Will Rogers Quotes

“Congress knew Coolidge would veto the farm bill. There was more politics than relief in that bill.”

“I never took a human life, I only sold the fellow the gun to take it with.”

“The money was all appropriated for the top in the hopes that it would trickle down to the needy. Mr. Hoover didn’t know that money trickled up. Give it to the people at the bottom and the people at the top will have it before night, anyhow. But it will at least have passed through the poor fellow’s hands.”

“If everybody (traded his car for a horse) they would be out of debt in a couple of years. Just think, no gas, no tires, no roads to pay for.”

“Invest in inflation. It is the only thing going up.”

“American invents everything, but the trouble is we get tired of it the minute the new is wore off.”

“Well, another senator rose and said {as they always do} 'Does the gentleman yield?' They always say that - least they call each other 'gentleman' in there. But the tone they put on the word, it would sound more appropriate if they came right out and said 'Would the coyote from Maine yield?' 'cause that's about the way it sounds. Well, then, the other senator says 'I yield' (for if he don't the other guy'll keep on talking anyhow). So the coyote from Maine says 'I yield to...the polecat from Oregon!'”

“There is not a man in the country that can't make a living for himself and family. But he can't make a living for them and his government, too, the way his government is living. What the government has got to do is live as cheap as the people”

“There is no income tax in Russia. But there's no income.”

“We will never get anywhere with our finances till we pass a law saying...every time we appropriate something, we...pass another bill...stating where the money is coming from.”

“I have always claimed Americans didn't want a drink as bad as they wanted the right to take a drink if they did happen to want one.”

“I am just an old country boy in a big town trying to get along. I have been eating pretty regular and the reason I have been is because I have stayed an old country boy.”

“Why don't they pass a constitutional amendment prohibiting anybody from learning anything? If it works as well as prohibition did, in five years Americans would be the smartest race of people on Earth.”

“There have been three great inventions since the beginning of time: fire, the wheel, and central banking.”

“Rumor travels faster, but it don't stay put as long as truth.”

“It sure did kick up some excitement in the Senate when one Senator called the other Senators 'sons of Wild jackasses.' Well, if you thought it made the Senators hot, you wait till you see what happens when the jackasses hear how they have been slandered.”

“Baseball is a skilled game. It's America's game - it, and high taxes.”

“If you want to know when a war might be coming, you just watch the U.S. and see when it starts cutting down on its defenses. It's the surest barometer in the world.”

“The bankers just got a good cussing by everybody for loaning too much money. Well, they got some awful nice buildings. So when a banker fails, he fails in splendor.”

“One wants recovery to start from the bottom, and the other wants it to start from the top. I don't know which is right. I've never heard of anybody suggesting that they might start it in the middle, so I hereby make that suggestion. To start recovery halfway between the two, because it's the middle class that does everything anyhow. But I don't know anything about it.”

“We are sure living in a peculiar time. You get morefor not working than you will for working, and morefor not raising a hog than for raising it.”

“Statistics have proven that the surest way to get anything out of the public mind and never hear of it again is to have a Senate committee appointed to look into it.”

“The budget is like a mythical bean bag. Congress votes mythical beans into it, then reaches in and tries to pull real ones out.”

“I read where they are going to limit debate in the Senate. It used to be that a man could talk all day, but now, as soon as he tells all he knows, he has to sit down. Most of these birds will just be getting up and nodding now. Why, some of them won't be able to answer roll call.”

“Our country has plenty of five-cent cigars, but the trouble is they charge fifteen cents for them.”