Famous quotes by Public Servants

Quotes from public servants across local, national, and global spheres highlight the values that guide work in the public interest: duty, integrity, accountability, and care for community. Voices from elected officials, civil servants, first responders, judges, diplomats, and public health workers offer reflections on leadership, policy, and everyday service. Whether pragmatic or visionary, their words speak to the challenges of governing, the humility of stewardship, and the resilience required to serve all people with fairness, transparency, and hope.

"I regret to say that we of the FBI are powerless to act in cases of oral-genital intimacy, unless it has in some way obstructed interstate commerce"

J. Edgar Hoover, Public Servant

"As of now, I am in control here in the White House"

Alexander Haig, Public Servant

"Evil prospers when good men do nothing"

John Philpot Curran, Public Servant

"The Internet provides very serious challenges to our ability to keep from children the kinds of things that are destructive to them"

John Ashcroft, Public Servant

John Ashcroft

"The cure for crime is not the electric chair, but the high chair"

J. Edgar Hoover, Public Servant

"Let them march all they want, as long as they continue to pay their taxes"

Alexander Haig, Public Servant

"Unintelligent people always look for a scapegoat"

Ernest Bevin, Public Servant

"Negotiations are a euphemism for capitulation if the shadow of power is not cast across the bargaining table"

George Schultz, Public Servant

"The surest test of discipline is its absence"

Clara Barton, Public Servant

"But we will lose the millions of records being created daily in a dizzying array of electronic forms unless we find a way to preserve and keep them accessible indefinitely"

Allen Weinstein, Public Servant

"You must never find time for anything. If you want time, you must make it"

Charles Buxton, Public Servant

"A thousand years will pass and the guilt of Germany will not be erased"

Hans Frank, Public Servant

"When in doubt, mumble; when in trouble, delegate; when in charge, ponder"

James H. Boren, Public Servant

"For the only way in which a durable peace can be created is by world-wide restoration of economic activity and international trade"

James Forrestal, Public Servant

"We didn't lose Vietnam. We quit Vietnam"

Alexander Haig, Public Servant

"I may be compelled to face danger, but never fear it, and while our soldiers can stand and fight, I can stand and feed and nurse them"

Clara Barton, Public Servant

"I have an almost complete disregard of precedent, and a faith in the possibility of something better. It irritates me to be told how things have always been done. I defy the tyranny of precedent. I go for anything new that might improve the past"

Clara Barton, Public Servant

"Economy, prudence, and a simple life are the sure masters of need, and will often accomplish that which their opposites, with a fortune at hand, will fail to do"

Clara Barton, Public Servant

"Dictators must have enemies. They must have internal enemies to justify their secret police and external enemies to justify their military forces"

Richard Perle, Public Servant

"Law-abiding citizens value privacy. Terrorists require invisibility. The two are not the same, and they should not be confused"

Richard Perle, Public Servant

"You can't rise as a class. You have to rise individually. It's what many of the civil rights-era people don't understand"

Alphonso Jackson, Public Servant

"The collapse of Enron was devastating to tens of thousands of people and shook the public's confidence in corporate America"

Robert Mueller, Public Servant

"To outlive one's child is a terrible thing, but to do so because your child has taken his or her life is horrible"

Pierre Salinger, Public Servant

"Triumphant science and technology are only at the threshold of man's command over sources of energy so stupendous that, if used for military purposes, they can wipe out our entire civilization"

Cordell Hull, Public Servant

"It is very important that our young people have constructive early work experiences. But it is equally important that their jobs are safe and complement their education, rather than complete it"

Alexis Herman, Public Servant

"The warning message we sent the Russians was a calculated ambiguity that would be clearly understood"

Alexander Haig, Public Servant

"This conflict is one thing I've been waiting for. I'm well and strong and young - young enough to go to the front. If I can't be a soldier, I'll help soldiers"

Clara Barton, Public Servant

"His smile is like the silver plate on a coffin"

John Philpot Curran, Public Servant

"National sovereignty is an obligation as well as an entitlement. A government that will not perform the role of a government forfeits the rights of a government"

Richard Perle, Public Servant

"In the Federal Government, electronic records are as indispensable as their paper counterparts for documenting citizens' rights, the actions for which officials are accountable, and the nation's history"

Allen Weinstein, Public Servant

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