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FOUNDED 1962
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“Performance of international duty to others means that in international affairs, in the commonwealth of nations, we shall not only refrain from wronging the weak, but shall, according to our capacity, and as opportunity offers, stand up for the weak when the weak are wronged by the strong.”
Kansas City, Missouri
May 30, 1916
“We Americans have many grave problems to solve, many threatening evils to fight, and many deeds to do, if, as we hope and believe, we have the wisdom, the strength, and the courage and the virtue to do them. But we must face the facts as they are. We must neither surrender ourselves to foolish optimism, or succumb to a timid and ignoble pessimism.”
Forum
April 1894
“There can be no higher international duty than to safeguard the existence and independence of industrious, orderly states, with a high personal and national standard of conduct, but without the military force of the great powers.”
The Outlook
September 23, 1914
“Good weapons are necessary, but if you put the best weapon that can be invented into the hands of a coward, he will be beaten by a brave man with a club.”
Kansas City, Missouri
May 1, 1903
“As a people we are indeed beyond measure fortunate in the characters of the two greatest of our public men, Washington and Lincoln. … Each had lofty ideas, but each in striving to attain these lofty ideas was guided by the soundest common sense.”
Hodgenville, Kentucky
February 12, 1909
“The administration of the government, the enforcement of the laws, must be fair and honest. The laws are not to be administered either in the interest of the poor man or the interest of the rich man. They are simply to be administered justly.”
Charleston, SC
April 9, 1902
“The only effective way to help any man is to help him to help himself.”
Oxford University
June 7, 1910
“I have a very strong feeling that it is a president’s duty to get on with Congress if he possibly can, and that it is a reflection upon him if he and Congress come to a complete break.”
Letter to Theodore Roosevelt Jr.
January 31, 1909
“In the long run, the man who makes a substantial contribution toward uplifting any part of the community has helped to uplift all of the community.”
Preface to Booker T. Washington
August 28, 1916
“The noblest of all forms of government is self-government; but it is also the most difficult.”
Fifth Annual Message to Congress
December 5, 1905
“In dealing with all these social problems, with the intimate relations of the family, with wealth in private use and business use, with labor, with poverty, the one prime necessity is to remember that, though hardness of heart is a great evil, it is no greater an evil than softness of head.”
Oxford University
June 7, 1910
“There is one quality which perhaps, strictly speaking, is as much intellectual as moral, but which is too often wholly lacking in men of high intellectual ability, and without which real character cannot exist – namely, the fundamental gift of commonsense.”
The Outlook
November 8, 1913
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