinations, believing in the principles that promise the greatest good to the greatest number-to ALL MEN, regardless of race, creed or previous condition of servitude ... It will be a fair newspaper, not a dull and selfish sheet ... — Samuel L. Jackson

The Ukrainian opposition should adopt democratic unity as its main principle, and it also must have one leader. — Zbigniew Brzezinski

The United Nations should become a proactive agent in the dissemination of democratic principles. — Michelle Bachelet

Our country will need real leadership to undo President Obama's failed policies, and replace them with the conservative principles Mitt Romney learned turning around businesses and a failing Olympics and successfully, conservatively governing a Democratic state. I am proud to endorse him and will work my hardest to ensure he is elected so we can turn around our country. — Nikki Haley

Capitalism brainwashes us through advertising and the skewing of priorities ... We need economies that promote human values, seek to limit suffering, and are committed to democratic principles, rather than ones dependent on global trade and a blind commitment to neo-liberal economic policies. — Sulak Sivaraksa

The Democratic Party is now a political mechanism having a genuine political principle: national socialism. — Rose Wilder Lane

In 1988, the Senate passed a Resolution "To acknowledge the contribution of the Iroquois Confederacy of Nations to the development of the United States Constitution," which included affirmations that "the original framers of the Constitution, including, most notably, George Washington and Benjamin Franklin, are known to have greatly admired the concepts of the Six Nations of the Iroquois Confederacy" and "the confederation of the original Thirteen Colonies into one republic was influenced by the political system developed by the Iroquois Confederacy as were many of the democratic principles which were incorporated into the Constitution itself. — Peter Manseau

Imagine, a First World country founded on egalitarian principles in which the top 20 per cent of households have 84 per cent of the wealth, while the bottom 40 per cent have 0.3 per cent; and one family, the Waltons, owns more than the bottom 40 per cent of US families combined; and the ratio of CEO salary to unskilled worker is 354 to 1 (fifty years ago it was 20 to 1). A minimum wage of $7.25 per hour, which is 34 per cent less than workers on the minimum were getting in 1968. More than 20 per cent of children in the United States live in poverty, more than twice the rate of any European country. With a quarter of totalitarian China's population, democratic America has about the same number of people in jail. — Don Watson

Our democratic societies rest on a meritocratic worldview, or at any rate a meritocratic hope, by which I mean a belief in a society in which inequality is based more on merit and effort than on kinship and rents. This belief and this hope play a very crucial role in modern society, for a simple reason: in a democracy, the professed equality of rights of all citizens contrasts sharply with the very real inequality of living conditions, and in order to overcome this contradiction it is vital to make sure that social inequalities derive from rational and universal principles rather than arbitrary contingencies. Inequalities must therefore be just and useful to all, at least in the realm of discourse and as far as possible in reality as well. — Thomas Piketty

Some of our newspapers and magazines are more concerned with the welfare of their advertisers than they are with the dissemination of news and the discussion of matters of lasting importance ... Radio, television, motion pictures, popular books - all contribute ... to ... the stifling of dissent on all but the most banal levels ... a renunciation of the most basic and precious of democratic principles. — J. Paul Getty

Russia does not and cannot have any political choice but democracy. I want to say, and even stress, that we share those universal democratic principles taken around the whole world. — Vladimir Putin

I'm all in favor of the democratic principle that one idiot is as good as one genius, but I draw the line when someone takes the next step and concludes that two idiots are better than one genius. — Leo Szilard

You know, Arabs are critical of United States foreign policy, but they also associate the U.S. with democratic principles and opportunity. — Jehane Noujaim

It is not bad that the main beneficiaries of freedom criticize open societies, where there is much that can be criticized. It is bad if they do so by taking the side of those who seek to destroy these open societies, replacing them with authoritarian regimes, as in Venezuela or Cuba. When many artists and intellectuals betray democratic ideals, they are not betraying abstract principles, but rather the thousands and millions of flesh-and-blood people who, under dictatorships, resist and fight to gain freedom. But the saddest thing is that this betrayal of the victims does not come from principles and convictions but rather from professional opportunism and posturing, gestures and actions adapted to circumstance. Many artists and intellectuals in our times have become very cheap. — Mario Vargas-Llosa

We assume that we can have an exploitive, ruthlessly competitive, profit-for-profit's-sake economy, and yet remain a decent and a democratic nation, as we still apparently wish to think ourselves. This simply means that our highest principles and standards have no practical force or influence and are reduced merely to talk. — Wendell Berry

Throughout out history, when people have looked for new ways to solve their problems, and to uphold the principles of this nation, many times they have turned to political parties. They have often turned to the Democratic Party. — Barbara Jordan

The great decisions of government cannot be dictated by the concerns of religious factions ... We have succeeded for 205 years in keeping the affairs of state separate from the uncompromising idealism of religious groups and we mustn't stop now. To retreat from that separation would violate the principles of conservatism and the values upon which the framers built this democratic republic. — Barry Goldwater

The United States and Israel have enjoyed a friendship built on mutual respect and commitment to democratic principles. Our continuing search for peace in the Middle East begins with a recognition that the ties uniting our two countries can never be broken. — George W. Bush

For I firmly believe that Jewish life, indeed any communal life, can only be organized according to democratic principles. — Theodore Bikel

We love your adherence to democratic principles. — William F. Buckley Jr.

Culture, what you believe, what you value, how you live matters. Now, as fundamental as these principles are, they may become topics of democratic debates from time to time, so it is today with the enduring institution of marriage. Marriage is a relationship between a man and a woman. — Mitt Romney

To honor the legacy of veterans and the democratic principles they fought for, I am glad that I introduced the Korean War Veterans Recognition Act which was enacted in 2009. — Charles B. Rangel

It is a different matter entirely to commit military resources to keep peace in such areas, where often no peace can be kept, or to build nations in our own image before they are ready for our freedoms - or even want them. The military need not do the work of sanctions and diplomacy. As we carry on in this new century, we would do well to remember the importance of balancing the twin goals of our foreign policy: preserving national security and promoting democratic principles. And we must remember that historic conflicts between enemies can be won on moral force, without firing a single bullet or missile; that cultural, market, political, and perhaps religious forces can be far more transformative in areas of the world where chaos and violence reign; and that America can contribute to the building of nations by any and all of these means - while preserving our military and reserving our sovereign right to wage war to maintain true peace. — Jeane Kirkpatrick

In my own experience, I have been amazed to see how unrealistic are the bases for political opinion in general. Only rarely have I found a person who has chosen any particular political party - democratic or totalitarian - through study and comparison of principles. — Joost Meerloo

A man may have strong humanitarian and democratic principles, but if he happens to have been brought up as a bath-taking, shirt-changing lover of fresh air, he will have to overcome certain physical repugnance before he can bring himself to put those principles into practice. — Aldous Huxley

We, as citizens or members of people's organisations, can preserve and nourish basic principles needed for long-term efforts aimed at transforming a totalitarian and war-torn society into a democratic one. — Katarina Kruhonja

He began with the core principle he had intoned at the dawn of his political career 25 years before: A democratic Calvinist in the Netherlands could not vote Democratic in the United States because that party trays its origins to Thomas Jefferson, who in turn had endorsed the principles of the French Revolution. — James Bratt

[T]he democratic principle of "one man, one vote," viewed against a background of voting masses numbering several millions, only serves to demonstrate the pitiful helplessness of the inarticulate individual, who functions at the polls as the smallest indivisible arithmetical (and not always algebraic) unit. He acts in total anonymity, secrecy and legal irresponsibility. — Erik Von Kuehnelt-Leddihn