"Be always sure you are right - then go ahead"
About this Quote
That’s the subtext that fits Crockett’s world. On the frontier, hesitation could be costly, but certainty was often a performance as much as a fact. The line reads like advice to a young republic that wanted to see itself as principled even while it was improvising law, borders, and identity in real time. "Right" is doing double duty: morally right and strategically correct. The ambiguity is the point. It lets the speaker claim virtue while endorsing action that may later look ruthless.
Crockett, a politician as well as an explorer, also understands the appeal of simple rules in complicated circumstances. The quote offers a clean algorithm for messy decisions: don’t get bogged down in doubt; convert doubt into certainty, then act. It’s persuasive because it grants you both conscience and momentum - a frontier-friendly blend of righteousness and forward motion that still echoes in American self-mythology.
Quote Details
| Topic | Decision-Making |
|---|---|
| Source | Verified source: A Narrative of the Life of David Crockett, of the State o... (Davy Crockett, 1834)
Evidence: I leave this rule for others when I'm dead Be always sure you're right , THEN GO AHEAD! (Title page (personal motto)). This wording is cited by multiple references as Crockett’s personal motto appearing on the title page of his 1834 autobiography, A Narrative of the Life of David Crockett, of the State of Tennessee. The commonly circulated modern form (“Be always sure you are right - then go ahead”) is a normalized variant; the earliest form I could specifically verify in secondary transcriptions uses “you’re” and includes the preceding line (“I leave this rule for others when I'm dead”). A later (non-primary) but historically relevant channel for popularizing the motto was the Crockett almanac series (published 1835–1856), though those were not authored by Crockett. I was not able to directly open the scanned 1834 title page image within this browsing session to lock down a scan-based page identifier beyond 'title page.' Other candidates (1) Brave Bright Feathers (Lucille Marano, 2022) compilation95.0% ... Davy , Leon , J. J. Ralph Waldo Emerson , George Eastman , John Quincy Adams , and Walter Penn . " Davy Crockett ... |
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Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Crockett, Davy. (2026, February 11). Be always sure you are right - then go ahead. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/be-always-sure-you-are-right-then-go-ahead-18973/
Chicago Style
Crockett, Davy. "Be always sure you are right - then go ahead." FixQuotes. February 11, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/be-always-sure-you-are-right-then-go-ahead-18973/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"Be always sure you are right - then go ahead." FixQuotes, 11 Feb. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/be-always-sure-you-are-right-then-go-ahead-18973/. Accessed 12 Feb. 2026.










