Fisher Ames Quotes

On account of being a democracy and run by the people, we are the only nation in the world that has to keep a government four years, no matter what it does.

A radical ... and revolutionary ... attack upon the fundamental basic principle of representative democracy for free people.

It is an essential tenet of our whole representative form of government, the idea that there should not be some tyranny which makes it so nobody can even have a chance to vote.

The court makes an amazing amount of decisions that ought to be made by the people.

Unlike any other nation, here the people rule, and their will is the supreme law.

We already have term limits. They’re called elections.

If you ever doubt that the people are the boss in a democracy, run for office. Even the President is a hired hand.

The government is just the people acting together.

In our system of government, nobody has the last word except the people.

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.

In this country the government responds to the people, not the other way around.

A democratic state must feel before it can see; that is what makes it slow to act. But the people, at last, will be right.

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.

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

We have submitted the issues to the American people, and their word is law.

Congress is where Americans are supposed to have our big, messy political fights. That's because the people who make the laws need to be hired and fired by the people. Don't like the laws? Fire the lawmakers.

Democracy consists of choosing your dictators, after they've told you what you think it is you want to hear.

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

In a democracy, supposedly we hold power by what we do at the ballot box, so therefore the more we know about political power the better our choices should be and the better, in theory, our democracy should be.

The problem is there is no such thing as a viable democracy made up of experts, zealots, politicians and spectators.

The Senate of the United States has been both extravagantly praised and unreasonably disparaged, according to the predisposition and temper of its various critics…. The truth is, in this case as in so many others, something quite commonplace and practical. The Senate is just what the mode of its election and the conditions of public life in this country make it.

If we were left solely to the wordy wit of legislators in Congress for our guidance, uncorrected by the seasonal experience and the effectual complaints of the people, America would not long retain her rank among the nations.

Our system of government is protected from the cabal of the few and the confusion of the multitude.

The people are certainly the best judges whether they are well governed.

The Congress is not a court of law but it is a court of public opinion.