Eugene V. Debs Quotes

patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel.

. . . the press and the pulpit have in every age and every nation been on the side of the exploiting class and the ruling class.

When great changes occur in history, when great principles are involved, as a rule the majority are wrong.

While there is a lower class, I am in it.
While there is a criminal element, I am of it.
While there is a soul in prison, I am not free.

They tell us that we live in a great free republic; that our institutions are democratic; that we are a free and self-governing people. This is too much, even for a joke. But it is not a subject for levity; it is an exceedingly serious matter.

Intelligent discontent is the mainspring of civilization. Progress is born of agitation. It is agitation or stagnation.

The people can have anything they want, the only problem is they do not want anything.

I am not a Labor Leader; I do not want you to follow me or anyone else; if you are looking for a Moses to lead you out of this capitalist wilderness, you will stay right where you are. I would not lead you into the promised land if I could, because if I led you in, some one else would lead you out. You must use your heads as well as your hands, and get yourself out of your present condition; as it is now the capitalists use your heads and your hands.

Privately owned industry and production for individual profit are no longer compatible with social progress and have ceased to work out to humane and civilized ends.

Beware of capitalism's politicians and preachers! They are the lineal descendants of the hypocrites of old who all down the ages have guarded the flock in the name of patriotism and religion and secured the choicest provender and the snuggest booths for themselves by turning the sheep over to the ravages of the wolves.

I left that church with rich and royal hatred of the priest as a person, and a loathing for the church as an institution, and I vowed that I would never go inside a church again.

[Eugene V. Debs, describing his teenage reaction to a hellfire lecture by a priest]

He must have had this Wall Street gentry in mind, or at least their prototypes, for in every age it has been the tyrant, the oppressor and the exploiter who has wrapped himself in the cloak of patriotism, or religion, or both to deceive and overawe the people.

Too long have the workers of the world waited for some Moses to lead them out of bondage. He has not come; he never will come. I would not lead you out if I could; for if you could be led out, you could be led back again.

The master class has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles.

Only the very ignorant and foolish believe that a president who has surrounded himself with Wall Street darlings as cabinet ministers has any serious designs on the trusts.