Richard M. Nixon the President, biography, facts and quotes

"Sure there are dishonest men in local government. But there are dishonest men in national government too"

"The greatest honor history can bestow is that of peacemaker"

"A man is not finished when he is defeated. He is finished when he quits"

"I am not a crook"

"Tell them to send everything that can fly"

"When I retire I'm going to spend my evenings by the fireplace going through those boxes. There are things in there that ought to be burned"

"The press is the enemy"

"Only if you have been in the deepest valley, can you ever know how magnificent it is to be on the highest mountain"

"You've got to learn to survive a defeat. That's when you develop character"

"You won't have Nixon to kick around anymore, because, gentlemen, this is my last press conference"

"The presidency has many problems, but boredom is the least of them"

"No event in American history is more misunderstood than the Vietnam War. It was misreported then, and it is misremembered now"

"I reject the cynical view that politics is a dirty business"

"You must never be satisfied with losing. You must get angry, terribly angry, about losing. But the mark of the good loser is that he takes his anger out on himself and not his victorious opponents or on his teammates"

"Americans admire a people who can scratch a desert and produce a garden. The Israelis have shown qualities that Americans identify with: guts, patriotism, idealism, a passion for freedom. I have seen it. I know. I believe that"

"Always remember that others may hate you but those who hate you don't win unless you hate them. And then you destroy yourself"

"A public man must never forget that he loses his usefulness when he as an individual, rather than his policy, becomes the issue"

"When the President does it, that means that it's not illegal"

"I don't think that a leader can control, to any great extent, his destiny. Very seldom can he step in and change the situation if the forces of history are running in another direction"

"I don't know anything that builds the will to win better than competitive sports"

"I can take it. The tougher it gets, the cooler I get"

"I can see clearly now... that I was wrong in not acting more decisively and more forthrightly in dealing with Watergate"

"I brought myself down. I impeached myself by resigning"

"I believe in the battle-whether it's the battle of a campaign or the battle of this office, which is a continuing battle"

"Finishing second in the Olympics gets you silver. Finishing second in politics gets you oblivion"

"Don't get the impression that you arouse my anger. You see, one can only be angry with those he respects"

"Defeat doesn't finish a man, quit does. A man is not finished when he's defeated. He's finished when he quits"

"Certainly in the next 50 years we shall see a woman president, perhaps sooner than you think. A woman can and should be able to do any political job that a man can do"

"Castro couldn't even go to the bathroom unless the Soviet Union put the nickel in the toilet"

"By the time you get dressed, drive out there, play 18 holes and come home, you've blown seven hours. There are better things you can do with your time"

"As this long and difficult war ends, I would like to address a few special words to the American people: Your steadfastness in supporting our insistence on peace with honor has made peace with honor possible"

"Any lady who is first lady likes being first lady. I don't care what they say, they like it"

"Any change is resisted because bureaucrats have a vested interest in the chaos in which they exist"

"I played by the rules of politics as I found them"

"I let the American people down"

"I have never been a quitter. To leave office before my term is completed is opposed to every instinct in my body. But as president I must put the interests of America first Therefore, I shall resign the presidency effective at noon tomorrow"

"I have impeached myself by resigning"

"I gave 'em a sword. And they stuck it in, and they twisted it with relish. And I guess if I had been in their position, I'd have done the same thing"

"Voters quickly forget what a man says"

"Solutions are not the answer"

"Our chief justices have probably had more profound and lasting influence on their times and on the direction of the nation than most presidents"

"If I were to make public these tapes, containing blunt and candid remarks on many different subjects, the confidentiality of the office of the president would always be suspect"

"We cannot learn from one another until we stop shouting at one another - until we speak quietly enough so that our words can be heard as well as our voices"

"Never say no when a client asks for something, even if it is the moon. You can always try, and anyhow there is plenty of time afterwards to explain that it was not possible"

"Never let your head hang down. Never give up and sit down and grieve. Find another way. And don't pray when it rains if you don't pray when the sun shines"

"My strong point, if I have a strong point, is performance. I always do more than I say. I always produce more than I promise"

"My own view is that taping of conversations for historical purposes was a bad decision on the part of all the presidents. I don't think Kennedy should have done it. I don't think Johnson should have done it, and I don't think we should have done it"

"My concern today is not with the length of a person's hair but with his conduct"

"Life isn't meant to be easy. It's hard to take being on the top - or on the bottom. I guess I'm something of a fatalist. You have to have a sense of history, I think, to survive some of these things... Life is one crisis after another"

"Let us move from the era of confrontation to the era of negotiation"

Born as	Richard Milhous Nixon
Occup.	President
From	USA
Born	January 9, 1913 Yorba Linda, California, US
Died	April 22, 1994 New York City, New York, US
Aged	81 years

Richard M. Nixon Biography

68 Famous quotes by Richard M. Nixon