Felix Frankfurter Quotes

Democracy is good, provided the government can function.

We need a strong state but we need a democratic one.

Constitutional democracy is a Western idea.

A republic is little better than a government of devils

Democracy sounded well and good, but its results are seen not to agree at all with its title. Monarchy, on the contrary, has an unpleasant sound, but is a more practical form of government to live under. For it is easier to find a single excellent man, than to find many of them.

Our great Republic is a government of laws and not of men. Here, the people rule.

Democracy, loudly upheld as a cure for much of the ailing world, has proved no guarantor of political wisdom, even if it remains the least bad form of government.

Democracy is still upon its trial. The civic genius of our people is its only bulwark.

The Founding Fathers gladly sacrificed government that could provide speedy, effective, cohesive, and internally consistent policies. They opted for one that had a maximum number of veto points and checks and balances and protections against tyranny by particular officials or tyranny by selfish majorities.

The American political system was created by a bunch of geniuses so that it could be run by a bunch of idiots.

The litmus test of democracy is the subordination of military power to civilian authority …

Republics are not in and of themselves better than other forms of government except in so far as they carry with them and guarantee to the citizen that liberty of thought and action for which they were established.

I do not conceive God did ever ordain [democracy] as a fit government for either church or commonwealth …. As for monarchy and aristocracy, they are both clearly approved and directed in the Scriptures.

Democracy can be defined in many different ways. This is one reason why there have existed so many varieties of -democratic- states in the world

Democracy cannot be created out of thin air

Nothing but a permanent body can check the imprudence of democracy.

The framers of the American Constitution were far from wishing or intending to found a democracy in the strict sense of the word, though, as was inevitable, every expansion of the scheme of government they elaborated has been in a democratical direction. But this has been generally the slow result of growth, and not the sudden innovation of theory…

The 20th century shows that the form of government that we take for granted, a constitutional democratic republic with checks and balances and a rule of law - that form of government is usually temporary.

There are a lot of benefits representative of government and it is far better than any type of dictatorial system and it is far better than a one-man rule situation.

Democracy must learn to defend itself.

The republican is the only form of government which is not eternally at open or secret war with the rights of mankind.

Democracy is the only system that persists in asking the powers that be whether they are the powers that ought to be.

Democracy is only an experiment in government, and it has the obvious disadvantage of merely counting votes instead of weighing them.

Our Founding Fathers crafted a constitutional Republic for the first time in the history of the world because they were shaping a form of government that would not have the failures of a democracy in it, but had the representation of democracy in it.

All free governments are managed by the combined wisdom and folly of the people.