"No
one is born a good citizen; no nation is born
a democracy. Rather, both are processes that
continue to evolve over a lifetime. Young
people must be included from birth. A society
that cuts off from its youth severs its lifeline."
-- Kofi
Annan
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"It
is not always the same thing to be a good man
and a good citizen."
-- Aristotle
(384-322 BC) |
"Man
is at the bottom an animal, midway, a citizen,
and at the top, divine. But the climate of this
world is such that few ripen at the top."
-- Henry
Ward Beecher |
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The
marvel of all history is the patience with which men
and women submit to burdens unnecessarily laid upon
them by their government.
-- William E. Borah
"Citizenship
comes first today in our crowded world...No man can
enjoy the privileges of education and thereafter with
a clear conscience break his contract with society.
To respect that contract is to be mature, to strengthen
it is to be a good citizen, to do more than your share
under it is noble."
-- Isaiah Bowman
"The
most important office... that of private citizen."
Justice Louis D. Brandeis
"The
only title in our democracy superior to that of President
is the title of citizen."
Justice Louis D. Brandeis
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"...we
all have an obligation as citizens of this earth
to leave the world a healthier, cleaner, and
better place for our children and future generations.”
~ Blythe
Danner
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"I
have no country to fight for: my country is the
earth, and I am a citizen of the world."
-- Euguene
V. Debs |
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"I
realized that public affairs were also my affairs.
I became active in politics because I saw the possibility,
if we all sat back and did nothing, of a world in
which there would no longer be any stages for actors
to act on."
-- Helen Gahagan Douglas (1900-1980)
"A
passive and ignorant citizenry will never create a
sustainable world."
-- Andrew Gaines
"Which
is the best government? That which teaches us to govern
ourselves."
--Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
"The
job of a citizen is to keep his mouth open."
-- Gunter Grass
Without
free, self-respecting, and autonomous citizens
there can be no free and independent nations.
Without internal peace, that is, peace among citizens
and between the citizens and the state, there
can be no guarantee of external peace.
-- Vaclav
Havel |
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"A
generation that acquires knowledge without ever understanding
how that knowledge can benefit the community is a
generation that is not learning what it means to be
citizens in a democracy."
-- Elizabeth L. Hollander (1817-1885)
"If
you look back in history, you will find the core mission
of public education in America was to create places
of civic virtue for our children and for our society.
As education undergoes the rigors of re-examination
and the need for reinvention, it is cruicial to remember
that the key role of public schools is to preserve
democracy and, that as battered as we might be, our
mission is central to the future of this county."
-- Paul D. Houston, Executive director of the American
Association of School Administrators
"A
community is like a ship; everyone ought to be prepared
to take the helm."
-- Henrik Ibsen, Norwegian playwright (1828-1906)
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"A
nation, as a society, forms a moral person,
and every member of it is personally responsible
for his society."
-- Thomas
Jefferson
"It
is strangely absurd to suppose that a million
of human beings, collected together, are not
under the same moral laws which bind each of
them separately."
-- Thomas
Jefferson
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"Ask
not what your country can do for you…Ask what
you can do for your country."
-- John
F. Kennedy
"The
efforts of the government alone will never be
enough. In the end the people must choose and
the people must help themselves."
-- John
F. Kennedy
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“What
do I owe to my times, to my country, to my neighbors,
to my friends? Such are the questions which a virtuous
man ought often to ask himself.”
-- Johann Kaspar Lavater, German poet and physiognomist
(1741-1801)
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"Let
us at all times remember that all American citizens
are brothers of a common country, and should
dwell together in bonds of fraternal feeling."
-- Abraham
Lincoln
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"Democracy
is never a thing done. Democracy is always something
that a nation must be doing."
-- Archibald MacLeish, American poet, public official
(1892-1982)
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"Democracy
is the most demanding of all forms of government
in terms of the energy, imagination, and public
spirit required of the individual."
-- George
C. Marshall (1880-1959)
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"Never
doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed
citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the
only thing that ever has."
-- Margaret
Mead |
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"The
worth of the state, in the long run, is the
worth of the individuals composing it."
-- John
Stuart Mill
|
"If
I knew something that would serve my country but would
harm mankind, I would never reveal it; for I am a
citizen of humanity first and by necessity, and a
citizen of France second, and only by accident"
-- Charles de Montesquieu
"Neither
democracy nor effective representation is possible
until each participant in the group...devotes a measurable
part of his life to furthering its existence."
-- Lewis Mumford, American social philosopher (1895-1990)
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There
can be no daily democracy without daily citizenship.
-- Ralph
Nader |
Bad
officials are elected by good citizens who do not
vote.
-- George Jean Nathan
"The
most important thing an institution does is not to
prepare a student for a career but for a life as a
citizen."
-- Frank Newman
 |
"The
World is my country, all mankind are my brethren,
and to do good is my religion."
-- Thomas
Paine. |
The
punishment which the wise suffer, who refuse to take
part in government, is to live under the government
of worse men.
-- Plato
"The
Greek word for idiot, literally translated, means
one who does not participate in politics. That sums
up my conviction on the subject."
Gladys Pyle, Senator (1890-1989)
Full
participation in government and society has been a
basic right of the country symbolizing the full citizenship
and equal protection of all.
-- Charles Rangel
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"The
government is us; we are the government, you
and I."
-- Theodore
Roosevelt
"The
first requisite of a good citizen in this republic
of ours is that he shall be able and willing
to pull his own weight."
-- Theodore
Roosevelt
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Whatever
system of governance is eventually adopted, it
is important that it carries the people with it.
We need to convey the message that safeguarding
our common property, humankind, will require developing
in each of us a new loyalty: a loyalty to mankind.
It calls for the nurturing of a feeling of belonging
to the human race. We have to become world citizens.
-- Joseph
Rotblat |
"As
citizens of this democracy, you are the rulers and
the ruled, the law-givers and the law-abiding, the
beginning and the end."
-- Adlai E. Stevenson
"I
am a citizen, not of Athens or Greece, but of the
world"
-- Socrates
 |
We
are citizens of the world. The tragedy of our
times is that we do not know this.
-- Woodrow
Wilson
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