John F. Kennedy Quotes

Occasionally the conflict between 'what we stand for' and 'what we do' has been forthrightly addressed.

I do what I think is right.

There comes a time when a moral man can't obey a law which his conscience tells him is unjust.

How shall Integrity face Oppression? What shall Honesty do in the face of Deception, Decency in the face of Insult, Self-Defense before Blows? How shall Desert and Accomplishment meet Despising, Detraction, and Lies? What shall Virtue do to meet Brute Force? There are so many answers and so contradictory; and such differences for those on the one hand who meet questions similar to this once a year or once a decade, and those who face them hourly and daily.

All of us have moments in our lives when we have to choose between what we know is right and what we feel obligated to do.

It doesn't make sense to have to do the wrong thing in order to do the right thing.

That you may retain your self-respect, it is better to displease the people by doing what you know is right, than to temporarily please them by doing what you know is wrong.

Any time the character is in a moral quandary is interesting. That's been true from the Greeks on down.

War has been good to me from a financial standpoint but I don't want to make money that way. I don't want blood money.

You cannot do wrong and feel right. It is impossible!

The last temptation is the greatest treason: to do the right deed for the wrong reason.

When your conscience says law is immoral, don't follow it.

I'm just doing what my conscience asks me to do.

Never let your sense of morals get in the way of doing what's right.

There comes a point when a man must refuse to answer to his leader if he is also to answer to his own conscience.

You just have to do what you know is right.

I have always tried my best to do what I thought was the right thing at the time.

Maybe I'll learn how, but the only thing I can do is turn down parts that would hurt my conscience.

I did not clash with the National Party. I clashed with my conscience. And in the end, conscience wins.

There comes a time in the life of every public official when he must decide between right and regularity.

doing what is right is easy. The problem is knowing what is right

While I was thus carrying out my obligations, I never did anything with which my conscience would have to find fault

Cowardice asks the question, is it safe? Expediency asks the question, is it politic? Vanity asks the question, is it popular? But conscience asks the question, is it right? And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but one must take it because it is right.

I know in war good people can feel obliged for good reasons to do things they would normally object to and recoil from.

There was one man in the Labour government, Robin Cook, whom I had a very high regard for. He had the courage to speak out and to resign over Iraq. He was an admirable man. But resignation over a matter of principle is not a very fashionable thing in our society.