John Adams Quotes

Democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy that did not commit suicide.

For not only every democracy, but certainly every republic, bears within itself the seeds of its own destruction.

Democracy... while it lasts is more bloody than either aristocracy or monarchy. Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There is never a democracy that did not commit suicide.

A democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world's greatest civilizations has been 200 years.

Every government of the world has the seeds of its own destruction in itself.

As John Adams said, all democracies will eventually self-destruct. We seem to be doing it very quickly.

We have, essentially, a worthless democracy.

No matter how hard we may try to revive Democracy, to help her once more stand on her legs, to breathe life into her, all efforts will be futile. All hopes for a victory of democracy over fascism are the crassest illusions.

The U.S. military will be stepping into a morass. Iraq presents as unpromising a breeding ground for democracy as any in the world. It has never really known democracy or even legitimate, centralized rule for any great duration.

Democracy has generally failed in Africa because to much power, too often, was concentrated in the hands of too few.

In 54 years of its existence, Pakistan has not been able to find a workable model of democracy

A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury

We are sliding down into the mire of a democracy ...

Most societies die of suicide, not attack.

Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide. It is in vain to say that democracy is less vain, less proud, less selfish, less ambitious, or less avaricious than aristocracy or monarchy. It is not true, in fact, and nowhere appears in history. Those passions are the same in all men, under all forms of simple government, and when unchecked, produce the same effects of fraud, violence, and cruelty.

Many thought or seemed to think at the time that our young democracy was not a continuation of Russian statehood, but its ultimate collpase.. They were mistaken.

Democracy destroys itself because it abuses its right to freedom and equality. Because it teaches its citizens to consider audacity as a right, lawlessness as a freedom, abrasive speech as equality, and anarchy as progress.

Given the right conditions, any society can turn against democracy. Indeed, if history is anything to go by, all societies eventually will.

There's no checklist of how democracies fail because they fail in different ways. Some of them fail because they break up and civil war breaks out... Often they fail because someone is elected to power who doesn't respect the rules of the democracy.

All great empires die from within.

Liberalism is exhausted because it has become a corruption.

Freedom does not die from frontal attack. It dies because men in power no longer believe in a system based upon liberty.

Democracy is becoming collateral damage in a world where global risks have been ignored or exacerbated by those with the power to act.

Famine is about so much more than food: it is about a famine of education, democracy, health, transport, and so many other items. The food famine becomes a symptom of that vast failure.

Exporting this Western model of democracy in countries that don't want it or are not ready creates disasters.