Ruling Government Quotes & Sayings

Our system was not set up to for the government to be able to do with a man's kingdom what they want. It was set up to protect that man's kingdom, to allow him to feel that his borders, no matter how great or small, would always be secure and that he would always be allowed to defend them. The Supreme Court took that right away with their eminent domain ruling back in 2005. The governments have taken advantage of that eminent domain ruling, and you, the media, have failed at protecting citizens. — Tit Elingtin

Because you look at it, you know, and there's basically one set of rules that protect that industrial ruling class. That's what the governments do, that's what the religions do. They protect the interests of that industrial ruling class. — John Trudell

What better way for a ruling class to claim and hold power than to pose as the defenders of the nation. — Christopher Hitchens

Vast accession of strength from their younger recruits, who having nothing in them of the feelings or principles of '76 now look to a single and splendid government of an Aristocracy, founded on banking institutions and monied in corporations under the guise and cloak of their favored branches of manufactures commerce and navigation, riding and ruling over the plundered ploughman and beggared yeomanry. — Thomas Jefferson

By its nature, government was either small and personal, something on the level of a town hall meeting, or it was tyranny, with the few ruling the many for their own benefit, no matter how representational that government might be in theory. — William H. Keith Jr.

People who consider themselves educated, open-minded and progressive do not want to think of themselves as the slaves of a master, or even the subjects of a ruling class. Because of this, much rationalizing and obfuscating has been done in an attempt to deny the fundamental nature of "government" as a ruling class. — Larken Rose

Loyalty is an asset, independent and scarce, parceled out among different contestants for power. No ruling government or nonruling group enjoys absolute loyalty - no contestant can have the whole pie. — Yossi Shain

So I do think sometimes the political mechanism is completely disconnected from the people. However, what I will say is that history tells us that whenever things start to move too fast, whenever progress makes people feel a little breathless, one of the go-to spots that government, that the ruling powers that society goes to is to try to repress women. — Anna Quindlen

A theory of the middle class: that it is not to be determined by its financial situation but rather by its relation to government. That is, one could shade down from an actual ruling or governing class to a class hopelessly out of relation to government, thinking of government as beyond its control, of itself as wholly controlled by government. Somewhere in between and In gradations is the group that has the sense that gov't exists for it, and shapes its consciousness accordingly. — Lionel Trilling

It is our happiness to live under the government of a PRINCE who is satisfied with ruling according to law; as every other good prince will - We enjoy under his administration all the liberty that is proper and expedient for us. — Jonathan Mayhew

By the end of the eighteenth century it had become clear that none of the estates or classes in the various countries was willing or able to become the new ruling class, that is to identify itself with the government as the nobility had done for centuries.8 The failure of the absolute monarchy to find a substitute within society led to the full development of the nation-state and its claim to be above all classes, completely independent of society and its particular interests, the true and only representative of the nation as a whole. — Hannah Arendt

The government [...] cannot be anything other than the organization of a minority. It is the aim of this minority to impose upon the rest of society a 'legal order', which is the outcome of the exigencies of dominion and of the exploitation of the mass of helots effected by the ruling minority, and can never be truly representative of the majority. — Robert Michels

The judgment, handed down by Judge Ian Chin of the Sarawak High Court, demonstrated astonishing independence from the Malaysian government. Chin knew the price of that independence. After a much-maligned judgment against a politician belonging to the ruling Barisan National government in 1998, he had been verbally threatened by Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, and then enrolled in a five-day boot camp with other judges for "re-educational" purposes. While there, the primacy of the government's interests was hammered into the judicial civil servants.3 Crushing the independence of the courts was done systematically under Mahathir. In 1988, the autocratic Premier had arbitrarily dismissed the country's top judge, Lord President Salleh Abas, thereby keeping the remaining judges on a short lead.4 Even today, in 2014, Malaysia's judges still have difficulty ruling independently when government interests are at stake. — Lukas Straumann

If the court strikes down the Defense of Marriage Act, is that a 'liberal' result enabling gay couples married in states where gay marriage is legal to enjoy the same economic advantages that federal laws now grant to straight couples? Or is it a 'conservative' ruling, limiting the federal government's ability to override state power? — Jeff Greenfield

Remember one thing as South Africa prepares to go to the polls this week and the world grapples with the ascendancy of the African National Congress leader Jacob Zuma: South Africa is not Zimbabwe.
In South Africa, no one doubts that Wednesday's elections will be free and fair. While there is an unacceptable degree of government corruption, there is no evidence of the wholesale kleptocracy of Robert Mugabe's elite. While there has been the abuse of the organs of state by the ruling ANC, there is not the state terror of Mugabe's Zanu-PF. And while there is a clear left bias to Zuma's ANC, there is no suggestion of the kind of voluntarist experimentation that has brought Zimbabwe to its knees. — Mark Gevisser

I see, ... and with the deepest affliction, the rapid strides with which the federal branch of our government is advancing towards the usurpation of all the rights reserved to the States, and the consolidation in itself of all powers, foreign and domestic; and that, too, by constructions which, if legitimate, leave no limits to their power ... It is but too evident that the three ruling branches of [the Federal government] are in combination to strip their colleagues, the State authorities, of the powers reserved by them, and to exercise themselves all functions foreign and domestic. — Thomas Jefferson

We are giving the citizens of Poland a sense that a reasonable and predictable government is ruling here. — Donald Tusk

The notion that the Supreme Court comes up with the ruling and that automatically subjects the two other branches to following it defies everything there is about the three equal branches of government. The Supreme Court is not the supreme branch. And for God's sake, it isn't the Supreme Being. It is the Supreme Court. — Mike Huckabee

Wars have been waged over millions of square miles, significantly larger than the British Empire at its peak. Historically, Islamic conquests stretched from southern France to the Philippines, from Austria to Nigeria, and from central Asia to New Guinea. The Muslim goal was to have a central government, first at Damascus, and then at Baghdad, later at Cairo, Istanbul, and other imperial centres. The local governors, judges, and other rulers were appointed by the central imperial authorities for far off colonies. Islamic law was introduced as the senior law, whether or not wanted by the local people. Arabic was introduced as the rulers' language, while the local languages frequently disappeared. Then, two classes of residents were established. The native residents paid a tax that their rulers did not have to pay. In each case, these laws allowed the local conquered people less freedom than was given to Muslims. — Anita B. Sulser PhD

Grant that the idea of God is the most splendid single act of the creative human imagination, and that all his multiple faces and attributes correspond to some need and satisfy some deep desire in mankind; still, for the Inquirers, it is impossible not to conclude that this mystical concept has been harnessed rudely to machinery of the most mundane sort, and has been made to serve the ends of an organization which, ruling under divine guidance, has ruled very little better, and in some respects, worse, than certain rather mediocre but frankly manmade systems of government. — Katherine Anne Porter

Churchill admired the division of powers in the American government, but he thought they were copied from much older British practices. In 1950 he said: [T]he division of ruling power has always been for more than 500 years the aim of the British people. The division of power is the keynote of our parliamentary system and of the constitutions we have spread all over the world. The idea of checks and counter checks; the resistance to the theory that one man, or group of men, can by sweeping gestures and decisions reduce all the rest of us to subservience; these have always been the war cries of the British nation and the division of power has always been one of the war cries of the British people. And from here the principle was carried to America. The scheme of the American Constitution was framed to prevent any one man or any one lot, getting arbitrary control of the whole nation. — Larry P Arnn

Under the appeals court ruling, the government must also show more than just friendship between people sharing in inside information in order to establish a benefit - one of the elements of proving insider trading. The court said the person passing on a tip must receive something of some consequence. — Anonymous

Representative government is artifice, a political myth, designed to conceal from the masses the dominance of a self-selected, self-perpetuating, and self-serving traditional ruling class. — Giuseppe Prezzolini

When a man gives himself up to the government of a ruling passion,
or, in other words, when his HOBBY-HORSE grows head- strong,
farewell cool reason and fair discretion. — Laurence Sterne

Instead of a weak and vacillating Government, a single, purposeful, energetic personality is ruling today. — Hjalmar Schacht

Oh, please," said Hessler. "It's your standard false duality designed to draw gullible believers into a world of monochromatic enemies and strip away any moral ambiguity - usually utilized by the ruling government to bolster whatever policies it wishes to implement. — Patrick Weekes

The people I distrust most are those who want to improve our lives but have only one course of action. — Frank Herbert

Governments, if they endure, always tend increasingly toward aristocratic forms. No government in history has been known to evade this pattern. And as the aristocracy develops, government tends more and more to act exclusively in the interests of the ruling class
whether that class be hereditary royalty, oligarchs of financial empires, or entrenched bureaucracy. — Frank Herbert

They looted your public and corporate treasuries, and turned your industries over to nincompoops," he said. "Then they had your Government borrow so heavily from us that we had no choice but to send over an Army of Occupation in business suits. Never before has the Ruling Class of a country found a way to stick other countries with all the responsibilities their wealth might imply, and still remain rich beyond the dreams of avarice! No wonder they thought the comatose Ronald Reagan was a great President! — Kurt Vonnegut

The newspapers are the ruling power. Any other government is reduced to a few marines at Fort Independence. If a man neglects to read the Daily Times, government will go down on its knees to him, for this is the only treason these days. — Henry David Thoreau

I could not move them. They would not even agree to a modification, of the ruling (banning the Rand vaccine), which would at least allow the 100 (cancer) patients at Richmond Heights (Ohio) to complete their injections. The Justice Department was prepared to go along, but the FDA commissioner, Dr. James Goddard, was adamant, even belligerent. It's wrong of the government to snatch away this hope when there is no evidence against its use offered in court. It's damnably wrong. — Stephen Young

Nothing genuinely historical was ever lost in this country. For this reason we have two ruling parties: villains and fools. — Franz Grillparzer

When mankind first saw the necessity of government, it is probable that many had conceived the desire of ruling. — Thomas Clarkson

Government is a ruling structured thuggery. — Toba Beta

It is only in relation to state action that the interests of different men become welded into "classes," for state action must always privilege one or more groups and discriminate against others. The homogeneity emerges from the intervention of the government in society. Thus, under feudalism or other forms of "land monopoly" and arbitrary land allocation by the government, the feudal landlords, privileged by the state, become a "class' (or "caste" or "estate"). And the peasants, homogeneously exploited by state privilege, also become a class. For the former thus constitute a "ruling class" and the latter the "ruled. — Murray N. Rothbard

In Parton's telling, the Village is "a permanent D.C. ruling class who has managed to convince themselves that they are simple, puritanical, bourgeois burghers and farmers, even though they are actually celebrity millionaires influencing the most powerful government on earth."17 It's not just the activist base of the left and the right who have recognized the widespread elite failure; more and more individual elites have broken ranks to acknowledge their own responsibility. — Christopher L. Hayes

The capitalist class rules but does not govern: it contents itself with ruling the government. — Karl Kautsky

Singling out political opponents for working against the ruling party is precisely the tactic of every tyrannical government from Red China to Venezuela. The first step in the process is creating unfounded public suspicion of political opponents, followed by arresting and jailing any who continue speaking against the regime. — John Carter

With a [democratic] government anyone in principle can become a member of the ruling class or even the supreme power. The distinction between the rulers and the ruled as well as the class consciousness of the ruled become blurred. The illusion even arises that the distinction no longer exists: that with a public government no one is ruled by anyone, but everyone instead rules himself. Accordingly, public resistance against government power is systematically weakened. While exploitation and expropriation before might have appeared plainly oppressive and evil to the public, they seem much less so, mankind being what it is, once anyone may freely enter the ranks of those who are at the receiving end. Consequently, [exploitation will increase], whether openly in the form of higher taxes or discretely as increased governmental money "creation" (inflation) or legislative regulation. — Hans-Hermann Hoppe

The newspapers could differ sharply on some questions because many were aligned with, or even sponsored financially by, either the ruling government or the opposition party, and tailored their coverage accordingly. — Jane Austen

A hereditary monarch is as absurd a position as a hereditary doctor or mathematician. — Thomas Paine

There could be nothing more fortunate for human affairs than that by the mercy of God they who are endowed with true piety of life if they have the skill for ruling people should also have the power. — Augustine Of Hippo

The ruling classes use broken and smashed up childhoods as weaponised instruments of domination around the world. This is why the government has no incentive to end child abuse; because the government needs abuse victims as enforcers. — Stefan Molyneux

Consequently, citizen legislators, rotating back to their communities after a short period of public service - considered an indispensable and routine characteristic and design of representative government at the time of the founding, and for a century thereafter - have been replaced with a professional ruling class led by governing masterminds. For the most part, they are isolated from the communities from which they hail and are consumed with the daily jockeying for position and power within their ranks. Moreover, they both pander to and lord over their constituents. — Mark R. Levin

Uncertainty is one of government recipes. — Toba Beta

Every single person in the government swears an oath to the very same constitution, to abide by the laws in pursuance of this constitution, and they all have the responsibility to follow its plain words ... If a judge makes a ruling that is contrary to the plain words of the Constitution, then it's not law, it's just his bad opinion! — Jim Babka

One can see [ ... ] that the so-called governing powers are cardboard characters that mask the true ruling factors of our culture. Of course, those who manipulate the nation are not stupid. Rulers throughout history are only as powerful as the people who support them allow them to be. — Peter Moon

I will only ask you to believe one thing. I have faith in myself. I believe that I am the man to guide England through the days of crisis that I see coming. If I did not honestly believe that I am needed by my country to steer the ship of state, I would not have done what I have done--made the best of both worlds--saved myself from disaster by a clever trick.'

'My lord, if you could not make the best of both worlds, you could not be a politician. — Agatha Christie

The country is headed toward a single and splendid government of an aristocracy founded on banking institutions and moneyed incorporations and if this tendency continues it will be the end of freedom and democracy, the few will be ruling ... I hope we shall ... crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations which dare already to challenge our government to trial and bid defiance to the laws of our country. I sincerely believe that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies. — Thomas Jefferson

With a nonviolent movement we are still inviting a strong reaction from the government or ruling authorities. We are inviting a powerful reaction against ourselves. But it undermines the moral legitimacy of our current government. That is the path we need to pursue. Rather than reinforcing their legitimacy we need to undermine their legitimacy. — Tim DeChristopher

The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country ... We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society ... In almost every act of our daily lives, whether in the sphere of politics or business, in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of persons ... who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they who pull the wires which control the public mind. — Edward L. Bernays

The Chinese government launched China's first 24-hour news channel. And since the channel will only report stories that are favorable to the ruling party, they've decided to call it Fox News. — Conan O'Brien

the single ruling party remains in control while a wide range of conversations about the country's problems nonetheless occurs on websites and social-networking services. The government follows this online chatter, and sometimes people are able to use the Internet to call attention to social problems or injustices and even manage to have an impact on government policies. As a result, the average person with Internet or mobile access has a much greater sense of freedom - and may feel that he has the ability to speak and be heard - in ways that were not possible under classic authoritarianism. — Larry Diamond

Thus, seeking to produce a typology of forms of the art of government, La Mothe Le Vayer, in a text from the following century (consisting of educational writings intended for the French Dauphin), says that there are three fundamental types of government, each of which relates to a particular science or discipline: the art of self-government, connected with morality; the art of properly governing a family, which belongs to economy; and finally the science of ruling the state, which concerns politics. What matters, notwithstanding this typology, is that the art of government is always characterized by the essential continuity of one type with the other, and of second type with the third. — Michel Foucault

A ruling government can't afford to publish history
in a version which lessens its' chance for reelection. — Toba Beta

In which, if any, of these constitutions do we find the art of ruling being practiced in the actual government of men? What art is more difficult to learn? But what art is more important to us? — Plato

The Jeffersonians "hated and feared" the Jacobin concept of a "general will," wrote Felix Morley in Freedom and Federalism.29 For if "the general will" were to become a practical reality regarding the operation of government, then all voluntary associations must be subjected to government regulation and control in the name of "the people" and their "will" - as interpreted by a ruling elite. This would be the road to serfdom and the end of individual liberty. — Thomas J. DiLorenzo

It is not necessary for the politician to be the slave of the public's group prejudices, if he can learn how to mold the mind of the voters in conformity with his own ideas of public welfare and public service. The important thing for the statesman of our age is not so much to know how to please the public, but to know how to sway the public. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. — Edward Bernays

[representative government is] deciding once in three or six years which member of the ruling class was to misrepresent the people in Parliament, — Karl Marx