Quotes of the day from previous years:
- 2004
- Do what you can, with what you have, where you are ~ Theodore Roosevelt
- 2005
- I profoundly believe that there is on this horizon, as yet only dimly perceived, a new dawn of conscience. In that purer light, people will come to see themselves in each other, which is to say they will make themselves known to one another by their similarities rather than by their differences. Man's knowledge of things will begin to be matched by man's knowledge of self. The significance rtt a smaller world will be measured not in terms of military advantage, but in terms of advantage for the human community. It will be the triumph of the heartbeat over the drumbeat. ~ Adlai Stevenson (born 5 February 1900)
- 2006
- What counts now is not just what we are against, but what we are for. Who leads us is less important than what leads us — what convictions, what courage, what faith — win or lose. ~ Adlai Stevenson II (born 5 February 1900)
- 2007
- God needeth not the help of a material sword of steel to assist the sword of the Spirit in the affairs of conscience. ~ Roger Williams (early advocate of freedom of conscience in religious matters, and the separation of Church and State, he emigrated from England to America on this date in 1631)
- 2008
- Let’s talk sense to the American people. Let’s tell them the truth, that there are no gains without pains, that we are now on the eve of great decisions, not easy decisions, like resistance when you're attacked, but a long, patient, costly struggle which alone can assure triumph over the great enemies of man — war, poverty, and tyranny — and the assaults upon human dignity which are the most grievous consequences of each. ~ Adlai Stevenson II
- 2009
- All progress has resulted from people who took unpopular positions. All change is the result of a change in the contemporary state of mind. Don't be afraid of being out of tune with your environment, and above all pray God that you are not afraid to live, to live hard and fast. To my way of thinking it is not the years in your life but the life in your years that count in the long run. You'll have more fun, you'll do more and you'll get more, you'll give more satisfaction the more you know, the more you have worked, and the more you have lived. For yours is a great adventure at a stirring time in the annals of men. ~ Adlai Stevenson II
- 2010
- Enforced uniformity confounds civil and religious liberty and denies the principles of Christianity and civility. No man shall be required to worship or maintain a worship against his will. ~ Roger Williams
- 2011
- For my part I believe in the forgiveness of sin and the redemption of ignorance. ~ Adlai Stevenson II
- 2012
- Every age needs men who will redeem the time by living with a vision of the things that are to be. ~ Adlai Stevenson II
- 2013
- 2014
- 2015
| I think that one of our most important tasks is to convince others that there's nothing to fear in difference; that difference, in fact, is one of the healthiest and most invigorating of human characteristics without which life would become meaningless. Here lies the power of the liberal way: not in making the whole world Unitarian, but in helping ourselves and others to see some of the possibilities inherent in viewpoints other than one's own; in encouraging the free interchange of ideas; in welcoming fresh approaches to the problems of life; in urging the fullest, most vigorous use of critical self-examination.
|
| ~ Adlai Stevenson II ~
|
- 2016
- 2017
- 2018
- 2019
- 2020
| I am a lawyer. I think that one of the most fundamental responsibilities, not only of every citizen, but particularly of lawyers, is to give testimony in a court of law, to give it honestly and willingly, and it will be a very unhappy day for Anglo-Saxon justice when a man, even a man in public life, is too timid to state what he knows and what he has heard about a defendant in a criminal trial for fear that defendant might be convicted. That would to me be the ultimate timidity.
|
| ~ Adlai Stevenson II ~
|
- 2021
- 2022
| There are those in our party who believe that as the presiding officer over the joint session of Congress, that I possessed unilateral authority to reject electoral college votes. And I heard this week, President Trump said I had the right to "overturn the election". But President Trump is wrong — I had no right to overturn the election. The presidency belongs to the American people, and the American people alone. And frankly there is no idea more un-American than the notion that any one person could choose the American president. Under the Constitution, I had no right to change the outcome of our election.
|
| ~ Mike Pence ~
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- proposed by Kalki, regarding recent remarks on significant historical events.
- 2023
- 2024
- 2025
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- DOB: William S. Burroughs · Barbara Hershey · Dwight L. Moody · Johan Ludvig Runeberg · Carl Spitzweg · Adlai Stevenson II · Elizabeth Swados
Men's consciences ought in no sort to be violated, urged, or constrained. ~ Roger Williams
- 3 Kalki 20:58, 5 February 2007 (UTC) with a very strong lean toward 4.
- 3 InvisibleSun 21:42, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
- 2 Zarbon 21:51, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
I'm Ready, I'm Ready, I'm Ready! ~ Spongebob Squarepants
- —This unsigned comment is by 69.253.95.224 (talk • contribs) .
- 1 Kalki 07:58, 4 February 2008 (UTC) (minor quote, no clear relation to the date)
- 0 Zarbon 21:51, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
A paranoid man is a man who knows a little about what's going on. ~ William S. Burroughs
- 3 Kalki 12:55, 22 October 2009 (UTC) with a strong lean toward 4.
- 2.5 ~ DanielTom (talk) 22:18, 2 February 2014 (UTC)
A functioning police state needs no police. ~ William S. Burroughs
- 3 Kalki 12:55, 22 October 2009 (UTC) with a lean toward 4.
Hell hath no vociferous fury than an endangered parasite. ~ William S. Burroughs
- 3 Kalki 12:55, 22 October 2009 (UTC) with a strong lean toward 4.
From symbiosis to parasitism is a short step. The word is now a virus. The flu virus may have once been a healthy lung cell. It is now a parasitic organism that invades and damages the central nervous system. Modern man has lost the option of silence. Try halting sub-vocal speech. Try to achieve even ten seconds of inner silence. You will encounter a resisting organism that forces you to talk. That organism is the word. ~ William S. Burroughs
- 3 Kalki 12:55, 22 October 2009 (UTC) with a very strong lean toward 4.
| The whole notion of loyalty inquisitions is a national characteristic of the police state, not of democracy. The history of Soviet Russia is a modern example of this ancient practice. I must, in good conscience, protest against any unnecessary suppression of our rights as free men. We must not burn down the house to kill the rats.
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| ~ Adlai Stevenson II ~
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| The problem of cat versus bird is as old as time. If we attempt to resolve it by legislation who knows but what we may be called upon to take sides as well in the age old problems of dog versus cat, bird versus bird, or even bird versus worm. In my opinion, the State of Illinois and its local governing bodies already have enough to do without trying to control feline delinquency.
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| ~ Adlai Stevenson II ~
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| The tragedy of our day is the climate of fear in which we live, and fear breeds repression. Too often sinister threats to the bill of rights, to freedom of the mind, are concealed under the patriotic cloak, of anti-communism.
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| ~ Adlai Stevenson II ~
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The early years of the United Nations have been difficult ones, but what did we expect? That peace would drift down from the skies like soft snow? That there would be no ordeal, no anguish, no testing, in this greatest of all human undertakings?
Any great institution or idea must suffer its pains of birth and growth. We will not lose faith in the United Nations. We see it as a living thing and we will work and pray for its full growth and development. We want it to become what it was intended to be — a world society of nations under law, not merely law backed by force, but law backed by justice and popular consent.
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| ~ Adlai Stevenson II ~
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| I have said what I meant and meant what I said. I have not done as well as I should like to have done, but I have done my best, frankly and forthrightly; no man can do more, and you are entitled to no less.
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| ~ Adlai Stevenson II ~
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| I'm not an old, experienced hand at politics. But I am now seasoned enough to have learned that the hardest thing about any political campaign is how to win without proving that you are unworthy of winning.
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| ~ Adlai Stevenson II ~
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| I have learned that In quiet places, reason abounds, that in quiet people there is vision and purpose, that many things are revealed to the humble that are hidden from the great.
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| ~ Adlai Stevenson II ~
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| You will find that the truth is often unpopular and the contest between agreeable fancy and disagreeable fact is unequal. For, in the vernacular, we Americans are suckers for good news.
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| ~ Adlai Stevenson II ~
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| Freedom is not an ideal, it is not even a protection, if it means nothing more than freedom to stagnate, to live without dreams, to have no greater aim than a second car and another television set.
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| ~ Adlai Stevenson II ~
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| There are worse things than losing an election; the worst thing is to lose one's convictions and not tell the people the truth.
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| ~ Adlai Stevenson II ~
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| The journey of a thousand leagues begins with a single step. So we must never neglect any work of peace within our reach, however small.
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| ~ Adlai Stevenson II ~
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