Ronald Reagan Quotes

The current tax code is a daily mugging.

It's hard, when you're up to your armpits in alligators, to remember you came here to drain the swamp.

Perhaps there is a simple answer -- not an easy answer -- but simple: If you and I have the courage to tell our elected officials that we want our national policy based on what we know in our hearts is morally right.

We speak with pride and admiration of that little band of Americans who overcame insuperable odds to set this nation on course 200 years ago. But our glory didn't end with them. Americans ever since have emulated their deeds.

All of us should remember that the federal government is not some mysterious institution comprised of buildings, files and paper. The people are the government. What we create we ought to be able to control.

On Father's Day, we pay tribute to all in our society who have taken on the responsibilities and joys of fatherhood. Whether our fathers are near at hand or a continent away, with their families or watching from the light of eternity, we take this day to remember them, to say our thanks for the years they have given us, and to ask that they receive God's blessings.

Work and family are at the center of our lives, the foundation of our dignity as a free people.

I know all the bad things that happened in that war. I was in uniform four years myself.

I believe now, as I alway have, that America's strength is in 'We the People.'

There you go again. When I opposed Medicare, there was another piece of legislation meeting the same problem before the Congress. I happened to favor the other piece of legislation and thought that it would be better for the senior citizens to provide better care than the one that was finally passed.

One of mankind's problems is we keep committing the same errors.

Are you better off than you were four years ago? One of my favorite quotes Is it easier for you to go and buy things in the stores ... Is there more or less unemployment?

You know, it was only a generation ago that actors couldn't be buried in the churchyard.

If we look to the answer as to why for so many years we achieved so much, prospered as no other people on earth, it was because here in this land we unleashed the energy and individual genius of man to a greater extent than has ever been done before. Freedom and the dignity of the individual have been more available and assured here than in any other place on earth. The price for this freedom at times has been high, but we have never been unwilling to pay that price.

Someone must stand up to those who say, "Here's the key, there's the Treasury, just take as many of those hard-earned tax dollars as you want."

And let us never forget that in honoring our flag, we honor the American men and women who have courageously fought and died for it over the last 200 years, patriots who set an ideal above any consideration of self. Our flag flies free today because of their sacrifice.

With our eyes fixed on the future, but recognizing the realities of today, we will achieve our destiny to be as a shining city on a hill for all mankind to see.

The time has come to match outgo to income, instead of always doing it the other way around.

When I've heard all I need to make a decision, I don't take a vote. I make a decision.

Good citizenship and defending democracy means living up to the ideals and values that make this country great.

The dustbin of history is littered with remains of those countries that relied on diplomacy to secure their freedom. We must never forget . . . in the final analysis . . . that it is our military, industrial and economic strength that offers the best guarantee of peace for America in times of danger.

I would have voted against the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

I'm not smart enough to lie

When I took the oath of office, I pledged loyalty to only one special interest group - ‘We the people’.

The thought of being President frightens me and I do not think I want the job.

We the people tell the government what to do, it doesn't tell us.

America's best days lie ahead. You ain't seen nothing yet.

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.

The future is best decided by ballots, not bullets.

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

When people tell me that I became President on January 20th, 1981, I feel I have to correct them. You don't become President of the United States. You are given temporary custody of an institution called the Presidency, which belongs to our people.

A stronger defense is an investment in peace.

You are Mrs. Reagan because Mr. Reagan loves you with all his heart.

The size of the federal budget is not an appropriate barometer of social conscience or charitable concern.

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.

It doesn't do any good to hold the door open for someone if they don't have a way to walk through it. And if they do have a way to pass through it then you probably don't need to hold it open because they can open it for themselves.

We must act today in order to preserve tomorrow

I knew Thomas Jefferson. He was a friend of mine. And believe me, you are no Thomas Jefferson. (at 1992 Republican party convention, referring to Bill Clinton)

One picture is worth 1,000 denials.

If a tax hike makes it to my desk, I'll veto it in less time than it takes Vanna White to turn the letters V-E-T-O!

We're more than friends and neighbors and allies; we are kin, who together have built the most productive relationship between any two countries in the world today.

Meaningful work, not welfare, is every American's hope, and we have a continuing responsibility to make those hopes a lasting reality.

Education is not the means of showing people how to get what they want. Education is an exercise by means of which enough men, it is hoped, will learn to want what is worth having.

Extreme taxation, excessive controls, oppressive government competition with business, frustrated minorities and forgotten Americans are not the products of free enterprise. They are the residue of centralized bureaucracy, of government by a self-anointed elite.

When you can't make them see the light, make them feel the heat.

Politics is, for me, forgive and -as you may have heard- sometimes forget.

In a world wracked by hatred, economic crisis, and political tension, America remains mankind's best hope.

f you analyze it I believe the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism. I think conservatism is really a misnomer just as liberalism is a misnomer for the liberals - if we were back in the days of the Revolution, so-called conservatives today would be the Liberals and the liberals would be the Tories. The basis of conservatism is a desire for less government interference or less centralized authority or more individual freedom and this is a pretty general description also of what libertarianism is.

Wearing love beads and touting our sincerity will not make this a safer world.

Almost all the worlds' constitutions are documents in which governments tell the people what their privileges are. Our Constitution is a document in which We the People tell the government what it is allowed to do. We the People are free.

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

I know I'm not in government anymore. In fact I'm out of work.

Don't give up on your ideals. Don't compromise. Don't turn to expediency. And for heaven's sake . . . don't get cynical.

One of the traditional methods of imposing statism or socialism on a people has been by way of medicine.

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.

For one, we very much need in any immigration bill - we need protection for people who are in this country and who have not become citizens, for example, that they are protected and legitimized and given permanent residency here. And we want to see some things of that kind added to the immigration bill.

Congressional mistakes have dramatically increased immigration through a series of what I believe were ill-advised actions going back to 1965 when the basic notions of our immigration laws were revised. In 1990, Congress opened the floodgates by passing a 35-percent increase in legal immigration.

Professional politicians like to talk about the value of experience in government. Nuts! The only experience you gain in politics is how to be political.

If I thought there was some reason to be concerned about them, I wouldn't be sleeping in this house tonight. (When asked about continued presence of Soviet nuclear submarines along US coastlines)

One way to make sure crime doesn't pay would be to let the government run it.