House of Representatives Quotes

You cannot found a monarchy on this Continent.

The thing is so done... The Yankees will shout in triumph; but it is they who lose most by our decision. The great danger of the time – a danger which the policy of the European System would have fostered – was a division of the world into European and American, republican and Monarchical; a league of worn-out governments, on the one had, and of youthful and stirring nations, with the United States at their head, on the other. We slip in between; and plant ourselves in Mexico. The United States have gotten the start of us in vain; and we link once more America to Europe. Six months more – and the mischief would have been done.

The conservation of monarchy in any portion of South America will tend to break the shock of that inevitable divorce by which the New World is about to be divided by the Old... But as to putting it forward, as a project or proposition of ours, that is out of the question. Monarchy in Mexico, and monarchy in Brazil, would cure the evils of universal democracy, and prevent the drawing of the line which I almost dread – America versus Europe. The United States, naturally enough, aim at this division and cherish the democracy which leads to it.

I believe that it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures. I believe that we must assist free peoples to work out their own destinies in their own way.

Of twenty Latin American republics only six are free from American interference in one form or another. In eleven countries this interference takes the form of official direction of financial policy, and in six this direction is backed by United States troops.

Bush will keep up that policy that gives the United State the role of promoting freedom in the world.

When you have a democratically elected president of Iran you don't topple him for the Shah. You don't help topple Arbenz in Guatemala. You don't do what we did in Vietnam, etc.

An empire that extends itself selectively is just being prudent about its own limitations. A republic that supports democratization selectively is another matter.

The Emperor Napoleon, ascending gradually from his post of national magistrate to seat himself upon a throne without limits, seems to have wished to punish, as for the abuse of republican reforms, by making us feel all the weight of absolute monarchy.

In the 1980s, the U.S. Army invaded two Caribbean countries, Grenada and Panama, to depose leaders who had defied Washington.

First of all, the world criticizes American foreign policy because Americans criticize American foreign policy. We shouldn't be surprised about that. Criticizing government is a God-given right - at least in democracies.

The United States is not for democracy in Iraq, it's for setting up a puppet government.

After installing friendly leaders in Iran and Guatemala, the United States lost interest in promoting democracy in either country.

We had, after all, no other recourse to protect ourselves, no other document, let's say, than the Monroe Doctrine. So that could be cited as a cause for intervention if and when it might become necessary.

Americans overthrew governments only when economic interests coincided with ideological ones.

And in Iraq we tried to implement the same policy that was so successful in Saudi Arabia, but Saddam Hussein didn't buy. When the economic hit men fail in this scenario, the next step is what we call the jackals.

Imperialism and popular government have nothing in common: they differ in spirit, in policy, in method.

Now in the whole of Europe there are only two parties: France for the freedom of peoples against all the rulers, and all the monarchs against France for despotism and old traditions.

Only idiots would believe that the U.S. is a democratic country seeking democracy in other countries

We hold that the Constitution follows the flag, and denounce the doctrine that an Executive or Congress deriving their existence and their powers from the Constitution can exercise lawful authority beyond it, or in violation of it. We assert that no nation can long endure half Republic and half empire, and we warn the American people that imperialism abroad will lead quickly and inevitably to despotism at home.

Such recognition is not necessary in order to enable the United States to intervene and pacify the Island.

The best American internationalists reject the idea that their nation holds a global copyright that gives it a mandate to churn out replicas dotting the world.

The United States cannot, therefore, fail to view with deep concern any serious threat to stability and constitutional government in Nicaragua tending toward anarchy and jeopardizing American interests, especially if such state of affairs is contributed to or brought about by outside influences or by any foreign power

Our policy in Asia finds its inspiration in the constitution of the Union of Soviets, which we regard as a model of political equality between different races. It even goes so far as to admit the right of nations entering into the Union to leave it of their own free will without securing the consent of other members of the Union. And we do not apply our logic to ourselves alone; we act in the interest of conserving our institutions by applying in our policy in Asia this principle of “self-determination” – an American principle, by the way, transported to Europe by the Frenchmen who took part in the American War of Independence

Assuredly no one of us would ever propose to retain in France the fatal race of kings; we all know but too well that dynasties have never been anything else than rapacious tribes who lived on nothing, but human flesh. It is necessary completely to reassure the friends of liberty. We must destroy this talisman, whose magic power is still sufficient to stupefy many a man. I move accordingly that you sanction by a solemn law the abolition of royalty.