Mahatma Gandhi Quotes

Democracy passes into despotism.

Perhaps the fact that we have seen millions voting themselves into complete dependence on a tyrant has made our generation understand that to choose one's government is not necessarily to secure freedom.

A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long be safe companions to liberty.

The difference between being out of step with a dictator and being out of step with the democratic majority is practically negligible. The important thing is to be in step.

In most of the countries where the people don’t like their government, we are now allowed to ask whether people like their government.

The revolutionary government is the despotism of liberty

Where annual elections end, there tyranny begins..

Let's not pretend we have too much of a democracy here, because we don't.

It's not up to one individual to decide, 'I'm going to dictate the outcome of what's going to happen legislatively.' That is not a democracy; it's an atrocity.

But on the other hand government takes away a certain amount of liberty and in some countries it takes away all of liberty. And it will, everywhere, if people who fight government do not fight government any longer.

Those who abhors democracy would rarely immigrate to an authoritarian state if they have to.

The deadliest foe of democracy is not autocracy but liberty frenzied.

If social stability goes pear-shaped, you have a choice between anarchy and dictatorship. Most people will opt for more security, even if they have to give up some personal freedom.

History proves that all dictatorships, all authoritarian forms of government are transient. Only democratic systems are not transient. Whatever the shortcomings, mankind has not devised anything superior.

Getting rid of the dictator is only a first step in establishing a free society. The dictatorship must also be disassembled.

Under conditions of tyranny it is far easier to act than to think.

I don't see democracy getting better. I see democracy diminishing. More rules, more legislation. Eventually governments will see everything.

A dissenting minority feels free only when it can impose its will on the majority: what it abominates most is the dissent of the majority.

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.

I don't believe in democracy by bayonet.

Despotism can only exist in darkness, and there are too many lights now in the political firmament to permit it to remain anywhere, as it has heretofore done, almost everywhere.

You can't become a dictator through checks and balances.

Where there is little or no public opinion, there is likely to be bad government, which sooner or later becomes autocratic government.

Be assured, fellow citizens, that in a democracy it is the laws that guard the person of the citizen and the constitution of the state, whereas the despot and the oligarch find their protection in suspicion and in armed guards.

Chinese citizens have never had the right to really express their opinions; in the constitution it says you can, but in the real world it is more dangerous. In the west people think it's a right they're born with. Here it's a right given by the government, and one that's not really practised.