Lyndon B. Johnson Quotes

I wake up 5 a.m. some mornings and hear the planes coming in at National Airport and I think they are bombing me.

All of us realize that war requires action. What is sometimes harder for us to realize is that peace and neutrality also require action.

All I have I would have given gladly not to be standing here today.

Peace does not come just because we wish for it. Peace must be fought for. It must be built stone by stone.

I may not worry as much as Prime Minister Eshkol does about Israel, but I worry as deeply.

If the American people don't love me, their descendants will.

I don't have any handicap. I am all handicap.

All that Hubert needs over there is a gal to answer the phone and a pencil with an eraser on it.

You never want to give a man a present when he's feeling good. You want to do it when he's down.

For the college years we will provide scholarships to high school students of the greatest promise and greatest need and guarantee low-interest loans to students continuing their college studies.

Voting is the first duty of democracy.

Every night before I turn out the lights to sleep, I ask myself this question: Have I done everything that I can.... Have I done enough?

He that in the latter part of his life too strictly inquires what he has done, can very seldom receive from his own heart such an account as will give him satisfaction.

Faith builds, cynicism destroys.

The law cannot save those who deny it but neither can the law serve any who do not use it. The history of injustice and inequality is a history of disuse of the law.

The future holds little hope for any government where the present holds no hope for the people.

The presidency has made every man who occupied it, no matter how small, bigger than he was; and no matter how big, not big enough for its demands.

In this age when there can be no losers in peace and no victors in war; we must recognize the obligation to match national strength with national restraint.

We cannot have government for all the people until we first make certain it is government of and by all the people.

It (the heart) is supposed in popular language, to be the seat sometimes, of courage, sometimes of affection, sometimes of honesty, or baseness.

If we become tow people-the suburban affluent and the urban poor, each filled with mistrust and fear of the other-then we shall effectively cripple each generation to come.

The test before us as a people is not whether our commitments match our will and our courage; but whether we have the will and courage to match our commitments.

Every citizen, regardless of his race, creed, or color, is entitled to equal justice.

Every President wants to do right.

If there is one word that describes our form of society in America, it may be the word-voluntary.

We will not have served the water needs of Americans if we meet only the requirements of today's population. A prudent nation must look ahead and plan for tomorrow.

Not merely a nation but a nation of nations.

It will help at every state along the road to learning. For the pre-school years we will help needy children become aware of the excitement of learning.

It is a truism that education is no longer a luxury. Education in this day and age is a necessity.

For the primary and secondary school years, we will aid public schools serving low-income families and assist students in both public and private schools.

Americans have always built for the future. That is why we established land grant colleges and passed the Homestead Act to open our Western lands more than 100 years ago.

Men who have worked together to reach the stars are not likely to descend together into the depths of war and desolation.

Law is the great civilizing machinery. It liberates the desire to build and subdues the desire to destroy.

It is always a strain when people are being killed. I don't think anybody has held this job who hasn't felt personally responsible for those being killed.

Presidents quickly realize that while a single act might destroy the world they live in, no one single decision can make life suddenly better or can turn history around for the good.

Effective law enforcement and social justice must be pursued together, as the foundation of our efforts against crime.

I hear the headlines on the radio, see them on TV and read them in the paper. When I hear from the men out there, I sometimes don't believe they are talking about the same situation.

Control of space means control of the world.

Today our problem is not making miracles, but managing them.

Curtis Le May wants to bomb Hanoi and Haiphong. You know how he likes to go around bombing.

Every citizen will be able, in his productive years when he is earning, to insure himself against the ravages of illness in his old age.

I won't have you electioneering on my doorstep. Every time you get in trouble in Parliament you run over here with your shirttail hanging out.

I report to you that our country is challenged at home and abroad: that it is our will that is being tried and not our strength; our sense of purpose and not our ability to achieve a better America.

Let no one ever think for a moment that national debate means national division.

I want every family in America to have a carpet on the floor and a picture on the wall. After bread, you've got to have a picture on the wall.

We Americans know - although others appear to forget - the risk of spreading conflict. We still seek no wider war.

So, I would appeal to my fellow Americans by saying, the only real road to progress for free people is through the process of law and that is the road that America will travel.

I believe that the country weekly acts as a form of social cement in holding the community together.

You have your own difficulties. We watch, with friendly confidence in your capacity to merge differences in the grand dream of Canadian design.

Second, this law has become a special symbol of our Nation's most important purpose: to fulfill the individual - his freedom, his happiness, his promise.