The weakness of man should not weaken the image of God.
¶ (1962)
Quotations by ...
John Fitzgerald Kennedy (1917-1963) US President (1961-63)
Domestic policy can only defeat us; foreign policy can kill us.
¶ (Attributed)
Quoted in The Imperial Presidency, ch. 11, by Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (1973).
Extreme opposites resemble the other. Each believes that we have only two choices: appeasement or war, suicide or surrender, humiliation or holocaust, to be either Red or dead.
¶ (Attributed)
If art is to nourish the roots of our culture, society must set the artist free to follow his vision wherever it takes him.
¶ (Attributed)
Liberty without learning is always in peril; learning without liberty is always in vain.
¶ (Attributed)
The basis of effective government is public confidence.
¶ (Attributed)
Our privileges can be no greater than our obligations. The protection of our rights can endure no longer than the performance of our responsibilities.
¶ (Attributed)
The problems of the world cannot possibly be solved by skeptics or cynics whose horizons are limited by the obvious realities. We need men who can dream of things that never were.
¶ (Attributed)
There are risks and costs to a programme of action, but they are far less than the long range risks and costs of comfortable inaction.
¶ (Attributed)
We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people.
¶ (Attributed)
Forgive your enemies, but never forget their names.
¶ (Attributed)
Too often we ... enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.
¶ (Attributed)
There are three things which are real: God, human folly and laughter. The first two are beyond our comprehension, so we must do what we can with the third.
¶ (Attributed)
Tolerance implies no lack of commitment to one's beliefs. Rather it condemns the oppression or persecution of others.
¶ (Attributed)
Now the trumpet summons us again — not as a call to bear arms, though arms we need — not as a call to battle, though embattled we are — but a call to bear the burden of a long twilight struggle year in and year out, 'rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation' — a struggle against the common enemies of man: tyranny, poverty, disease, and war itself.
¶ (Attributed)
If this nation is to be wise as well as strong, if we are to achieve our destiny, then we need more new ideas for more wise men reading more good books in more public libraries. These libraries should be open to all -- except the censor. We must know all the facts and hear all the alternatives and listen to all the criticisms. Let us welcome controversial books and controversial authors. For the Bill of Rights is the guardian of our security as well as our liberty.
¶ Saturday Review (29 Oct 1960), response to questionnaire
http://www.bartleby.com/73/132.html
Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.
¶ Address to the Latin American diplomatic corps (13 Mar 1962)
On the first anniversary of the Alliance for Progress
For of those to whom much is given, much is required. And when at some future date the high court of history sits in judgment on each of us — recording whether in our brief span of service we fulfilled our responsibilities to the state — our success or failure, in whatever office we hold, will be measured by the answers to four questions:
First, were we truly men of courage — with the courage to stand up to one’s enemies — and the courage to stand up, when necessary, to one’s associates — the courage to resist public pressure, as well as private greed?
Secondly, were we truly men of judgment — with perceptive judgment of the future as well as the past — of our mistakes as well as the mistakes of others — with enough wisdom to know what we did not know and enough candor to admit it.
Third, were we truly men of integrity — men who never ran out on either the principles in which we believed or the men who believed in us — men whom neither financial gain nor political ambition could ever divert from the fulfillment of our sacred trust?
Finally, were we truly men of dedication — with an honor mortgaged to no single individual or group, and comprised of no private obligation or aim, but devoted solely to serving the public good and the national interest?
Courage — judgment — integrity — dedication — these are the historic qualities … which, with God’s help … will characterize our Government’s conduct in the 4 stormy years that lie ahead.
¶ Address to the Massachusetts legislature (9 Jan 1961)
As President-elect
The purpose of foreign policy is not to provide an outlet for our own sentiments of hope or indignation; it is to shape real events in a real world.
¶ Address, Salt Lake City (26 Sep 1963)
And we must face the fact that the United States is neither omnipotent or omniscient — that we are only 6 percent of the world’s population — that we cannot impose our will upon the other 94 percent of mankind — that we cannot right every wrong or reverse every adversity — and that therefore there cannot be an American solution to every world problem.
¶ Address, U. of Washington’s 100th anniversary program, Seattle (16 Nov 1961)
For the great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie — deliberate, contrived, and dishonest — but the myth — persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic. Too often we hold fast to the cliches of our forebears. We subject all facts to a prefabricated set of interpretations. We enjoy the comfort of opinions without the discomfort of thought.
¶ Commencement address, Yale (11 Jun 1962)
So, let us not be blind to our differences — but let us also direct attention to our common interests and to the means by which those differences can be resolved. And if we cannot end now our differences, at least we can help make the world safe for diversity.
¶ Commencement speech at American University, Wash., D.C. (10 Jun. 1963)
On Russo-American relations
To those peoples in the huts and villages of half the globe struggling to break the bonds of mass misery, we pledge our best efforts to help them help themselves, for whatever period is required — not because the communists may be doing it, not because we seek their votes, but because it is right. If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.
¶ Inaugural Address (20 Jan 1961)
Let the word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans — born in this century, tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our ancient heritage and unwilling to witness or permit the slow undoing of those human rights to which this nation has always been committed and to which we are committed today at home and around the world.
¶ Inaugural address (20 Jan 1961)
Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty.
¶ Inaugural address (20 Jan 1961)
Full text.
Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate.
¶ Inaugural address (20 Jan 1961)
With a good conscience our only sure reward, with history the final judge of our deeds, let us go forth to lead the land we love, asking His blessing and His help, but knowing that here on earth God's work must truly be our own.
¶ Inaugural address (20 Jan 1961)
There is always inequity in life. Some men are killed in a war and some men are wounded, and some men never leave the country, and some men are stationed in the Antarctic and some are stationed in San Francisco. It’s very hard in military or in personal life to assure complete equality. Life is unfair.
¶ News conference (21 Mar 1962)
If this nation is to be wise as well as strong, if we are to achieve our destiny, then we need more new ideas for more wise men reading more good books in more public libraries. These libraries should be open to all — except the censor. We must know all the facts and hear all the alternatives and listen to all the criticisms. Let us welcome controversial books and controversial authors. For the Bill of Rights is the guardian of our security as well as our liberty.
¶ Response to a questionnaire, Saturday Review (29 Oct 1960)
For while this year it may be a Catholic against whom the finger of suspicion is pointed, in other years it has been, and may someday be again, a Jew — or a Quaker — or a Unitarian — or a Baptist. It was Virginia’s harassment of Baptist preachers, for example, that helped lead to Jefferson’s statute of religious freedom. Today I may be the victim — but tomorrow it may be you — until the whole fabric of our harmonious society is ripped at a time of great national peril.
¶ Speech to Greater Houston Ministerial Association (12 Sep 1960)
Speech context
Whatever issue may come before me as President -- on birth control, divorce, censorship, gambling or any other subject -- I will make my decision in accordance with these views, in accordance with what my conscience tells me to be the national interest, and without regard to outside religious pressures or dictates. And no power or threat of punishment could cause me to decide otherwise. But if the time should ever come -- and I do not concede any conflict to be even remotely possible -- when my office would require me to either violate my conscience or violate the national interest, then I would resign the office; and I hope any conscientious public servant would do the same.
¶ Speech to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association (12 Sep 1960)
Full speech.
Finally, I believe in an America where religious intolerance will someday end -- where all men and all churches are treated as equal -- where every man has the same right to attend or not attend the church of his choice -- where there is no Catholic vote, no anti-Catholic vote, no bloc voting of any kind -- and where Catholics, Protestants and Jews, at both the lay and pastoral level, will refrain from those attitudes of disdain and division which have so often marred their works in the past, and promote instead the American ideal of brotherhood.
¶ Speech to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association (12 Sep 1960)
Full speech.
I do not speak for my church on public matters -- and the church does not speak for me.
¶ Speech to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association (12 Sep 1960)
Full text.
I believe in an America that is officially neither Catholic, Protestant nor Jewish -- where no public official either requests or accepts instructions on public policy from the Pope, the National Council of Churches or any other ecclesiastical source -- where no religious body seeks to impose its will directly or indirectly upon the general populace or the public acts of its officials -- and where religious liberty is so indivisible that an act against one church is treated as an act against all.
¶ Speech to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association (12 Sep 1960)
Full speech.
This is a time for courage and a time of challenge. Neither conformity nor complacency will do. Neither fanatics nor the faint-hearted are needed. And our duty as a Party is not to our Party alone, but to the Nation, and, indeed to all mankind. Our duty is not merely the preservation of political power but the preservation of peace and freedom.
¶ Undelivered speech (22 Nov. 1963)
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WIST is my collection of quotations I find meaningful, moving, amusing (intended or not), well-phrased, and/or to which I just say I "Wish I'd Said That." But just because I quote it here doesn't mean I actually agree with it. If you have any comments, corrections, or suggestions, please don't hesitate to
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