Mahatma Gandhi Quotes
True democracy is not inconsistent with a few persons representing the spirit, the hope and the aspirations of those whom they claim to represent.
Gandhi, Mahatma. The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol. 54. Publications Division, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Government of India, 1973, p. 147.
This is a very important quotation. Abraham Lincoln obtained a printed copy of Parker’s sermon and underlined this quotation on his copy. Later when he was President he used a slight variation of Parker’s last phrase in the last line of his famous Gettysburg Address.
In Dolgoff’s era, his argument was that the political parties were so powerful that it was they who controlled who held public office, not the voters. And the parties were controlled by a few party leaders. However, when the system was reformed in the latter part of the 20th century, the individual incumbent member of Congress in America was so hard to dislodge due to the role of money and the advantage of incumbency, that the class of professional politicians was still very powerful. Reform had reduced the control of political parties but not politicians.
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was an Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalist, and political ethicist, who employed nonviolent resistance to lead the successful campaign for India's independence from British rule, and in turn inspired movements for civil rights and freedom across the world. The honorific Mahātmā (Sanskrit: "great-souled", "venerable"), first applied to him in 1914 in South Africa, is now used throughout the world.
