WIST Quotations

Marx, Groucho -- Groucho and Me, ch. 26 “Foot in Mouth Disease” (1959)

Dave — Fri, 18 Mar 2022 19:35:28 +0000

I don’t want to belong to any club that will accept me as a member.

Groucho Marx (1890-1977) American comedian [b. Julius Henry Marx]
Groucho and Me, ch. 26 “Foot in Mouth Disease” (1959)
(Source)

Variant: "I don't want to belong to any club that would have me as a member."

Different confidants of Groucho's attributed this resignation note to different organizations, though most think the resignation from the Friars Club or the Hillcrest Country Club. In his autobiography (the noted source), Grouch referred to it apocryphally as "the Delaney Club."

More discussion of this quotation:

Lee, Harper -- To Kill a Mockingbird, ch. 20 (1960)

Dave — Fri, 31 Mar 2017 21:56:35 +0000

I’m no idealist to believe firmly in the integrity of our courts and in the jury system — that is an ideal to me, it is a living, working reality. Gentlemen, a court is no better than each man of you sitting before me on this jury. A court is only as sound as its jury, and a jury is only as sound as the men who make it up.

Harper Lee (1926-2016) American writer [Nellie Harper Lee]
To Kill a Mockingbird, ch. 20 (1960)

Buchwald, Art -- Speech, Horatio Alger Award Dinner, Washington, DC (May 1989)

Dave — Mon, 18 Jul 2016 15:37:27 +0000

If you attack the establishment long enough and hard enough, they will make you a member of it.

Art Buchwald (1925-2007) American humorist, columnist
Speech, Horatio Alger Award Dinner, Washington, DC (May 1989)

Buchwald used a number of variations of this phrase; this particular one was reported a week later in the International Herald Tribune (24 May 1989), but other versions go back to the 1960s (e.g., "Woe to the person in this country who attacks the establishment. It isn’t jail, nor even physical harm, that he must fear. His main problem is that by attacking the Establishment, he automatically becomes a member of it, and there is no greater punishment in the world," from his column of 7 May 1968). See here for more info.

Mencken, H. L. -- “Mr. Mencken Sounds Off,” interview, LIFE Magazine (5 Aug 1946)

Dave — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 12:44:04 +0000

The trouble with Communism is the Communists, just as the trouble with Christianity is the Christians.

H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) American writer and journalist [Henry Lewis Mencken]
“Mr. Mencken Sounds Off,” interview, LIFE Magazine (5 Aug 1946)
(Source)