It is a great evil for a Chief of a nation to be born the enemy of the freedom whose defender he should be.

The one pervading evil of democracy is the tyranny of the majority, or rather of that party, not always the majority, that succeeds, by force or fraud, in carrying elections. To break off that point is to avert the danger. The common system of representation perpetuates the danger. Unequal electorates afford no security to majorities. Equal electorates give none to minorities. Thirty-five years ago it was pointed out that the remedy is proportional representation. It is profoundly democratic, for it increases the influence of thousands who would otherwise have no voice in the government; and it brings men more near an equality by so contriving that no vote shall be wasted, and that every voter shall contribute to bring into Parliament a member of his own opinions.

The modern institution of the presidency is the primary political evil Americans face, and the cause of nearly all our woes. It squanders the national wealth and starts unjust wars against foreign peoples that have never done us any harm. It wrecks our families, tramples on our rights, invades our communities, and spies on our bank accounts. It skews the culture toward decadence and trash. It tells lie after lie. Teachers used to tell school kids that anyone can be president. This is like saying anyone can go to Hell. It’s not an inspiration; it’s a threat.

For what is most dreaded is not the agony of dying, nor yet the strange impossibility that when we do not exist we should suffer for not existing. What is dreaded is the defeat of a present will directed upon life and its various undertakings.

The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge, natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism.

A disordered currency is one of the greatest political evils.

Of all the enemies to public liberty, war is perhaps the most to be dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other.

I look upon an increase in the power of the State with the greatest fear because, although while apparently doing good by minimizing exploitation, it does the greatest harm to mankind by destroying individuality which lies at the heart of all progress.

I regard anticommunism as a matter of principle an evil even greater than communism itself.

Fear is the most dangerous emotion in politics. People do terrible things to one another out of fear. In my opinion, anyone who can look at the raunchier frontiers of American culture without at least some trepidation hasn't got a lick of sense. But we are now looking at a form of fundamentalism in which fear is being deliberately fanned for political purposes.
The boogeymen are everywhere: Sex education will lead to promiscuity, AIDS, and Chinese communism. Failure to discriminate against gay people will lead to Sodom and Gomorrah. Failure to have official prayers in school means the End Is Nigh.
I have no claim to expertise on eternal rewards and punishments. But personally, I suspect there is a special place in hell for the fear-mongers.

The one pervading evil of democracy is the tyranny of the majority, or rather of that party, not always the majority, that succeeds, by force or fraud, in carrying elections.

Nothing is more dangerous to good government than great power in improper hands.

The very idea of the fabrication of a new government is enough to fill us with disgust and horror.

Party has no doubt its evils; but all the evils of party put together would be scarcely a grain in the balance, when compared to the dissolution of honourable friendships, the pursuit of selfish ends, the want of concert in council, the absence of a settled policy in foreign affairs, the corruption of separate statesmen, the caprices of an intriguing Court, which the extinction of party connection has brought and would again bring upon this country.