Top 100 Quotes About Harry Truman
#1. There are examples of ex-presidents speaking out. Jimmy Carter has not held back on a variety of issues. Harry Truman didn't.
Robert Dallek
#2. Let me tell you the first president to recognize the state of Israel was Harry Truman, a Democrat and every president since, Democrat and Republican, has stood closely with Israel.
Dick Durbin
#3. In 1940, then-Senator Harry Truman headed up a Senate Special Committee to Investigate the National Defense Program. In the course of World War II, more than $15 billion in unnecessary and fraudulent defense spending was identified.
Bernie Sanders
#4. Harry Truman, after all, in conjunction with Secretary of Defense Louis Johnson, radically cut back American arms following the end of the Second World War. Johnson himself wished to dismantle the Marine Corps and felt nuclear weapons had made all such conventional arms unnecessary.
Victor Davis Hanson
#5. Harry Truman once said: "Find me a one-armed economist, because every one I know always says, 'Well, on the other hand . . .
Ronald Reagan
#6. We now have a lack of readiness that is quite scary. We have planes that were - that Harry Truman inaugurated, the B-52. We have - the Navy has been gutted and decimated. The readiness of the Marines is way down.
Jeb Bush
#7. I loved Harry Truman with all my heart and soul.
Willard Scott
#8. Yet Barkley drew back. Perhaps he, like Harry Truman, knew that the quiet power of incumbency easily overcomes the noise of crowds and bands.
David Pietrusza
#9. Leo Crowley, Harry [Truman]'s Foreign Economic Administrator, tells Congressmen the theory ... : 'If you create good governments in foreign countries, automatically you will have better markets for ourselves.' With that honeycunt staring you in the face, you'd forget your grammar too.
E.L. Doctorow
#10. If Obama's vision of the public sector is socialism, then so too were the visions of Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower, John Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, and Richard Nixon.
Jeff Greenfield
#11. I'm a Harry Truman, JFK, Scoop Jackson and Bill Clinton Democrat.
Joe Lieberman
#12. Barack Obama is not Harry Truman, who dropped the A-bomb on Japan to stop World War II. Barack Obama is not John F. Kennedy, who lowered marginal tax rates to get economic growth and job creation. Barack Obama and the far left, they are a completely different ball of wax.
Monica Crowley
#13. Harry Truman wrote scathing letters, but he almost never sent them.
Robert Dallek
#14. Have. Harry Truman, of all people, comes to mind, when he said, concerning his administration's programs, We'll just try them ... and if they don't work ... why then we'll just try something else.
Robert M. Pirsig
#15. Harry Truman, who was a Bible-believing Christian Zionist, defied the secretary of state he so admired, George C. Marshall, and won a place in Israel's history by recognizing the new state 11 minutes after it declared its independence in 1948.
Elliott Abrams
#16. Despite its flaws, the American electoral system has produced Lincoln, the two Roosevelts, and Harry Truman.
Robert Dallek
#17. Anticommunism in its modern form was invented by liberals like Harry Truman, the architect of the national security state. The proportion of the voting population that was not anticommunist in 1961 was miniscule.
Rick Perlstein
#18. In the first rule of politics, you know, Harry Truman, the buck stops here. Take responsibility. What I've learned over the years is that people will give people in politics a lot of rope if they just take responsibility.
Susan Estrich
#19. Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, others, knew how to lead. They knew how to ask the American people for the right things.
John F. Kerry
#20. I'm very proud of what Harry Truman turned out to be in office and the record he made. Certainly I think he'll go down in history as one of the greats, because of his conscience, his determination to stick with what he knew was right.
Walter Cronkite
#21. Nobody wants to hear that you met Harry Truman ... I met Harry Truman ... But you know what I mean? Nobody's interested. They want to know you met Rihanna. And that kills me.
Joan Rivers
#22. I always go back to Harry Truman: Should we drop an atomic bomb to save 100,000 lives? That's a hell of a decision to make. Did he make that decision by himself? No, he had advisers.
Lee Iacocca
#23. I think Democrats made a mistake running away from liberalism. Liberalism, uh, Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, John and Robert Kennedy - that's what the Democratic party ought to reach for.
Theodore C. Sorensen
#24. Some of our finest leaders were not intellectuals at all, and I admire them enormously because they weren't. Harry Truman wasn't.
Michael Ignatieff
#25. I'm a true reactionary. Like all patricians, I'd like to restore the original republic, which we lost 40 years ago when Harry Truman imposed the national security state on us, which has kept us at war, hot or cold, for almost half a century, and it's got us $4 trillion into debt.
Gore Vidal
#26. Everyone is against Harry (Truman) except the people.
Clark Griffith
#27. If there had been any formidable body of cannibals in the country he [Harry Truman] would have promised to provide them with free missionaries, fattened at the taxpayers' expense.
H.L. Mencken
#28. My favourite president, and the one I admired most, was Harry Truman.
Jimmy Carter
#29. All will concede that in order to have good neighbors, we must also be good neighbors. That applies in every field of human endeavor.
Harry S. Truman
#30. It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.
Harry Truman
#31. You members of this Conference are to be the architects of the better world. In your hands rests our future.
Harry S. Truman
#32. The friendless, the weak, the victims of prejudice and public excitement are entitled to the same quality of justice and fair play that the rich, the powerful, the well-connected, and the fellow with pull thinks he can get.
Harry S. Truman
#33. We have found that it is easier for men to die together on the field of battle than it is for them to live together at home in peace.
Harry S. Truman
#34. We shall never be able to remove suspicion and fear as potential causes of war until communication is permitted to flow, free and open, across international boundaries.
Harry S. Truman
#37. The dictators of the world say that if you tell a lie often enough, why, people will believe it. Well, if you tell the truth often enough, they'll believe it and go along with you.
Harry Truman
#38. Brave men don't belong to any one country. I respect bravery wherever I see it.
Harry Truman
#39. Whenever a fellow tells me he's bipartisan, I know he's going to vote against me.
Harry S. Truman
#41. In the long view, no nation is any healthier than its children.
Harry S. Truman
#42. Art is parasitic on life, just as criticism is parasitic on art.
Harry S. Truman
#43. Most of the time most people know the right thing to do ... its the doing of it that gives them trouble
Harry S. Truman
#44. Dictatorship, by whatever name, is founded on the doctrine that the individual amounts to nothing; that the State is the only one that counts; and that men and women and children were put on earth solely for the purpose of serving the state.
Harry Truman
#45. Democracy alone can supply the vitalizing force to stir the peoples of the world into triumphant action, not only against their human oppressors, but also against their ancient enemies-hunger, misery, and despair.
Harry S. Truman
#46. There isn't any question about Washington's greatness. If his administration had been a failure, there would have been no United States. A lesser man couldn't have done it ... Washington was both a great administrator and a great leader, a truly great man in every way.
Harry S. Truman
#47. I don't believe in anti-anything. A man has to have a program; you have to be for something, otherwise you will never get anywhere.
Harry Truman
#48. Fame is a vapor, popularity is an accident, riches take wings, those who cheer today may curse tomorrow and only one thing endures - character.
Harry Truman
#49. The President hears a hundred voices telling him that he is the greatest man in the world. He must listen carefully indeed to hear the one voice that tells him his is not.
Harry S. Truman
#50. Nothing is more important in our national life than the welfare of our children.
Harry S. Truman
#53. I come to the office each morning and stay for long hours doing what has to be done to the best of my ability. And when you've done the best you can, you can't do any better.
Harry Truman
#54. A leader in the Democratic Party is a boss, in the Republican Party he is a leader.
Harry S. Truman
#55. I believe that we must assist free peoples to work out their own destinies in their own way.
Harry S. Truman
#56. Some of my best friends never agree with me politically.
Harry S. Truman
#57. To be able to lead others, a man must be willing to go forward alone.
Harry S. Truman
#58. Sixteen hours ago an American airplane dropped one bomb on Hiroshima ... The force from which the sun draws its power has been loosed against those who brought war to the Far East.
Harry S. Truman
#59. I'm very proud that I'm smart enough to get to the point
Harry S. Truman
#60. Unless Russia is face with an iron fist and strong language, another is in the making. Only one language do they understand - 'How many divisions have you?' ... I'm tired of babying the Soviets.
Harry S. Truman
#61. We have to get tough with the Russians. They don't know how to behave. They are like bulls in a china shop. They are only 25 years old. We are over 100 and the British are centuries older. We have got to teach them how to behave.
Harry S. Truman
#62. If I want to be great, I have to win the victory over myself ... self-d iscipline.
Harry S. Truman
#63. Herbert Hoover once ran on the slogan, 'Two cars in every garage'. Apparently, the Republican candidate this year is running on the slogan, 'Two families in every garage'.
Harry S. Truman
#64. I do not believe there is a problem in this country or the world today which could not be settled if approached through the teaching of the Sermon on the Mount.
Harry S. Truman
#65. Work Hard. Do your best. Keep your word. Never get too big for your britches. Trust in God. Have no fear; and Never forget a friend.
Harry S. Truman
#67. Canadian-American relations for many years did not develop spontaneously. The example of accord provided by our two countries did not come about merely through the happy circumstance of geography. It is compounded of one part proximity and nine parts good will and common sense.
Harry S. Truman
#68. The seeds of totalitarian regimes are nurtured by misery and want.
Harry S. Truman
#69. Some day we'll awake, have a reformation of the heart, teach our kids honor and kill a few sex psychologists, put boys in high schools with men teachers (not sissies), close all the girls' finishing schools, shoot all the effeciency experts and become a nation of God's people once more.
Harry S. Truman
#70. Three things ruin a man: power, money, and women. I never wanted power. I never had any money, and the only woman in my life is up at the house right now.
Harry S. Truman
#71. The record proves that in peaceful commerce the combined efforts of our countries can produce outstanding results. Our trade with each other is far greater than that of any other two nations on earth.
Harry S. Truman
#72. The Republican Party either corrupts its liberals or it expels them.
Harry S. Truman
#75. The America to which these Swedish settlers came was a land that needed the hardy qualities they brought. It was not a land that was particularly softhearted towards newcomers, but everyone believed that each should have a fair chance regardless of his origin.
Harry S. Truman
#76. In reading the lives of great men, I found that the first victory they won was over themselves ... self-discipline with all of them came first.
Harry Truman
#77. On the one hand X is true, but on the other hand, Y is true," Harry S. Truman is reported to have muttered in frustration, "Get me a one-armed economist!
Hal Herzog
#78. Everybody has the right to express what he thinks. That, of course, lets the crackpots in. But if you cannot tell a crackpot when you see one, then you ought to be taken in.
Harry S. Truman
#79. Put an underdog on top and it makes no difference whether his name is Russian, Jewish, Negro, Management, Labor, Mormon, or Baptist he goes haywire. I've found very, very few who remember their past condition when prosperity comes.
Harry S. Truman
#80. A leader has to lead otherwise he has no business in politics.
Harry S. Truman
#82. I have had enough experience in all my years, and have read enough of the past, to know that advice to grandchildren is usually wasted.
Harry S. Truman
#83. It isn't important who is ahead at one time or another, in either an election or a horse race.
It's the horse that comes in first at the finish that counts
Harry S. Truman
#84. The true foundation of the brotherhood of humankind is belief in the knowledge that God is the Father of humankind. For us, therefore, brotherhood is not only a generous impulse but also a divine command.
Harry S. Truman
#85. worked, the bomb, in all probability, would shorten
Harry Truman
#86. Children and dogs are as necessary to the welfare of the country as Wall Street and the railroads.
Harry S. Truman
#87. Give me a one-handed economist! All my economists say, On the one hand on the other.
Harry S. Truman
#88. We must help to the limits of our strength. And we will.
Harry S. Truman
#89. America was not built on fear. America was built on courage, on imagination, and unbeatable determination to do the job at hand.
Harry Truman
#91. As you get older, you get tired of doing the same things over and over again, so you think Christmas has changed. It hasn't. It's you who has changed.
Harry S. Truman
#92. The United States has become great because we, as a people, have been able to work together for great objectives even while differing about details.
Harry S. Truman
#93. I had faith in Israel before it was established, I have in it now. I believe it has a glorious future before it - not just another sovereign nation, but as an embodiment of the great ideals of our civilization.
Harry S. Truman
#94. Poor Ike. He'll say do this and do that and nothing at all will happen.
Harry Truman
#96. If we do not abolish war on this earth, then surely one day war will abolish us from the earth.
Harry S. Truman
#99. Too many?pass judgement on wartime decisions in the luxury of a peacetime environment.
Harry S. Truman
#100. If you don't have your own goals, you'll be doomed to work toward someone else's.
Harry S. Truman
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