Loyal Opposition Quotes

To YOU I'm an atheist; to God, I'm the Loyal Opposition

I don't care a damn for your loyal service when you think I am right; when I really want it most is when you think I am wrong.

To me “bipartisan foreign policy” means a mutual effort, under our indispensable two-Party system, to unite our official voice at the water’s edge so that America speaks with maximum authority against those who would divide and conquer us and the free world. It does not involve the remotest surrender of free debate in determining our position. On the contrary, frank cooperation and free debate are indispensable to ultimate unity. In a word, it simply seeks national security ahead of partisan advantage. Every foreign policy must be totally debated … and the “loyal opposition” is under special obligation to see that this occurs.

A prince is also respected when he is a true friend and a true enemy; that is, when he declares himself on the side of one prince against another without any reservation.

To Confucius, harmony was consensus, not conformity. It required loyal opposition.

I do not want to be recorded in history as the man who bequeathed a tyranny.

It has been said that England invented the phrase, 'Her Majesty's Opposition'.

I want to caution that we must not confuse patriotism with blind endorsement of bad policies.

The more insanity that comes from Washington, D.C., the stronger the loyal opposition becomes.

We pledge to you in our name... that we will resist the invaders.

It has been said that England invented the phrase, 'Her Majesty's Opposition'; that it was the first government which made a criticism of administration as much a part of the polity as administration itself. This critical opposition is the consequence of cabinet government.

I'm my dad's biggest fan and, yes, sometimes his worst critic.

No government can long be secure without a formidable Opposition.

A man may be loyal to his government and yet oppose the particular principles and methods of administration.

In Washington, particularly, the loyal opposition has a job to be the opposition. But you can't stop there.

It is the duty of every patriot to hate his country creatively.

As the loyal opposition we can be loyal and still generate a lot of opposition.

To criticize one's country is to do it a service.... Criticism, in short, is more than a right; it is an act of patriotism-a higher form of patriotism, I believe, than the familiar rituals and national adulation.

The Soviet Union needs thinking and critical friends, such as are capable not only of singing hymns in the hours of success, but of not shrinking in the hour of defeat and danger.

No government can be long secure without a formidable opposition. It reduces their supporters to that tractable number which can be managed by the joint influences of fruition and hope. It offers vengeance to the discontented, and distinction to the ambitious; and employs the energies of aspiring spirits, who otherwise may prove traitors in a division or assassins in a debate.

There is danger, even now, that the adverse element seeks insidiously to pre-occupy the ground. If a few professedly loyal men shall draw the disloyal about them, and colorably set up a State government, repudiating the emancipation proclamation, and re-establishing slavery, I can not recognize or sustain their work. I should fall powerless in the attempt. This government, in such an attitude, would be a house divided against itself.

How strange to have failed as a social creature—even criminals do not fail that way—they are the law's "Loyal Opposition," so to speak. But the insane are always mere guests on earth, eternal strangers carrying around broken decalogues that they cannot read.

Traditional African tribal government was entirely different from Parliamentary democracy in the sense that we understand it. The essence of our system is we can change our Government, and therefore change or even reverse the policy it is pursuing, without bloodshed or violence, by the simple process of persuading our fellow citizens to put their vote in the ballot box. But once a Chief, after fullest consultation with his Council, had arrived at a decision, any further argument or opposition became treasonable. That is why in Africa you can never have a "loyal opposition". It follows from this that when the multi-party system of Parliamentary Government has been tried out in Africa, it has almost always become one-party rule.

The fact that there are singer-songwriters dealing with substantive issues is encouraging. It's important for young people to perceive that there are acceptable avenues of dissent, because we live in a world where dissent is hard-pressed; treated as if it were unpatriotic. I've always liked the concept of the loyal opposition. It allows for dissent to be a respectable part of the whole.

Buddhism ... is not a culture but a critique of culture, an enduring nonviolent revolution or "loyal opposition" to the culture in which it is involved.