Nick Clegg Quotes

Our economic freedom is founded on individual property rights; government should never be permitted to take those away.

The great and abiding lesson of American history, particularly the cold war, is that the engine of capitalism, the individual, is mightier than any collective.

Political freedom can be inimical to economic freedom.

When the war [World War I] closed ... we were challenged with a peacetime choice between the American system of rugged individualism and a European philosophy of ... paternalism and State Socialism.

Classical liberalism is the idea that individual freedom and limited government are the best way for humans to form a free society.

Capitalism is based on individual rights - not on the sacrifice of the individual to the 'public good' of the collective.

If succeeding generations of Americans don't understand the concepts of justice, individual rights, free enterprise, capitalism, sovereignty or national security, there can be no guarantee that those concepts - or others like them - will continue.

Underlying most arguments against the free market is a lack of belief in freedom itself.

Government has a legitimate sphere of operation. The problem arises when that sphere continually expands, encompassing areas where government lacks legitimacy.

My fundamental tenets are concerned with freedom of the individual; the market isn't perfect, but it's the best available way of allocating resources.

In all that the people can individually do as well for themselves, government ought not to interfere.

Libertarians are my most intense enemies

The granting of monopolies, or exclusive privileges to individuals or corporations, is an invasion of the right of others to choose a lawful calling, and an infringement of personal liberty.

Individualism is to collectivism as capitalism is to socialism

The Anarchists believe in the State; only they insist that the greater part, if not all, of the necessity for its existence is the result of an artificial limitation of the freedom of civil society, and that the completion of industrial freedom may one day so harmonize individuals that it will no longer be necessary to provide a guarantee of political freedom.

The program of liberalism, therefore, if condensed into a single word, would have to read: property, that is, private ownership of the means of production... All the other demands of liberalism result from his fundamental demand.

The Plan provides economic safety while at the same time retaining a huge measure of economic liberty. The problem has been how to attain safety without losing freedom. A solution would appear to lie in comparatively simple compromise between socialism and individualism by applying the one to Necessaries and the other to Luxuries.

There is only one social system that reflects the sovereignty of the individual: the free-market, or capitalist, system.

It is true that classical libertarian thought is opposed to state intervention in social life, as a consequence of deeper assumptions about the human need for liberty, diversity, and free association.

I'm not a libertarian in the sense that I think all these social programs should be abolished in any sense.

Ever since the end of Medieval feudalism, and the writings of John Locke, we have understood the importance of being able to buy and sell one's own property, including books and watches, both for reasons of economics and liberty.

Liberals don't believe in the ultimate concept of self-reliance, which is why they look to the government for stability.

Choice is a national instinct. This capitalist bedrock of our prosperity and security is threatened by a Labour Party that wants to overthrow the whole system.

I support the state, but not the state-run economy. The state should intervene only to create the conditions necessary for the private sector to thrive.

The foundations of liberty are private property and the rule of law; this system guarantees the fewest possible forms of injustice, produces the greatest material and cultural progress, most effectively stems violence and provides the greatest respect for human rights. According to this concept of liberalism, freedom is a single, unified concept. Political and economic liberties are as inseparable as the two sides of a medal.