Top 100 Dwight Eisenhower Sayings

#1. When Dwight Eisenhower became president, I personally was delighted. I thought that that was a very good thing.

Malcolm Muggeridge

#2. The people of the world genuinely want peace. Some day the leaders of the world are going to have to give in and give it to them.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#3. I guess I was the most unbohemian of all bohemians. My bohemianism consisted of not wanting to get involved with the stupid stuff that I thought people wanted you to get involved with - ... namely America ... Dwight Eisenhower, McCarthyism and all those great things.

Amiri Baraka

#4. Un-American activity cannot be prevented or routed out by employing un-American methods; to preserve freedom we must use the tools that freedom provides.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#5. Now this brings me to my main topic - our military strength - more specifically, how to stay strong against threat from outside, without undermining the economic health that supports our security.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#6. Before all else, we seek, upon our common labor as a nation, the blessings of Almighty God.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#7. Having established as our goals a lasting world peace with justice and the security of freedom on this earth, we must be prepared to make whatever sacrifices are demanded as we pursue this path to its end.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#8. Planning is useless ... but the process itself is indispensable.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#9. When shallow critics denounce the profit motive inherent in our system of private enterprise, they ignore the fact that it is an economic support of every human right we possess and without it, all rights would disappear.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#10. Since the advent of nuclear weapons, it seems clear that there is no longer any alternative to peace, if there is to be a happy and well world.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#11. Never question another man's motive. His wisdom, yes, but not his motives.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#12. In this war, which was total in every sense of the word, we have seen many great changes in military science. It seems to me that not the least of these was the development of psychological warfare as a specific and effective weapon.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#13. Help the Cubans to the utmost counseling his successor while handing over the reins. We cannot let Castro's government go on.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#14. But all history has taught us the grim lesson that no nation has ever been successful in avoiding the terrors of war by refusing to defend its rights - by attempting to placate aggression.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#15. Take your job seriously, but not yourself

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#16. The most terrible job in warfare is to be a second lieutenant leading a platoon when you are on the battlefield.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#17. We merely want to live in peace with all the world, to trade with them, to commune with them, to learn from their culture as they may learn from ours, so that the products of our toil may be used for our schools and our roads and our churches and not for guns and planes and tanks and ships of war.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#18. We the people, elect leaders not to rule but to serve

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#19. The search for a scapegoat is the easiest of all hunting expeditions.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#20. We are not saints. We know we make mistakes, but at least our heart is with the right cause.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#21. There is one thing about being President
nobody can tell you when to sit down.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#22. Now, the education of our children is of national concern, and if they are not educated properly, it is a national calamity.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#23. War is a contest, and you finally get to a point where you are talking merely about race suicide, and nothing else.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#24. Without God there could be no American form of government, nor an American way of life. Recognition of the Supreme Being is the first, the most basic, expression of Americanism. Thus, the founding fathers of America saw it, and thus with God's help, it will continue to be.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#25. The righteousness of men should be treated with the same respect that one would accord to a rattlesnake. Things are more like they are now than they ever were before.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#26. Don't join the book burners. Don't think you're going to conceal faults by concealing evidence that they ever existed. Don't be afraid to go in your library and read every book ...

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#27. One small ball in the air. I wouldn't believe that at this moment you have to fear the intelligence aspects of this.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#28. Rep. John Lewis, Georgia Democrat and a civil rights leader during the 1960s, was one of those calling on the president for a more robust federal response, such as President Dwight D. Eisenhower did against Jim Crow-defending Southern governors.

Anonymous

#29. Peace and justice are two sides of the same coin.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#30. The unity of all who dwell in freedom is their only sure defense.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#31. The one quality that can be developed by studious reflection and practice is the leadership of men.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#32. The spirit of man is more important than mere physical strength, and the spiritual fiber of a nation than its wealth.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#33. Any nations right to a form of government and economic system of its own choosing is inalienable. Any nations attempt to dictate to other nations their form of government is indefensible.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#34. The peace we seek, founded upon decent trust and cooperation among nations, can be fortified not by weapons of war but by wheat and cotton, by milk and wool, by meat and timber, and by rice. These are words that translate into every language.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#35. Through knowledge and understanding we will drive from the temple of freedom all who seek to establish over us thought control - whether they be agents of a foreign power or demagogues thirsty for personal power and public notice.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#36. During the time I have had WACs under my command, they have met every test and task assigned to them ... their contributions in efficiency, skill, spirit, and determination are immeasurable.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#37. I like to believe that people in the long run are going to do more to promote peace than our governments. Indeed, I think that people want peace so much that one of these days governments had better get out of the way and let them have it.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#38. I would rather try to persuade a man to go along, because once I have persuaded him, he will stick. If I scare him, he will stay just as long as he is scared, and then he is gone.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#39. Censorship, in my opinion, is a stupid and shallow way of approaching the solution to any problem.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#40. I have full confidence in your courage and devotion to duty and skill in battle. We will accept nothing less than full Victory! Good luck! And let us beseech the blessing of Almighty God upon this great and noble undertaking.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#41. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty-loving people everywhere march with you.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#42. Dwight D. Eisenhower changed America forever with the creation of the interstate highway program.

Joel Garreau

#43. The necessary and wise subordination of the military to civil power must be sustained.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#44. Leadership is the ability to decide what is to be done and then get others to do it.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#45. Change is the law of life and of relations between nations. When two great peoples such as ours, energetic and optimistic, live side by side in all the diversity that freedom offers, change is rapid and brings in its wake problems, sometimes frictions.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#46. [on the atomic bomb] It is not enough to take this weapon out of the hands of soldiers. It must be put into the hands of those who will know how to strip its military casing and adapt it to the arts of peace.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#47. Any man who wants to be president is either an egomaniac or crazy.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#48. Four other pieces of equipment that most senior officers came to regard as among the most vital to our success in Africa and Europe were the bulldozer, the jeep, the 2
ton truck, and the C-47 airplane. Curiously, none of these is designed for combat.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#49. We have heard much of the phrase, peace and friendship. This phrase, in expressing the aspiration of America, is not complete. We should say instead, peace and friendship, in freedom. This, I think, is America's real message to the rest of the world.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#50. Mob rule can not be allowed to override the decisions of our courts.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#51. You know, this is what I've always thought a college should look like.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#52. Art is a universal language and through it each nation makes its own unique contribution to the culture of mankind.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#53. If a man's associates find him guilty of being phony, if they find that he lacks forthright integrity, he will fail. His teachings and actions must square with each other. The first great need, therefore, is integrity and high purpose.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#54. Some years ago I became president of Columbia University and learned within 24 hours to be ready to speak at the drop of a hat, and I learned something more, the trustees were expected to be ready to speak at the passing of the hat.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#55. Knowledge-full, unfettered knowledge of its own heritage, of freedom's enemies, of the whole world of men and ideas-this knowledge is a free people's surest strength.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#56. Not making the baseball team at West Point was one of the greatest disappointments of my life, maybe my greatest.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#57. Character in many ways is everything in leadership. It is made up of many things, but I would say character is really integrity.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#58. The building of such a peace is a bold and solemn purpose. To proclaim it is easy. To serve it will be hard. And to attain it, we must be aware of its full meaning - and ready to pay its full price.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#59. It is still a fact that our common frontier grows stronger every year, defended only by friendship.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#60. Once Dwight Eisenhower makes up his mind, he's full of indecision.

Oscar Levant

#61. The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities ... We pay for a single fighter with a half million bushels of wheat. We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#62. We just became very good friends [ with Dwight Eisenhower ], we played golf, we played heart exhibitions. Then his doctor said he should not play golf anymore.

Arnold Palmer

#63. It is far more important to be able to hit the target than it is to haggle over who makes a weapon or who pulls a trigger.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#64. I think that people want peace so much that one of these days government had better get out of their way and let them have it.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#65. Freedom bestows on us the priceless gift of opportunity - if we neglect our opportunities we shall certainly lose our freedom.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#66. Only our individual faith in freedom can keep us free.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#67. If a problem cannot be solved, enlarge it.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#68. Kinship among nations is not determined in such measurements as proximity of size and age. Rather we should turn to those inner things - call them what you will - I mean those intangibles that are the real treasures free men possess.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#69. Never lose your temper, except intentionally.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#70. I feel impelled to speak today in a language that in a sense is new-one which I, who have spent so much of my life in the military profession, would have preferred never to use. That new language is the language of atomic warfare.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#71. I do not believe that any political campaign justifies the declaration of a moratorium on ordinary common sense.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#72. Innovations and discoveries have created new industries giving more and more Americans better jobs and adding greatly to the prosperity and well being of all.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#73. A people that values its privileges above its principles soon loses both.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#74. Unless we progress, we regress.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#75. Neither a wise man nor a brave man lies down on the tracks of history to wait for the train of the future to run over him.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#76. That was not the biggest battle that ever was, but for me it always typified one thing; the dash, the ingenuity, the readiness at the first opportunity that characterizes the American soldier.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#77. Wars are stupid and they can start stupidly.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#78. Statesmanship is developed in the hard knocks of general experience, private and public.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#79. We have been warned by the power of modern weapons, that peace may be the only climate possible for human life itself ... There must be law, steadily invoked and respected by all nations, for without law, the world promises only such meager justice as the pity of the strong upon the weak.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#80. We face a hostile ideology global in scope, atheistic in character, ruthless in purpose and insidious in method.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#81. I despise people who go to the gutter on either the right or the left and hurl rocks at those in the center.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#82. I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its futility, its stupidity. a

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#83. Mistakes are always paid for in casualties and troops are quick to see any blunder made by their commanders. - DWIGHT DAVID EISENHOWER

Geary A. Rummler

#84. Speeches are for the younger men who are going places. And I'm not going anyplace except six feet under the floor of that little chapel adjoining the museum and library at Abilene.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#85. Life is certainly only worthwhile as it represents struggle for worthy causes. There is no struggle in perfect security. I am quite certain that the human being could not continue to exist if he or she had perfect security.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#86. For every obstacle there is a solution. Persistence is the key. The greatest mistake is giving up!

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#87. Only strength can cooperate. Weakness can only beg.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#88. Only Americans can hurt America.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#89. The peace we seek and need means much more than mere absence of war. It means the acceptance of law, and the fostering of justice, in all the world.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#90. [Not achieving a nuclear test ban] would have to be classed as the greatest disappointment of any administration of any decade, of any time and of any party.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#91. An atheist is a man who watches a Notre Dame - Southern Methodist University game and doesn't care who wins.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#92. No easy problems ever come to the President of the United States. If they are easy to solve, someone else has solved them.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#93. Oh, that lovely title, ex-president.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#94. It is better to have one person working with you than three people working for you.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#95. History teaches that, when powerful despots can gain something
through aggression, they try, by the same methods, to gain more and
more and more.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#96. Farming looks mighty easy when your plow is a pencil and you're a thousand miles from the corn field.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#97. Public opinion wins wars.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#98. Get it all on record now - get the films - get the witnesses -because somewhere down the road of history some bastard will get up and say that this never happened.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#99. As it is an ancient truth that freedom cannot be legislated into existence, so it is no less obvious that freedom cannot be censored into existence.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

#100. Those who take the extreme positions in American political and economic life are always wrong.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

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