Jack Germond Quotes

Polling can undermine the ability of officials to lay out, debate, analyze, and implement their plans. By turning to instant [electronic] polls we would eliminate the captain and the officers and leave every shipboard decision to the passengers.

Polls make leadership impossible.

I’m not in favor of referendums, and I will never put one before the British people.

Being 'at the mercy of legislative majorities' is merely another way of describing the basic American plan: representative democracy.

Forget the consultants, the pundits and the pollsters; good policy is good politics.

In our system of government, nobody has the last word except the people.

There is something wrong with the way in which we make our decisions. The Government listen too much to the pollsters and the party managers. The trouble is that they are not even very good at politics, and they are entering too much into policy decisions. As a result, there is too much short-termism, too much reacting to events, and not enough shaping of events. We give the impression of being in office but not in power. Far too many important decisions are made for 36 hours' publicity.

I actually don't believe in governance by referendum. I believe that we have a democracy, that we elect people to make decisions.

Politics is not the art of the possible. It consists in choosing between the disastrous and the unpalatable.

The House is rooted in the principle of direct elections and is unique among all branches and bodies of the federal government as without exception, the people's voice.

All free governments are managed by the combined wisdom and folly of the people.

We make a great mistake in supposing all people are capable of self-government.

Let the people think they govern and they will be governed.

When politicians try to govern by raising a wet finger to the wind or on the basis of public opinion polling, the public gets to think that all leaders are interchangeable.

If any ask me what a free government is, I answer, that for any practical purpose, it is what the people think so, and that they, and not I, are the natural, lawful, and competent judges of the matter.

Decision by majorities is as much an expedient as lighting by gas.

Their ideas may contradict the sense of the whole people; hence the consequence that instructions are binding on the representative is of a doubtful, if not a dangerous nature.

Are the governors such exceptionally gifted men as to enable them … to represent the masses and act in the interests of all men better than all men would be able to act for themselves?

I know of no better or safer human tribunal than the people.

Democracy is politics.

A democratic state must feel before it can see; that is what makes it slow to act. But the people, at last, will be right.

A Popular Assembly without a Senate cannot be wise. A Senate without a Popular Assembly will not be honest.

Good organization does not necessarily mean it will produce good policy. But bad organization will almost never produce good policy.

How is it the community can check ? The community can act only when assembled; and when assembled, it is incapable of acting. The community, however, can choose representatives.

I'll let the people decide what they think is good taste.