Walter E. Williams Quotes - Page 3

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• The bottom line is that we've become a nation of thieves, a value rejected by our founders. James Madison, the father of our Constitution, was horrified when Congress appropriated $15,000 to help French refugees. He said, 'I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents.' Tragically, today's Americans would run Madison out of town on a rail.

  Walter E. Williams

  Running, Father, Thieves

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• However, if we wish to be compassionate with our fellow man, we must learn to engage in dispassionate analysis. In other words, thinking with our hearts, rather than our brains, is a surefire method to hurt those whom we wish to help.

  Walter E. Williams

  Hurt, Heart, Men

  Walter E. Williams (2013). “Liberty Versus the Tyranny of Socialism: Controversial Essays”, p.257, Hoover Press

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• What we call the market is really a democratic process involving millions, and in some markets billions, of people making personal decisions that express their preferences. When you hear someone say that he doesn't trust the market, and wants to replace it with government edicts, he's really calling for a switch from a democratic process to a totalitarian one.

  Walter E. Williams

  Government, People, Decision

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• I believe our nation is at a point where there are enough irreconcilable differences between those Americans who want to control other Americans and those Americans who want to be left alone that separation is the only peaceable alternative. Just as in a marriage where vows are broken, our rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution have been grossly violated by a government instituted to protect them. These constitutional violations have increased independent of whether there's been a Democrat-controlled Washington or a Republican-controlled Washington.

  Walter E. Williams

  Believe, Independent, Rights

  Walter E. Williams (2015). “American Contempt for Liberty”, p.37, Hoover Institution Press

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• We might think of dollars as being 'certificates of performance.' The better I serve my fellow man, and the higher the value he places on that service, the more certificates of performance he gives me. The more certificates I earn, the greater my claim on the goods my fellow man produces. That's the morality of the market. In order for one to have a claim on what his fellow man produces, he must first serve him.

  Walter E. Williams

  Men, Thinking, Order

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• The idea that even the brightest person or group of bright people, much less the U.S. Congress, can wisely manage an economy has to be the height of arrogance and conceit.

  Walter E. Williams

  Ideas, People, Arrogance

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• Minimum-wage laws are one of the most powerful tools in the arsenal of racists.

  Walter E. Williams

  Powerful, Law, Liberty

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• Economic planning is nothing more than the forcible superseding of other people's plans by the powerful elite backed up by the brute force of government.

  Walter E. Williams

  Powerful, Government, People

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• Increases in money supply are what constitute inflation, and a general rise in prices is the symptom.

  Walter E. Williams

  Liberty, Economic, Increase

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• In 302, the Roman emperor Diocletian commanded "there should be cheapness," declaring, "Unprincipled greed appears wherever our armies ... march. ... Our law shall fix a measure and a limit to this greed." The predictable result of Diocletian's food price controls were black markets, hunger and food confiscation by his soldiers. Despite the disastrous history of price controls, politicians never manage to resist tampering with prices -- that's not a flattering observation of their learning abilities.

  Walter E. Williams

  Army, Law, Greed

  "Economics for the Citizen (Part 9)". capitalismmagazine.com. January 20, 2005.

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• Saying the Constitution is a living document is the same as saying we don't have a Constitution.

  Walter E. Williams

  Constitution, Documents

  Walter E. Williams (2013). “Liberty Versus the Tyranny of Socialism: Controversial Essays”, p.236, Hoover Press

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• The greatest percentage of poverty is found in female-headed households. Over 70 percent of female-headed households are poor. A large percentage of poor people are children (17 percent); fully 85 percent of black children living in poverty reside in a female-headed household.

  Walter E. Williams

  Children, People, Black

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• Universities have failed in their function of the pursuit of academic excellence by having dumbed down classes and granting degrees to students who are just barely literate and computationally incompetent.

  Walter E. Williams

  Academic Excellence, Class, Degrees

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• School choice opponents are also dishonest when they speak of saving public schools. A Heritage Foundation survey found that 47 percent of House members and 51 percent of senators with school-age children enrolled them in private schools in 2001. Public school teachers enroll their children in private schools to a much greater extent than the general public, in some cities close to 50 percent.

  Walter E. Williams

  Teacher, Children, School

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• I was more than anything a radical. I was more sympathetic to Malcolm X than Martin Luther King because Malcolm X was more of a radical who was willing to confront discrimination in ways that I thought it should be confronted, including perhaps the use of violence. But I really just wanted to be left alone. I thought some laws, like minimum-wage laws, helped poor people and poor black people and protected workers from exploitation. I thought they were a good thing until I was pressed by professors to look at the evidence.

  Walter E. Williams

  Kings, Law, People

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• The public good is promoted best by people pursuing their own private interests. This bothers some people because they're more concerned with motives than with results.

  Walter E. Williams

  People, Results, Interest

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• If the States do not have the right to secede, then they have no rights at all.

  Walter E. Williams

  Rights, Political, Revolution

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• If there's a distinct group of Americans who harbor open contempt for constitutional principles and rule of law, it's lawyers, judges and members of Congress.

  Walter E. Williams

  Law, Judging, Political

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• The message coming out of Washington, especially from our leftist politicians and the news media, is that we solve our budget problems by raising taxes on the rich. If Americans were more informed, such a message would be insulting to our intelligence. There are not enough rich people to satisfy Congress' appetite.

  Walter E. Williams

  Media, People, Insulting

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• Try this thought experiment. Pretend you're a tyrant. Among your many liberty-destroying objectives are extermination of blacks, Jews and Catholics. Which would you prefer, a United States with political power centralized in Washington, powerful government agencies with detailed information on Americans and compliant states or power widely dispersed over 50 states, thousands of local jurisdictions and a limited federal government?

  Walter E. Williams

  Powerful, Agency, Government

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• Multiculturalists argue that different cultural values are morally equivalent. That's nonsense.

  Walter E. Williams

  Different, Arguing, Nonsense

  Walter E. Williams (2015). “American Contempt for Liberty”, p.338, Hoover Institution Press

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• I have nothing against rich people. In fact, I've been struggling most of my life to join them.

  Walter E. Williams

  Struggle, People, Facts

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• Government schools can go for decades delivering low-quality services, and what's the result? The people who manage it earn higher pay. It's nearly impossible to fire the incompetents. And, taxpayers, who support the service, are given higher tax bills.

  Walter E. Williams

  School, Government, Fire

  Walter E. Williams (2013). “Liberty Versus the Tyranny of Socialism: Controversial Essays”, p.62, Hoover Press

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• It was not until the Abraham Lincoln administration that an income tax was imposed on Americans. Its stated purpose was to finance the war, but it took until 1872 for it to be repealed. During the Grover Cleveland administration, Congress enacted the Income Tax Act of 1894. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled it unconstitutional in 1895. It took the Sixteenth Amendment (1913) to make permanent what the Framers feared -- today's income tax.

  Walter E. Williams

  War, Cleveland, Income

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• All we have to do now is to inform the public that the payment of social security taxes is voluntary and watch the mass exodus.

  Walter E. Williams

  Money, Watches, Irs

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