Lee H. Hamilton Quotes

I promised to run the most open and transparent administration in Britain. That is why, with this brutally honest and unprecedented progress report, I am determined to level with Londoners.

Secrecy in government, in the public mind, becomes synonymous with deception in government.

To Any Officer or Employee of the Government: Please tell Mr. Lincoln Steffens anything whatever about the government that you know (not incompatible with the public interest) and provided only that you tell him the truth—no matter what it might be—I will see to it that you are not hurt. T. Roosevelt.

The more government transparency, the better.

Every thing secret degenerates, even the administration of justice; nothing is safe that does not show how it can bear discussion and publicity.

To restore and keep the public's confidence in the integrity of their government, state government and its officials must be open, honest and transparent.

Remarkably, governments are beginning to embrace the idea that nothing enhances democracy more than giving voice and information to everybody in the country. Why not open their books if they have nothing to hide?

You’re doing the people’s business and they have a right to know.

Government ought to be all outside and no inside.... Everybody knows that corruption thrives in secret places, and avoids public places, and we believe it a fair presumption that secrecy means impropriety.

Secrecy is an instrument of conspiracy; it ought not, therefore, to be the system of a regular government

The government being the people’s business, it necessarily follows that its operations should be at all times open to public view.

I believe that the American People have a right to know what was done in their name..

Theresa May and her advisers should understand that to rebuild faith in the competence and integrity of our government, transparency is vital. It shines light on the good as well as the bad. And it leads to better-informed decisions, therefore better outcomes.

When it comes to governments and corporations, we should demand that less is secret. That's where corruption flowers.

Ever since I arrived in Washington in April 2009, I have been fighting for more transparency and accountability in government.

Our public officials have forgotten that they are ultimately accountable to the people who put them in office, that the information they keep in secrecy belongs to all of us.

If governments did not mislead their citizens so often, there would be less need for secrecy, and if leaders knew they could not rely on keeping the public in the dark about what they are doing, they would have a powerful incentive to behave better.

I want to make sure we are presenting to the South Australian people a Government that is open and accountable. I want to make sure that we maintain public confidence in government at all levels.

I have been instructed by cabinet and caucus members at our last secret meeting that we need more openness in government, but, like, not too much.

Public disclosure is one of the great disinfectants ever invented.

The root of the problem [secrecy in government] is not so much that our people have lost confidence in government, but that government has demonstrated time and again its lack of confidence in the people.

I find it extremely difficult to argue against telling the people of the United States how much we intend to spend on the aggregate for intelligence purposes.

Can the public business be thus transacted and in secret?

By and large, our leaders don’t lie to us.

The overarching purpose of access to information legislation … is to facilitate democracy. It does so in two related ways. It helps to ensure first, that citizens have the information required to participate meaningfully in the democratic process, and secondly, that politicians and bureaucrats remain accountable to the citizenry.