WIST Quotations

Schlesinger, Arthur -- “A Clinton Card, So Far,” New York Times (11 Apr 1993)

Dave — Thu, 26 Jul 2012 13:38:45 +0000

What higher obligation does a President have than to explain his intentions to the people and persuade them that the direction he wishes to go is right? Politics in a democracy is, at the end, an educational process.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (1917-2007) American historian, author, social critic
“A Clinton Card, So Far,” New York Times (11 Apr 1993)

Schlesinger, Arthur -- “On Heroic Leadership,” Encounter (Dec 1960)

Dave — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 14:01:50 +0000

The first rule of democracy is to distrust all leaders who begin to believe their own publicity.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (1917-2007) American historian, author, social critic
“On Heroic Leadership,” Encounter (Dec 1960)

Schlesinger, Arthur -- “The Decline of Greatness,” Saturday Evening Post (1 Nov 1958)

Dave — Mon, 07 Apr 2014 12:55:13 +0000

If we are to survive, we must have ideas, vision, courage. These things are rarely produced by committees. Everything that matters in our intellectual and moral life begins with an individual confronting his own mind and conscience in a room by himself.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (1917-2007) American historian, author, social critic
“The Decline of Greatness,” Saturday Evening Post (1 Nov 1958)

Schlesinger, Arthur -- “The Decline of Greatness,” Saturday Evening Post (1 Nov 1958)

Dave — Thu, 07 May 2020 22:35:18 +0000

Brave men earn the right to shape their own destiny.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (1917-2007) American historian, author, social critic
“The Decline of Greatness,” Saturday Evening Post (1 Nov 1958)
(Source)

Reprinted in The Politics of Hope, ch. 2 (1963)

Schlesinger, Arthur -- “The Decline of Greatness,” Saturday Evening Post (1 Nov 1958)

Dave — Thu, 14 May 2020 16:47:50 +0000

The great appeal of fatalism, indeed, is as a refuge from the terror of responsibility.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (1917-2007) American historian, author, social critic
“The Decline of Greatness,” Saturday Evening Post (1 Nov 1958)
(Source)

The same phrase is used in the successor essay, "On Heroic Leadership," sec. 2. (1960)

Schlesinger, Arthur -- “The Historian as Participant,” Daedalus (Spring 1971)

Dave — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 12:48:17 +0000

The present, as historians well know, re-creates the past. This is partly because, once we know how things have come out, we tend to rewrite the past in terms of historical inevitability.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (1917-2007) American historian, author, social critic
“The Historian as Participant,” Daedalus (Spring 1971)

Schlesinger, Arthur -- “The Necessary Amorality of Foreign Affairs,” Harper’s (Aug 1971)

Dave — Wed, 16 Jul 2014 22:32:16 +0000

Saints can be pure but statesmen must be responsible. As trustees for others, they must defend interests and compromise principles. In politics, practical and prudential judgment must have priority over moral verdicts.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (1917-2007) American historian, author, social critic
“The Necessary Amorality of Foreign Affairs,” Harper’s (Aug 1971)

Schlesinger, Arthur -- “The One Against the Many,” Paths to American Thought, ed. Schlesinger and Morton White (1963)

Dave — Wed, 15 Dec 2010 18:26:21 +0000

By ideology I mean a body of systematic and rigid dogma by which people seek to understand the world — and to preserve or transform it.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (1917-2007) American historian, author, social critic
“The One Against the Many,” Paths to American Thought, ed. Schlesinger and Morton White (1963)

Schlesinger, Arthur -- “The Opening of the American Mind,” New York Times (23 Jul 1989)

Dave — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 12:52:12 +0000

It is this belief in absolutes, I would hazard, that is the great enemy today of the life of the mind. This may seem a rash proposition. The fashion of the time is to denounce relativism as the root of all evil. But history suggests that the damage done to humanity by the relativist is far less than the damage done by the absolutist — by the fellow who, as Mr. Dooley once put it, “does what he thinks th’ Lord wud do if He only knew th’ facts in th’ case.”

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (1917-2007) American historian, author, social critic
“The Opening of the American Mind,” New York Times (23 Jul 1989)

Schlesinger, Arthur -- The Age of Roosevelt: The Coming of the New Deal, ch. 33, sec. 3 (1959)

Dave — Thu, 28 May 2020 18:26:21 +0000

The worst error a president can make is to assume the automatic implementation of his own decisions. In certain respects, having able subordinates aggravates that problem, since strong personalities tend to have strong ideas of their own. Civil government operates by consent, not by command; the President’s task, even within his own branch of government, is not to order but to lead.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (1917-2007) American historian, author, social critic
The Age of Roosevelt: The Coming of the New Deal, ch. 33, sec. 3 (1959)
(Source)

Schlesinger, Arthur -- The Age of Roosevelt, ch. 33, sec. 8 (1960)

Dave — Thu, 30 Apr 2020 19:57:02 +0000

Political campaigns tend to be exercises in progressive degeneration. The steady increase, week after week, in excitement and strain and weariness produces an oversimplification of issues, an over dramatization of alternatives, a growing susceptibility to extreme and catastrophic statements. Candidates find themselves shouting things in the fall that they would never dream of whispering in the summer.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (1917-2007) American historian, author, social critic
The Age of Roosevelt, ch. 33, sec. 8 (1960)
(Source)

Schlesinger, Arthur -- The Bitter Heritage: Vietnam and American Democracy, 1941-1966, ch. 7 (1967)

Dave — Mon, 09 Apr 2012 20:55:55 +0000

Nations follow their historic interests rather more faithfully than they do their ideologies.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (1917-2007) American historian, author, social critic
The Bitter Heritage: Vietnam and American Democracy, 1941-1966, ch. 7 (1967)

Schlesinger, Arthur -- Interview with Brian Lamb, C-SPAN (10 May 1998)

Dave — Fri, 07 Apr 2017 21:04:42 +0000

Clarity in language depends on clarity in thought.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (1917-2007) American historian, author, social critic
Interview with Brian Lamb, C-SPAN (10 May 1998)