Quotes by Ronald Reagan

• Today, if you invent a better mousetrap, the government comes along with a better mouse.
• They say the world has become too complex for simple answers. They are wrong.
• Thomas Jefferson once said, 'We should never judge a president by his age, only by his works.' And ever since he told me that, I stopped worrying.
• To paraphrase Winston Churchill, I did not take the oath I have just taken with the intention of presiding over the dissolution of the world's strongest economy.
• Trust, but verify.
• Today we did what we had to do. They counted on America to be passive. They counted wrong.
• There are no great limits to growth because there are no limits of human intelligence, imagination, and wonder.
• The greatest security for Israel is to create new Egypts.
• To sit back hoping that someday, some way, someone will make things right is to go on feeding the crocodile, hoping he will eat you last - but eat you he will.
• There are no easy answers' but there are simple answers. We must have the courage to do what we know is morally right.
• There are no constraints on the human mind, no walls around the human spirit, no barriers to our progress except those we ourselves erect.
• The thought of being President frightens me and I do not think I want the job.
• The taxpayer - that's someone who works for the federal government but doesn't have to take the civil service examination.
• Unemployment insurance is a pre-paid vacation for freeloaders.
• The most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the government and I'm here to help.
• We should declare war on North Vietnam. We could pave the whole country and put parking strips on it, and still be home by Christmas.
• The best minds are not in government. If any were, business would steal them away.
• Surround yourself with the best people you can find, delegate authority, and don't interfere as long as the policy you've decided upon is being carried out.
• Status quo, you know, is Latin for 'the mess we're in'.
• The problem is not that people are taxed too little, the problem is that government spends too much.
• Welfare's purpose should be to eliminate, as far as possible, the need for its own existence.
• Without God, democracy will not and cannot long endure.
• Within the covers of the Bible are the answers for all the problems men face.
• While I take inspiration from the past, like most Americans, I live for the future.
• We might come closer to balancing the Budget if all of us lived closer to the Commandments and the Golden Rule.
• What we have found in this country, and maybe we're more aware of it now, is one problem that we've had, even in the best of times, and that is the people who are sleeping on the grates, the homeless, you might say, by choice.
• Violence has been Nicaragua's most important export to the world.
• We're in greater danger today than we were the day after Pearl Harbor. Our military is absolutely incapable of defending this country.
• We will always remember. We will always be proud. We will always be prepared, so we will always be free.
• We should measure welfare's success by how many people leave welfare, not by how many are added.
• We must reject the idea that every time a law's broken, society is guilty rather than the lawbreaker. It is time to restore the American precept that each individual is accountable for his actions.
• We have the duty to protect the life of an unborn child.
• We can't help everyone, but everyone can help someone.
• We can not play innocents abroad in a world that is not innocent.
• We are never defeated unless we give up on God.
• When you can't make them see the light, make them feel the heat.
• Man is not free unless government is limited.
• Information is the oxygen of the modern age. It seeps through the walls topped by barbed wire, it wafts across the electrified borders.
• Mr Gorbachev, tear down this wall!
• You know, if I listened to Michael Dukakis long enough, I would be convinced we're in an economic downturn and people are homeless and going without food and medical attention and that we've got to do something about the unemployed.
• Life is one grand, sweet song, so start the music.
• Let us not forget who we are. Drug abuse is a repudiation of everything America is.
• Latinos are Republican. They just don't know it yet.
• It's silly talking about how many years we will have to spend in the jungles of Vietnam when we could pave the whole country and put parking stripes on it and still be home by Christmas.
• It's difficult to believe that people are still starving in this country because food isn't available.
• My fellow Americans, I am pleased to tell you I just signed legislation which outlaws Russia forever. The bombing begins in five minutes.
• It doesn't do good to open doors for someone who doesn't have the price to get in. If he has the price, he may not need the laws. There is no law saying the Negro has to live in Harlem or Watts.
• One picture is worth 1,000 denials.
• Inflation is as violent as a mugger, as frightening as an armed robber and as deadly as a hit man.
• If we love our country, we should also love our countrymen.
• If we ever forget that we are One Nation Under God, then we will be a nation gone under.
• If the Soviet Union let another political party come into existence, they would still be a one-party state, because everybody would join the other party.
• It has been said that politics is the second oldest profession. I have learned that it bears a striking resemblance to the first.
• Politics is just like show business. You have a hell of an opening, coast for a while, and then have a hell of a close.
• If the federal government had been around when the Creator was putting His hand to this state, Indiana wouldn't be here. It'd still be waiting for an environmental impact statement.
• It's true hard work never killed anybody, but I figure, why take the chance?
• You can tell alot about a fellow's character by his way of eating jellybeans.
• Some people wonder all their lives if they've made a difference. The Marines don't have that problem.
• Republicans believe every day is the Fourth of July, but the democrats believe every day is April 15.
• Recession is when a neighbor loses his job. Depression is when you lose yours.
• No mother would ever willingly sacrifice her sons for territorial gain, for economic advantage, for ideology.
• Politics is not a bad profession. If you succeed there are many rewards, if you disgrace yourself you can always write a book.
• My philosophy of life is that if we make up our mind what we are going to make of our lives, then work hard toward that goal, we never lose - somehow we win out.
• Politics I supposed to be the second-oldest profession. I have come to realize that it bears a very close resemblance to the first.
• People do not make wars; governments do.
• Peace is not absence of conflict, it is the ability to handle conflict by peaceful means.
• One way to make sure crime doesn't pay would be to let the government run it.
• Of the four wars in my lifetime, none came about because the U.S. was too strong.
• No matter what time it is, wake me, even if it's in the middle of a Cabinet meeting.
• 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!
• Protecting the rights of even the least individual among us is basically the only excuse the government has for even existing.
• Approximately 80% of our air pollution stems from hydrocarbons released by vegetation, so let's not go overboard in setting and enforcing tough emission standards from man-made sources.
• Freedom prospers when religion is vibrant and the rule of law under God is acknowledged.
• Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same.
• Facts are stubborn things.
• Each generation goes further than the generation preceding it because it stands on the shoulders of that generation. You will have opportunities beyond anything we've ever known.
• Democracy is worth dying for, because it's the most deeply honorable form of government ever devised by man.
• Concentrated power has always been the enemy of liberty.
• Going to college offered me the chance to play football for four more years.
• Before I refuse to take your questions, I have an opening statement.
• Entrepreneurs and their small enterprises are responsible for almost all the economic growth in the United States.
• All the waste in a year from a nuclear power plant can be stored under a desk.
• All great change in America begins at the dinner table.
• Above all, we must realize that no arsenal, or no weapon in the arsenals of the world, is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women. It is a weapon our adversaries in today's world do not have.
• A tree's a tree. How many more do you need to look at?
• A people free to choose will always choose peace.
• Let us be sure that those who come after will say of us in our time, that in our time we did everything that could be done. We finished the race; we kept them free; we kept the faith.
• I've often said there's nothing better for the inside of a man than the outside of a horse.
• But there are advantages to being elected President. The day after I was elected, I had my high school grades classified Top Secret.
• I call upon the scientific community in our country, those who gave us nuclear weapons, to turn their great talents now to the cause of mankind and world peace: to give us the means of rendering these nuclear weapons impotent and obsolete.
• I've never been able to understand why a Republican contributor is a 'fat cat' and a Democratic contributor of the same amount of money is a 'public-spirited philanthropist'.
• I never drink coffee at lunch. I find it keeps me awake for the afternoon.
• I know in my heart that man is good. That what is right will always eventually triumph. And there's purpose and worth to each and every life.
• Don't be afraid to see what you see.
• I favor the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and it must be enforced at gunpoint if necessary.
• I am not worried about the deficit. It is big enough to take care of itself.
• How do you tell a communist? Well, it's someone who reads Marx and Lenin. And how do you tell an anti-Communist? It's someone who understands Marx and Lenin.
• How can a president not be an actor?
• Government does not solve problems; it subsidizes them.
• Heroes may not be braver than anyone else. They're just braver five minutes longer.
• Governments tend not to solve problems, only to rearrange them.
• Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.
• Government's first duty is to protect the people, not run their lives.
• Government is like a baby. An alimentary canal with a big appetite at one end and no sense of responsibility at the other.
• Government exists to protect us from each other. Where government has gone beyond its limits is in deciding to protect us from ourselves.
• History teaches that war begins when governments believe the price of aggression is cheap.
• I have wondered at times what the Ten Commandments would have looked like if Moses had run them through the US Congress.
• In the darkest hour, it is our light that guides us forward.
• All great change begins at the dinner table
• If life gives you lemons, make lemonade... and then find someone whose life gives them vodka and have a party!
• Anything is possible if you don't mind who gets the credit.