227 Quotes by Jon Meacham

A politician’s task was to bring reality and policy into the greatest possible account with the ideal and the principled.

The war between the ideal and the real, between what’s right and what’s convenient, between the larger good and personal interest is the contest that unfolds in the soul of every American.

My mind has been long fixed to bow to the judgment of the world, who will judge me by my acts, and will never take counsel from me as to what that judgment should be.

Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half the people are right more than half of the time.

In our finest hours, though, the soul of the country manifests itself in an inclination to open our arms rather than to clench our fists;.

Not all great presidents were always good, and neither individuals nor nations are without evil.

Cherish therefore the spirit of our people, and keep alive their attention.1 Do not be too severe upon their errors, but reclaim them by enlightening them. – THOMAS JEFFERSON.

Well,” Bush answered, “I’m worried that sometimes your idealism will get in the way of what I think is sound governance.

If we did a good act merely from the love of god, and a belief that it is pleasing to him, whence arises the morality of the atheist?” Jefferson once asked. “It is idle to say, as some do, that no such being exists.” Religion, then, could not claim to be the universal source of individual moral conduct.