Top 27 Quotes & Sayings by Michael D. Higgins

Explore popular quotes and sayings by an Irish politician Michael D. Higgins.
Last updated on April 14, 2025.
Michael D. Higgins

Michael Daniel Higgins is an Irish politician, poet, sociologist, and broadcaster, who has served as the ninth president of Ireland since November 2011. Entering national politics through the Labour Party, he served as a senator from 1973 to 1977 having been nominated by the Taoiseach. Elected in 1981 as a Teachta Dála (TD), he represented the Galway West constituency from 1981 to 1982 and 1987 to 2011. Between these terms, he returned to Seanad Éireann from 1983 to 1987 as a senator for the National University. He served as Minister for Arts, Culture and the Gaeltacht from 1993 to 1997 and mayor of Galway from 1981 to 1982 and 1990 to 1991. Higgins was the president of the Labour Party from 2003 to 2011, until he resigned following his election as president of Ireland.

I love our shared island, our shared Ireland and its core decency. I love it for its imagination and its celebration of the endless possibilities for our people.
You are not speaking for yourself, but for Ireland.
I want to say to all of you that when I take my oath of office I will do my absolute best to use all of my abilities for all of the people of Ireland. — © Michael D. Higgins
I want to say to all of you that when I take my oath of office I will do my absolute best to use all of my abilities for all of the people of Ireland.
While the wider global environment is worrying, we are seeing some positive results in our economic affairs.
Every age, after all, must have its own aisling and dream of a better, kinder, happier, shared world.
Now it is time to turn to an older wisdom that, while respecting material comfort and security as a basic right of all, also recognises that many of the most valuable things in life cannot be measured.
We need to discuss the basis of a new form of trust built on a meaningful form of citizenship appropriate for a republic.
I'm happy with the vote and the support. I'm very glad that it is so decisive. It will enable me to be a president for all of the people.
I think the important thing now is to have a celebration and then with determination move into our common, shared, different future.
Making an Irishness to be proud of in a real Republic. It is the vision of a real Republic where life and language, where ideals and experience have the ring of authenticity which we need now as we go forward.
The necessary transformation of which I speak and of which my presidency will be a part is built on turning creative possibilities into live realities for all our people.
I want to say a very sincere thank you for this welcome home - it is a wonderful welcome home. It is the place to where I return and where I will always return because it is of Galway that I am.
The mandate I have received and for which I will speak with heart and head to implement over the next seven years had its four pillars - an inclusive citizenship, equality and participation and respect in a creative society creating an excellence in everything we Irish do.
I am delighted to be back home in Galway, the place I first came to as a 19-year-old in 1960. It's here where my heart is and will forever be.
I have encountered on this long road an enthusiasm for an Irishness which will be built on recognising again those sources from which spring the best of our reason and curiosity.
The connection has been lost between the country's direction, especially with regard to the way in which the economy has been run, and the citizen.
I am very glad as well that it is a presidency built on a campaign that emphasized ideas. I hope it will be a presidency that will enable everybody to be part of and proud of.
I will be a President for all the people, whether they voted for me or not, whether they are young or old and particularly for the Irish abroad. I'm looking forward to it and I think it will be exciting and wonderful.
The presidency is an independent office and the Irish people whom I appreciate so much and I take with such responsibility have given a very clear mandate on a very clear set of ideas to me, as the ninth president.
The reconnection of society, economy and ethics is a project we cannot postpone.
Ireland has made its choice for the future and it has chosen the version of Irishness it will build. I know, and I will work with head and heart to be part of it with all of you in creating that future one in which all of us can be part of and part of us too.
Through the inspiration of Vaclav's words, the courage of his dissidence and the integrity of his leadership, Czechoslovakia successfully transitioned from an authoritarian state to a free democracy at the heart of Europe.
I am delighted with the strong vote I have received. My message of positive leadership, patriotism and commitment clearly was resonating with tens of thousands of ordinary Irish people.
I hope that at the end of the seven years, people will say that I have been of some inspirational value to them at home in terms of inclusiveness and abroad, I look forward to representing Ireland.
I think even the poorest people in the great country that is the United States should be entitled to basic health care. — © Michael D. Higgins
I think even the poorest people in the great country that is the United States should be entitled to basic health care.
Be proud to be a decent American rather than a wanker whipping up fear.
When I started out, people were afraid of parish priests. Now they're afraid of newspaper editors.
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