Frank M. Bryan Quotes

An actual residence of such a length of time as would give a man an opportunity of esteeming the Government from knowing its intrinsic value, was essentially necessary to assure us of a man’s becoming a good citizen.

… schools of liberty …. warehouses of disinterested patriotism

The job of a citizen is to keep his mouth open.

If the undocumented have to work hard to attain citizenship, those of us who already are citizens should have to work hard to sustain it. We should all have to serve more, vote more, build more, and do more for our country.

There can be no daily democracy without daily citizenship.

Empowerment is not about doing the same thing the same way in the same environment. It's about building the man and the woman and doing so with a view to creating better citizens and, by extension, better patriots in this society of ours.

Join America taught English, an understanding of the U.S. Constitution, that the Bill of Rights is the ultimate insurance policy for a citizen, and that being a citizen is not an entitlement. And we also taught a bit of capitalism.

A constitutional democracy is in serious trouble if its citizenry does not have a certain degree of education and civic virtue.

The first duty of an American citizen, then is that he shall work in politics.

For America to work, Americans have to participate. If they don’t pay attention, they’re going to get screwed.

The citizens of America are her monarchs. No country deserves so well of its people, and none is so dependent upon them.

We have a great nation to help govern. We who are citizens of this great republic are favored children, yet we are all the time complaining; but that is one of the inalienable privileges of an American to complain about his neighbor and government-always crying for a change. But, with all of its faults, this is the best government for man on the face of the earth

In the great fulfillment, we must have a citizenship less concerned about what the government can do for it, and more anxious about what it can do for the nation.

Citizenship should be placed above everything else, even learning.

I feel that a period of service to the nation would be good for all of us, though I hope it will not be a purely military period. I have a great appreciation for the need for discipline and basic training in military methods, but above all, I believe we must develop the realization of every individual's responsibility in a democracy for his government. To me any period of training should stress this very clearly and should include service to the community. I believe both boys and girls should receive such training.

A popular society must provide a school for citizens where through the best, most accessible and direct means they may be educated in the pure doctrine of Patriotism.

A little citizenship ought to be taught at the mother’s knee and in the nursery. Citizenship is what makes a republic; monarchies can get along without it.

The health of our republic depends on shared principles like the First Amendment, but it is also built on the Teddy Roosevelt-like vigor of its citizens and local self-reliance.

Essentially, social education is moral education, and moral education is preparation for citizenship... When Jefferson and others advocated public education, it was to prepare for citizenship in a new, constitutional, democratic society.

The business of education has lay[ed] the foundations for nurseries of wise and good men, to adapt our modes of teaching to the peculiar form of our government . . . . He must be taught to love his fellow creatures in every part of the world, but he must cherish with a more intense and peculiar affection the citizens of Pennsylvania and of the United States.

We need to understand that we as citizens and as a government in any community throughout this country have no more important obligation than to educate those who are going to replace us.

It is the State which educates its citizens in civic virtue, gives them a consciousness of their mission and welds them into unity.

Growing up, when we would get dragged to these events, I didn't want to be there. Over time, as we got older, I developed a real appreciation of the importance of being involved in the democratic process.

Citizenship is a tough occupation which obliges the citizen to make his own informed opinion and stand by it.

You can't be a full participant in our democracy if you don't know our history.