Gavin Esler Quotes

We have a constitution that says that the way you get things is by passing legislation, not by threatening to destroy the country unless you get your way.

Voters will decide how they want to be governed.

I came into American politics and into this political system proud of politics and the way we make decisions.

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?

Our democratic belief that anyone can be a political leader paradoxically feeds into the anti-democratic belief that we should look to one person to quickly and easily save us. No one, alone, can fix it, and in our system of government, this authoritarian approach is a prescription for catastrophe.

Government is not a game show, though at times it is amusing and entertaining to watch.

It is becoming more widely acknowledged that it is better to have a good constitution than not having a perfect one.

My primary motivation for running for the 9th Congressional District is that I strongly believe that one of the hallmarks of the American democracy is a representative form of democracy.

It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried.

Here, also, has been evolved the form of government consistent with the largest possible civil liberty.

Laws are important precisely because in a democracy they reflect the attitudes and aspirations of those they govern.

The basis of our political system is the right of the people to make and to alter their constitutions of government.

When you are President you have to get something done, and that often means compromise.

Now we are governed by gentlemen.

The federal constitution is perhaps the greatest of human experiments.

Governments propose, and oppositions dispose.

We need a strong state but we need a democratic one.

The people who own the country ought to govern it.

American democracy must be a failure because it places the supreme authority in the hands of the most ignorant part of society.

... the grand depository of the democratic principles of the Government ...

We’ve come pretty far on this old, rickety, 18th century, political system, and I for one like it.

The wisdom and discretion of Congress ... are the restraints on which the people must often rely solely, in all representative governments

Let us give our Republic not the best possible laws but the best which they will bear.

Politics is about explanations.

Americans invented not simply a new form of government but an entirely new concept of politics.