A Quote by Archibald MacLeish

Democracy is never a thing done. Democracy is always something that a nation must be doing.

Archibald MacLeish

Quote Topics

Always Democracy Doing Done Must Nation Never Something Thing

Quote Author

Archibald MacLeish
American - Poet
May 7, 1892 - April 20, 1982

Democracy is never a thing done. Democracy is always something that a nation must be doing. What is necessary now is one thing and one thing only that democracy become again democracy in action, not democracy accomplished and piled up in goods and gold.

Archibald MacLeish

Democracy is never a thing done. Democracy is always something that a nation must be doing. What is necessary now is one thing and one thing only, that democracy become again democracy in action, not democracy accomplished and piled up in goods and gold.

Archibald MacLeish

When we talk about Cuban democracy we are referring to participatory democracy which is big difference with representative bourgeois democracy. Our is a democracy in which everything is consulted with the people; it is a democracy in which every aspect and important decision that has an impact in the life and society of the people, is done in consultation.

Alejandro Castro Espin

Democracy's a very fragile thing. You have to take care of democracy. As soon as you stop being responsible to it and allow it to turn into scare tactics, it's no longer democracy, is it? It's something else. It may be an inch away from totalitarianism.

Sam Shepard

Democracy is something America has never really practiced. Because the Founding Fathers hated two things: monarchy and democracy. They wanted a republic, a replica of the Roman or Venetian republics. They didn't even like the etymology of the word "democracy."

Gore Vidal

I am a Mexican. The United States lived seventy-five years with the one party system in Mexico - the PRI - without batting an eyelid, never demanding democracy of Mexico. Democracy came because Mexicans fought for democracy and made a democracy out of our history, our possibilities, our perspectives. Democracy is not something that can be exported like Coca-Cola. It has to be bred from the inside, according to the culture, the conditions of each country.

Carlos Fuentes

Democracy is not something you believe in or a place to hang your hat, but it's something you do. You participate. If you stop doing it, democracy crumbles.

Abbie Hoffman

We must fortify African democracy and peace by launching Radio Democracy for Africa, supporting the transition to democracy now beginning to take place in Nigeria.

William J. Clinton

'Peace on earth, good will toward men' - democracy must cling to that message. For it is my deep conviction that democracy cannot live without that true religion which gives a nation a sense of justice and moral purpose.

Franklin D. Roosevelt

We think about democracy, and that's the word that Americans love to use, 'democracy,' and that's how we characterize our system. But if democracy just means going to vote, it's pretty meaningless. Russia has democracy in that sense. Most authoritarian regimes have democracy in that sense.

Timothy D. Snyder

Democracy doesn't recognize east or west and democracy is simply people's will. Therefore, I do not acknowledge that there are various models of democracy; there is just democracy itself.

Shirin Ebadi

Democracy doesn't recognize east or west; democracy is simply people's will. Therefore, I do not acknowledge that there are various models of democracy; there is just democracy itself.

Shirin Ebadi

In the world there is no democracy better than our democracy. Such a thing has never before been seen.

Ruhollah Khomeini

Noam Chomsky has a book, which I read for the first time when I was in Spain, called 'Fear of Democracy'. There is your answer. Fear of democracy. In Honduras, they had a sham democracy. It was run by elites, what was called a liberal democracy, but in reality was a false democracy.

Hugo Chavez

Democracy... while it lasts is more bloody than either aristocracy or monarchy. Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There is never a democracy that did not commit suicide.