William S. Cohen Quotes

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.

I'm fed up with democracy. In a democracy, people vote for the mayors. I wanted to build a city where I will choose the citizens.

It is foolishly thought by some that democratical constitutions will not, cannot, last; that the States will quarrel with each other; that a king, or at least a nobility, are indispensable for the prosperity of a nation.

The difference between a democracy and a dictatorship is that in a democracy you vote first and take orders later; in a dictatorship you don't have to waste your time voting.

Sometimes it's better to have a benign dictator than a dumb democracy, to be honest.

Logically, in a society ostensibly grounded on representative government, it would seem reasonable that a majority of the people in a State would elect a majority of that State’s legislators.

Democracy is a slow and complex process …. Democracy is counter-intuitive. Democracy takes time to learn. It takes years or even decades to take on the habits of democracy…. If you jump too fast, the wrong people come to power…. Yes democracy, but democracy slow.

Democracy is good, provided the government can function.

A democracy is a government in the hands of men of low birth, no property, and vulgar employments.

One of the distinctions between democracy and other forms of government is that while democracy is messy on the surface, other forms of government are messy underneath.

Democracy doesn't mean electing a dictator every five years.

The method of democracy is to bring ... conflicts out into the open where their special claims can be seen and appraised, where they can be discussed and judged.

American democracy is at its best in its talent for the transfer for power.

The cure for the evils of democracy is more democracy.

Our President is not a King, nor our senate a House of Lords.

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

The king, in possession of the throne, was the sole representative of sovereignty, the sole representative of power. Not so in a Republic … Here we have no sole representative of power. The ballot box is the instrumentality through which the sovereign power is exercised.

Sure the people are stupid: the human race is stupid. Sure Congress is an inefficient instrument of government. But the people are not stupid enough to abandon representative government for any other kind, including government by the guy who knows.

Democracy, in a word, is meant to be an aristocracy which has broadened into a universal aristocracy.

Democracy can be noisy and messy. But it works.

I have a negative approach to democracy. I think it should be primarily a mechanism by which people can remove a bad leader.

The collective judgement of the Congress, with all its faults, could be superior to that of one man who makes the final decision, in the executive.

You can choose whatever name you like for the two types of government. I personally call the type of government which can be removed without violence democracy, and the other tyranny.

In America we have no need of kings.

I always believe the rule by king or official leader is outdated. Now we must catch up with the modern world.