Helen Gahagan Douglas Quotes

• In trying to make something new, half the undertaking lies in discovering whether it can be done. Once it has been established that it can, duplication is inevitable.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Lying, Innovation, Trying

  47 Copy quote

• Character isn't inherited. One builds it daily by the way one thinks and acts, thought by thought, action by action. If one lets fear or hate or anger take possession of the mind, they become self-forged chains.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Courage, Fear, Hate

  33 Copy quote

• To be free you must afford freedom to your neighbor, regardless of race, color, creed, or national origin, and that sometimes, for some, is very difficult.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Race, Color, Justice

  17 Copy quote

• Democracy cannot long survive when the people permit their lives to be dominated - economically or politically - by a powerful few.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Powerful, Long, People

  19 Copy quote

• Character isn't inherited. One builds it daily by how one thinks and acts.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Character, Thinking

  18 Copy quote

• There is no danger is letting people have their say. ... There is a danger when you try to stop them from saying it.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  People, Trying, Free Speech

  14 Copy quote

• Freedom is not won on the battlefields. The chance for freedom is won there. The final battle is won or lost in our hearts and minds.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Freedom, Heart, Mind

  22 Copy quote

• The discrepancy between American ideals and American practice - between our aims and what we actually do - creates a moral dry rot which eats away at the foundations of our democratic faith.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Discrepancies Between, Practice, Dry

  12 Copy quote

• Politicians aren't any more wicked than other citizens but the situation in which they are placed warps their judgment.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Wicked, Citizens, Judgment

  16 Copy quote

• If you tell me that there are obstacles in the way of your ambition that make it impossible to pursue, then I know it's not a real ambition. There are always obstacles. The 'perversity of events,' as someone once called it, is always ready to lick us. Events are never right for achieving what we most want to achieve. If this were not so, there would be no real fun in being 17 -- or even in being alive.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Fun, Real, Ambition

  11 Copy quote

• Such pip-squeaks as Nixon and McCarthy are trying to get us so frightened of Communism that we'll be afraid to turn out the lights at night.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Night, Light, Trying

  11 Copy quote

• The first step toward liberation of any group is to use the power in hand... And the power in hand is the vote.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Women, Hands, Democracy

  9 Copy quote

• I realized that public affairs were also my affairs. I became active in politics because I saw the possibility, if we all sat back and did nothing, of a world in which there would no longer be any stages for actors to act on.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Political, Actors, World

  11 Copy quote

• men never would share power with women willingly. If we wanted it, we would have to take it.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Power, Men, Share

  10 Copy quote

• We cannot legislate equality but we can legislate ... equal opportunity for all.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Opportunity, Equality, Equal

  8 Copy quote

• You cannot barter security for freedom, or freedom for security.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Security

  7 Copy quote

• If the national security is involved, anything goes. There are no rules. There are people so lacking in roots about what is properand what is improper that they don't know there's anything wrong in breaking into the headquarters of the opposition party.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Party, Roots, People

  10 Copy quote

• A vigorous democracy a democracy in which there are freedom from want, freedom from fear, freedom of religion, and freedom of speech would never succumb to communism or any other ism.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Freedom Of Speech, Democracy, Isms

  5 Copy quote

• The ... irrational fear of communism is being deliberately used in many quarters to blind us to our real problems.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Real, Irrational Fear, Problem

  9 Copy quote

• I never felt I left the stage.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Stage, Felt, Left

  15 Copy quote

• If one lets fear or hate or anger take possession of the mind, they become self-forged chains.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Hate, Self, Mind

  9 Copy quote

• When a marriage works, nothing on earth can take its place

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Marriage, Love And Marriage, Earth

  7 Copy quote

• I realized that public affairs were also my affairs.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Affair, I Realized, Public Affairs

  7 Copy quote

• You can't prove you're an American by waving Old Glory.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  Old Glory, Glory, Prove

  4 Copy quote

• if we pursue the arms race no other problem will be solved.

  Helen Gahagan Douglas

  War, Race, Arms

  7 Copy quote

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