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President’s Day

On President’s Day it seems only fitting that we let the men who’ve held the title speak for themselves.

George Washington	1789 – 1797	Government is not reason: It is not eloquence, it is force, like fire it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.
John Adams	1797 – 1801	Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.
Thomas Jefferson	1801 – 1809	To take from one because it is thought that his own productivity has acquired too much, in order to give to others who have not exercised equal industry and skill is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association: the guarantee to everyone of a free exercise of his hard work and the profits acquired by it.
James Madison	1808-1817	It will be of little avail to the people, that the laws are made by men of their own choice, if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood.
James Monroe	1817-1825	It is only when the people become ignorant and corrupt, when they degenerate into a populace, that they are incapable of exercising their sovereignty.
John Quincy Adams	1825-1829	Individual liberty is individual power, and as the power of a community is a mass compounded of individual powers, the nation which enjoys the most freedom must necessarily be in proportion to its numbers the most powerful nation.
Andrew Jackson	1829-1837	Americans are not a perfect people, but we are called to a perfect mission.
Martin van Buren	1837-1841	There is a power in public opinion in this countryâ€”and I thank God for it: for it is the most honest and best of all powersâ€”which will not tolerate an incompetent or unworthy man to hold in his weak or wicked hands the lives and fortunes of his fellow-citizens.
William Henry Harrison	Â Â 1841	The people are the best guardians of their own rights and it is the duty of their executive to abstain from interfering in or thwarting the sacred exercise of the lawmaking functions of their government.
John Tyler	1841-1845	The great truth that government was made for the people and not the people for government has already been established in the practice and by the example of these United Statesâ€¦
James K Polk	1845-1849	There is more selfishness and less principle among members of Congress…than I had any conception of, before I became President of the U.S.
Zachary Taylor	1849-1850	I shall pursue a straight forward course deviating neither to the right or left so that comes what may I hope my real friends will never have to blush for me, so far as truth, honesty & fair dealings are concerned.
Millard Fillmore	1850-1853	Nothing brings out the lower traits of human nature like office-seeking. Men of good character and impulses are betrayed by it into all sorts of meanness.Â
Franklin Pierce	1853-1857	Frequently the more trifling the subject, the more animated and protracted the discussion. Â
James Buchanan	1857-1861	Liberty must be allowed to work out its natural results; and these will, ere long, astonish the world.Â
Abraham Lincoln	1861-1865	Let us not grope for some middle ground between right and wrong. Let us not search in vain for a policy of â€˜don’t careâ€™ on a question about which we â€˜do care.â€™ Nor let us be frightened by threats of destruction to the government. Let us have faith that right makes might â€¦ and in that faith â€¦ let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it!
Andrew Johnson	1865-1869	Outside of the Constitution we have no legal authority more than private citizens, and within it we have only so much as that instrument gives us. This broad principle limits all our functions and applies to all subjects. Â
Ulysses S Grant	1869-1877	Hold fast to the Bible. To the influence of this Book we are indebted for all the progress made in true civilization and to this we must look as our guide in the future. Â
Rutherford B Hayes	1887-1881	The President of the United States should strive to be always mindful of the fact that he serves his party best who serves his country best. Â
James Garfield	Â Â 1881	A brave man is a man who dares to look the Devil in the face and tell him he is a Devil. Â
Chester Arthur	1881-1885	The extravagant expenditure of public money is an evil not to be measured by the value of that money to the people who are taxed for it. Â
Grover Cleveland	1885-1889, 1893-1897	A government for the people must depend for its success on the intelligence, the morality, the justice, and the interest of the people themselves. Â
Benjamin Harris	1889-1893	No other people have a government more worthy of their respect and love or a land so magnificent in extent, so pleasant to look upon, and so full of generous suggestion to enterprise and labor. Â
William McKinley	1897-1901	The free man cannot be long an ignorant man.Â
Theodore Roosevelt	1901-1909	Character, in the long run, is the decisive factor in the life of an individual and of nations alike.Â
William Howard Taft	1909-1913	We live in a stage of politics, where legislators seem to regard the passage of laws as much more important than the results of their enforcement.Â
Woodrow Wilson	1913-1921	Living political constitutions must be Darwinian in structure and in practice. Society is a living organism and must obey the laws of life, not of mechanics; it must develop. All that progressives ask or desire is permissionâ€”in an era when â€˜development,â€™ â€˜evolution,â€™ is the scientific wordâ€”to interpret the Constitution according to the Darwinian principle; all they ask is recognition of the fact that a nation is a living thing and not a machine.Â
Warren Harding	1921-1923	It is my conviction that the fundamental trouble with the people of the United States is that they have gotten too far away from Almighty God.Â
Calvin Coolidge	1923-1929	About the Declaration there is a finality that is exceedingly restful.Â It is often asserted that the world has made a great deal of progress since 1776, that we have had new thoughts and new experiences which have given us a great advance over the people of that day, and that we may therefore very well discard their conclusions for something more modern.Â But that reasoning cannot be applied to this great charter.Â If all men are created equal, that is final.Â If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final.Â If governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, that is final.Â No advance, no progress can be made beyond these propositions. Â If anyone wishes to deny their truth or their soundness, the only direction in which he can proceed historically is not forward, but backward toward the time when there was no equality, no rights of the individual, no rule of the people.Â Those who wish to proceed in that direction cannot lay claim to progress.Â They are reactionary. Â Their ideas are not more modern, but more ancient, than those of the Revolutionary fathers.Â
Herbert Hoover	1929-1933	Competition is not only the basis of protection to the consumer, but is the incentive to progress.Â
Franklin D Roosevelt	1933-1945	The United States Constitution has proved itself the most marvelously elastic compilation of rules of government ever written.
Harry S Truman	1945-1953	It can be lost, and it will be, if the time ever comes when these documents are regarded not as the supreme expression of our profound belief, but merely as curiosities in glass cases.Â
Dwight D Eisenhower	1953-1961	If you want total security, go to prison. There youâ€™re fed, clothed, given medical care and so on. The only thing lackingâ€¦is freedom.Â
John F Kennedy	1961-1963	The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie â€” deliberate, contrived and dishonest â€” but the myth â€” persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic. Â
Lyndon B Johnson	1963-1969	It is the genius of our Constitution that under its shelter of enduring institutions and rooted principles there is ample room for the rich fertility of American political invention.Â
Richard Nixon	1969-1974	Any nation that decides the only way to achieve peace is through peaceful means is a nation that will soon be a piece of another nation.Â
Gerald R Ford	1974-1977	Our constitution works. Our great republic is a government of laws, not of men.Â
James Carter	1977-1981	Whatever starts in California unfortunately has an inclination to spread. Â
Ronald Reagan	1981-1989	I’ve spoken of the shining city all my political life, but I don’t know if I ever quite communicated what I saw when I said it. But in my mind it was a tall, proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans, windswept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace; a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and creativity. And if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here. Thatâ€™s how I saw it, and see it still.
George H W Bush	1989-1993	America is never wholly herself unless she is engaged in high moral principle. We as a people have such a purpose today. It is to make kinder the face of the nation and gentler the face of the world.Â
Bill Clinton	1993-2001	There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured by what is right with America.Â
George W Bush	2001-2009	We need commonsense judges who understand that our rights were derived from God.
Barack Obama	2009-2012	WhenÂ you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody.