Thomas Jefferson Quotes

We respect opposition to any position or policy. But we believe that the opinion that should prevail and be respected is that of the majority.

A dissenting minority feels free only when it can impose its will on the majority: what it abominates most is the dissent of the majority.

I'm an extreme libertarian, but I realize we're in a democracy, and in a democracy, people can have views of all stripes, and there's no reason to argue about it.

Democracy—the essential thing as distinguished from this or that democratic government—was primarily an attitude of mind, a spiritual testament, and not an economic structure or a political machine. The testament involved certain basic beliefs—that the personality was sacrosanct, which was the meaning of liberty; that policy should be settled by free discussion; that normally a minority should be ready to yield to a majority, which in turn should respect a minority’s sacred things.

If a democracy is to remain real and stable, the majority must be humane and farsighted enough to take care of minorities who have serious objections to the majorities point of view and who, because of lack of numbers, do not have the political strength to impose their own policy solutions through their own political power.

Minority rights are just as important as majority decisions.

If a majority be united by a common interest, the rights of the minority will be insecure.

The majority of people wherever found ought in all questions to govern the minority.

… though the majority might be temporarily wrong, in the end, a majority that remained a majority over a period of years was usually right, and in our country, at least, we have been governed by the will of the majority. It has not meant, nor I surmise, does it mean in the present, the destruction of minorities …

… the most powerful party must happily accept and hear the opinions of the weakest

Every opinion must be suffered. One must listen to what may be rousing, annoying, even shocking, but it must be done honestly, fairly and with equanimity, respecting the rights of every Member of the Knesset and each faction, guarding the minority in the face of the predatory majority.

The tendency of democracies is, in all things, to mediocrity.

A free society is a place where it's safe to be unpopular.

Because we are a democracy, there will be “winners” and “losers” on policy issues and curriculum decisions. But if the different perspectives have been given full and fair hearing and if every effort has been made to protect the conscience of all parents and students, then even those who may “lose” on a particular policy will most likely remain supporters of the public schools.

Majority rule is not the norm for solving issues or problems.

At times those who won, 51 percent of the population claim the right to ride roughshod over the other 49 percent.

The foundation of democratic liberty is a willingness to believe that other people may perhaps be wiser than oneself.

The majority are not morally free to become a tyranny and destroy the rights of minorities.

When the candidate must seek support from all levels of his community, his political creed will be tolerance, not hatred; equal protection for every minority, not discrimination.

Under universal suffrage the elected are those who know best how to take in the masses. The minority, which may happen to be the half minus one, is sacrificed.

Liberty resides in the rights of those people whose views we find most odious.

A democracy is a state which recognizes the subjection of the minority to the majority, that is, an organization for the systematic use of violence by one class against the other, by one part of the population against another.

In a democracy, not everyone gets what they want.

Parliamentary government is simply a mild and disguised form of compulsion. We agree to try strength by counting heads instead of breaking heads, but the principle is exactly the same... The minority gives way not because it is convinced that it is wrong, but because it is convinced that it is a minority.

The principle that the majority have a right to rule the minority, practically resolves all government into a mere contest between two bodies of men, as to which of them shall be masters, and which of them slaves; a contest, that—however bloody—can, in the nature of things, never be finally closed, so long as man refuses to be a slave.