Quotes About Authority

There is a great difference, then, between "power" and "authority." Power refers to one's ability to coerce others (through physical, economic, or other means) to do one's bidding. One can possess the means of power: physical strength, armaments, and money. But authority must be performed. Authority refers to one's ability to gain the trust and willing obedience of others. While power rests on intimidation, authority survives through inspiration.

Anarchy, when it works to destroy authority in all its aspects, when it demands the abrogation of laws and the abolition of the mechanism that serves to impose them, when it refuses all hierarchical organization and preaches free agreement - at the same time strives to maintain and enlarge the precious kernel of social customs without which no human or animal society can exist. Only, instead of demanding that those social customs should be maintained through the authority of a few, it demands it from the continued action of all.

I had to take responsibility, even if it meant saying no to an authority figure, because I was the authority on me.

Despite their tremendous talent, (NBA players) are still, by and large, young adults, seeking validation from an authority figure, and there is no greater authority figure on a team than the coach. Needless to say, in today's warped, self-indulgent climate, too many players couldn't care less about appeasing the coach.

We've gone all the way from foolishly accepting authority to foolishly rejecting all authority.

Freedom is about authority. Freedom is about the willingness of every single human being to cede to lawful authority a great deal of discretion about what you do.

What causes adolescents to rebel is not the assertion of authority but the arbitrary use of power, with little explanation of therules and no involvement in decision-making. . . . Involving the adolescent in decisions doesn't mean that you are giving up your authority. It means acknowledging that the teenager is growing up and has the right to participate in decisions that affect his or her life.

Authority is not a quality one person 'has,' in the sense that he has property or physical qualities. Authority refers to an interpersonal relation in which one person looks upon another as somebody superior to him.

The central objective in decolonising the African mind is to overthrow the authority which alien traditions exercise over the African. This demands the dismantling of white supremacist beliefs, and the structures which uphold them, in every area of African life. It must be stressed, however, that decolonisation does not mean ignorance of foreign traditions; it simply means denial of their authority and withdrawal of allegiance from them.

... immediately call on Congress to pass far-reaching industry regulation like the Firearms Safety and Consumer Protection Act ... [which] would give the Treasury Department health and safety authority over the gun industry, and any rational regulator with that authority would ban handguns.

Authority poisons everybody who takes authority on himself.

Central authority is bad. The bias should be for freedom. And without a central authority, there are lots of little authorities, and we learn which ones to trust.

Wherever there is a man who exercises authority, there is a man who resists authority.

The script for this film was written 52 years ago by Edward R. Murrow, who taught us many valuable lessons about responsibility and always, always questioned authority, because without it authority often goes unchecked.

I was an ordinary boy at school, a young man. In fact, what did the headmaster once say? "You're constantly challenging those in authority; questioning and challenging those in authority." Which was not really the way I saw it. I felt there were questions that had to be answered, and things that weren't quite right.

You can look at Bad Religion, and, really, almost everything I've ever done was an exercise in creativity. I've always had a desire to challenge and question authority, and that's where the fire inside comes from. I challenged authority out of a desire to make things better, not to be nihilistic about it.

Anarchism, in my view, is an expression of the idea that the burden of proof is always on those who argue that authority and domination are necessary. They have to demonstrate, with powerful argument, that that conclusion is correct. If they cannot, then the institutions they defend should be considered illegitimate. How one should react to illegitimate authority depends on circumstances and conditions: there are no formulas.

What good does it do me, after all, if an ever-watchful authority keeps an eye out to ensure that my pleasures will be tranquil and races ahead of me to ward off all danger, sparing me the need even to think about such things, if that authority, even as it removes the smallest thorns from my path, is also absolute master of my liberty and my life; if it monopolizes vitality and existence to such a degree that when it languishes, everything around it must also languish; when it sleeps, everything must also sleep; and when it dies, everything must also perish?

They must find it hard to take Truth for authority who have so long mistaken Authority for Truth.

I obviously identify with the anti-authority figure. I've pretty much always had problems with authority, ever since I was a kid. But, yeah, it's not identifying, I think it's more a part of my natural DNA that I question anybody who has a plan. Everybody's got to have an angle; that's the way I grew up.

The importance of immobility and silence to photographic authority, the nonfilmic nature of this authority, leads me to some remarks on the relationship of photography with death. Immobility and silence are not only two objective aspects of death, they are also its main symbols, they figure it.

I obviously identify with the anti-authority figure. I've pretty much always had problems with authority, ever since I was a kid.

The modern world detests authority but worships relevance. Our Christian conviction is that the Bible has both authority and relevance, and that the secret of both is Jesus Christ

Our moral authority is as important, if not more important, than our troop strength or our high-tech weapons. We are rapidly losing that moral authority, not only in the Arab world but all over the world.

Israel can make peace with an organization that seeks its destruction. That's Hamas. But Israel can make peace with the Palestinian Authority. It requires a lot of courage from both sides including President Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority.

Be yourself. Don't pretend that you know something you don't. Don't create the appearance of fake authority. Speak about the things you really care about.

Let us be true: this is the highest maxim of art and of life, the secret of eloquence and of virtue, and of all moral authority.

A Congresswoman must look like a girl, act like a lady, think like a man, speak on any given subject with authority and most of all work like a dog.

The love of fame is almost another name for the love of excellence; or it is the ambition to attain the highest excellence, sanctioned by the highest authority, that of time.

I cannot find any authority in the Constitution for public charity.

The great soul of power extends far beyond states, to every domain of life, from families to international affairs. And throughout, every form of authority and domination bears a severe burden of proof. It is not self-legitimizing. And when it cannot bear the burden, as is commonly the case, it should be dismantled.

To say that authority, whether secular or religious, supplies no ground for morality is not to deny the obvious fact that it supplies a sanction.

Attempts to enforce by legal sanctions, acts obnoxious to so great a proportion of Citizens, tend to enervate the laws in general, and to slacken the bands of Society. If it be difficult to execute any law which is not generally deemed necessary or salutary, what must be the case, where it is deemed invalid and dangerous? And what may be the effect of so striking an example of impotency in the Government, on its general authority?

He was resentful against all those in authority over him, and this, combined with a lazy indifference toward his work, exasperated every master in school. He grew discouraged and imagined himself a pariah; took to sulking in corners and reading after lights. With a dread of being alone he attached a few friends, but since they were not among the elite of the school, he used them simply as mirrors of himself, audiences before which he might do that posing absolutely essential to him. He was unbearably lonely, desperately unhappy.

His [John Paul II] humanity, combined with his extraordinary spiritual authority, was unlike anything I've ever met.

I'm sitting here watching Hannah Montana, so I'm not going to annihilate 4.3 million Pakistanis without hearing directly from someone whose authority I recognize!

It is by the Lord's stripes that we are healed, and it is through our own stripes that we, too, are given the authority for healing. In the place where the enemy wounds us, once we are healed, we are given the power to heal others.

Sometimes a decision has to be made by a single individual, who has the authority to enforce it. That's why you need a captain. You can't run a ship by a committee-at least not all the time.

Anyone who knows anything about journalism knows that reporters are rarely in a position to investigate anything. They lack the authority to subpoena witnesses, to cross-examine, to scrutinize official records. They are lucky to get their phone calls returned.

So the Clinton-Gore era culminates with an election as stained as the blue dress, a Democratic chorus complaining that the Constitution should not be the controlling legal authority, and Clinton's understudy dispatching lawyers to litigate this: It depends on what the meaning of 'vote' is.

The credulous ... advance the authority of hearsay in place of reasons for possible success or facts that can be demonstrated.

The primary truth that any government will be able to stand on is that God is King, not man. The Lord created this world for His purpose, and only those who are aligned with His purpose will have the authority that can stand any pressures of the times we are entering. We can build our lives on this kingdom and nothing that happens will shake us.

It is surely time for men to think for themselves, and to throw off the authority of names so artificially magnified.

The least Anararchic person in that conversation is the person saying 'you can't be an anarchist if you believe in god.' Because that's not an argument, it's just a statement. Why would somebody accept that? Because they either bow to your authority or they are afraid of your aggression. That's threatening to be another kind of ruler. Does that make any sense?

If one asks the whence derives the authority of fundamental ends, since they cannot be stated and justified merely by reason, one can only answer: they exist in a healthy society as powerful traditions, which act upon the conduct and aspirations and judgments of the individuals; they are there, that is, as something living, without its being necessary to find justification for their existence.

But the culture has failed, almost entirely, in inculcating internal controls on actions that have their origin in authority. For this reason, the latter constitutes a far greater danger to human survival.

Authority leads through position. Influence builds others out of relationship.

We should never invoke the spirit of antiquity as our authority. Spirits are peculiar things; they cannot be grasped with the hands and be held up before others. Spirits reveal themselves only to spirits. The most direct and concise method would be, in this case as well, to prove the possession of the only redeeming faith by good works.