The way people in democracies think of the government as something different from themselves is a real handicap. And of course sometimes the government confirms their opinion.

To hear some men talk of the government you would suppose that Congress was the law of gravitation and kept the planets in their places.

I have long believed taxpayers make better use of their money than the government ever could.

Government is a trust and the officers of the government are trustees. And both the trust and the trustees are created for the benefit of the people.

The danger is not that a particular class is unfit to govern: every class is unfit to govern.

A corporation's primary goal is to make money. Government's primary role is to take a big chunk of that money and give it to others.

Here is my first principle of foreign policy: good government at home.

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

It is hard to feel individually responsible with respect to the invisible processes of a huge and distant government.

The people are the government administering it by their agents they are the government the sovereign power.

Governments never learn. Only people learn.

Our government... teaches the whole people by its example. If the government becomes the lawbreaker it breeds contempt for law it invites every man to become a law unto himself it invites anarchy.

If men were angels no government would be necessary.

People try to live within their income so they can afford to pay taxes to a government that can't live within its income.

The worst thing in this world next to anarchy is government.

To rule is easy to govern difficult.

The instant formal government is abolished society begins to act. A general association takes place and common interest produces common security.

For in reason all government without the consent of the governed is the very definition of slavery.

The government solution to a problem is usually as bad as the problem.

It is to be regretted that the rich and powerful too often bend the acts of government to their own selfish purposes.

The government which was designed for the people has got into the hands of the bosses and their employers the special interests. An invisible empire has been set up above the forms of democracy.

Knowledge will forever govern ignorance and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.

The marvel of all history is the patience with which men and women submit to burdens unnecessarily laid upon them by their governments.

Whenever the people are well-informed they can be trusted with their own government.