Sunday, November 01, 2026 Text is available under the CC BY-SA 3.0 licence.

Richard Nixon (1913 – 1994)


37th U S President.
Richard Nixon
Riots were also the most virulent symptoms to date of another, and in some ways graver, national disorder—the decline in respect for public authority and the rule of law in America. Far from being a great society, our is becoming a lawless society.
Nixon quotes
I call it the Madman Theory, Bob. I want the North Vietnamese to believe I've reached the point where I might do anything to stop the war. We'll just slip the word to them that, for God's sake, you know Nixon is obsessed about Communism. We can't restrain him when he's angry — and he has his hand on the nuclear button — and Ho Chi Minh himself will be in Paris in two days begging for peace.
Nixon
He was captured by TV, that was how he tried to connect with the American people. One of the few times I've met him was at Pompidou's funeral, right before the end. There was a TV in the church. He [Nixon] had a half-centimetre-thick layer of pancake, or make-up, because there could be TV-cameras around. It looked completely macabre, you could barely see the face. I was conversing with him, and it was like speaking to a mask.




Nixon Richard quotes
Well, then, some of you will say, and rightly, "Well, what did you use the fund for, Senator? Why did you have to have it?" Let me tell you in just a word how a Senate office operates. First of all, a Senator gets $15,000 a year in salary. He gets enough money to pay for one trip a year, a round trip, that is, for himself, and his family between his home and Washington, D.C. And then he gets an allowance to handle the people that work in his office to handle his mail. And the allowance for my State of California, is enough to hire 13 people. And let me say, incidentally, that that allowance is not paid to the Senator. It is paid directly to the individuals that the Senator puts on his pay roll. But all of these people and all of these allowances are for strictly official business; business, for example, when a constituent writes in and wants you to go down to the Veteran's Administration and get some information about his GI policy — items of that type, for example. But there are other expenses that are not covered by the Government. And I think I can best discuss those expenses by asking you some questions.
Nixon Richard
On evenings such as these, Deep Throat had talked about how politics had infiltrated every corner of government — a strong-arm takeover of the agencies by the Nixon White House.... He had once called it the 'switchblade mentality' — and had referred to the willingness of the President's men to fight dirty and for keeps....
Richard Nixon quotes
To leave office before my term is completed is abhorrent to every instinct in my body. But as President I must put the interests of America first. America needs a full-time President and a full-time Congress, particularly at this time with problems we face at home and abroad.
Richard Nixon
What are our schools for if not for indoctrination against communism?
Nixon Richard quotes
Let us build a structure of peace in the world in which the weak are as safe as the strong — in which each respects the right of the other to live by a different system — in which those who would influence others will do so by the strength of their ideas, and not by the force of their arms.
Let us accept that high responsibility not as a burden, but gladly — gladly because the chance to build such a peace is the noblest endeavor in which a nation can engage; gladly, also, because only if we act greatly in meeting our responsibilities abroad will we remain a great Nation, and only if we remain a great Nation will we act greatly in meeting our challenges at home.
Nixon
Now, some may ask why we don't get rid of the bases, since the Soviet Government declares today that it has only peaceful intentions. The answer is that whenever the fear and suspicions that caused us and our Allies to take measures for collective self-defense are removed, the reason for our maintaining bases will be removed. In other words, the only possible solution of this problem lies in mutual, rather than unilateral action leading toward disarmament.
Nixon Richard
As long as I'm sitting in the chair, there's not going to be any Jew appointed to that court. [No Jew] can be right on the criminal-law issue.
Richard Nixon
The greatest honor history can bestow is the title of peacemaker.




Richard Nixon quotes
I recognize that this additional material I am now furnishing may further damage my case.
Richard Nixon
And I want you to know that I have no intention whatever of ever walking away from the job that the people elected me to do for the people of the United States.
Nixon quotes
He was the most dishonest individual I ever met in my life. President Nixon lied to his wife, his family, his friends, longtime colleagues in the US Congress, lifetime members of his own political party, the American people and the world.
Nixon Richard
The average American is just like the child in the family. You give him some responsibility and he is going to amount to something. He is going to do something. If, on the other hand, you make him completely dependent and pamper him and cater to him too much, you are going to make him soft, spoiled and eventually a very weak individual.
Nixon Richard quotes
I am now a Keynesian in economics.
Richard Nixon
Short of changing human nature, therefore, the only way to achieve a practical, livable peace in a world of competing nations is to take the profit out of war.
Richard Nixon quotes
If he gets shot, it's too damn bad.
Richard Nixon
But, Bob, generally speaking, you can't trust the bastards. They turn on you. Am I wrong or right?
Nixon Richard
The peace we seek in the world is not the flimsy peace which is merely an interlude between wars, but a peace which can endure for generations to come.
It is important that we understand both the necessity and the limitations of America's role in maintaining that peace.
Unless we in America work to preserve the peace, there will be no peace.
Unless we in America work to preserve freedom, there will be no freedom.


© 2009–2013Quotes Privacy Policy | Contact