Ronald Reagan Quotes

Concentrated power has always been the enemy of liberty. Democracy is worth dying for, because it's the most deeply honorable form of government ever devised by man.Entrepreneurs and their small enterprises are responsible for almost all the economic growth in the United States.

Could there be anything but widespread misery, where a privileged few controlled a nation's wealth, while millions labored for a pittance, and millions more were desperate for want of employment?

I have left orders to be awakened at any time during national emergency, even if I'm in a cabinet meeting.

It is the Soviet Union that runs against the tide of human history by denying human freedom and human dignity to its citizens.

We meant to change a nation, and instead, we changed a world.

Even now I wonder what I might have accomplished if I'd studied harder

Seventy-five years ago I was born in Tampico, Illinois, in a little flat above the bank building. We didn't have any other contact with the bank than that.

The closest thing to eternal life on earth is a Government Program

The great dynamic success of capitalism had given us a powerful weapon in our battle against Communism-money.

Freedom is always just one generation away from extinction. We don't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. We have to fight for it and protect it and then hand it to them, so that they shall do the same, or we're going to find ourselves spending our sunset years telling our children and our children's children, about a time in America, back in the day, when men and women were free.

While other [military] alliances have been formed to win wars, our fundamental purpose is to prevent war while preserving and extending the frontiers of freedom.

Two Soviets . . . were talking to each other. And one of them asked, "What's the difference between the Soviet Constitution and the United States Constitution?" And the other one said, "That's easy. The Soviet Constitution guarantees freedom of speech and freedom of gathering. The American Constitution guarantees freedom after speech and freedom after gathering."

My fellow Americans, I must speak to you tonight about a mounting danger in Central America that threatens the security of the United States. This danger will not go away it will grow worse, much worse, if we fail to take action now.

Some people wonder all their lives if they've made a difference. The Marines don't have that problem.

That's the nice thing about this job. You get to quote yourself shamelessly. If you don't, Larry Speakes will.

Since when do we in America believe that our society is made up of two diametrically opposed classes - one rich, one poor - both in a permanent state of conflict and neither able to get ahead except at the expense of the other? Since when do we in America accept this alien and discredited theory of social and class warfare? Since when do we in America endorse the politics of envy and division?

No nation in history has ever survived a tax burden that reached a third of its national income.

We are at war with the most dangerous enemy that has ever faced mankind in his long climb from the swamp to the stars, and it has been said if we lose that war, and in so doing lose this way of freedom of ours, history will record with the greatest astonishment that those who had the most to lose did the least to prevent its happening.

We can not play innocents abroad in a world that is not innocent.

When the Lord calls me home, whenever that may be, I will leave with the greatest love for this county of ours and eternal optimism for its future.

Blondes have the hottest kisses. Red-heads are fair-to-middling torrid, and brunettes are the frigidest of all. It's something to do with hormones, no doubt.

Freedom is the very essence of our nation. To be sure, ours is not a perfect nation. But even with our troubles, we remain the beacon of hope for oppressed peoples everywhere. Never give up the fight for freedom - a fight which, though it may never end, is the most ennobling known to man.

One hundred nations in the UN have not agreed with us on just about everything that's come before them, where we're involved, and it didn't upset my breakfast at all.

There are some who've forgotten why we have a military. It's not to promote war. It's to be prepared for peace. There's a sign over the entrance to the Fairchild Air Force Base in Washington state, and that sign says it all: 'Peace is our profession'.

No matter how big and powerful government gets, and the many services it provides, it can never take the place of volunteers.

America's view of apartheid is simple and straightforward: We believe it is wrong. We condemn it. And we are united in hoping for the day when apartheid will be no more.

No government ever voluntarily reduces itself in size. Government programs, once launched, never disappear. Actually, a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we'll ever see on this earth!

I'm a sucker for hero worship.

America has not been a story or a byword. That small community of Pilgrims prospered and, driven by the dreams and, yes, by the ideas of the Founding Fathers, went on to become a beacon to all the oppressed and poor of the world.

You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We will preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth.

There are some who've forgotten why we have a military. It's not to promote war, it's to be prepared for peace.

All of us can see what happens once you establish the precedent that the government can determine a man's working place and his working methods, determine his employment. From here it's a short step to all the rest of socialism, to determining his pay....He will wait for the government to tell him where he will go to work and what he will do.

Everyone is a liberal until they have something to conserve. Then they become a conservative.

We're approaching the end of a bloody century plagued by a terrible political invention, totalitarianism. Optimism comes less easily today, not because democracy is less vigorous, but because democracy's enemies have refined their instruments of repression.

The most confident person in any transaction ALWAYS introduces themselves first.

Throughout America today, we honor the dead of our wars. We recall their valor and their sacrifices. We remember they gave their lives so that others might live.

Jesse Helms wants me to move to the right, Lowell Weiker wants me to move to the left, and Teddy Kennedy wants me to move back to California.

Many a man has failed because he had his wishbone where his backbone should have been.

The . . . inescapable truth is: government does not have all the answers. In too many instances, government does not solve problems; it subsidizes them.

Let it never be said of this generation of Americans that we became so obsessed with failure that we refused to take risks that could further the cause of peace and freedom in the world.

My fellow citizens, our nation is poised for greatness. We must do what we know is right, and do it with all our might. Let history say of us: "These were golden years - when the American Revolution was reborn, when freedom gained new life, and America reached for her best."

We have found, in our country, that when people have the right to make decisions as close to home as possible, they usually make the right decisions.

You get a little stir crazy during the week.

For centuries the Bible's emphasis on compassion and love for our neighbor has inspired institutional and governmental expressions of benevolent outreach such as private charity, the establishment of schools and hospitals, and the abolition of slavery.

I'm beginning to wonder if the symbol of the United States pretty soon isn't going to be an ambassador with a flag under his arm climbing into an escape helicopter.

America is a melting pot, and education has been a mainspring for our democracy and freedom, a means of providing gifts of knowledge and opportunity to all citizens, no matter how humble their background, so they could climb higher, help build the American dream, and leave a better life for those who follow.

When cruelty is inflicted on innocent people, it discredits whatever cause.

I usually never walk by a microphone.