Calvin Coolidge quotes - page 13

This is the day on which the American people each year acknowledged that they have such a debt. It has been set aside that a grateful Nation may do fitting honor to the memory of those who have made the greatest and most voluntary contribution to it. Here about us, in this place of beauty and reverence, lies the mortal dust of a noble host, to whom we have come to pay our tribute, as thousands of other like gatherings will do throughout our land. In their youth and strength, their love and loyalty, those who rest here gave to their country all that mortality can give. For what they sacrificed we must give back the pledge of faith to all that they held dear, constantly renewed, constantly justified. Doing less would betray them and dishonor us. (Calvin Coolidge)
We cannot make over the people of Europe. We must help them as they are, if we are to help them at all. I believe that we should help, not at the sacrifice of our independence, not for the support of imperialism, but to restore to those great peoples a peaceful civilization. In that course lies the best guarantee of freedom. In that course lies the greatest honor which we can bestow upon the memory of Lafayette. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
The consolidations need to be carried out with due regard to public interest and to the rights and established life of various communities in our country. It does not seem to me necessary that we endeavor to anticipate any final plan or adhere to an artificial and unchangeable project which shall stipulate a fixed number of systems, but rather we ought to approach the problem with such a latitude of action that it can be worked out step by step in accordance with a comprehensive consideration of public interest. Whether the number of ultimate systems shall be more or less seems to me can only be determined by time and actual experience in the development of such consolidations. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
Perhaps I have said enough to indicate the great advantages that accrue to all of us by the support and maintenance of our Government, the continuation of the functions of legislation, the administration of justice, and the execution of the laws. There can be no substitute for these, no securing of greater freedom by their downfall and failure, but only disorganization, suffering and want, and final destruction. All that we have of rights accrue from the Government under which we live. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
It is our purpose in our intercourse with foreign powers to rely not on the strength of our fleets and our armies but on the justice of our cause. For these reasons our country has not wished to maintain huge military forces. It has been convinced that it could better serve itself and better serve humanity by using its resources for other purposes. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
We must also recognize that the national administration is not and cannot be adjusted to the needs of local government. ... The states should not be induced by coercion or by favor to surrender the management of their own affairs. The federal government ought to resist the tendency to be loaded up with duties which the States should perform. It does not follow that because something ought to be done the national government ought to do it. ... View quote
Calvin Coolidge
No plan of centralization has ever been adopted which did not result in bureaucracy, tyranny, inflexibility, reaction, and decline. Of all forms of government, those administered by bureaus are about the least satisfactory to an enlightened and progressive people. Being irresponsible they become autocratic. ... Unless bureaucracy is constantly resisted it breaks down representative government and overwhelms democracy. It ... sets up the pretense of having authority over everybody and being responsible to nobody. ... View quote
Calvin Coolidge
But there is another ... recent development ... the greatly disproportionate influence of organized minorities. Artificial propaganda, paid agitators, selfish interests, all impinge upon members of legislative bodies to force them to represent special elements rather than the great body of their constituency. When they are successful, minority rule is established. ... The result is an extravagance on the part of the Government which is ruinous to the people and a multiplicity of regulations and restrictions for the conduct of all kinds of necessary business, which becomes little less than oppressive. ... View quote
Calvin Coolidge
The spirit of America is to help everybody and injure nobody. We can be in a position to help only by unifying the American nation, building it up, making it strong, keeping it independent, using its inclination to help and its disclination to injure. Those who cast in their lot with this country can be true to the land of their origin only by first being true to America. When the public sees and realizes that racial groups here are first of all devoted to the interests of this country, there will be little difficulty in securing here the present needed help and assistance for the countries of the old world. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
The history of government on this earth has been almost entirely a history of the rule of force held in the hands of a few. Under our Constitution, America committed itself to ... the power in the hands of the people. ... Our government rests upon religion. It is from that source that we derive our reverence for truth and justice, for equality and liberty, and for the rights of mankind. Unless the people believe in these principles they cannot believe in our government. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
There are only two main theories of government in the world. One rests on righteousness, the other rests on force. One appeals to reason, the other appeals to the sword. One is exemplified in a republic, the other is represented by a despotism. ... (Calvin Coolidge)
I think the American people want a solemn ass as a President and I think I will go along with them. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
Those who do not want to be partakers of the American spirit out not to settle in America. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
Nothing is more dangerous to good government than great power in improper hands. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
When large numbers of men are unable to find work, unemployment results. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
You can't know too much, but you can say too much. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
I have found it advisable not to give too much heed to what people say when I am trying to accomplish something of consequence. Invariably they proclaim it can't be done. I deem that the very best time to make the effort. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
To the people of the United States, the death of Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States from March 4, 1913, to March 4, 1921, which occurred at 11:15 o'clock today at his home at Washington, District of Columbia, deprives the country of a most distinguished citizen, and is an event which causes universal and genuine sorrow. To many of us it brings the sense of a profound personal bereavement. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
His picture to me seems always to have the enthusiasm and freshness of youth, moved with the high-minded and patriotic purpose of maturity. He displayed the same ambition for faithful service, whether he was leading his soldiers in the last charge for American liberty at Yorktown or rebuking the mob at Paris for its proposal to make him king. His part in the French Revolution is well known. He served the cause of ordered liberty in America; he was unwilling to serve any other cause in France. His admirers might say of him on the first anniversary of Bastile Day, 'He is galloping through the ages' But he refused to be a man on horseback. He knew that the welfare of his country lay in moderation. The people trusted him, but the extremists, whether Jacobin or Royalist, feared him. He urged the National Assembly to establish by constitutional guarantees what the Revolution had gained. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
Yet the world has never thoroughly learned this lesson It has never been willing entirely to acknowledge this principle. One of the greatest needs of the present day is the establishment and recognition of standards, and holding ourselves up to their proper observance. This cannot be done without constant effort and it will meet constant opposition. Always there have been those who fail to recognize this necessity. Their opposition to it and their philosophy of life were well expressed by Robert Burns in that poem which describes the carousings of a collection of vagabonds, where one of them gave his views: 'A fig for those by law protected! Liberty's a glorious feast! Courts for cowards were erected, Churches built to please the priest'. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
You who represent the more recent accretions to our population, know how generously you have been received. You know how free and unquestioned has been your access to the opportunities of this land. You have been expected to do your honest share of the day's work in a community which ranked productive toil as a distinction rather than a degradation. We have all taken our chance on that condition. Because we have been willing to do so, we have been prospered in material things and, what is ever more worth while, in the things of the spirit. Generation after generation, from the beginnings of permanent settlement here, the country has been able to receive and absorb a great number of newcomers from the older countries. That was possible so long as there was cheap land for settlement, and the assurance that industry could put value into it. (Calvin Coolidge)
Though the war ended forever the possibility of disunion, there still remain problems between State and Federal authority. There are divisions of interest, perhaps more apparent than real, among geographical sections or social groups. The seaboard thinks it has interests in maritime transportation and overseas commerce which differ greatly from those of the interior, which is peculiarly dependent upon railroads. Difference in climate and physical conditions throughout so great a territory tend to varied social habits and modes of living which react upon the economic and political attitudes. The industrial development of some sections contrasts with the agricultural character of others. Obviously, these differences give rise to many problems in government, which must always be recognized. But it is hardly conceivable that a really menacing contest between the sovereignty of the States and of the Union could ever again arise. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
You know, I have found out in the course of a long public life that the things I did not say never hurt me. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
In such a view of the history of the Negro race in America, we may find the evidences that the black man's probation on this continent was a necessary part in a great plan by which the race was to be saved to the world for a service which we are now able to vision and, even if yet somewhat dimly, to appreciate. View quote
Calvin Coolidge
He had a deep appreciation of this action, but always refused to support the Napoleonic regime. After Waterloo he insisted that Napoleon must abdicate and that the nation must guarantee his life and liberty. When the Bourbons were restored he denounced usurpations in the name of royalty, as he had formerly denounced usurpations in the name of liberty. As a consequence he was charged with treason. He defied the Assembly to try him on such a charge. 'During the whole of a life devoted entirely to liberty I have constantly been attacked by the enemies of that cause', he declared. 'I demand a public inquiry within the walls of this chamber and in the face of this nation. View quote
Calvin Coolidge