American - Writer | September 15, 1789 - September 14, 1851
It is the besetting vice of democracies to substitute public opinion for law. This is the usual form in which the masses of men exhibit their tyranny.
James Fenimore Cooper
MenLawOpinionTyrannyViceMasses
Party leads to vicious, corrupt and unprofitable legislation, for the sole purpose of defeating party.
PurposePartyCorruptLegislation
The tendency of democracies is, in all things, to mediocrity.
MediocrityThingsAll ThingsTendency
The common faults of American language are an ambition of effect, a want of simplicity, and a turgid abuse of terms.
SimplicityAmbitionLanguageAmerican
The very existence of government at all, infers inequality. The citizen who is preferred to office becomes the superior to those who are not, so long as he is the repository of power, and the child inherits the wealth of the parent as a controlling law of society.
PowerGovernmentChildLawSociety
It is a misfortune that necessity has induced men to accord greater license to this formidable engine, in order to obtain liberty, than can be borne with less important objects in view; for the press, like fire, is an excellent servant, but a terrible master.
FireMenViewLibertyImportant
It is a besetting vice of democracies to substitute public opinion for law. This is the usual form in which masses of men exhibit their tyranny.
They who have reasoned ignorantly, or who have aimed at effecting their personal ends by flattering the popular feeling, have boldly affirmed that 'one man is as good as another;' a maxim that is true in neither nature, revealed morals, nor political theory.
NatureGoodManMoralsPolitical
Systems are to be appreciated by their general effects, and not by particular exceptions.
AppreciatedGeneralExceptions
Whenever the government of the United States shall break up, it will probably be in consequence of a false direction having been given to public opinion.
GovernmentOpinionDirectionWillUp
The affairs of life embrace a multitude of interests, and he who reasons in any one of them, without consulting the rest, is a visionary unsuited to control the business of the world.
LifeBusinessControlWorldRestHe
The disposition of all power is to abuses, nor does it at all mend the matter that its possessors are a majority.
PowerMatterMajorityDisposition
Copyright © 2024 QuotesDict James Fenimore Cooper quotes