Big Government Quotes

• War is just one more big government program.

  Joseph Sobran

  War, Government, Liberty

  59 Copy quote

• The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Gun, Government, Southern

  178 Copy quote

• A government big enough to give you everything you want is a government big enough to take from you everything you have.

  Gerald R. Ford

  Inspirational, Success, Peace

  "If Elected, I Promise: 1001 Jokes, Toasts, Stories, and Gems of Wisdom by and about Politicians". Book by John Francis Parker, 1960.

  147 Copy quote

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• Government is not a solution to our problem government is the problem.

  Ronald Reagan

  Freedom, Government, Problem

  32 Copy quote

• The best minds are not in government. If any were, business would steal them away.

  Ronald Reagan

  Inspirational, Success, Business

  16 Copy quote

• I hope we once again have reminded people that man is not free unless government is limited. There's a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics: As government expands, liberty contracts.

  Ronald Reagan

  Independent, Men, Law

  Ronald Reagan, Michael Reagan (2016). “The Last Best Hope: The Greatest Speeches of Ronald Reagan”, p.226, Humanix Books

  67 Copy quote

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• Tyranny is defined as that which is legal for the government but illegal for the citizenry.

  Unknown

  Government, Liberty, Libertarian

  196 Copy quote

• They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.

  Benjamin Franklin

  Inspirational, Happiness, Peace

  Benjamin Franklin, William-Temple Franklin (1818). “Memoirs of the Life and Writings of (the Same), Continued to the Time of His Death by William Temple Franklin. - London, H. Colburn 1818”, p.270

  180 Copy quote

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• The most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the government and I'm here to help.

  Ronald Reagan

  Funny, Business, Military

  "Biography / Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

  219 Copy quote

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• The best view of big government is in the rearview mirror as we leave it behind.

  Ronald Reagan

  Mirrors, Government, Views

  United States. President (1981-1989 : Reagan), Ronald Reagan (1984). “Ronald Reagan”

  15 Copy quote

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• When you can't make them see the light, make them feel the heat.

  Ronald Reagan

  Business, Light, Politics

  178 Copy quote

• Today it is not big business that we have to fear. It is big government.

  Wendell Phillips

  Government, Today, Bigs

  14 Copy quote

• What we should be asking is not whether we need a big government or small government, but how we can create a smarter and better government.

  Barack Obama

  Government, Needs, Asking

  University of Michigan Commencement Speech, www.huffingtonpost.com. 2010.

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• You can't be for big government, big taxes and big bureaucracy and still be for the little guy.

  Ronald Reagan

  Government, Guy, Voting

  Ronald Reagan (2004). “Speaking My Mind: Selected Speeches”, p.398, Simon and Schuster

  18 Copy quote

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• None of us here in Washington knows all or even half of the answers ... If you love your country, don't depend on handouts from Washington for your information. If you cherish your freedom, don't leave it all up to big government.

  Barry Goldwater

  Love, Country, Government

  28 Copy quote

• Pure, hard-core liberals believe in a superior race. They think they're it. They believe they're more intelligent than the general run of mankind, better suited than the little people are to manage the little people's lives. They think they have the one true vision, the ability to solve all the moral dilemmas of the century. They prefer big government because that is the first step to totalitarianism, toward unquestioned rule by the elite. And of course they see themselves as the elite.

  Dean Koontz

  Running, Believe, Intelligent

  17 Copy quote

• The era of big government is over.

  William J. Clinton

  Government, Presidential, Liberty

  State of the Union Address, 23 Jan. 1996

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• Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.

  Ronald Reagan

  Freedom, Military, Moving

  Remarks to state chairs of National White House Conference on Small Business, 15 Aug. 1986

  88 Copy quote

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• Government is like a baby. An alimentary canal with a big appetite at one end and no sense of responsibility at the other.

  Ronald Reagan

  Funny, Baby, Military

  Ronald Reagan, Bill Adler (1981). “The Reagan wit”, Jameson Books

  268 Copy quote

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• Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Wisdom, Law, Tyrants

  Thomas Jefferson, Joyce Appleby, Terence Ball (1999). “Jefferson: Political Writings”, p.224, Cambridge University Press

  78 Copy quote

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• I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than those attending too small a degree of it.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Freedom, Government, Political

  Letter to Archibald Stewart, 23 Dec. 1791

  83 Copy quote

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• 

  The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Business, Book, Reading

  105 Copy quote

• We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Life, Change, Happiness

  Declaration of Independence (1776).

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• Once we roared like lions for liberty; now we bleat like sheep for security! The solution for America's problem is not in terms of big government, but it is in big men over whom nobody stands in control but God.

  Norman Vincent Peale

  God, Men, America

  15 Copy quote

• What is so bad about big government? My indictment of big government is that it is bad because it attacks liberty, prosperity, progress, harmony, and morality. Thanks to big government, we have significantly less of all of those good things than we would if we had been able to keep government right-sized. Big government is cancerous. Like a cancer, it hurts the body and tends to spread, doing more and more harm as it grows. It is time for some radical surgery.

  George Leef

  Hurt, Cancer, Government

  8 Copy quote