Dwight D. Eisenhower Quotes

Knowledge-full, unfettered knowledge of its own heritage, of freedom's enemies, of the whole world of men and ideas-this knowledge is a free people's surest strength.

Some day there is going to be a man sitting in my present chair who has not been raised in the military services and who will have little understanding of where slashes in their estimates can be made with little or no damage. If that should happen while we still have the state of tension that now exists in the world, I shudder to think of what could happen in this country

Teachers need our active support and encouragement. They are doing one of the most necessary and exacting jobs in the land. They are developing our most precious national resource: our children, our future citizens.

This world of ours... must avoid becoming a community of dreadful fear and hate, and be, instead, a proud confederation of mutual trust and respect.

Don't join the book burners... Don't be afraid to go in your library and read every book.

Firmness in support of fundamentals, with flexibility in tactics and methods, is the key to any hope of progress in negotiation.

Preventive war was an invention of Hitler. I would not even listen to anyone seriously that came and talked about such a thing.

But I think a life of raising prize cattle, going shooting two or three times a year, fishing in the summer, and interspersing the whole thing with some golf and bridge - and whenever I felt like talking or writing, doing it with abandon and with no sense of responsibility whatsoever - maybe such a life wouldn't be so bad.

The world no longer has a choice between force and law; if civilization is to survive, it must choose the rule of law.

Recognition of the Supreme Being was the first - the most basic - expression of Americanism.

We are tired of aristocratic explanations in Harvard words.

How far have we come in man's long pilgrimage from darkness toward light? Are we nearing the light-a day of freedom and of peace for all mankind? Or are the shadows of another night closing in upon us?

We ... must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering for our own ease and convenience the precious resources of tomorrow.

Some people wanted champagne and caviar when they should have had beer and hot dogs.

I feel like the fellow in jail who is watching his scaffold being built." (On construction of reviewing stands for inauguration of his successor John F Kennedy)

[T]he rule of law does more than ensure freedom from high-handed action by rulers. It ensures justice between man and man however humble the one and however powerful the other. A man with five dollars in the bank can call to account the corporation with five billion dollars in assets-and the two will be heard as equals before the law.

Disarmament, with mutual honor and confidence, is a continuing imperative.

Any nations right to a form of government and economic system of its own choosing is inalienable. Any nations attempt to dictate to other nations their form of government is indefensible.

The supreme quality of leadership is integrity.

Never question another man's motive. His wisdom, yes, but not his motives.

From this day forward, the millions of our school children will daily proclaim in every city and town, every village and rural schoolhouse, the dedication of our Nation and our people to the Almighty.

This desk of mine is one at which a man may die, but from which he cannot resign.

Kinship among nations is not determined in such measurements as proximity of size and age. Rather we should turn to those inner things - call them what you will - I mean those intangibles that are the real treasures free men possess. To preserve his freedom of worship, his equality before law, his liberty to speak and act as he sees fit, subject only to provisions that he trespass not upon similar rights of others - a Londoner will fight. So will a citizen of Abilene. When we consider these things, then the valley of the Thames draws closer to the farms of Kansas and the plains of Texas.

No man can always be right. So the struggle is to do one's best, to keep the brain and conscience clear, never be swayed by unworthy motives or inconsequential reasons, but to strive to unearth the basic factors involved, then do one's duty.

Laughter can relieve tension, soothe the pain of disappointment, and strengthen the spirit for the formidable tasks that always lie ahead.

Of course Overlord did not fail. How could it? With some many fine young men and women from all corners of the earth all determined to do their best to free a world gone half mad.

When people speak to you about a preventive war, you tell them to go and fight it. After my experience, I have come to hate war.

Plans are useless, but planning is essential.

I can think of nothing more boring for the American people than to have to sit in their living rooms for a whole half hour looking at my face on their television screens.

I firmly believe that the future of civilization is absolutely dependent upon finding some way of resolving international differences without resorting to war.

When I was a small boy in Kansas, a friend of mine and I went fishing. I told him I wanted to be a real Major League baseball player, a genuine professional like Honus Wagner. My friend said that he'd like to be President of the United States. Neither of us got our wish.

Our forces saved the remnants of the Jewish people of Europe for a new life and a new hope in the reborn land of Israel. Along with all men of good will, I salute the young state and wish it well.

I think of going back to the sports field again, and let's take a baseball game. Well, you have cracked out a grounder and you put in your last ounce of energy and you just happen to make first base. But you don't stop there. First base is the beginning. Now you call on all your alertness, your skill, your energy - and you count on your teammates, you count on the people that are working with you. And the purpose of that getting on first base was to get you around to count a run.

Why are we proud? We are proud, first of all, because from the beginning of this Nation, a man can walk upright, no matter who he is, or who she is. He can walk upright and meet his friend - or his enemy; and he does not fear that because that enemy may be in a position of great power that he can be suddenly thrown in jail to rot there without charges and with no recourse to justice. We have the habeas corpus act, and we respect it.

This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children.

Every leader should have enough humility to accept, publicly, the responsibility for the mistakes of the subordinates he has himself selected and, likewise, to give them credit, publicly, for their triumphs.

Plans are nothing; planning is everything.

'Worry' is a word that I don't allow myself to use.

make it a practice to avoid hating anyone. If someone's been guilty of despicable actions, especially toward me, I try to forget him. I used to follow a practice - somewhat contrived, I admit - to write the man's name on a piece of scrap paper, drop it into the lowest drawer of my desk, and say to myself: "That finishes the incident, and so far as I'm concerned, that fellow." The drawer became over the years a sort of private wastebasket for crumbled-up spite and discarded personalities.

No people on earth can be held, as a people, to be an enemy, for all humanity shares the common hunger for peace and fellowship and justice.

Life is certainly only worthwhile as it represents struggle for worthy causes. There is no struggle in perfect security. I am quite certain that the human being could not continue to exist if he or she had perfect security.

When you appeal to force, there's one thing you must never do - lose.

I'll tell you what leadership is. It's persuasion and conciliation, and education, and patience.

I thought it completely absurd to mention my name in the same breath as the presidency.

But all history has taught us the grim lesson that no nation has ever been successful in avoiding the terrors of war by refusing to defend its rights - by attempting to placate aggression.

Leadership consists of nothing but taking responsibility for everything that goes wrong and giving your subordinates credit for everything that goes well.

People in the long run are going to do more to promote peace than governments.

Fortunately for us and our world, young people are not easily discouraged. The hopes of the world rest on the fresh outlook of young people