election quotes

Why, this is the worst disaster since my election.

- Pat (Edmund Gerald, Sr) Brown
  Of the Watts riots. Recalled in the NewYork Times, 21  Aug 1994.

Politics are much discussed, so are banks, so is cotton. Quiet peopleavoid the question of the Presidency†the great constitutional feature of this institution being, that directly theacrimonyof the last election is over, the next one begins.

- CharlesJohn Huffam Dickens
  American Notes.

An election is coming.Universal peace is declared, and thefoxeshavea sincere interest inprolonging thelives of the poultry.

- George pseudonym of  MaryAnn Evans Eliot
  Felix Holt, ch.5.

In our system, at about11.30pm on election night, they just push you off the edge of the cliffand that's it.You might scream on the way down, but you're going to hit the bottom, and you're not going to be in office.

-Walter F(rederick) Mondale
  On losing to Ronald Reagan in the presidential elections, in the NewYork Times, 4 Mar.

We live in a time when we have fictitious election results that elect a fictitious president, a time where we have a man sending us to war for fictitious reasons. We are against this war, Mr Bush. Shame on you, Mr Bush. Shame on you.

- Michael Moore
   At the 76th  Academy Awards, where he was awarded an Oscar for Best Documentary Director.

Armed with a notebook, ingratiating grin and fine intelligence, he grew to be a most discerning witness of America's most distinctive rite, not just the election but the making of our presidents.

-NewYorkTimes
  Of journalist Theodore H  White.'Teddy White, the Maker of Epics', editorial,17 May.

   Democracy substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few.

- George Bernard Shaw
  Man and Superman,'Maxims for Revolutionists: Democracy'.

The Labour Party's election programme†is the most fantastic and impracticable programme ever put before the electors. This is not socialism. It is bolshevism run mad.

- Philip Snowden, 1st Viscount Snowden
  Radio broadcast,17 Oct.

We may say 'God Save the Queen', because nothing will save the Governor-General† Maintain your rage and your enthusiasm for the election now to be held and until polling day.

- (Edward) Gough Whitlam
  On the Governor-General SirJohn Kerr's action in dissolving theAustralian Parliament,11 Nov.Whitlam lost the subsequent election.