George F. Kennan Quotes

Voters do not decide issues. They decide who will decide issues.

It is the healthiest thing in a democracy when the people who are elected exert power.

Are the governors such exceptionally gifted men as to enable them … to represent the masses and act in the interests of all men better than all men would be able to act for themselves?

The great advantage of representatives is their capacity of discussing public affairs. For this, the people collectively are extremely unfit, which is one of the chief inconveniences of a democracy.

The wisdom and discretion of Congress ... are the restraints on which the people must often rely solely, in all representative governments

We will, of course, work with whoever Americans decide to elect as president.

Canadians want to elect good people to be their voice in Ottawa.

I ask the rights to pursue happiness by having a voice in that government to which I am accountable.

Government is not a bottom line enterprise. You can get yourself elected ... but you can't fire the legislature if they won't do what you want.

To govern is to chose.

As the power of the populace increases, the wisdom of its statesmen, who concern themselves with external affairs, decreases proportionately.

Many people in the UN vote and then go home where nobody votes.

… a permanent Council of the ablest men chosen by the people

To speak practically and as a citizen, unlike those who call themselves no-government men, I ask for, not at once no government, but at once a better government. Let every man make known what kind of government would command his respect, and that will be one step toward obtaining it.

We don’t trust government, but we need government….Government didn’t land here from Mars. We elected them.

A government may only govern so long as the people, through their representatives, vote it the money to carry on.

… in order to emerge from a state of nullity, the [Dutch] bourgeois are asking to take part in government; the most extreme among them wish to participate in all deliberations on public matters …. The more moderate ask only to elect their regents and to have representatives to watch over the maintenance of their rights …

We have noted that the federal Constitution put the permanent control of the nation's foreign interests in the hands of the President and the Senate, which to some extent frees the Union's general policy from direct and daily popular control. One should not therefore assert without qualification that American democracy controls the state's external affairs..

Because America is a democracy, public support for presidential foreign-policy decisions is essential.

We need a modern people's lobby that empowers all of us to choose our leaders and set our agenda. Imagine voting for a president we're truly excited about. Imagine a government that promotes capitalism and civil rights.

We need to be constantly reminded that this is a representative democracy, and we need to be in tune to what people are talking about.

We are a democracy, and we get the leaders we deserve because we elect them.

If you want a government that's going to do the things we ask our government to do, you've got to get it from somebody.

Did somebody dream there is some way that the government doesn't need us?

You can't keep a democracy going in a functional and constructive way if only 10 percent of the people you represent think your institution is functioning in an acceptable way. That's just not viable.