Top 334 Quotes & Sayings by Calvin Coolidge

Explore popular quotes and sayings by an American president Calvin Coolidge.

Last updated on December 23, 2024.

Calvin Coolidge was the 30th president of the United States from 1923 to 1929. Born in Vermont, Coolidge was a Republican lawyer from New England who climbed up the ladder of Massachusetts state politics, eventually becoming the 48th governor of Massachusetts. His response to the Boston Police Strike of 1919 thrust him into the national spotlight and gave him a reputation as a man of decisive action. The next year, he was elected the 29th vice president of the United States, and he succeeded to the presidency upon the sudden death of Warren G. Harding in 1923. Elected in his own right in 1924, he gained a reputation as a small-government conservative and also as a man who said very little and had a dry sense of humor, receiving the nickname "Silent Cal". He chose not to run again in 1928, remarking that ten years as president was "longer than any other man has had it – too long!"

American - President | July 4, 1872 - January 5, 1933

Source: Wikipedia

If I had permitted my failures, or what seemed to me at the time a lack of success, to discourage me I cannot see any way in which I would ever have made progress.

Calvin Coolidge

It is only when men begin to worship that they begin to grow.

Calvin Coolidge

Perhaps one of the most important accomplishments of my administration has been minding my own business.

Calvin Coolidge

Four-fifths of all our troubles would disappear, if we would only sit down and keep still.

Calvin Coolidge

The business of America is business.

Calvin Coolidge

Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers. It may not be difficult to store up in the mind a vast quantity of facts within a comparatively short time, but the ability to form judgments requires the severe discipline of hard work and the tempering heat of experience and maturity.

Calvin Coolidge

Any man who does not like dogs and want them about does not deserve to be in the White House.

Calvin Coolidge

No man ever listened himself out of a job.

Calvin Coolidge

Advertising is the life of trade.

Calvin Coolidge

No nation ever had an army large enough to guarantee it against attack in time of peace, or ensure it of victory in time of war.

Calvin Coolidge

Industry, thrift and self-control are not sought because they create wealth, but because they create character.

Calvin Coolidge

It takes a great man to be a good listener.

Calvin Coolidge

Never go out to meet trouble. If you just sit still, nine cases out of ten, someone will intercept it before it reaches you.

Calvin Coolidge

One with the law is a majority.

Calvin Coolidge

They criticize me for harping on the obvious; if all the folks in the United States would do the few simple things they know they ought to do, most of our big problems would take care of themselves.

Calvin Coolidge

Christmas is not a time nor a season, but a state of mind. To cherish peace and goodwill, to be plenteous in mercy, is to have the real spirit of Christmas.

Calvin Coolidge

Duty is not collective; it is personal.

Calvin Coolidge

Those who trust to chance must abide by the results of chance.

Calvin Coolidge

Men speak of natural rights, but I challenge any one to show where in nature any rights existed or were recognized until there was established for their declaration and protection a duly promulgated body of corresponding laws.

Calvin Coolidge

If you don't say anything, you won't be called on to repeat it.

Calvin Coolidge

The government of the United States is a device for maintaining in perpetuity the rights of the people, with the ultimate extinction of all privileged classes.

Calvin Coolidge

You know, I have found out in the course of a long public life that the things I did not say never hurt me.

Calvin Coolidge

Heroism is not only in the man, but in the occasion.

Calvin Coolidge

If you see ten troubles coming down the road, you can be sure that nine will run into the ditch before they reach you.

Calvin Coolidge

Collecting more taxes than is absolutely necessary is legalized robbery.

Calvin Coolidge

No person was ever honored for what he received. Honor has been the reward for what he gave.

Calvin Coolidge

Ultimately property rights and personal rights are the same thing.

Calvin Coolidge

The man who builds a factory builds a temple, that the man who works there worships there, and to each is due, not scorn and blame, but reverence and praise.

Calvin Coolidge

I have never been hurt by what I have not said.

Calvin Coolidge

There is no force so democratic as the force of an ideal.

Calvin Coolidge

When more and more people are thrown out of work, unemployment results.

Calvin Coolidge

We do not need more intellectual power, we need more spiritual power. We do not need more of the things that are seen, we need more of the things that are unseen.

Calvin Coolidge

When a great many people are unable to find work, unemployment results.

Calvin Coolidge

The slogan 'press on' has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race.

Calvin Coolidge

Little progress can be made by merely attempting to repress what is evil. Our great hope lies in developing what is good.

Calvin Coolidge

After all, the chief business of the American people is business. They are profoundly concerned with producing, buying, selling, investing and prospering in the world.

Calvin Coolidge

We draw our Presidents from the people. It is a wholesome thing for them to return to the people. I came from them. I wish to be one of them again.

Calvin Coolidge

No enterprise can exist for itself alone. It ministers to some great need, it performs some great service, not for itself, but for others; or failing therein, it ceases to be profitable and ceases to exist.

Calvin Coolidge

When large numbers of men are unable to find work, unemployment results.

Calvin Coolidge

Advertising ministers to the spiritual side of trade. It is great power that has been entrusted to your keeping which charges you with the high responsibility of inspiring and ennobling the commercial world. It is all part of the greater work of the regeneration and redemption of mankind.

Calvin Coolidge

Mass demand has been created almost entirely through the development of advertising.

Calvin Coolidge

When people are bewildered they tend to become credulous.

Calvin Coolidge

In the discharge of the duties of this office, there is one rule of action more important than all others. It consists in never doing anything that someone else can do for you.

Calvin Coolidge

All growth depends upon activity. There is no development physically or intellectually without effort, and effort means work.

Calvin Coolidge

Don't expect to build up the weak by pulling down the strong.

Calvin Coolidge

We cannot do everything at once, but we can do something at once.

Calvin Coolidge

We need more of the Office Desk and less of the Show Window in politics. Let men in office substitute the midnight oil for the limelight.

Calvin Coolidge

Patriotism is easy to understand in America. It means looking out for yourself by looking out for your country.

Calvin Coolidge

Prosperity is only an instrument to be used, not a deity to be worshipped.

Calvin Coolidge

There is no dignity quite so impressive, and no one independence quite so important, as living within your means.

Calvin Coolidge

I sometimes wish that people would put a little more emphasis upon the observance of the law than they do upon its enforcement.

Calvin Coolidge

I have found it advisable not to give too much heed to what people say when I am trying to accomplish something of consequence. Invariably they proclaim it can't be done. I deem that the very best time to make the effort.

Calvin Coolidge

You can't know too much, but you can say too much.

Calvin Coolidge

To live under the American Constitution is the greatest political privilege that was ever accorded to the human race.

Calvin Coolidge

The right thing to do never requires any subterfuge, it is always simple and direct.

Calvin Coolidge

Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not: nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not: the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.

Calvin Coolidge

The nation which forgets its defenders will be itself forgotten.

Calvin Coolidge

Civilization and profit go hand in hand.

Calvin Coolidge

I have noticed that nothing I never said ever did me any harm.

Calvin Coolidge

Economy is the method by which we prepare today to afford the improvements of tomorrow.

Calvin Coolidge