In America, anyone can become president. It’s one of the risks we take.
—Adlai Stevenson
Change is inevitable. Change for the better is a full-time job.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Change
Some people approach every problem with an open mouth.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Problem-solving, Speaking, Speakers
The time to stop a revolution is at the beginning, not the end.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Revolution
Accuracy is to a newspaper what virtue is to a lady, but a newspaper can always print a retraction.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Facts
The idea that you can merchandise candidates for high office like breakfast cereal—that you can gather votes like box tops—is, I think, the ultimate indignity to the democratic process.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Voting, Elections
The whole basis of the United Nations is the right of all nations—great or small—to have weight, to have a vote, to be attended to, to be a part of the twentieth century.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Nationality, Nationalism, Nation
I’m not an old, experienced hand at politics. But I am now seasoned enough to have learned that the hardest thing about any political campaign is how to win without proving that you are unworthy of winning.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Voting, Elections
It is not the years in your life but the life in your years that counts!
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Life and Living
Communism is the corruption of a dream of justice.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Communism, Socialism
If we value the pursuit of knowledge, we must be free to follow wherever that search may lead us. The free mind is not a barking dog, to be tethered on a ten-foot chain.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Knowledge
Peace is the one condition of survival in this nuclear age.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Peace
She would rather light candles than curse the darkness and her glow has warmed the world.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Attitude
Man does not live by words alone, despite the fact that sometimes he has to eat them.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Words, Eating
Our strength lies, not alone in our proving grounds and our stockpiles, but in our ideals, our goals, and their universal appeal to all men who are struggling to breathe free.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Goals
A hungry man is not a free man.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Freedom
The relationship of the toastmaster to the speaker should be the same as that of the fan to the fan dancer. It should call attention to the subject without making any particular effort to cover it.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Attention, Speaking, Speakers
Ignorance is stubborn and prejudice is hard.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Prejudice
Power corrupts, but lack of power corrupts absolutely.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Power
For my part I believe in the forgiveness of sin and the redemption of ignorance.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Forgiveness, Ignorance, Attitude
Understanding human needs is half the job of meeting them.
—Adlai Stevenson
You can tell the size of a man by the size of the thing that makes him mad.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Anger, Men
The first principle of a free society is an untrammeled flow of words in an open forum.
—Adlai Stevenson
A hypocrite is the kind of politician who would cut down a redwood tree, then mount the stump and make a speech for conservation.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Just for Fun
Golf is a fine relief from the tensions of office, but we are a little tired of holding the bag.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Golf
There is a spiritual hunger in the world today – and it cannot be satisfied by better cars on longer credit terms.
—Adlai Stevenson
We can chart our future clearly and wisely only when we know the path which has led to the present.
—Adlai Stevenson
Those who corrupt the public mind are just as evil as those who steal from the public purse.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Politics, Politicians
On this shrunken globe, men can no longer live as strangers.
—Adlai Stevenson
Freedom is not an ideal, it is not even a protection, if it means nothing more than freedom to stagnate, to live without dreams, to have no greater aim than a second car and another television set.
—Adlai Stevenson
Topics: Freedom
Wondering Whom to Read Next?
- Madeleine Albright Czech-born American Diplomat
- Henry Kissinger American Diplomat
- Carlos P. Romulo Filipino Diplomat
- Lyndon B. Johnson American Head of State
- Hubert Humphrey American Head of State
- R. James Woolsey, Jr. American Lawyer, Government Official
- John Foster Dulles American Politician
- Douglas MacArthur American Military Leader
- Pablo Neruda Chilean Poet
- Romain Gary French Novelist
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