Conservatism Quotes

• Liberalism is trust of the people tempered by prudence. Conservatism is distrust of the people tempered by fear.

  William E. Gladstone

  Trust, Fear, People

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• I cannot help fearing that men may reach a point where they look on every new theory as a danger, every innovation as a toilsome trouble, every social advance as a first step toward revolution, and that they may absolutely refuse to move at all.

  Alexis de Tocqueville

  Moving, Men, Innovation

  "Democracy in America". Book by Alexis de Tocqueville. Volume II, Book Three, Chapter XXI, 1840.

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• f you analyze it I believe the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism. I think conservatism is really a misnomer just as liberalism is a misnomer for the liberals - if we were back in the days of the Revolution, so-called conservatives today would be the Liberals and the liberals would be the Tories. The basis of conservatism is a desire for less government interference or less centralized authority or more individual freedom and this is a pretty general description also of what libertarianism is.

  Ronald Reagan

  Believe, Heart, Thinking

  "Reason" Magazine, July 1, 1975.

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• Conservatism is the antidote to tyranny. It's the only one. It's based on thousands of years of human experience. There is nothing narrow about the conservative philosophy. It's a liberating philosophy. It is a magnificent philosophy. It is a philosophy for the ages, for all times.

  Mark Levin

  Philosophy, Years, Age

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• The very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism.

  Ronald Reagan

  Heart, Soul, Libertarian

  Reason magazine, July 1, 1975.

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• Conservatism is not about leaving people behind. Conservatism is about empowering people to catch up, to give them the tools at their disposable that make it possible for them to access all the hope, all the promise, all the opportunity that America offers. And our programs to help them should reflect that.

  Marco Rubio

  Opportunity, America, People

  "Rubio: 'Conservatism Is About Empowering People To Catch Up'". www.realclearpolitics.com. August 24, 2011.

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• Conservatism, we are told, is out-of-date. This charge is preposterous and we ought to boldly say so. The laws of God, and of nature, have no dateline. These principles are derived from the nature of man, and from the truths that God has revealed about His creation. To suggest that the Conservative philosophy is out of date is akin to saying that the Golden Rule, or the Ten Commandments or Aristotle's Politics are out of date.

  Barry Goldwater

  Philosophy, Men, Law

  "The Conscience of a Conservative". Book by Barry Goldwater and L. Brent Bozell, 1960.

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• A conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs who, however, has never learned how to walk forward.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Clever, Men, Perfectly Good

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• Conservatism is not the problem. Conservatism is the founding of this country, essentially. Conservatism isn't even really an ideology. Conservatism is just what is right, proper, decent, and moral. That's all it is.

  Rush Limbaugh

  Country, Moral, Problem

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• The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness.

  John Kenneth Galbraith

  Honesty, Integrity, Philosophy

  "Stop the Madness". "The Globe and Mail" Newspaper, July 6, 2002.

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• Conservatism clings to what has been established, fearing that, once we begin to question the beliefs that we have inherited, all the values of life will be destroyed.

  Morris Raphael Cohen

  Belief, Value Of Life, Has Beens

  Morris Raphael Cohen (1993). “The Faith of a Liberal”, p.438, Transaction Publishers

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  Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.

  Thomas Paine

  Motivation, War, 4th Of July

  Common Sense (1776)

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• What is conservatism? Is it not the adherence to the old and tried against the new and untried?

  Abraham Lincoln

  Success, Political, Politics

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• I've always believed that conservatism is the politics of reality, and that reality ultimately asserts itself in a reasonably free society, in behalf of the conservative position.

  William F. Buckley, Jr.

  Reality, Conservative, Behalf

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• To be conservative, then, is to prefer the familiar to the unknown, to prefer the tried to the untried, fact to mystery, the actual to the possible, the limited to the unbounded, the near to the distant, the sufficient to the superabundant, the convenient to the perfect, present laughter to utopian bliss.

  Michael Joseph Oakeshott

  Laughter, Perfect, Facts

  "On Being Conservative". Essay by Michael Joseph Oakeshott, 1956.

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• Conservatism has always been about reforming government and solving problems, and that's why the conservative movement should lead on immigration reform.

  Marco Rubio

  Government, Immigration, Reform

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• Now make no mistake, I think we need a strong dose of fiscal conservatism in Washington, D.C.

  Kristi Noem

  Strong, Mistake, Thinking

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• Conservatism is not about the party, because the party is merely the shell. It is the inside - it's the filling that really means something.

  Jonathan Krohn

  Party, Mean, Shells

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• There is danger in reckless change, but greater danger in blind conservatism.

  Henry George

  Change, Growth, Blind

  Henry George (2006). “Social Problems”, p.7, Cosimo, Inc.

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• All conservatism is based upon the idea that if you leave things alone you leave them as they are. But you do not. If you leave a thing alone you leave it to a torrent of change.

  Gilbert K. Chesterton

  Change, Ideas, Political

  Orthodoxy (1908) ch. 7

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• Conservatism discards Prescription, shrinks from Principle, disavows Progress; having rejected all respect for antiquity, it offers no redress for the present, and makes no preparation for the future.

  Benjamin Disraeli

  Political, Preparation, Progress

  'Coningsby' (1844) bk. 2, ch. 5

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• The future of Conservatism lies in our beliefs and values, not by throwing them away. We need to shed associations that bind us to past failures, but hold faith with those things that make us Conservatives.

  Iain Duncan Smith

  Faith, Lying, Past

  "Full text: statement by Iain Duncan Smith", www.theguardian.com. June 19, 2001.

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• Their very conservatism is secondhand, and they don't know what they are conserving.

  Robertson Davies

  Political, Politics, Knows

  Robertson Davies (1949). “The Table Talk of Samuel Marchbanks”, Clarke, Irwin

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• Ostensibly rigorous and realistic, contemporary conservatism is an ideology of denial. Its symbol is a smile button.

  Christopher Lasch

  Smile, Buttons, Denial

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• Do not bury our glorious orthodoxy in the treacherous pit of a spurious conservatism.

  Abraham Kuyper

  Pits, Orthodoxy, Glorious

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