Political Principles Quotes

If a political party does not have its foundation in the determination to advance a cause that is right and that is moral, then it is not a political party; it is merely a conspiracy to seize power.

Politics have no relation to morals.

Politics is - once in a while - a forum for serious debate about political philosophy.

Principles aren't of much account anyway, except at election time. After that you hang them up to let them season.

Governments have never learned anything from history, or acted on principles deduced from it.

We are Republicans, and don't propose to have our party identify itself with the party whose antecedents are rum, Romanism, and rebellion.

In public life, a man whose political principles have any decided character and who has energy enough to give them effect must always expect to encounter political hostility from those of adverse principles.

This will not be disloyalty but will show that as members of a party they are loyal first to the fine things for which the party stands and when it rejects those things or forgets the legitimate objects for which parties exist, then as a party it cannot command the honest loyalty of its members.

I have been a Democrat ever since I registered to vote, and I'll stay a Democrat, but that's because of what the Democratic Party was supposed to be.

The presidents I served under don't have anything to do with my politics.

I would reject wholeheartedly any notion of a Labour Party that is not committed to returning to power at the first opportunity. Of course that needs to be principled power. But standing on the sidelines looking for the purest ideology is a dereliction of the duty for any Labour member.

Some men change their party for the sake of their principles; others their principles for the sake of their party

I've never hidden my faith, but there are only a couple of issues I would die for. There are a few others I would dig my heels in on, and I've told my caucus that what they see is what they get.

It is for the good of nations, and not for the emolument or aggrandizement of particular individuals, that government ought to be established, and that mankind are at the expense of supporting it. The defects of every government and constitution both as to principle and form, must, on a parity of reasoning, be as open to discussion as the defects of a law, and it is a duty which every man owes to society to point them out.

To call the American role in the world imperial was, for many who did so, a way of asserting that the United States was misusing its power beyond its borders and, in so doing, subverting its founding political principles within them.

The Labor Party is a party with no ideals, regulations or laws, and it is a party I will not be a part of.

What is the use of being elected or reelected unless you stand for something?

The more Democrats try to abandon the values and policies embodied in our platform, the more we will continue to lose. We can't win by running on incrementalism.

Choose the politics of principle over the politics of personality.

Liberal activists would often rather be right than be President.

I am a democrat only on principle, not by instinct, nobody is that. Doubtless some people say they are, but this world is grievously given to lying.

I'm not tied to any particular political line.

I used to be a Democrat, now I'm basically a Republican.

I used to like John McCain, too, but I must admit that was because he was bucking his party to do things I agreed with. I would not have had that reaction if, say, Bernie Sanders decided to rebel out of principle and support privatizing Social Security.

In politics, there is no such thing as getting something for nothing. The payoff may involve compromises of various types that strike at the ideals and principles one has held deal all his life.