Mark Twain Politics Quotes & Sayings

The political and commercial morals of the United States are not merely food for laughter, they are an entire banquet. — Mark Twain

When politics enter into municipal government, nothing resulting therefrom in the way of crimes and infamies is then incredible. It actually enables one to accept and believe the impossible ... — Mark Twain

It is by the goodness of god that in our country we have those 3 unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them. — Mark Twain

Few things are more irritating than when someone who is wrong is also very effective in making his point. — Mark Twain

Conservatism is the blind and fear-filled worship of dead radicals. — Mark Twain

One of the first achievements of the legislature was to institute a ten-thousand-dollar agricultural fair to show off forty dollars' worth of pumpkins in - however, the Territorial legislature was usually spoken of as the "asylum". — Mark Twain

The government of my country snubs honest simplicity but fondles artistic villainy, and I think I might have developed into a very capable pickpocket if I had remained in the public service a year or two. — Mark Twain

No country can be well governed unless its citizens as a body keep religiously before their minds that they are the guardians of the law, and that the law officers are only the machinery for its execution, nothing more. — Mark Twain

Thanksgiving Day, a function which originated in New England two or three centuries ago when those people recognized that they really had something to be thankful for
annually, not oftener
if they had succeeded in exterminating their neighbors, the Indians, during the previous twelve months instead of getting exterminated by their neighbors, the Indians. Thanksgiving Day became a habit, for the reason that in the course of time, as the years drifted on, it was perceived that the exterminating had ceased to be mutual and was all on the white man's side, consequently on the Lord's side; hence it was proper to thank the Lord for it and extend the usual annual compliments. — Mark Twain

Demagogue
a vessel containing beer and other liquids. — Mark Twain

I ascribe to Mark Twain's theory that the last person who should be President is the one who wants it the most. The one who should be picked is the one who should be dragged kicking and screaming into the White House. — Bill Hicks

Reader, suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself. — Mark Twain

Where every man in a state has a vote, brutal laws are impossible. — Mark Twain

In light matters
matters of small consequence, like religion and politics and such things
he never acquired a conviction that could survive a disapproving remark from a cat. — Mark Twain

I was an arden Hayes man, but that was natural, for I was pretty young at the time, I have since convinced myself that the political opinioins of a nation are of next to no value, in any case, but that what little rag of value they posess is to be found among the old, rather than among the young. — Mark Twain

How solemn and beautiful is the thought, that the earliest pioneer of civilization, the van-leader of civilization, is never the steamboat, never the railroad, never the newspaper, never the Sabbath-school, never the missionary - but always whiskey! Such is the case. Look history over; you will see. The missionary comes after the whiskey - I mean he arrives after the whiskey has arrived; next comes the poor immigrant, with ax and hoe and rifle; next, the trader; next, the miscellaneous rush; next, the gambler, the desperado, the highwayman, and all their kindred in sin of both sexes; and next, the smart chap who has bought up an old grant that covers all the land; this brings the lawyer tribe; the vigilance committee brings the undertaker. All these interests bring the newspaper; the newspaper starts up politics and a railroad; all hands turn to and build a church and a jail - and — Mark Twain

In the beginning of a change the patriot is a scarce man, and brave, and hated and scorned. When his cause succeeds, the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a patriot. — Mark Twain

If we would learn what the human race really is at bottom, we need only observe it in election times. — Mark Twain

There are some natures which never grow large enough to speak out and say a bad act is a bad act, until they have inquired into the politics or the nationality of the man who did it. — Mark Twain

The new political gospel: public office is private graft. — Mark Twain

Why waste your money looking up your family tree? Just go into politics and your opponent will do it for you. — Mark Twain

Look at the tyranny of party
at what is called party allegiance, party loyalty
a snare invented by designing men for selfish purposes
and which turns voters into chattels, slaves, rabbits; and all the while, their masters, and they themselves are shouting rubbish about liberty, independence, freedom of opinion, freedom of speech, honestly unconscious of the fantastic contradiction; and forgetting or ignoring that their fathers and the churches shouted the same blasphemies a generation earlier when they were closing thier doors against the hunted slave, beating his handful of humane defenders with Bible-texts and billies, and pocketing the insults nad licking the shoes of his Southern master. — Mark Twain

Hardly a man in the world has an opinion upon morals, politics or religion which he got otherwise than through his associations and sympathies. Broadly speaking, there are none but corn-pone opinions. And broadly speaking, Corn-Pone stands for Self-Approval. Self-approval is acquired mainly from the approval of other people. The result is Conformity. — Mark Twain

Imagine, if you will, that I am an idiot. Then, imagine that I am also a Congressman. But, alas, I repeat myself. — Mark Twain

I am persuaded that a coldly-thought-out and independent verdict upon a fashion in clothes, or manners, or literature, or politics, or religion, or any other matter that is projected into the field of our notice and interest, is a most rare thing -- if it has indeed ever existed. — Mark Twain

Two things which are the peculiar domain of the heart, not the mind - politics and religion. He doesn't want to know the other side. He wants arguments and statistics for his own side, and nothing more. — Mark Twain

An honest man in politics shines more there than he would elsewhere.
- A Tramp Abroad — Mark Twain

Loyalty to country ALWAYS. Loyalty to government, when it deserves it. — Mark Twain

All war must be just the killing of strangers against whom you feel no personal animosity; strangers whom, in other circumstances, you would help if you found them in trouble, and who would help you if you needed it. — Mark Twain

Fleas can be taught nearly anything a congressman can. — Mark Twain

Politicians and diapers must be changed often, and for the same reason. — Mark Twain

I hate to hear people say this Judge will vote so and so, because he is a Democrat
and this one so and so because he is a Republican. It is shameful. The Judges have the Constitution for their guidance; they have no right to any politics save the politics of rigid right and justice when they are sitting in judgment upon the great matters that come before them. — Mark Twain

I am quite sure now that often, very often, in matters concerning religion and politics a man's reasoning powers are not above the monkey's. — Mark Twain

In truth I care little about any party's politics-the man behind it is the important thing. — Mark Twain

In religion and politics people's beliefs and convictions are in almost every case gotten at second-hand, and without examination, from authorities who have not themselves examined the questions at issue but have taken them at second-hand from other non-examiners, whose opinions about them were not worth a brass farthing. — Mark Twain