A Quote by James Montgomery Boice

A nation's strength is found not in the number of its laws but in the character of its people.

James Montgomery Boice

Quote Topics

Character Found Laws Nation Number People Strength

Quote Author

James Montgomery Boice
American - Author
July 7, 1938 - June 15, 2000

Laws, it is said, are for the protection of the people. It's unfortunate that there are no statistics on the number of lives that are clobbered yearly as a result of laws: outmoded laws; laws that found their way onto the books as a result of ignorance, hysteria or political haymaking; antilife laws; biased laws; laws that pretend that reality is fixed and nature is definable; laws that deny people the right to refuse protection. A survey such as that could keep a dozen dull sociologists out of mischief for months.

Tom Robbins

A nation,” he heard himself say, “consists of its laws. A nation does not consist of its situation at a given time. If an individual’s morals are situational, that individual is without morals. If a nation’s laws are situational, that nation has no laws, and soon isn’t a nation.

William Gibson

We're a nation of laws, but the good thing about America, is that laws reside in the people and people can change the laws.

Rick Warren

Undeniably, character does count for our citizens, out communities, and our Nation, and this week we celebrate the importance of character in our individual lives... core ethical values of trustworthiness, fairness, responsibility, caring, respect, and citizenship form the foundation of our democracy, our economy, and our society... Instilling sound character in our children is essential to maintaining the strength of our Nation into the 21st century.

William J. Clinton

We are a nation of immigrants. But we are also a nation of laws. It is wrong and ultimately self-defeating for a nation of immigrants to permit the kind of abuse of our immigration laws we have seen in recent years, and we must do more to stop it.

William J. Clinton

We have to deal with reality. The reality is, we have a number a very high number of illegal immigrants in this country. They're meeting an important economic need. And we are a nation of laws, and we're a nation of immigrants. And if we're going to address the real threats, then we need to have a temporary worker program to allow our Border Patrol agents to focus on the criminals and the thugs and the terrorists and the traffickers and smugglers that are trying to come into this country illegally.

Scott McClellan

The ideal to which John Adams subscribed-that we would be a nation of laws, not of men-was quickly subverted when the churches forced upon everyone, through supposedly neutral and just laws, their innumerable taboos on sex, alcohol, gambling. We are now indeed a nation of laws, mostly bad and certainly antihuman.

Gore Vidal

It is not the enactment, but the observance of laws, that creates the character of a nation.

Calvin Coolidge

A nation's greatness is measured not just by its gross national product or military power, but by the strength of its devotion to the principles and values that bind its people and define their character.

Ronald Reagan

We are a nation of laws, not a nation that ignores laws if it benefits the Democrat Party.

Ted Nugent

I am a citizen of the most beautiful nation on earth, a nation whose laws are harsh yet simple, a nation that never cheats, which is immense and without borders, where life is lived in the present. In this limitless nation, this nation of wind, light, and peace, there is no other ruler besides the sea.

Bernard Moitessier

The customs of that most criminal nation (Israel) have gained such strength that they have now been received in all lands. The conquered have given laws to the conquerors.

Seneca the Younger

The strength of a nation, especially of a republican nation, is in the intelligent and well ordered homes of the people.

Lydia Sigourney

There was such an incredible logic to kissing, such a metal-to-magnet pull between two people that it was a wonder that they found the strength to prevent themselves from succumbing every second. Rightfully, the world should be a whirlpool of kissing into which we sank and never found the strength to rise up again.