Lapham’s Quarterly

When we define democracy now, it must still be as a thing hoped for but not seen.

All voting is a sort of gaming, like checkers or backgammon, with a slight moral tinge to it.

Democracy produces both heroes and villains, but it differs from a fascist state in that it does not produce a hero who is a villain.

Despotism achieves great things illegally; democracy doesn’t even take the trouble to achieve small things legally.

What touches all shall be approved by all.

The king times are fast finishing. There will be blood shed like water, and tears like mist; but the peoples will conquer in the end.

What keeps the democracy alive at all but the hatred of excellence, the desire of the base to see no head higher than their own?

An election is coming. Universal peace is declared, and the foxes have a sincere interest in prolonging the lives of the poultry.

The most may err as grossly as the few.

The world is wearied of statesmen whom democracy has degraded into politicians.

In America, everybody is, but some are more than others.

Vox populi, vox humbug.

Democracy is the fig leaf of elitism.

Democracy cannot be static. Whatever is static is dead.

Democracy, like the human organism, carries within it the seed of its own destruction.

Let the people think they govern, and they will be governed.

If the people be the governors, who shall be governed?

Whenever in history equality appeared on the agenda, it was exported somewhere else, like an undesirable.

The only equals are those who are equally rich.

Despotism subjects a nation to one tyrant, democracy to many.

When great changes occur in history, when great principles are involved, as a rule the majority are wrong.

The worship of opinion is, at this day, the established religion of the United States.

Everyone else is represented in Washington by a rich and powerful lobby, it seems. But there is no lobby for the people.

So many men, so many opinions.

It is hell to belong to a suppressed minority.

The people are the foundation of the state. If the foundations are firm, the state will be tranquil.

Man’s capacity for justice makes democracy possible, but man’s inclination to injustice makes democracy necessary.

The tendency of democracies is, in all things, to mediocrity.

An electoral choice of ten different fascists is like choosing which way one wishes to die.

In a true democracy, everyone can be upper-class and live in Connecticut.

Nothing but a permanent body can check the imprudence of democracy.

The whole dream of democracy is to raise the proletariat to the level of bourgeois stupidity.

I have always been of the mind that in a democracy, manners are the only effective weapons against the bowie knife.

Oh, democracy! Whither are you leading us?

Some to the common pulpits, and cry out / “Liberty, freedom, and enfranchisement!”

Do you suppose it possible to know democracy without knowing the people?

Democracy means simply the bludgeoning of the people by the people for the people.

Television is democracy at its ugliest.

Television has made dictatorship impossible, but democracy unbearable.

Even though counting heads is not an ideal way to govern, at least it is better than breaking them.

I have often been convinced that a democracy is incapable of empire.